'Best of TBH Politoons'
Recommended Reading
from Bruce
Larry Beinhart: Bush's "Magic" Economic Formula: The Rich get Richer; Regular People Lose Ground (AlterNet.org)
The economy keeps growing, as does the enormous largesse of the wealthy, while the average person makes less than they did when Bush took Office. This is Bush's magic economic formula.
Jim Hightower: CORPORATE CREEPS BILK THE ELDERLY (jimhightower.com)
We've seen plenty of disgusting corporate behavior in our country - but surely there's an unfathomably-hot part of hell being reserved for the participants in a recent telemarketing scheme to steal the life savings of old folks. This is not a scam run by small-time hucksters, but by supposedly legitimate businesses, including database giant infoUSA and Wachovia, our country's fourth-largest bank. It's also a scam that's abetted by an outrageous national banking rule.
Dean Kuipers: 3rd Degree: Peter Singer (lacitybeat.com)
The noted bio-ethicist on Jean-Baptiste Oudry, animal liberation, and jailing animal activists as terrorists.
Story of the blues (guardian.co.uk)
Rugged and hard-wearing, Levi's were the original American jeans. But they couldn't keep up with the designer ranges or the supermarket bargains, and have spent a decade in the doldrums. Hadley Freeman on the slow decline of a superbrand.
Darcey's last dance (guardian.co.uk
The country's favourite ballerina is quitting at the height of her powers. But, with the search for a successor on, is the future bright for British dance, asks Martin Kettle.
I've had it with men (guardian.co.uk)
Ten years ago, men's monthlies were making fortunes for publishers on both sides of the Atlantic. And FHM editor Ed Needham was at the heart of it. But, he says, the internet and trashy weeklies have destroyed all that: the party's over, and it's time to move on.
Straight Dope scoop: The truth about the boy with "two spiders living in his ear"
You demonstrate a useful trait which fewer people in the U.S. seem to have now than ever before in our history: healthy skepticism.
WEIRD WORD OF THE WEEK
CALLIPYGIAN
"CALLIPYGIAN"
ON LINE DEFINITION: Having beautifully formed buttocks
ON THE STREET: A Fine Ass
IN A SENTENCE: She carried her callipygian attributes with perfect aplomb
(Read BartCop Entertainment and learn a useless new word each Tuesday)
Hubert's Poetry Corner
SECRETS FROM AMBER RAY
Purple Gene Reviews
Criss Angel (In A Box)
Selected Readings
from that Mad Cat, JD
In The Chaos Household
Last Night
June Gloom morning, nice sunny afternoon.
Appeals Court Win
Broadcasters
A federal appeals court Monday found that a new Federal Communications Commission policy penalizing accidentally aired expletives was invalid, saying it was "arbitrary and capricious" and might not survive First Amendment scrutiny.
The 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals did not, however, outlaw the policy outright. It ruled in favor of a Fox Television-led challenge to the policy and returned the case to the FCC to let the agency try to provide a "reasoned analysis" for its new approach to indecency and profanity.
Included in the arguments were references to a January 2003 broadcast of the Golden Globes awards show by NBC when U2 lead singer Bono uttered the phrase "f------ brilliant." A year later, the FCC said the "F-word" in any context "inherently has a sexual connotation" and can be subject to enforcement action.
In a 2-to-1 ruling, the appeals court said it found that the FCC's new policy regarding so-called fleeting expletives "represents a significant departure from positions previously taken by the agency and relied on by the broadcast industry."
Broadcasters
Spoleto Festival To Honor
Gian Carlo Menotti
The Festival of Two Worlds in Spoleto will celebrate its 50th anniversary with a tribute to its late founder, Gian Carlo Menotti, featuring concerts and an opera written by the Italian composer.
The festival, running June 29 to July 15, will include a performance of Menotti's three-act opera "Maria Golovin" and concerts featuring pieces from his Christmas classic, "Amahl and the Night Visitors," and other works by the composer, organizers said Monday.
In 1957 Menotti founded the festival in the Umbrian hilltown and 20 years later a similar event in Charleston, S.C., as he sought to bring together fresh creative forces in U.S. and European culture.
Gian Carlo Menotti
Italian Film Industry Rebukes
Quentin Tarantino
The Italian cinema industry is up in arms after recent comments from director Quentin Tarantino, who called the current state of the film industry "depressing."
Italian newspapers on Monday and over the weekend were full of reaction to the American director's comments, which came less than a month after it was revealed that he would co-present a series of Spaghetti Westerns in a special sidebar at this year's Venice Film Festival.
The center-left daily La Repubblica, Italy's second-largest newspaper, said that if Italian film isn't what it used to be, neither was Tarantino.
"Tarantino is no longer the Tarantino who made 'Pulp Fiction,"' the newspaper opined.
Quentin Tarantino
Wins Van Cliburn Competition
Drew Mays
An ophthalmologist from Birmingham, Ala., bested 74 other competitors from 23 states and seven nations to win the Van Cliburn Foundation's Fifth International Piano Competition for Outstanding Amateurs.
Drew Mays, 47, took top honors Sunday for his 30-minute recital of Beethoven's "Waldstein" sonata and Liszt's "Mephisto Waltz." Mays also won the audience award and the best performance of a work from the Romantic Era.
The weeklong competition was limited to contestants age 35 and older who don't earn their living teaching or playing the piano.
Second prize went to Mark Fuller, a Phoenix lawyer who also won the press jury award and best performance of a post-Romantic work. Composer Clark Griffith, of Fort Worth, won third prize and best performance of a baroque work.
Drew Mays
Sports Stadium
Crowe & LaPaglia
Anthony LaPaglia and Russell Crowe are in preliminary talks about building a new sports stadium in Sydney. LaPaglia, star of CBS' "Without a Trace," is a director and shareholder in Sydney FC, a soccer team in the domestic A-League.
Crowe, who won an Oscar for 2000's "Gladiator," is co-owner of the South Sydney Rabbitohs in the National Rugby League.
LaPaglia said he and Crowe are in preliminary talks on constructing a 25,000-seat stadium that both teams could use during their respective seasons.
LaPaglia won an Emmy in 2002 for his guest-starring role as Daphne's brother, Simon, on "Frasier."
Crowe & LaPaglia
1,683 Guitarists Play
'Smoke On The Water'
More than 1,680 guitar players turned out, tuned up and took part in what organizers say was a world record rendition of Deep Purple's "Smoke on the Water" - a song that was the first many of them ever learned.
Some came from as far away as California and Germany on Sunday to take part in a Kansas City radio station's effort to break a Guinness world record for the most people playing the same song simultaneously. The record had been 1,323 people playing the same song in Vancouver, British Columbia, in 1994.
Preliminary numbers show 1,683 people played the popular early '70s guitar riff on Sunday at CommunityAmerica Ballpark.
'Smoke On The Water'
Booked For DUI
Shemar Moore
"Criminal Minds" actor Shemar Moore is due in court later this month after being booked for investigation of driving under the influence, authorities say.
Moore, who was released on $5,000 bail, was doing over 65 mph on Santa Monica Boulevard around 1 a.m. Friday when he was stopped by the California Highway Patrol, officers said.
Moore was arrested a half hour later and taken to a nearby station where he took a breath test and was later booked.
Shemar Moore
Secession Movement Gains Traction
Vermont
At Riverwalk Records, the all-vinyl music store just down the street from the state Capitol, the black "US Out of Vt.!" T-shirts are among the hottest sellers.
But to some people in Vermont, the idea is bigger than a $20 novelty. They want Vermont to secede from the United States - peacefully, of course.
Disillusioned by what they call an empire about to fall, a small cadre of writers and academics hopes to put the question before citizens in March. Eventually, they want to persuade state lawmakers to declare independence, returning Vermont to the status it held from 1777 to 1791.
Vermont
Israel Museum Displays
Rare Manuscript
A rare Old Testament manuscript some 1,300 years old is finally on display for the first time, after making its way from a secret room in a Cairo synagogue to the hands of an American collector.
The manuscript, containing the "Song of the Sea" section of the Old Testament's Book of Exodus and dating to around the 7th century A.D., comes from what scholars call the "silent era" - a span of 600 years between the third and eighth centuries from which almost no Hebrew manuscripts survive.
It is now on public display for the first time, at the Israel Museum in Jerusalem.
The parchment is believed to have been left in the Cairo Genizah, a vast depository of medieval Jewish manuscripts discovered in the late 1800s in a previously unknown room at Cairo's ancient Ben Ezra Synagogue. It was in private hands until the late 1970s, when its Lebanese-born American owner turned it over to the Rare Books, Manuscripts, and Special Collections Library at Duke University.
Rare Manuscript
Growth Industry
Indian Casinos
Indian gambling pulled in $25 billion in 2006, 11 percent more than the year before as the industry's explosive growth outpaced Las Vegas.
Federal figures announced Monday, compiled from 387 tribal facilities in 28 states, show Indian gambling revenue has nearly doubled in five years.
There are now 415 Indian gambling facilities nationwide operated by more than 200 tribes. They range from full-blown casinos with slot machines and other Las Vegas-style games to smaller gambling centers offering video poker, bingo or other games short of slots.
Indian Casinos
Greek Police Close
'Indecent' Art Show
Greek police shut down an Athens art exhibit and arrested the show's curator for what they said was "indecent" art, prompting heated protests from Greece's press and art world on Monday.
Police stormed the Art Athina show on Saturday, shut down the video exhibit, which combined pornographic material with the Greek national anthem, and arrested curator Michalis Argyros who spent the night in jail.
The work -- showing scenes from 1960s Greek pornographic movies through a peephole to the sound of the Greek national anthem - was clearly marked with signs that it was not suitable for those under 18 years of age.
'Indecent' Art Show
Scientists Find 24 New Species
Suriname
A frog with fluorescent purple markings and 12 kinds of dung beetles were among two dozen new species discovered in the remote plateaus of eastern Suriname, scientists said Monday.
The expedition was sponsored by two mining companies hoping to excavate the area for bauxite, the raw material used to make aluminum, and it was unknown how the findings would affect their plans.
Among the species found were the atelopus frog, which has distinctive purple markings; six types of fish; 12 dung beetles, and one ant species.
Suriname
Landslide Damages
Valley of Geysers
A severe landslide has nearly obliterated one of Russia's most noted natural wonders, the Valley of Geysers, officials and environmental activists said Monday.
The valley in the Kronotsky national reserve on the Far Eastern Kamchatka Peninsula contained about 90 geysers, as well as an array of thermal pools, and is the region's most popular tourist attraction.
A snow-covered mound collapsed Sunday "within seconds" and caused a massive landslide, about a mile long and 600 feet wide, burying two-thirds of the valley, park ranger Valery Tsypkov said in televised remarks.
The landslide dumped millions of cubic yards of mud and stones and destroyed most of the valley's geysers and dozens of thermal springs, stopping yards away from the valley's only hotel, he said.
Valley of Geysers
Million Pound Reward
Loch Ness
A bookmaker offered a one million pound reward on Monday to anyone who can prove that Scotland's legendary Loch Ness monster does actually exist.
Bookmakers William Hill are supplying up to 50,000 instant cameras to fans attending a Loch Ness pop festival next weekend.
The bookmakers are confident the bounty will not be claimed at the Rock Ness music festival on June 9 and 10 -- they are offering odds of 250-1 about it happening in 2007.
Loch Ness
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