Reader Response
'The Simpsons'
Did you catch the opening scene?
Dark, overgrown, Frankenstienesque castle on the hill, lightning bolts
flashing, and a sign posted "Springfield Republican Headquarters". Inside,
Mr. Burns, at the head of the conference table asks who would like to hatch
the next evil plot. Sitting to his left, Ralph Nader enthusiastically raises
his hand. "No, Ralph, you've done enough." says Burns.
~~ Steve Trunk
Damn! Missed it! But, will watch for the rerun, and hope they don't make any
edits between now & then.
For Curiosity Sake - Current National Enquirer
'Apple Bong'
In The Chaos Household
Last Night
Started with MNF on ABC. They must feed the talking head-boys real good....either that or they're
retaining a lot of water.
Saw some of 'King of Queens' on CBS, and it was creepier than usual, although Jerry Stiller is
amazing with what is given him.
Sadly, the 'Regis - Olympic Version' did little to dispell the dumb-jock myth.
Planning on staying up late to check out 'Last Call' on NBC.
Well, it's past 1:30 am (pst), and there was no 'Last Call' on KNBC, NBC for LA. Instead, 'SCTV'
aired....wonder what's up?
Tonight, Tuesday, CBS has 3 fresh hours...'JAG', 'The Guardian', and
'Judging Amy'.
NBC also has 3 fresh hours of programming, starting with the debut of 'Imagine That (AKA: The Hank Azaria Show)' (just remember only 5 episodes were
produced, and it's not likely to be renewed), '3 Sisters', 'Frasier' (1 of a 2 parter with
Daphne's relatives visiting), 'Scrubs', and 'Dateline'.
ABC also has 3 fresh hours, 'Dharma & Greg', 'Spin City', 'NYPD Blues', and
'Philly'.
The WB has nothing but reruns of 'Gilmore Girls' and 'Smallville'.
Faux has 2 hours of fresh programming...'That 70's Show', 'Undeclared', and
'24' (6 am - 7 am).
AMC has 'Butch Cassidy & The Sundance Kid' and 'Hello, He Lied', a special based on the book of
the same name by Lynda Obst, which follows the path of getting a movie made.
TCM celebrates the birthday of Elvis with 17 hours of his movies -- from 'Spinout' to 'Viva Las Vegas'.
Anyone have any opinions?
Or reviews?
(See below for addresses)
Sometimes A Rumor Is Just A Rumor
Bill and Hillary Clinton
Bill and Hillary Clinton say they're not giving up on their house in Chappaqua.
For months now, busybodies in the Westchester suburb have been saying that the former First Couple were
looking to unload their house.
Some claimed the Clintons were getting a chilly reception from Chappaqua townsfolk fed up with the Secret
Service battalion and media swarm. Talk that the former White House occupants might split intensified last
week, after a neighbor ran over and killed their beloved dog, Buddy.
"I haven't heard of any resistance from the neighbors," added the friend. "In fact, most people don't want them
to leave, because they've helped boost property values. Some of the neighbors have actually offered to sell them their homes."
Says Bill Clinton's spokesman: "The Clintons love their home and they're not going anywhere."
Bill and Hillary Clinton
Updated!
BartCop TV!
Visit the site at BC TV
The 'Vidiot' never seems to rest - and doesn't let little things like laundry or
housekeeping get in the way!
Damn near every show on TV must is listed - days & days worth of great reading.
If you have any questions about nearly any tv program, check out
BC TV!
Court Sides With Heirs
Three Stooges
The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday sided with the heirs of the Three Stooges in a dispute with a Los Angeles artist
over lithographs and T-shirts depicting the slapstick comedians who first became famous in the 1920s.
The justices let stand a California Supreme Court ruling that an artist must get approval and pay licensing fees
to depict a celebrity unless the new work contains ``significant creative elements.''
The ruling by the California court was viewed as a victory for celebrities or their heirs in the battle over who
should control publicity rights -- similar to trademarks or copyrights -- to famous names and images.
Under the existing California ``right of publicity'' law, the right of the heirs continues for 70 years after
the celebrity's death, they said.
Three Stooges
Fun Link
Really Scary Masks
Really Scary Masks
'Not A Facelift Person'
Robert Redford
Actor and director Robert Redford insists he'll keep his wrinkles.
Redford, who turned 64 in August, told TV Guide in its Jan. 12 issue that plastic surgery is not
in his future. ``I'm not a facelift person. I am what I am,'' Redford said.
Redford, interviewed as his annual Sundance Film Festival was set to open in Park City, Utah, said he did
not want to put down the practice. ``It is OK for some people,'' he said.
But the ``trade-off is that something of your soul in your face goes away,'' he said. ``You end up looking
body-snatched in the last analysis. That's just my view. It's not necessarily a popular view.''
Robert Redford
Hosting The Oscars Again
Whoopi Goldberg
Actress Whoopi Goldberg will return as host of the Oscars in March after taking a two-year break from the
high-profile job, officials announced Monday.
The 74th annual Academy Awards ceremony March 24 will mark Goldberg's fourth turn at the helm, following stints
in 1999, 1996 and 1994. She won an Oscar herself in 1991 for her supporting role as a clairvoyant in ``Ghost.''
Last year's Oscars were hosted by Steve Martin, whose dry, understated performance contrasted with the spirited
antics of 2000 host Billy Crystal, who fronted six other ceremonies during the 1990s.
Goldberg, 46, said in a statement she was delighted to return as host, and she noted that the Oscars would
take place for the first time at the new Kodak Theatre in Hollywood, after years of alternating between two
venues in downtown Los Angeles.
Whoopi Goldberg
New!
In The Kitchen With BartCop & Friends
Bo's Autobiography ''Riding Lessons''
Jane & Ted & Bo
After Jane Fonda dumped Ted Turner over his serial cheating, she asked Bo Derek to help ease his loneliness.
In her new autobiography "Riding Lessons," Derek reveals that Fonda begged her to date Turner after their
spring 2000 split. "She told me she loved him and that she just wanted him to be happy and that he was a
great lover," she writes.
Fonda also told her, "He knows how to be faithful now." Derek was sold and agreed to go out with Turner. "I
spent the next two weeks dying, wondering how I would handle the next part of this drama," she recalls.
"Ultimately, he never called."
Jane & Ted & Bo
Women's Doubles Partners
Martina Hingis & Anna Kournikova
Women's doubles partners Anna Kournikova of Russia, right, and Martina Hingis of Switzerland share a laugh during their match against Janet Lee of Taiwan and Wynne Prakusya of Indosesia at the Sydney Internation tennis tournament in Sydney, Monday, Jan. 7, 2002. Kournikova and Hingis won the match 6-4, 6-2.
Photo by Rick Rycroft
CNN Promotional Spot Pulled
Paula Zahn
Executives at CNN had a new mantra on Monday: don't call Paula Zahn sexy, don't call Paula Zahn sexy.
A CNN promotional spot touting its new morning newscaster as ``just a little sexy'' was pulled off the
air after it was broadcast repeatedly over the weekend in error, CNN officials said.
Red-faced executives said the 15-second ad was the work of an overzealous promotional staff and that
``appropriate steps'' were being taken to ensure future promos are cleared through proper channels.
``It was a major blunder by our promo department,'' CNN Chairman and CEO Walter Isaacson said in a statement.
``The ad was never seen or approved by anyone outside the promo department. I was outraged, and so was Paula Zahn,
who has spent more than 20 years proving her credibility day in and day out on the air.''
In a CNN promo that aired several times on Saturday and Sunday, a voice-over asks: ``Where can you find a
morning news anchor who's provocative, super-smart, oh yeah, and just a little sexy?'' At that point, the
music pauses and the voice-over intones the answer: ``CNN, Yeah, CNN.''
Fox officials were clearly gleeful over the Zahn promo embarrassment. Kevin Magee, Fox News vice president of
programming, called the ad a ``sign of desperation.''
Paula Zahn
On ''The Late Late Show with Craig Kilborn''
Julie Bowen
"Ed" star Julie Bowen came clean on "The Late Late Show with Craig Kilborn" about the controversial photos of
her snuggling up to Bill Clinton. "The horrible truth is that I pretty much catapulted myself at him at a benefit
for all of 90 seconds," Bowen said. "[Clinton] is a very powerful man, there's something very sexy about
that . . . and no, he hasn't called me. I've never seen him again." Kilborn asked: "Did he caress your back?"
Bowen replied, "You know what? He did."
Julie Bowen
New! Updated!
(10 Dec., 2001)
The official BartCop Astrologer, Geneva, has done good, again!
Very interesting reading!
Alan Keyes
MSNBC has hired former Republican presidential candidate Alan Keyes to be host of a nightly political talk show.
``Alan Keyes is Making Sense'' debuts at 10 p.m. EST Jan. 21.
His show represents something of a departure for MSNBC, which has run documentaries in that time slot. It's also a nod
to rival Fox News Channel's success among conservative audiences with prime-time talk shows.
MSNBC President Erik Sorenson said there's been a greater appetite for topical talk shows since Sept. 11, and
he doesn't expect that to end soon.
``If he were a left-leaning libertarian instead of a right-leaning libertarian, I probably would have hired him
anyway,'' Sorenson said.
But the MSNBC executive said the success of conservative-oriented talk show hosts in TV and radio ratings was
a factor in Keyes' hiring.
Alan Keyes
Koresh, just what's needed - another conservative talking head. Yeah, real shortage of them.
Isn't adolescent-libertarian is a more accurate description of Alan Keyes?
Wonder if Erik Sorenson can name one liberal talking head on his payroll? Or on his network?
Bunking At The Queen Mary In Long Beach
Cirque du Soleil
Cirque du Soleil has outgrown the Santa Monica Pier.
In March, the acrobatic troupe, which since its inception in the mid-'80s has called the pier its Los Angeles
home, will pitch its blue-and-yellow big top in Long Beach.
Cirque's first Long Beach performance, of the Chinese-influenced spectacle ``Dralion,'' will be held next to
the Queen Mary on March 6.
Since ``Dralion's'' 1999 premiere in Montreal, the show -- which fuses ancient Chinese acrobatics with the
standard avant-garde approach of Cirque du Soleil -- has played a series of sold-out engagements in 18 North American cities.
Cirque du Soleil
BC Entertainment Favorite Link
Moose & Squirrel Information One-Stop
http://geocities.com/mooseandsquirrel1
What a great site! Information and reference materials of the first order!
Between 'Moose & Squirrel'
and 'Google', who needs daddy drudge!
Prince Edward, Ardent, &
Prince Charles
Britain's Prince Edward was on Monday reported to have infuriated his eldest brother, royal heir Prince Charles, by asking
him to take part in a television documentary about his love life.
Edward, who runs a television production company, wanted Charles to cooperate in a program he planned to make about his
brother's failed marriage to Princess Diana and his love affair with Camilla Parker Bowles, according to British newspapers.
Edward's Ardent company has already hit trouble. It was the only television crew to continue to film Charles's elder
son, Prince William, at university after other media had complied with a palace request to leave the young student alone.
The Daily Mail said that when Edward came up with his latest proposal, Charles was so appalled that he could barely speak.
Ardent is making the A to Z of Royalty for the Los Angeles-based E! Entertainment cable television channel.
Strained relations between the royal brothers had improved after Edward's wife Sophie underwent emergency
surgery for an ectopic pregnancy last month. But Edward's latest plans were said to have set them at odds again.
Prince Charles
Contract Not Being Bought Out?
Mariah Carey
EMI Group Plc. Monday threw cold water on reports that it had agreed to pay pop diva Mariah Carey a lump sum
to end her multimillion-dollar recording contract after her last album, ``Glitter,'' flopped.
Recent reports suggested EMI had agreed to pay Carey off with much as $50 million after its Virgin label signed
the star in one of the most expensive recording deals ever, only to see her ``Glitter'' sell a mere 2 million copies.
``EMI wishes to make clear that it has made no such payment or agreement,'' EMI said in a statement.
EMI, the world's third largest music group, has been under severe pressure to brush up its act, especially in
the core U.S. market, after two failed merger attempts -- first with Warner Music and then with BMG.
In a move to cut costs in a shrinking industry, a number of music groups have been offloading high-profile
artists who do not sell enough albums to warrant costly contracts.
Mariah Carey
Demand Appears To Be Stronger Than Expected
XM Satellite Radio
Satellite radio broadcaster XM Satellite Radio Holdings Inc. said Monday it hit the high end of the subscriber
benchmark set by Wall Street, suggesting the new service has sparked consumer interest.
Wall Street analysts estimated it would sign between 20,000 and 30,000 subscribers for the period ended Dec. 31.
The radio service is the first of kind in the United States, with about 100 music and news channels available to
car stereos and home systems via satellite for $9.99 per month. Some of XM's music channels are also commercial free.
XM, which broadcasts digital-quality radio programs, first started its service in San Diego and Dallas in September.
Since it rolled out its service in November, analysts have reported that demand appears to be stronger than expected.
XM's announcement came hours after its only competitor, Sirius Satellite Radio Inc. , said it would begin streaming
all of its stations live over the Web as a way to preview its service ahead of a Feb. 14 limited rollout.
XM Satellite Radio
An Officer Is An Officer Is An Officer?
The Wrong Stuff
or: What happened when America's top female fighter pilot refused to put Saudi Arabia's cultural sensitivities before her own
by David Usborne
08 January 2002
The images that streamed from inside Afghanistan after the fall of Kabul were a propaganda dream for the United States government. Afghan women, after years of cruel subjugation by the Taliban, were daring to shed their veils and to expose their faces once again to the world and to sunlight. It was America with a little help from Britain that had made this happen. The smiles shone brightly; eyes shimmered with joy.
Cut now to the Prince Sultan US Air Force Base in Saudi Arabia. An American fighter pilot is climbing into a Chevrolet Suburban to make a trip off-base. The pilot, a Lieutenant Colonel, is not wearing Air Force uniform. This officer of the US military is instead wearing something called an "abaya". A slightly less restrictive version of the burqa, it is a suffocating, head-to-toe robe that allows no glimpse of flesh and has only two slits for the eyes.
If this seems a little rum to you, you are not alone. The officer in the Suburban has a name, and the brass in the Pentagon are getting a little tired of hearing it. It belongs, of course, to a woman. Not any woman, but the first female to become a fighter pilot in the US Air Force since the military first decreed that women could serve in combat in 1993. Today, she is also America's most senior female officer.
But the career of Martha McSally may be about to be shot down. She and other women serving in Saudi Arabia wear the abaya robes when they leave base because they are obliged to. US military regulations insist that servicewomen must always wear an abaya when leaving the base. There is more. Out of respect for local religious custom, Lt Col McSally may not drive the car herself. (That is almost funny. She can pilot a plane, but is not permitted to take the wheel of the Suburban.) In fact, she is not even allowed in the front. And she must have a male escort.
McSally, 35, is a veteran pilot of the A-10 Warthog a single-seat aircraft with a powerful gun that is usually deployed to seek out and destroy tanks. She has patrolled the hazardous no-fly zones in northern and southern Iraq. Most recently, she been given control of all search-and-rescue missions in Iraq, and now also in Afghanistan. Hers has been a dream career, marred only by her deep-seated distaste for the abaya regulation. She first heard of it in 1995, long before she was herself sent to Saudi Arabia, and has been fighting ever since to have it rescinded. Apparently, however, her commanders have not been listening. And so now she is taking the route of litigation and suing the Pentagon for violating her constitutional rights. More specifically, she is suing the man in charge, the US Defense Secretary, Donald Rumsfeld.
The timing of the suit is either way off or it is perfect. Mr Rumsfeld has a war to run. Moreover, this surely is not the best time to disturb an already thoroughly complicated relationship with Saudi Arabia. On the other hand, how can the US continue to require its own servicewomen to cover themselves in the Kingdom, when it is celebrating its success in liberating women from the custom in Afghanistan?
It is not hard to see how the regulation came about and why it has endured. To those behind desks in Washington mostly men it must seem like an almost cost-free gesture to a country that may be an ally of the West, but that remains a fundamentalist Islamic society. It is, indeed, the homeland of Osama bin Laden. Keeping the lid on Muslim sentiment that would chase the Americans off the sacred Islamic soil of the Kingdom remains one of the trickiest challenges for the monarchy and the US. If obliging female servicewomen and there are about 1,000 of them currently affected by the regulation to tent up every time they go off-base helps demonstrate respect for Islamic traditions, so much the better. And the old adage always holds good: when in Rome, do as the Romans do.
Equally easy to grasp, however, is McSally's viewpoint. What is curious is the support she is getting in the US. It is coming partly from feminist groups with left-wing agendas: the National Coalition of Women's Organisations is among those to have lobbied the Defense Secretary. But at the same time, McSally is being lauded by conservative politicians and lobby groups who hold the US Constitution above all else. "What makes this particularly bizarre is that we are waging a war in Afghanistan to remove those abayas, and the very soldiers who are conducting that war have to cover up," Bob Smith, a Republican senator from New Hampshire and a noted conservative, told The Washington Post.
Similarly offended is Lionel van Deerlin, a former US Congressman from San Diego, California. "What mockery that the reforms in Afghanistan should be achieved while, in friendlier surroundings, we abjectly copy the medieval mode of Saudi Arabia," he noted.
Most startlingly, the McSally case has been taken up by none other than the Rutherford Institute, a notorious right-wing advocacy group that came to the fore when it took Paula Jones under its wing and pressed her sexual harassment suit against former president, Bill Clinton. The institute has taken it upon itself to file the suit against Mr Rumsfeld on her behalf. It runs to 14 pages and requests no financial compensation, but asks simply that the military desists from humiliating servicewomen in Saudi Arabia. At its core is McSally's objection to what she recently called the US treating her "like a piece of Muslim property".
It does not help that American policy appears to be hopelessly inconsistent. The US State Department, for example, has no abaya requirement for its personnel at the US embassy in Saudi Arabia. It is hard to imagine a female chargι d'affaires or ambassador posted to the kingdom going about her business in Riyadh covered from head to toe. Nor does the cover-up regulation apply to the wives of male military officers. Servicemen posted there, moreover, are expressly forbidden from donning traditional Muslim clothes. Thus, when a female officer leaves the US force in her abaya, she will be escorted by burly American GIs with crewcuts. "We hardly blend in," McSally quipped recently.
Nor is McSally impressed by the notion that America should make cultural allowances for whatever country it stations its soldiers in. "If it were in our national security to deploy to South Africa under apartheid, would we have found it acceptable or customary to segregate African American soldiers from other American soldiers and say, 'It's just a cultural thing'?" she asked, addressing a group of girl students at the National Cathedral School in Washington recently. "I don't think so. I would hope not."
In the end, she says, the American military has to pay attention to the US Constitution first, and to the values that America holds dear not to the local customs and religious dictates of whatever state is acting as host to an American base. "When those customs and values conflict with ones that our Constitution is based on, and that women and men in uniform died for in the past, that is where you draw the line."
Forcing the women to wear the abayas has practical consequences, too, she argues. The effect is to demean her and her colleagues and that, in turn, undermines their positions on base. When she climbs, virtually incognito, into the back of the Suburban, she is under the escort of officers who are junior to her. It has taken many years to encourage equal respect for men and women in the military culture. But in Saudi Arabia, the abaya rule is helping to undo all that has been achieved.
In response, the Pentagon has replied simply that servicewomen must abide by the regulation when stationed in Saudi Arabia, because Americans are there as guests of that country. Those are carefully chosen words. You could argue that Americans are rather more than guests they are defenders of the Kingdom. You could also highlight the shortcomings in the relationship. Saudi Arabia has come under harsh criticism for failing to co-operate fully with Washington in crushing terrorist cells worldwide. It might also be noted that at least eight of the 11 September hijackers in the US hailed from the Kingdom. And yet America fears offending its rulers. It needs its base there. And the West needs its oil.
Lt Col McSally, who was given her wings even though, at 5ft 3ins, she is theoretically too short to fly for the US Air Force, insists that she is not acting out of some feminist fervour. "The last thing I ever wanted to do was make a big deal out of being a woman," she told The Washington Post. But she is clear in her head that the package of regulations imposed on her and her female peers in Saudi Arabia "abandons our American values that we all raised our right hand to die for". Is she risking all that she has achieved in her career including being the first American women to fly in combat because of her commitment to this one issue? "I don't know," she said. "I try not to think about it."
What happens next? The Pentagon has conceded that the issue is now "on people's radar". It is not quite clear what they mean by that, however. The clear hope of the Lieutenant Colonel is that the brass will decide to settle with her by quietly ditching the offending regulation with who knows what effect on Saudi public opinion. Otherwise, several months from now, she will find herself fighting her cause in court. And even a fearless pilot such as McSally might tremble at facing a foe as formidable as Rumsfeld.
http://news.independent.co.uk/world/asia_china/story.jsp?story=113299
Why is this not a story in the US Press? Why do we have to read about it in the British Press?
Why is the right-wing taking up this cause?
I am ashamed and embarrassed for my military if they think this is how to reward a pilot, let alone reap a benefit
from all the training & tax dollars invested. May everyone of the sons of bitches involved only have daughters for 100 generations!
In Memory
Avery Schreiber
Comedian Avery Schreiber, who with his partner Jack Burns was a fixture on television in the 1960s and '70s, died Monday of a heart attack. He was 66.
Schreiber had recently been in declining health, said his wife, Rochelle Isaacs Schreiber. He died at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center.
Burns and Schreiber appeared often on a number of television shows, including ``The Ed Sullivan Show'' and Hollywood Palace.'' They also had their own summer comedy-variety series, ``The Burns and Schreiber Show,'' on ABC in 1973.
Among Burns and Schreiber's works was the album ``The Watergate Comedy Hour.'' (see below)
After the duo went their separate ways, Schreiber became a popular fixture in Doritos commercials, appearing as a chef, sultan, judge, pilot or other character who would be distracted by people crunching on the chips.
But his forte, his wife said, was skewering politicians in his standup routine.
``He was a very good and gentle man but politics got him,'' she said.
Schreiber also appeared on stage in such plays as ``Hamlet,'' ``Showboat,'' ``Fiddler on the Roof,'' and ``Ovid's Metamorphoses.''
His last stage appearance was on Broadway in ``Welcome to the Club,'' a 1989 Cy Coleman musical about divorced men who refuse to pay alimony.
He had been working on a screenplay, ``Julius and Ethel,'' about the Rosenbergs' 1950s espionage trial and execution, his wife said.
``He loved theater. He loved comedy. He loved his act and he lived his art all the time,'' she said.
Avery Schreiber
For more background on Burns & Schreiber
Still MISSING
Marc Chagall's "Study for 'Over Vitebsk'"
