'Best of TBH Politoons'
Recommended Reading
from Bruce
Garrison Keillor: Observations from the back of the line
For some people, the urge to compete is very, very strong, such as the tall red-haired woman Sunday morning at New York's LaGuardia Airport who cut in front of me at the boarding gate and did it so smoothly, expertly, no body contact, you have to assume she's been acing people out all her life.
Froma Harrop: Long Hot Summer in Minnesota (creators.com)
But the very Democratic St. Paul City Council voted against extending the bar hours, which may have reflected a reluctance to stretch the rules for Republicans as much as for drinking. Council member David Thune put it memorably, "I got 8,000 people who live downtown who don't want a bunch of Republican lobbyists puking on the streets."
Jim Hightower: FENCING OFF OUR DEMOCRACY (jimhightower.com)
Good grief, it's bad enough that the BushCheney regime keeps usurping power to create an imperial presidency, but it's far worse that our Congress critters have been weaker than Canadian hot sauce, meekly giving away their own constitutional power to the autocracy.
Jody Diperna: Pittsburgh Passion's Play (Pittsburgh City Paper)
Pittsburgh's women's football team leaves "powder puff" games in the dust.
ZETH LUNDY: "Anyone Can Play Guitar: The Replacements on Twin/Tone, 1981-1984" (popmatters.com)
With four albums for the independent Minneapolis label Twin/Tone, the 'Mats rendered the hierarchies and caste system of the rock world irrelevant by remaking rock 'n' roll as an anonymous force.
Mike Usinger: Raconteurs Produce Rock 'n' Roll Alchemy (The Georgia Straight)
In addition to playing music, the Raconteurs will be selling homemade elixirs on tour, including one that puts hair on your chest and another that removes it.
Jim Abbott: Carlos Santana says his old hits don't mean a thing without new creative swing (The Orlando Sentinel)
If wannabe guitar gods are looking for tips, Santana advises them to look within themselves. "Take the time for 15 minutes a day to visit yourself in innocence and silence," he says. "Imagine a new baby that just popped out. See the eyes of this new baby child and you see purity and innocence. That's what we want to hear in the music."
Luaine Lee: Judy Collins continues to view life from both sides now (McClatchy-Tribune News Service)
In spite of debilitating tragedy in her life, singer-songwriter Judy Collins still has something to sing about. And she's doing it all over the world.
Dan Deluca: Billy Bragg plays politics - and more (The Philadelphia Inquirer)
Billy Bragg stood on stage at the South by Southwest Music Festival with an electric guitar around his neck and a brand-new song to play.
"I want to dedicate this to everyone who is taking their ability to articulate themselves and forging it into some kind of weapon to change the world," said the 50-year-old British punk-folk songwriter, whose first album in six years, "Mr. Love & Justice," comes out this week.
Larry Morrisey: Fiddle and Stomp All Night Long (Jackson Free Press)
The first thing you notice when watching Jack Magee play is how he moves with his fiddle.
Thor Christensen: Canadian singer Feist's success has been as easy as '1234' (The Dallas Morning News)
"Oh my God," says Feist. "No! I'm not getting up there. I won't fit!" The singer is trying to do an interview via cell phone, but she's also busy playing cram-the-band-into-a-taxi so she can get to that night's show in Detroit.
Michael Agger: Laughing Baby vs. the YouTube Commenters (slate.com)
A BATTLE OF INTERNET GOOD AND INTERNET EVIL.
Selected Readings
from that Mad Cat, JD
In The Chaos Household
Last Night
Sunny and on the cool side.
Will Miss Film Festival
Roger Ebert
Roger Ebert says he'll have to skip this year's Ebertfest film festival after breaking a hip.
The 65-year-old movie critic writes on his blog on the Chicago Sun-Times' website that his doctors have told him he should remain in a Chicago hospital rather than travel to Urbana-Champaign for the 10th annual festival, which runs through Sunday.
Ebert is recovering from minor hip surgery following a recent fall.
Roger Ebert
U.N. Goodwill Ambassador
Nicole Kidman
Nicole Kidman has urged world leaders and ordinary people to join the global fight to end violence against women.
The actress, seven months pregnant and passionately committed to her role as a goodwill ambassador for the U.N. Development Fund for Women, said Tuesday the violence was probably the "most widespread human rights violation of our time."
"One in three women will encounter violence in some way, shape or form against them in their lifetime," Kidman told a news conference at U.N. headquarters. "That's an extraordinary statistic. Yet do we ever hear it?"
The 40-year-old Australian star became a goodwill ambassador in January 2006 for the U.N. Development Fund for Women, known as UNIFEM. Its acting executive director, Joanne Sandler, said Kidman wanted to focus on an issue "where she could make a difference."
Nicole Kidman
UC Santa Cruz Gets Archives
Grateful Dead
Dancing bears, meet the Banana Slugs.
The surviving members of the Grateful Dead are turning over the rock band's archives to the University of California at Santa Cruz. The archive will hold the band's correspondence and other memorabilia, but not its recordings, longtime band spokesman Dennis McNally said Wednesday.
Ex-Dead guitarist Bob Weir and bassist Phil Lesh will announce a partnership with the university Thursday. The announcement will take place at San Francisco's Fillmore Auditorium, where many of the band's legendary shows were held.
Grateful Dead
Case Going To Trial
Oscars
A judge has ordered a trial in the case involving ownership of two Oscars presented to Mary Pickford, and a third given to former husband Charles "Buddy" Rogers.
Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Charles C. Lee issued a final ruling late Tuesday in favor of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, which sued heirs of Rogers' second wife, Beverly, in August to prevent public sale of the statuettes.
The Academy says its bylaws give it the first chance to buy the Oscars.
Lee denied a motion by attorneys for Beverly Rogers' children to dismiss the case, which is scheduled to go to trial Sept. 8.
Oscars
Dutch Teacher Discovers Postcard
Anne Frank
Going through some old books in his father's antiques shop in Naarden near Amsterdam, Paul van den Heuvel stumbled upon a postcard sent and signed by Anne Frank in 1937 to a friend.
The Anne Frank museum, which includes the attic hideaway and now a top destination for visitors to Amsterdam, confirmed the postcard's authenticity.
Anne sent the postcard to her friend Sanne Ledeman in December 1937 when Anne was staying with her grandmother during a visit to Germany's Aachen.
Anne Frank
Secret Visit To England?
Elvis Presley
For decades Elvis Presley's English fans have accepted that the King of Rock and Roll's only known visit to Britain was a quick stop at Glasgow Prestwick Airport in Scotland. An Elvis lounge and a plaque commemorates his 1960 stopover there.
Now a prominent theater producer says Presley made a secret visit to London in 1958 to see the sights with popular British rocker Tommy Steele, and he promised never to reveal that they had gone to famous landmarks together.
However, a spokesman for Elvis Presley Enterprises in Memphis, Tenn., denied the secret trip ever took place, and insisted that the only time Presley was on British soil was when he was returning to the U.S. to wrap up an army tour.
The theater producer, Bill Kenwright, told a BBC radio show that Steele had told him that Presley flew in for a day after calling out of the blue to say he liked the British rocker's music.
Steele, now 71, said in a written note to London's Daily Mail that he wished the secret had never come out.
Elvis Presley
Finally Eligible For Emmy
Reality TV Hosts
Real competition is coming to reality TV: Hosts including Ryan Seacrest, Howie Mandel and Tyra Banks are now eligible for an Emmy Award.
A category recognizing "outstanding host for a reality or reality-competition program" was created by the Academy of Television Arts & Sciences and will be presented at the 60th annual Emmys in September.
Eligibility is open to hosts of programs entered in the reality program and reality-competition categories. Sorry, Simon Cowell: The award isn't for "reactive participants or judges," the academy rules state.
Reality TV Hosts
Hosts Charity Auction
The Edge
U2 guitarist The Edge announced Wednesday he will donate two Gibson guitars and other items from his personal collection to the "Icons of Music" auction benefiting Music Rising, a charity The Edge co-founded to replace musical equipment lost or destroyed by Hurricane Katrina.
The Edge, whose real name is David Evans, created Music Rising in 2005 with record producer Bob Ezrin and Gibson chairman Henry Juszkiewicz to preserve New Orleans' rich musical culture after the devastation of Katrina.
Music Rising has provided grants to replace instruments and equipment for 2,700 professional musicians and 50,000 students and church parishioners to date, he said.
The Edge
Sues Anti-Science Filmmakers
Yoko Ono
John Lennon's widow, Yoko Ono, and his sons are suing the filmmakers of "Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed" for using the song "Imagine" in the documentary without permission.
Yoko Ono, son, Sean Ono Lennon, and Julian Lennon, John Lennon's son from his first marriage, along with privately held publisher EMI Blackwood Music Inc filed suit in U.S. District Court in Manhattan seeking to bar the filmmakers and their distributors from continuing to use "Imagine" in the movie.
The documentary, which features Ben Stein, an actor, comedian and former speechwriter for President Richard Nixon, looks at alleged discrimination against scientists and teachers who support so-called intelligent design as an alternative to Darwin's theory of evolution.
Yoko Ono
Pleads Innocent To Cocaine Charge
Steve-O
Steve-O, the stunt-performing star of the MTV series "Jackass" and its movie spinoffs, pleaded innocent on Wednesday to a cocaine possession charge stemming from his March arrest in Hollywood.
The 33-year-old reality-television star, whose real name is Stephen Glover, entered his plea in a Los Angeles courtroom and was ordered to return on May 13 for a hearing in the case.
He was reportedly hospitalized for psychiatric evaluation after his arrest and blogged about the experience on his Web site in a post headlined: "You Should All Know I'm In The Looney Bin."
Steve-O
Bear Turns On Handler
Stephan Miller
When friends Linda Carter and Cherrie Giles booked a three-day retreat in a remote cabin in the San Bernardino Mountains, the proprietor told them not to be startled by the roar of lions and bears from the exotic-animal training center nearby.
The women fell asleep to the roars the first night, but on Tuesday they were startled by different sound - an urgent yell. About 30 minutes later, sirens wailed as paramedics rushed to an animal trainer who had been bitten on the neck by a 700-pound, 7 1/2-foot-tall grizzly bear. Stephan Miller, 39, died at the scene.
Harry Morse, a spokesman for the California Department of Fish and Game, said Miller was killed by the 5-year-old bear during the making of a promotional video for Randy Miller's Predators in Action center. The bear's fate has not been decided.
The bear, named Rocky, recently appeared in the Will Ferrell sports comedy "Semi-Pro." Center owner Randy Miller, the victim's cousin, was a stunt double for Ferrell in a wrestling match with the bear. The center's animals have appeared in many other movies, documentaries and TV shows, including "Gladiator" and "The Last Samurai."
Stephan Miller
Exits Novie Over Cookie Controversy
James Caan
James Caan has left the political comedy "Nailed" after a dispute led him to storm off the set, and it all seems to have centred on a cookie.
The trouble started last Wednesday on the first of Caan's two days of shooting the role of a U.S. speaker of the house who chokes to death on a cookie. Director David O. Russell asked him to cough as he choked, but Caan argued that the character couldn't cough and choke to death at the same time.
Russell suggested that they shoot it both ways, but the veteran "Godfather" actor expressed distrust that his version would be considered and left the South Carolina set. A spokesman for Caan wouldn't confirm or deny the specifics of what happened but said with a laugh that there were creative differences and the departure was amicable.
Russell has a reputation for on-set battles. He had well-documented differences with George Clooney (in which the two came to blows on the set of "Three Kings") and Lily Tomlin (in heated verbal exchanges on the set of "I Heart Huckabees" as seen last year on YouTube).
James Caan
Complain About Political Pressure
EPA Scientists
Hundreds of Environmental Protection Agency scientists say they have been pressured by superiors to skew their findings, according to a survey released Wednesday by an advocacy group.
The Union of Concerned Scientists sent an online questionnaire to 5,500 EPA scientists and received 1,586 responses, a majority of them senior scientists who have worked for the agency for 10 years or more. The survey included chemists, toxicologists, engineers, geologists and experts in the life and environmental sciences.
The report said 60 percent of those responding, or 889 scientists, reported personally experiencing what they viewed as political interference in their work over the last five years. Four in 10 scientists who have worked at the agency for more than a decade said they believe such interference has been more prevalent in the last five years than in the previous five years.
Nearly 400 scientists said they had witnessed EPA officials misrepresenting scientific findings, 284 said they had seen the "selective or incomplete use of data to justify a specific regulatory outcome" and 224 scientists said they had been directed to "inappropriately exclude or alter technical information" in an EPA document.
EPA Scientists
Painting Sells At Auction
Winston Churchill
An oil painting by Winston Churchill of a sunset over mountains in Morocco, a view he later took U.S. President Franklin Roosevelt to see during World War II, was sold on Wednesday for $420,000 (212,121 pounds) in New York.
The late British wartime leader's "Sunset over the Atlas Mountains" was sold to an anonymous phone buyer after a short bidding battle, said Staci Smith, a spokeswoman for Bonhams New York, which auctioned the painting.
Churchill painted the work from his balcony in a Marrakech hotel while on vacation in 1935. He used bright-coloured paints, many straight from the tube, said Malcolm Walker, an expert at Bonhams.
Winston Churchill
Reunited With Violin
Philippe Quint
A Grammy-nominated violinist has been reunited with a $4 million violin he left in the back of a cab.
Philippe Quint exited a minivan cab at New York City's Battery Park early Monday, leaving the 1723 Antonio Stradivari "Ex-Keisewetter" inside.
The violin spent the remainder of the night on the seat of the cab, which owner Mohamed Khalil parked on a Newark street. By the morning, he was still unaware of what he was carrying.
On Monday afternoon, Khalil checked his taxi while at Newark Liberty International Airport and discovered the violin case with the instrument inside.
Philippe Quint
In Memory
Paul Davis
Singer-songwriter Paul Davis, who had a hit with the soft rock hit "I Go Crazy," has died.
Davis died today at a hospital in Meridian, Mississippi, the city where he grew up. He died of a heart attack, according to his cousin, James Edwards. Davis was 60.
"I Go Crazy" peaked at number seven in 1977 eight months after its release. It then stayed in the Top 100 for 40 more weeks, according to Billboard.
Davis also had hits with "65 Love Affair," and "You're Still New To Me," a country duet with Marie Osmond.
Paul Davis
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