'Best of TBH Politoons'
Faux's 'Heartland' Tonight
Erin Hart
Erin Hart will be interviewed on Heartland (Fox Cable) tonight (03/11/06) at 8pm (est) / 5pm (pst)
Producer says we will talk about Teacher in CO (right, because why talk
about DUBAI PORTS FIASCO when there is a liberal teacher to skewer?)
And the gathering of the Pubbies in straw poll (right, because on the right
they must talk about 2008 because WHO AMONG 'EM WANTS to talk about
2006--see ports disaster, continuing mess in 'Potamia, economy drag, nuclear
giveaway to India, Katrina ongoing).
My tentative opponent may by my old OJ trial sparring partner, Dan Caplis of
KHOW in Denver. CO listeners--let me know the latest about the teacher if
you'd like.
Join me for the brief fun, set for sometime in the first half hour of the
show. And let me know if you'd like a demo or resume, know any program
directors, radio syndicates or other ne'er do wells who may have a paycheck
in my future. I have also worked for newspapers and magazines, fyi.
Erin Hart
Recommended Reading
from Bruce
Bill Fleckenstein: The numbers behind the lies (moneycentral.msn.com)
Economist John Williams says 'real' unemployment and inflation numbers -- figured the old-fashioned way -- may be two or three times what the government admits. Here's why, and what it means for Social Security.
PAUL KRUGMAN: The Conservative Epiphany (The New York Times)
Bruce Bartlett, the author of "Impostor: How George W. Bush Bankrupted America and Betrayed the Reagan Legacy," is an angry man. At a recent book forum at the Cato Institute, he declared that the Bush administration is "unconscionable," "irresponsible," "vindictive" and "inept."
Andre Glucksmann - Separating truth and belief (signandsight.com)
For centuries, Jupiter and Christ, Jehovah and Allah have had to put up with many a joke. The Jews are past masters at criticising Yaweh - they've even made it a bit of a speciality. That does not prevent the true believers of any confession from believing, or from respecting those of a different faith. That is the price of religious peace.
Mark Morford: Let's All Get ADD! (sfgate.com)
What do coffee, cell phones, the Net, stress and sleep drugs have in common? You, silly
Adam Kirsch: Rereading the Renaissance, Reviving the foundational humanist texts (harvardmagazine.com)
Before the invention of printing and the rediscovery of many ancient authors, finding good new books to read was an ordeal of a kind we can hardly conceive in the age of amazon.com. Manuscripts first had to be tracked down, often in dusty monastic libraries, and then copied by hand.
Diane Ravitch: The Fall of the Standard-Bearers (schoolandcollege.com)
Little more than a century ago, the leaders of American secondary and higher education concluded that there was a need for uniform standards in college admissions. The high-school leaders were frustrated because every college had its own requirements, and they could find themselves preparing 16 students for 16 different colleges. That was "educational anarchy," some principals justly said.
Libby Copeland: Picky, Picky: In the Outlet Mall of Love, Finding A Good Fit Can Mean Lots of Returns (washingtonpost.com)
She asked if he liked the shoes and he said in fact, he didn't. She finished her sushi and stood up. "Don't call me again," she said, and walked out. And, as a matter of fact, he never did.
zEN mAN sighting
Show Opening
Update From Colby
Re: Katherine Harris
Hi,
The story that keeps on giving.
Lining Up Harris' Replacemant
Colby
in Frostproof
Thanks, Colby!
Purple Gene Reviews
Bill Maher
Purple Gene's Recap of "Real Time with Bill Maher" on HBO friday march 10, 2006:
Bill opened with a gag about South Dakota and the new Fetus police that track newly pregnant couples and their "EPT" tests.
Live via satellite was the record holding and former betting baseball hero/goat Pete Rose who was quizzed about steroids by Bill....Pete said he may be the only baseball player to hold any record without the help of some kind of "Substance"!
Selected Readings
from that Mad Cat, JD
In The Chaos Household
Last Night
Cloudy & cold followed by a rainy night.
Added another new flag - Malawi 
California Auction To Help Publisher
Beat Memorabilia
An auction of first-edition books, handwritten manuscripts and letters by Beat Generation writers Jack Kerouac, Allen Ginsberg and Charles Bukowski raised $225,000 US to benefit a publisher left homeless by Hurricane Katrina.
New Orleans resident Edwin Blair, 69, said Thursday he reluctantly agreed to auction the items he had been collecting for 40 years as a way to help his friends, Gypsy Lou Webb and her husband, Jon, who published some of Bukowski's earliest works.
Blair more than quadrupled the $50,000 he hoped to raise to help pay the Webbs' living expenses after their home was destroyed in the hurricane.
"She's in her 80s now and was going to be living in a trailer after the storm," said Blair. "That just ain't right."
Beat Memorabilia
Tour of New Jersey
'Sopranos'
As the tour bus curves out of the Lincoln Tunnel into New Jersey, Marc Baron prepares his guests for what they're about to see: what Tony Soprano sees during the opening credits of The Sopranos.
"Get your cameras ready," he tells the group of 51 people as they pass the glorious Manhattan skyline. "Welcome to New Jersey." One of the biggest stars in The Sopranos, the acclaimed HBO series which returns this Sunday after a nearly two-year hiatus, is New Jersey itself.
A New York company has capitalized on the show's popularity, offering a four-hour Sopranos-themed tour of northern New Jersey. For $40 US a head, fans visit the real home of the Bada Bing (a strip club called Satin Dolls) on Route 17 in Lodi and the fake storefront of Satriale's, where Tony and his crew often talk shop, in Kearny.
'Sopranos'
Sopranos Maps
Sue Disney Over Movie Plans
Hells Angels
Hells Angels has sued Walt Disney Co., claiming that a planned movie about a group of motorcycle riders called "Wild Hogs" infringes on its trademark name and skull logo.
"Wild Hogs," which has not yet begun filming, is a story about "a group of middle-aged wannabe bikers look(ing) for adventure out on the open road, where they encounter a chapter of the Hells Angels," according to the tag line on Internet Movie Database (www.imdb.com).
In the lawsuit filed in the U.S. District Court of California on Wednesday, the Hells Angels Motorcycle Corp. said the characters in the movie are identified as members of the club and wear trademark logos, although in the suit the club said Disney had not given it a copy of the script.
Hells Angels
Returning To NY Stage
Eric McCormack
Eric McCormack, a star of the long-running television program "Will & Grace," will appear in the US premiere of a new Neil LaBute play, taking over a role played in London last year by another well-known television personality, "Friends" star David Schwimmer.
McCormack, who plays Will Truman in the NBC situation comedy about a gay man and his best friend, will play "Man" in "Some Girl(s)," about a soon-to-be-engaged man who pays a last visit to four ex-girlfriends, the producers said on Friday.
The play is set to open on June 8 at the off-Broadway Lucille Lortel Theater. It will be directed by Jo Bonney, who also directed LaBute's critically acclaimed "Fat Pig" in New York in 2004.
Eric McCormack
Osama's Niece
Wafah Dufour
Osama bin Laden's niece, an aspiring singer who posed for a sexy photo shoot in a men's magazine last year, has signed up for a reality television show about her life and her as yet unfulfilled "quest for stardom."
Wafah Dufour Bin Ladin, whose mother was married to the al Qaeda leader's half brother, was born in California but lived in Saudi Arabia from the age of three to 10.
Dufour has dropped the "Bin Ladin" -- a different spelling of the Arabic name from that used by Osama bin Laden -- and now goes by the name Wafah Dufour.
Wafah Dufour
An Americanized Version
Wagner's 'Ring'
In the world of Wagnerian opera, Wotan is the king of Germanic gods. In an upcoming American production he'll appear on stage in a natty 1920s suit, a fedora and a black eye patch.
Erda, the earth goddess and mother of Wotan's eight children, the Valkyrie, will look very much like an American Indian.
The fanciful costumes will give a distinctly American twist to the Washington National Opera's production of Richard Wagner's four epic German operas, "The Ring of the Nibelungs," which the company will present over the next four years.
When "Das Rheingold" opens the cycle March 25 at the Kennedy Center, tradition will prevail in one aspect of the production: It will be sung in German.
Next season the company will present "Die Walkure," with Placido Domingo in the lead role of Siegmund. Domingo is general director of the Washington Opera.
Wagner's 'Ring'
Ordered to Another Month in Rehab
Leif Garrett
Leif Garrett was ordered to remain in a strict live-in drug rehabilitation program for another month, despite telling a judge he was "going down the right path" after spending 42 days there.
The 44-year-old former teen idol asked a Superior Court commissioner Thursday for permission to return to an outpatient treatment program so he could be with his mother, who is suffering from an undisclosed illness.
Standing outside the courthouse with his mother and his attorney, Garrett blamed his recent drug arrest on his concerns for his mother's poor health.
He also vowed to never appear again in an orange jail suit mug shot: "I don't look good in orange," he said.
Leif Garrett
Won't Be Charged in Airport Incident
Scott Stapp
Former Creed singer Scott Stapp expressed gratitude Thursday that prosecutors didn't charge him with public drunkenness for an incident at Los Angeles International Airport, and he promised to get his life together and start keeping his name out of the tabloids.
Stapp, 32, and his wife, former Miss New York Jaclyn Nesheiwat, were on their way to Hawaii for their honeymoon when he was arrested Feb. 11 for allegedly being drunk in public. The two were married in Miami the day before.
"No charges have been filed by the L.A. district attorney's office, and for that I am appreciative," Stapp said in a statement. "I have said it before, but we all make mistakes, and the day will come soon enough where you no longer read of mine in the tabloids."
Scott Stapp
Workers Barred
Neverland Ranch
The state barred workers from Michael Jackson's Neverland Ranch on Thursday and fined the singer $69,000 because the estate's workers compensation insurance policy had lapsed.
The "stop order" was issued after a worker reported Tuesday that a co-worker who had been injured did not have the state-required health coverage, said Dean Fryer, spokesman for the California Department of Industrial Relations.
Jackson and his immediate family may still live at Neverland, however, and he could keep the ranch running by hiring an outside company whose employees are covered by workers compensation, Fryer said.
Neverland Ranch
View of Disaster All Wrong
Easter Island
The first settlers on Easter Island didn't arrive until 1200 AD, up to 800 years later than previously thought, a new study suggests.
The revised estimate is based on new radiocarbon dating of soil samples collected from one of oldest known sites on the island, which is in the South Pacific west of Chile.
The finding challenges the widely held notion that Easter Island's civilization experienced a sudden collapse after centuries of slow growth. If correct, the finding would mean that the island's irreversible deforestation and construction of its famous Moai statues began almost immediately after Polynesian settlers first set foot on the island.
The study, conducted by Terry Hunt of the University of Hawaii, Manoa and Carl Lipo of California State University, Long Beach, is detailed today in the online version of the journal Science.
Easter Island
Gay Rights Activists Arrested
Equality Ride
More than 20 gay rights activists were arrested on trespassing charges Friday when they stepped onto the campus of Liberty University, the school founded by the Rev. Jerry Falwell.
Many of the activists were part of Soulforce, a Lynchburg-based group on its first stop of a nationwide "Equality Ride" tour to promote gay rights at the nation's conservative Christian universities and military academies. Most of those arrested were members of the tour, but the group also included supporters from other colleges and the community.
Some 60 people, including 35 members of the Equality Ride bus tour, gathered for the late morning rally on a sidewalk outside the school's main entrance. A music group played guitars and sang 1960s peace songs.
The 20 activists who actually entered the campus were arrested immediately.
Equality Ride
Proud Fascist
Alessandra Mussolini
Alessandra Mussolini, granddaughter of Italy's WWII dictator and an ally of Silvio Berlusconi in upcoming legislative elections, said Thursday night she was proud to be a fascist, and that in any case it was better than being "queer."
Campaigning ahead of legislative elections in April, Mussolini lashed out on national television at transsexual Vladimir Luxuria -- a candidate for the Rifondazione Comunista party -- after Luxuria repeatedly accused her of being a fascist.
"Yes, and proud of it!", snapped Mussolini, adding that it "was better to be a fascist than a queer."
Alessandra Mussolini
Orphaned Whale Feared Dead
Luna
It appears Luna the orphaned killer whale has died after being struck by a tugboat on the west coast of Vancouver Island, officials said Friday.
The federal fisheries department said the boat was idling to escape rough weather in Nootka Sound when it collided with the whale. A department official said it was an accident and the boat's skipper is distressed over the incident.
Luna arrived in the sound in 2001 after becoming separated from his pod.
Luna
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