'Best of TBH Politoons'
Recommended Reading
from Bruce
Terry Jones: A true land of opportunity (guardian.co.uk)
Where there's death and destruction, there's profit - as security companies in Iraq know only too well
Stephen Lendman: Reviewing Noam Chomsky's New Book: "Interventions" (smirkingchimp.com)
The introductory Editor's Note explains that post-9/11 Chomsky began writing short, roughly 1000 word, concise articles distributed by The New York Times Syndicate as op-eds. They were widely picked up overseas but rarely in the US and only in smaller regional or local papers.
Howard Karger: America's Exploding Mortgage Crisis Reveals That Home Ownership Isn't Paradise for Everyone (Dollars and Sense; Posted on Alternet.org)
Middle-class and poor families have been sold the idea that home ownership is the ticket to economic security, but mortgage vultures and soaring costs have turned buying a home into a financial nightmare.
Annalee Newitz: Google My Bedroom
Google's newest widget has questionable ethics. Do you really want to walk down the street never knowing whether your furtive nose-picking has been captured and broadcast to the Google-using public?
Will Durst: Paris Hilton Pays for George Bush's Sins
Could it be that our love of punishing Paris really can be traced to our built up frustration with Dubyah? Are we kicking this poor poodle of a person as a Presidential proxy?
Still walking this way (telegraph.co.uk)
Aerosmith's Steven Tyler tells Andrew Perry how the band have survived 35 years of rock-and-roll excess.
Kevin Maher: Forget the cape. I'm a real action hero (entertainment.timesonline.co.uk)
Betting on a certain ennui among a cine-ma-going public tired of synthetic comic-book heroes such as Spider-Man, the X-Men and the Fantastic Four, the marketing hounds at 20th Century Fox have come up with a genius promotional tagline for their punchy new Die Hard movie: "No mask. No cape. No problem."
Is there no end to the talents of Robert Rodriguez? (entertainment.timesonline.co.uk)
Director reveals a skill that doesn't involve loads of CGI effects in a clip on YouTube.
Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer (entertainment.timesonline.co.uk)
A blockbuster that doesn't feel the need to justify its own existence with bloated running times.
Selected Readings
from that Mad Cat, JD
In The Chaos Household
Last Night
Sunny and warm.
Lawyer Takes Fall
Angelina Jolie
Angelina Jolie, star of the new film "A Mighty Heart," about the widow of slain reporter Daniel Pearl and freedom of the press, says her representatives were trying to protect her when they sought to make media outlets sign an agreement not to ask Jolie personal questions.
"I didn't put it out there," Jolie said Thursday on "The Daily Show." "It was from my representatives trying to be protective of me, but it was excessive and I wouldn't have put it out there. But it's all right and nobody was forced to do it."
Jolie's lawyer, Robert Offer, told The New York Times that he blamed himself - a "boneheaded, overzealous lawyer" - for the contract and that Jolie was unaware of the action. The document "was drafted overly broadly," he said. "It was well intended, but I understand how it was received."
Angelina Jolie
'Cream of Wheat' Man
Frank L. White
A man widely believed to be the model for the smiling chef on Cream of Wheat boxes finally has a grave marker bearing his name.
Frank L. White died in 1938, and until this week, his grave in Woodlawn Cemetery bore only a tiny concrete marker with no name.
When White died Feb. 15, 1938, the Leslie Local-Republican described him as a "famous chef" who "posed for an advertisement of a well-known breakfast food."
The chef was photographed about 1900 while working in a Chicago restaurant. His name was not recorded. White was a chef, traveled a lot, was about the right age and told neighbors that he was the Cream of Wheat model, the Jackson Citizen Patriot said.
Frank L. White
Theory Gains Credence
'The Sopranos'
Fans of "The Sopranos" are seizing on clues suggesting that the controversial blackout which abruptly ended the TV mob drama meant that Tony Soprano was rubbed out, and HBO said on Thursday they may be on to something.
One clue in particular, a flashback in the penultimate episode to a conversation between Tony and his brother-in-law about death, gained credence as Quentin Schaffer, HBO spokesman, called it a "legitimate" hint and confirmed that series creator David Chase had a definite ending in mind.
The biggest hint, according to a consensus taking shape on the Web, is a scene from an earlier episode in which Tony and his brother-in-law, Bobby Bacala, muse about what it feels like to die.
"You probably don't even hear it when it happens," Bobby says while they sit fishing in a small boat on a lake.
"I think that is one of the most legitimate things to look at," Schaffer said when asked about theories that the flashback was meant to foreshadow Tony's death.
'The Sopranos'
China Censors
'Pirates of the Caribbean'
China has censored part of the latest installment of hit Hollywood movie "Pirates of the Caribbean" for "vilifying and defacing the Chinese," the official Xinhua news agency said on Friday.
The role of Hong Kong star Chow Yun-Fat, who plays pirate lord Captain Sao Feng, had been slashed in half to just about 10 minutes of screen time, the report said.
It cited local magazine The Popular Cinema as saying: "The captain played by Chow is bald, his face heavily scarred. He also has a long beard and long nails, whose image is still in line with Hollywood's old tradition of demonizing the Chinese."
"Chinese censors also cut Chow's line in which he states 'Welcome to Singapore' because it hints Singapore is a land of pirates ...," Xinhua added.
'Pirates of the Caribbean'
Singing Seniors Redefine Rock Songs
Young@Heart Chorus
Fred Knittle wears his belt up high. His nose is tethered to an oxygen tank, and on stage he's confined to a folding chair. From this unlikely perch, he's turning rock 'n' roll on its head.
Singing Coldplay's "Fix You," Knittle transforms the song into a powerful ballad about a grandfather's healing wisdom. It means something different coming from an 80-year-old retiree suffering from congestive heart failure.
Knittle is a singer for the Young@Heart Chorus, whose members range from 73 to 92 years old. Singing songs they shouldn't even know, at an age when they're expected to be sitting quietly somewhere, they subvert all accepted notions of old and young.
Songs by bands like the Radiohead, OutKast and Nirvana take on a new dimension when performed by these 23 foot-stomping senior citizens. "Fix You" or the Clash's "Should I Stay or Should I Go" become about life and death.
Young@Heart Chorus
Elvira Seeks Protegé
Cassandra Peterson
Fox Reality has given the green light to "The Search for the Next Elvira," in which the Mistress of the Dark -- portrayed by Cassandra Peterson -- will seek "a surrogate handmaiden with whom to share her personal appearance duties."
The series will feature 13 contestants -- culled from an open "casket call" taking place July 13 at the Queen Mary in Long Beach, Calif. -- competing to see whether they can look the part and present the same persona as the Elvira character. Three hourlong episodes will air starting at 9 p.m. October 13. After the second episode October 20, viewers can vote for the winner, who will be announced during the live finale on Halloween.
"We receive hundreds of Elvira appearance requests every year," said Peterson's manager, Eric Gardner. "We began dreaming of a world in which there would eventually be legions of franchised Elviras, including one in every shopping-mall atrium in the country each Halloween season. Fox Reality has given us the opportunity to anoint the first recruit."
Cassandra Peterson
Settles Suit
Naomi Campbell
Naomi Campbell has settled a lawsuit with a former employee who claims the British supermodel abused her verbally and physically on three continents.
The settlement of the lawsuit by Amanda Brack, of Fort Lauderdale, Fla., came to light Thursday when a judge in Manhattan issued a brief order granting dismissal of the case.
The order said only that "the action has settled and been discontinued" according to the lawyers' agreement dated April 27. No settlement terms were disclosed, and lawyers for Brack and Campbell did not return telephone calls Thursday.
Naomi Campbell
Get Rights To Simpson Book
Goldman Family
A federal bankruptcy judge Friday awarded Ron Goldman's family the rights to O.J. Simpson's canceled book, "If I Did It," which the Goldmans want to rename "Confessions of a Double Murderer."
Goldman was slain along with Simpson's ex-wife Nicole Brown Simpson in 1994. The Goldmans want the book's proceeds included as part of a nearly $33.5 million civil jury award they have been trying to collect for almost a decade.
The ruling "ensures that Mr. Simpson will never see another dime from this book," said Paul Battista, an attorney for the Goldman family.
U.S. Bankruptcy Judge A. Jay Cristol ruled that Lorraine Brooke Associates, which owned the rights to the book, can be considered as belonging to the former football star. The company is run by Simpson's daughter, Arnelle.
Goldman Family
Custody Fight Over
David Hasselhoff
A beaming David Hasselhoff said Friday he had won a long-running battle with ex-wife Pamela Bach over custody of his two teenage daughters.
"The judge said, `Enough is enough,'" Hasselhoff said outside court after a hearing.
Bach and her lawyer, Debra A. Opri, declined to talk about the case as they left the courthouse, saying they were prevented from doing so by a court order.
Further details were unavailable about the closed hearing.
David Hasselhoff
Must Have Hired That Faux Intern
ABC
ABC News has apologized for mistakenly running a picture of former Washington Mayor Marion Barry when it was promoting a "World News" story about a man suing a dry cleaner for $54 million for losing his pants.
Both Roy L. Pearson, who filed the lawsuit, and Barry are black. Barry's picture ran for East Coast feeds Tuesday when Pearson's story was "teased" at the beginning of the news. It was corrected for later editions, spokeswoman Natalie Raabe said.
The mistake happened because both men happened to be in a Washington court that day and ABC got video of both, Raabe said. Barry was acquitted this week of drunken driving charges.
It was the second such case of mistaken identity this month involving newsworthy black men. Fox News Channel apologized for running tape of House Judiciary Chairman John Conyers while reporting on the indictment of Rep. William J. Jefferson on bribery charges.
ABC
Shot to Death
4 Dolphins
Four dead dolphins have washed ashore with fatal bullet wounds and fifth with lacerations on its pectoral fin, said authorities who have offered a reward for information on the slayings.
The long-beaked common dolphins were all discovered between Carlsbad State Beach and Oceanside Harbor between May 29 and June 5. Photos showed their normally sleek gray skin mottled and stained with blood from the bullet wounds.
Necropsies revealed that the dolphins, which were healthy with bellies full of fish, may have been shot at the same time with the same gun. Four had between one and three bullets of the same caliber in the same part of their heads.
Federal officials say that nationwide, they normally get one report of a dolphin shooting a year. The last time San Diego reported such a death was five years ago. Before that there hadn't been one in the area since the 1960s.
4 Dolphins
Endangered Bunnies Breed
Pygmy Rabbits
The only surviving pair of endangered pygmy rabbits released as part of a program to increase their numbers in the wild have dodged coyotes, badgers, hawks and owls and found time for love. Proud scientists announced Thursday that the rabbits have successfully bred.
"We were worried. It took them a little while, but they did what rabbits do best," Rod Sayler, a Washington State University conservation biologist, said from Pullman.
The rabbits, slightly larger than a man's hand, eat sagebrush and are the only rabbits in the United States that dig their own burrows.
No Columbia Basin pygmy rabbits are known to be left in the wild. Predators nearly wiped out the population of 20 captive-reared Columbia Basin pygmy rabbits released in March in central Washington.
Pygmy Rabbits
Freed In Bulgaria
Dancing Bears
After a lifetime of brutal treatment, including walking on burning embers, Bulgaria's last three dancing bears will get to rest their paws at a mountain sanctuary, in an apparent end to the centuries-old performance tradition in the Balkans.
Activists on Friday bought the freedom of Mima, 8, Misho, 19, and Svetla, 17.
Bulgaria is believed to have been the last country in the Balkans where dancing bears still performed, even though the practice was outlawed in 1993, when there were 20 to 30 such bears in the country.
The three bears will join another 20 brown bears on Mount Rila at a 30-acre sanctuary for former dancing bears 110 miles south of Sofia.
Dancing Bears
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