Recommended Reading
from Bruce
Paul Krugman: Europe's Austerity Madness (New York Times)
Much commentary suggests that the citizens of Spain and Greece are just delaying the inevitable, protesting against sacrifices that must, in fact, be made. But the truth is that the protesters are right. More austerity serves no useful purpose; the truly irrational players here are the allegedly serious politicians and officials demanding ever more pain.
Paul Krugman: Not the Election They were Expecting (New York Times)
The GOP has made it clear that it has a very different vision of what America should be than that of Democrats, and Democrats have rallied around their cause. Among other things, while we weren't looking, social issues became a source of Democratic strength, not weakness - partly because the country has changed, partly because the Democrats have finally worked up the nerve to stand squarely for things like reproductive rights.
Suzanne Moore: The politics that matters is happening on the streets of Europe (Guardian)
Globally, another narrative exists: from Occupy, from the 99%, or even the 47% - or even us plebs could roll one out. But nowhere is it represented in the party system. As party leaders congratulate themselves on the tough choices they make, not one will say we are slashing the NHS by precisely the amount the war in Afghanistan costs us. Not one will explain that stopping tax avoidance by the super rich would pay for a functioning welfare system. Instead, we are offered the choice only between who can cut most earnestly and most efficiently.
Susan Estrich: Moments (Creators Syndicate)
[Mitt Romney] doesn't get that some of the people who need a helping hand from the government aren't "victims," but seniors who built this country, or disabled vets who put their lives on the line, or students who need help to go to college, or children who otherwise won't get a hot meal in the day.
Susan Estrich: Atonement (Creators Synicate)
As I write this, Jews across the world are preparing for the holiest day of the year: Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement. Yom Kippur is the day on which we seek forgiveness for the sins of the past year and ask God to inscribe us and those we love in the book of life. We light candles for those we have lost and say special prayers. It is and always has been a painful holiday for me, and not just because of the fast that begins at sundown.
Leo Traynor: Meeting A Troll... (Traynor's Eye)
I'm back on Twitter. I can imagine the cries of 'I knew he wouldn't last!' from the Twitterati.
But give me a few minutes of your time and I'll tell you why I'm back and the real truth about exactly why I left in the first place.
Emily Temple: The Best Life Advice from William Faulkner (FlavorWire)
"Read, read, read. Read everything -trash, classics, good and bad, and see how they do it. Just like a carpenter who works as an apprentice and studies the master. Read! You'll absorb it. Then write. If it is good, you'll find out. If it's not, throw it out the window." - Statement at the University of Mississippi, 1947
Robert Trussell: "Oh what a life: Frankie Valli reflects on 'Jersey Boys'" (The Kansas City Star)
Stop for a minute and think about the contrast between illusion and reality. Where does one stop and the other begin? That's what Frankie Valli found himself considering the first time he watched a run-through of "Jersey Boys," the mega-hit Broadway musical that depicts Valli's rise to fame in the 1960s with the band that would become famous as the Four Seasons.
David Bruce's Amazon Author Page
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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."
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From The Creator of 'Avery Ant'
Selected Readings
from that Mad Cat, JD
In The Chaos Household
Last Night
Anybody else have an easy time with the Final Jeopardy question last night?
Says Writers Losing Influence In West
Salman Rushdie
Salman Rushdie believes literature has lost much of its influence in the West, and movie stars like George Clooney and Angelina Jolie have taken the place of Susan Sontag andNorman Mailer when it comes to addressing the big issues.
The British author, who has just released his account of 10 years in hiding after an Iranian fatwa was declared against him in 1989, believes the "Arab Spring" uprisings have failed but that there is hope for freer Muslim societies in the future.
"If you look at America, for instance, there is a generation older than mine in which writers like Susan Sontag and Norman Mailer and Gore Vidal would have a significant public voice on issues of the day. Now there's virtually no writers.
"Instead you have movie stars, so if you are George Clooney or Angelina Jolie then you do have the ability to speak about public issues ... and people will listen in a way they would once listen to Mailer and Sontag. That's a change."
He added that in authoritarian countries the situation was different, and literature had held on to some of its power.
Salman Rushdie
NYC Auction
125 Meteorites
A New York City auction will offer 125 meteorites for sale, including a large chunk of the moon and a 179-pound iron cosmic rock that evokes Edvard Munch's iconic painting "The Scream."
The sale, one of the largest of its kind, is being held by the Dallas-based Heritage Auctions on Oct. 14.
The sale also includes a large piece of the Peekskill meteorite, famous for puncturing a Chevy Malibu in 1992 about 50 miles north of Manhattan, and the largest complete slice of the most famous meteorite in the world, the Willamette, a huge specimen that is housed at the American Museum of Natural History in New York.
The moon rock has the highest pre-sale estimate of $340,000 to $380,000; less than 0.1 percent of all meteorites recovered are lunar in origin. The 18-inch-tall meteorite, dubbed "The Scream," is estimated at $175,000 to $225,000.
There are others that have lower estimates but come with interesting stories, like a small portion of a meteorite estimated at about $4,000 that fell from the sky in 1492. It was later chained up in a church so it couldn't fly back into orbit.
125 Meteorites
Trove Of Dresses
Frida Kahlo
The colorful dresses of Mexican painter Frida Kahlo will go on display for the first time in November after being kept hidden from public view for 50 years at the request of her husband, acclaimed muralist Diego Rivera.
Curators of the Kahlo's "Blue House" in Mexico City discovered a trove of 300 dresses, bathing suits, accessories and photographs in 2004 and are now ready to show the public 22 items from the unique wardrobe that turned her into a fashion muse.
The exhibit explores Kahlo's fascination with Mexico's indigenous women and her penchant for richly embroidered ethnic frocks, flowery headpieces and ornate silver jewelry that earned her a photo shoot with Vogue magazine in 1937.
It also reveals how she chose clothes to hide her disfigurement after a bout of childhood polio that left one leg thinner than the other and a devastating bus accident that broke her spine in three places and left her in constant pain and scarred from subsequent surgeries.
Kahlo and Rivera are two of Mexico's most celebrated figures, and their on-off stormy marriage was among the most prominent of the 20th century art world.
Frida Kahlo
Baltimore Police Uncover 1951 Theft Report
Renoir
Police have located a 60-year-old theft report from the day a Renoir painting disappeared from the Baltimore Museum of Art that matches the description of an artwork that sold for $7 recently at a flea market. Now an art theft expert says the museum has a strong case to get it back.
Baltimore police on Friday uncovered the report from Nov. 17, 1951. The museum on Thursday said it also found a record in its library that the painting was stolen. The police report noted there was no evidence of forced entry at the museum and that the painting was valued then at $2,500.
According to the report, James N. Foster Jr., an executive assistant at the museum, reported that "some time between 6 p.m. Nov. 16 and 1 p.m. this date (Nov. 17) someone stole the following painting."
The brief police report notes the 5½-by-9-inch piece, "On the Shore of the Seine," was painted byPierre-Auguste Renoir. It describes "a river scene in pink and blue." No other items were reported stolen.
Before the police report was found, the museum's loan record was its only record of the painting being stolen. The card noted the museum had collected $2,500 from its insurance company after the loss.
Renoir
Republican-Style
Voter Fraud
What first appeared to be an isolated problem in one Florida county has now spread statewide, withelection officials in at least seven counties informing prosecutors or state election officials about questionable voter registration forms filled out on behalf of the Republican Party of Florida.
State Republican officials already have fired the vendor it had hired to register voters, and on Thursday took the additional step of filing an election fraud complaint against the company, Strategic Allied Consulting, with state officials.
The Florida state party has paid Strategic Allied Consulting more than $1.3 million, and the Republican National Committee used the group for nearly $3 million of work in Nevada, North Carolina, Colorado and Virginia.
The company said earlier this week that it was cooperating with elections officials in Florida. It said the suspect forms were turned in by one person, who has been fired.
Paul Lux, election supervisor for Okaloosa County, said questionable forms in the Florida Panhandle appear to have all come from Strategic's effort based at the local Republican Party headquarters. He said his office has turned up dozens of suspect forms.
Voter Fraud
The Pro's At Fox
Shepard Smith
A carjacking in Arizona ended when the suspect shot himself in the head today as footage of the incident was broadcast live on Fox News Channel.
A chopper covered the high-speed chase along I-10 outside Phoenix. Initial reports indicated that a victim may have remained in the stolen car.
Chopper video showed the vehicle zooming along Arizona's wide open highway, flashing past cars and trucks, switching lanes as it weaved through traffic, often speeding along the shoulder of the road. The camera from the chopper captured the moment the chase ended with a male stumbling out of a red SUV into a grassy area. He reached into his waistband and pulled a handgun. He then shot himself in the head.
Fox cut away from the shot soon after the man shot himself and went to commercial break.
Following the break anchor Shepard Smith apologized for airing the shooting. He said the feed was on a five second delay, but they failed to cut it off in time.
Shepard Smith
Owner Donates Land For Memorial
The Station
The owner of the site of a 2003 nightclub fire that killed 100 people is donating the land for a permanent memorial, bringing an end to a year long effort to secure the site of The Station fire by families of those killed and survivors of the blaze.
Dan McKiernan, a lawyer for Ray Villanova, transferred ownership of the plot of land in West Warwick to the Station Fire Memorial Foundation on Friday, five months before the 10th anniversary of the blaze, which started when pyrotechnics for the rock band Great White set fire to flammable foam that lined the walls of the club.
A makeshift memorial consisting of homemade crosses, flowers, photos and other personal items cropped up on the site shortly after the fire and has been maintained there by family members of the dead ever since. The site was left open to the public, and a memorial service is held there annually on the anniversary, Feb 20. While the foundation has a design for a permanent memorial and pledges from construction workers to build it, nothing could move forward until it secured rights to the land.
The transfer was announced during a news conference at the site Friday, which was attended by dozens of survivors, relatives of those killed and supporters. Gov. Lincoln Chafee choked up as he offered a prayer, while members of the foundation's board cried and held hands. In the crowd that gathered to hear their announcement, people hugged and sobbed.
The Station
Judge Dismisses Defamation Lawsuit
John Travolta
John Travolta has scored another legal victory with the dismissal of a defamation lawsuitfiled by a Los Angeles man who wrote a book alleging he had gay encounters with the film star.
A judge in Los Angeles Superior Court on Thursday dismissed the defamation lawsuit against Travolta and his lawyer, Martin Singer, filed by Robert Randolph.
The author of "You'll Never Spa in This Town Again," published in February 2012, claimed the actor and lawyer spread false statements about his mental health in 2010 in an effort to dissuade the public from buying his upcoming book, according to court documents obtained by Reuters.
Judge Malcolm Mackey on Thursday dismissed Randolph's defamation suit, which centered on a letter Singer wrote to the website Gawker.com in response to a story about the planned book. Court documents available to Reuters did not spell out the reason for the dismissal, but CNN reported the judge found, in part, that the letter has free speech protection under the law.
The book was published three months before two unidentified male masseurs filed sexual assault lawsuits against Travolta, the star of "Grease" and "Saturday Night Fever." Both accusers swiftly dropped their lawsuits in May after doubt was cast on the details of their alleged encounters.
John Travolta
Reunion Ends On Sour Note
Beach Boys
Earlier this year, the Beach Boys reunited to celebrate their 50th anniversary with worldwide tour.
But it has now emerged that Brian Wilson, David Marks and Al Jardine are being excluded from the tour following this week's two sell-out gigs in London, the Daily Express reported.
Announcing the move, Mike Love, who has the legal right to use the Beach Boys name, said: "You've got to be careful not to get overexposed. The Eagles found out the hard way when they went out for a second year and wound up selling tickets for just five dollars."
The decision left band members confused with Wilson saying: "I can't understand why."
Beach Boys
One Film, Many Names
Bacile/Nakoula/Youssef
Muslims across the Middle East outraged by an anti-Islam film made in America wanted swift punishment for the man behind the movie, and now Mark Basseley Youssef is behind bars. But he's jailed for lying about his identity, not because of the video's content.
Court documents show Youssef, 55, legally changed his name from Nakoula Basseley Nakoula in 2002, but never told federal authorities, who now are using that as part of the probation violation case against him.
Youssef was ordered jailed without bail Thursday until a hearing is held to determine if he violated terms of his supervised release on a 2010 bank fraud conviction. Prosecutors allege he used multiple aliases and lied to his probation officers about his real name.
Youssef, an Egyptian-born Christian who's now a U.S. citizen, sought to obtain a passport in his new name but still had a California driver's license as Nakoula, assistant U.S. Attorney Robert Dugdale said Friday. Youssef used a third name, Sam Bacile, in association with the 14-minute trailer for the movie "Innocence of Muslims" that was posted on YouTube. It portrays Muhammad as a religious fraud, womanizer and pedophile.
Bacile/Nakoula/Youssef
Auction For Charity
007
Posters, set models and Daniel Craig's swim trunks are among items up for grabs in an auction of memorabilia from the James Bond movies.
Christie's auction house is selling the items to coincide with the 50th birthday of the spy movie series. The first Bond film, "Dr. No," was released on Oct. 5, 1962.
Forty lots are being sold in an online auction with bidding open Friday to Oct. 8. Ten more items will go under the hammer at Christie's on Oct. 5, designated Global James Bond Day by the movies' producers.
Proceeds will go to several charities, including the U.N. children's fund, UNICEF.
007
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