Recommended Reading
from Bruce
Roger Ebert's Journal: The incredible shrinking man
I've revealed many personal details here, but the other day I discovered something I didn't much want to share. I am shrinking.
Deborah Orr: Why am I so wrong to put my faith in science? (Guardian)
My trust that science holds the rational answers is not the same as religious faith, despite what my detractors say.
Deborah Orr: Why is feminism still so afraid to focus on its flaws? (Guardian)
Feminism forbids women from admitting too many self-evident truths for fear that the utterance of them will encourage discrimination.
Henry Rollins: Hey, Ladies
It must be election time again because Republicans are saying the word "abortion" a lot. It's a tried-and-true fundraiser and always gets the same people to do the same things.
Henry Rollins: Outed
Over the weekend, US congressman Dana Rohrabacher, of California's 46th District of California was asked to leave Iraq after statements he made at a press conference in Baghdad that some Iraqis found inappropriate. This is perhaps the zinger that knotted the panties: "Once Iraq becomes a very rich and prosperous country… we would hope that some consideration be given to repaying the United States some of the mega-dollars that we have spent here in the last eight years."
Froma Harrop: The Right Question for the Defense Budget (Creators Syndicate)
"Can we afford the military budget?" Not quite the right question, but one being asked these days even in hawkish circles. It reflects a break in the Republicans' traditional reluctance to cut defense spending and a declining enthusiasm for changing other societies through force. The mix includes a re-emerged isolationist strain and new recognition that wars can no longer be charged on the national credit card. The right question is, "What should our military budget be?"
Andrew Tobias: CLAPTRAP - I (andrewtobias.com)
"Low taxes on the best off create jobs."
Oh, yeah? How come we created almost none during the Bush years?
"Hiking taxes on the best off, like successful small business owners, destroy jobs."
Oh yeah? How come, after Clinton raised taxes on the best off, the economy created 22 million new jobs?
Jim Hightower: "PRIVATIZATION: THE ROAD TO HELL"
Sure enough, some laissez-faire extremists at such Koch-funded corporate fronts as Cato Institute and Heritage Foundation are presently howling for the government to sell all of America's gold stored in Fort Knox.
How Keanu Reeves cheered up (Guardian)
Last summer, a glum shot of Keanu Reeves sparked a global campaign to put a smile on his face. Did it inspire Ode to Happiness, his first book? He reveals all to Steve Rose.
Tom Service: The best way to improve an orchestra? Get rid of the bloke with the baton (Guardian)
The Spira Mirabilis orchestra have freed themselves from the dictatorship of the conductor.
David Bruce has 42 Kindle books on Amazon.com with 250 anecdotes in each book. Each book is $1, so for $42 you can buy 10,500 anecdotes. Search for "Funniest People," "Coolest People, "Most Interesting People," "Kindest People," "Religious Anecdotes," "Maximum Cool," and "Resist Psychic Death."
Hubert's Poetry Corner
"The Fortune of Stan Maslowski"
wrote:
responded:
From The Creator of 'Avery Ant'
Selected Readings
from that Mad Cat, JD
In The Chaos Household
Last Night
Thick marine layer hung around until mid-afternoon.
UN Backs For First Time Ever
Gay Rights
The United Nations endorsed the rights of gay, lesbian and transgender people for the first time ever Friday, passing a resolution hailed as historic by the U.S. and other backers and decried by some African and Muslim countries.
The declaration was cautiously worded, expressing "grave concern" about abuses because of sexual orientation and commissioning a global report on discrimination against gays.
But activists called it an important shift on an issue that has divided the global body for decades, and they credited the Obama administration's push for gay rights at home and abroad.
Following tense negotiations, members of the Geneva-based U.N. Human Rights Council narrowly voted in favor of the declaration put forward by South Africa, with 23 votes in favor and 19 against.
Backers included the U.S., the European Union, Brazil and other Latin American countries. Those against included Russia, Saudi Arabia, Nigeria and Pakistan. China, Burkina Faso and Zambia abstained, Kyrgyzstan didn't vote and Libya was suspended from the rights body earlier.
Gay Rights
The Not-Coms
Internets
Coming soon to the Internet: website addresses that end in ".bank," ".Vegas" and ".Canon."
The organization that oversees the Internet address system is preparing to open the floodgates to a nearly limitless selection of new website suffixes, including ones in Arabic, Chinese and other scripts. That could usher in the most sweeping transformation of the Domain Name System since its creation in the 1980s.
More than 300 suffixes are available today, the bulk of them country-code domains, such as ".uk" for the United Kingdom and ".de" for Germany.
Hundreds or even thousands more suffixes could be created, categorized by everything from industry to geography to ethnicity.
The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers will meet Monday in Singapore (Sunday evening in the U.S.) to vote on its expansion plan for domain names. If ICANN approves the plan as expected, new domains could start appearing late next year.
Internets
Visits Syrian Refugees In Turkey
Angelina Jolie
U.N. envoy Angelina Jolie traveled to Turkey's border with Syria on Friday, sharing fruit and dessert with some of the thousands of Syrian refugees who have fled their government's bloody crackdown.
The Hollywood celebrity and goodwill ambassador for the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees arrived in the Turkish province of Hatay on a private jet with boxes of toys for the refugee camps.
Jolie spent two-and-a-half hours with the refugees, asking how they were in Arabic and then speaking with them through an interpreter, Turkey's NTV television reported. It said she took notes, showing particular interest in the women and children.
Nearly 10,000 Syrians have sought refuge in camps in Turkey.
Angelina Jolie
Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences
178 Invitations
Even after struggling to establish himself as a Hollywood leading man, raunchy English comedian Russell Brand has been invited to become an Oscar voter.
He is among 178 actors, filmmakers and other Hollywood notables invited to join the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, the organization said on Friday.
Also on the list are R&B singer and occasional actress Beyonce Knowles, "Hangover" star Bradley Cooper, the husband-and-wife duo of David Duchovny and Tea Leoni, and a crop of 2011 Oscar nominees including Jesse Eisenberg, Mila Kunis, Jennifer Lawrence and Australian actress Jacki Weaver.
Tom Hooper, who won the best director Oscar this year for "The King's Speech," was among the eight directors invited. Danish filmmaker Susanne Bier whose "In a Better World" won for foreign-language film, also made the cut, as did Aaron Sorkin, the Oscar-winning writer of "The Social Network."
In a symbolic gesture, the list includes "Restrepo" co-director Tim Hetherington, who was recently killed during the Libya uprising.
178 Invitations
Loses Bid To Revive NY Suit
Diandra Douglas
Michael Douglas' ex-wife has lost a bid to revive her quest for half his "Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps" earnings in a New York court, ending the latest episode in a bitter sequel to their multimillion-dollar divorce.
A Manhattan judge reiterated in a ruling Thursday that the cash clash belongs in California, where the couple divorced in 2000 after 23 years together. Cooper threw out Diandra Douglas's suit for the same reasons in November, but she asked him to reconsider.
Even before the decision, Diandra Douglas had filed a notice that she plans to appeal to a higher court. Still, Michael Douglas' lawyer, Marilyn Chinitz, said she hoped Cooper's ruling "would be the last of it."
The couple's divorce deal gives Diandra Douglas an equal share of spin-offs from projects the actor did when they were married.
Diandra Douglas
Sued By Deaf Groups
Netflix & Time Warner
An advocacy group for deaf Americans sued Netflix on Friday for failing to provide closed captioning on its streaming online television and movies.
The National Association of the Deaf, in a lawsuit filed in Massachusetts federal court, accused Netflix of violating the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) by not providing the deaf with equal access to its "watch instantly" digital video.
"While streaming (video) provides more access to entertainment to the general public, it threatens to be yet another barrier to people who are deaf and hard of hearing," the lawsuit said.
Another advocacy group and three individuals filed a separate suit on Wednesday against Time Warner. Both lawsuits seek injunctions requiring the companies to provide closed captions on all streaming video content.
The suit filed on Friday said Netflix provides captions on less than 5 percent of its streaming titles, despite repeated requests from the association dating back to 2009.
Netflix & Time Warner
Pulled Off The YouTubes
'Friday'
Rebecca Black's official "Friday" music video has been taken off YouTube.
The page where the video starring the 13-year-old singer once played now says it "is no longer available due to a copyright claim by Rebecca Black."
Black's spokesman says her team sent a takedown notice to YouTube because of a dispute over the video with Ark Music Factory, the company Black's parents paid $4,000 to produce the song and video.
Lawyers for Black and Ark Music have been haggling over who owns the rights to everything associated with "Friday" since it became a sensation earlier this year.
'Friday'
Movies Pulled From Netflix Streaming
Sony
Sony movies were pulled from Netflix Inc.'s online streaming service Friday because of what Netflix said is a "temporary contract issue" between Sony Corp. and its pay TV distributor, Starz.
Netflix notified its members in a blog post on Friday, when movies such as "Easy A" and "Grown Ups" stopped being available on its "Watch Instantly" service. They are still available to be rented as DVDs through the mail.
Starz said in a statement that "all parties are working diligently to resolve the issue."
A person familiar with the matter said Netflix's explosive subscriber growth triggered a clause in Sony's agreement with Starz that resulted in the stoppage. The person was not authorized to speak publicly and requested anonymity.
Sony
Seriously Cool DIY Festival
Hillstock
During the first weekend in June, the fourth annual Hillstock festival took place in New York.
Hillstock, a Do-It-Yourself, self-sustaining venture assembled by musicians and organizers just looking to play together and foster a sense of community within the scene, cost weekend-long attendees $15 in total. The festival featured acts with names like Easter Vomit and Kittens Ablaze, and took place in the backyards of Brooklyn apartment buildings.
By rallying the aid of local DIY organizers and an army of volunteers, co-founders Eric Williams and Alex Billig have built an annual gathering that nurtures an off-the-radar musical community and ultimately pays for itself.
The idea for Hillstock came a few years ago, when Williams and Billig-both members of the Eskalators, a 15- to 20-piece New York-based band known in the DIY scene for its uncommon performances (like lining subway cars with friends, fans and a full orchestral setup) wanted a way to unite the disparate side projects of the Eskalators' members.
Hillstock
In Memory
Larry "Wild Man" Fischer
Larry "Wild Man" Fischer, the former mental patient and ubiquitous street musician who briefly attained stardom as one of the first signings to Frank Zappa's Bizarre imprint, died in Los Angeles June 15 at 66.
Fischer had suffered from heart ailments for several years, according to a post on Live Journal page of his friend and fan, DJ Barry "Dr. Demento" Hansen.
Diagnosed as a teen with paranoid schizophrenia and manic depression, L.A. native Fischer was institutionalized at Camarillo State Hospital at the age of 16. After his release, he began performing on the streets of Hollywood, selling his eccentric songs to passersby for a dime. He received his nickname from soul singer Solomon Burke.
Zappa, leader of the Mothers of Invention, inked Fischer to Warner-distributed Bizarre/Straight, whose roster also included the groupie "band" the GTOs and Captain Beefheart. Zappa produced Fischer's two-LP, 36-song debut "An Evening With Wild Man Fischer" (1968). Fischer parlayed that album into an appearance on "Rowan & Martin's Laugh-In."
Fischer's relationship with Zappa ended abruptly after Fischer nearly hit his producer's infant daughter Moon Unit with a thrown bottle. But his naive, bluntly honest, free-associating songs later made him an avatar of the "outsider music" cult.
In the late '70s, Fischer became a habitue of the Rhino Records store in Westwood. He recorded "Go to Rhino Records," the first single issued by the label's eponymous label.
He went on to release "Wildmania" (1978) and a pair of albums with the novelty act Barnes & Barnes, who also produced "It's a Hard Business," an unlikely duet with Rosemary Clooney. Warner Music Group's Rhino Handmade reissued his collected work for the label in the 1999 limited edition set "The Fischer King."
Fischer's life and career were explored in Josh Rubin's 2005 documentary "Derailroaded."
Larry "Wild Man" Fischer
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