TODAY!
Erin Hart
Please join Erin Hart as she fills in
for Jay Marvin on AM760 Progressive Talk in Denver
this week (4 - 8 August), from 5am to 9am (pdt) | 6am to 10am (mdt) | 7am to 11am (cdt) | 8am to noon (edt).
Continue the Countdown to the Convention!
Talk about the Race for the White House; Record Oil Profits; the Search for Viable Green Energy; How to Protect Our Votes; the Rove Effect and who is going to testify?
For more information check out Erin Hart Show
The Monday Or Thursday Poll
Today's Question
The current question is:
Rate your interest in watching the Olympic Games...
1.) Extremely interested! ... All Olympics, All the time! USA! USA! USA!
2.) Very interested ... I am a/an _______ fan and will watch those events without fail and perhaps some others, too, ever mindful of the true spirit of the games...
3.) Moderately interested ... Maybe, if I'm in the mood and, besides, my partner wants to watch it together all snuggle-bunnies like...
4.) Little interest ... Only if I'm bored to tears because the weather sucks and I'm completely unmotivated to do anything else indoors and there's nothing else interesting on TV and I don't have a new book to read...
5.) Zero interest ... Olympics!... Ack!... I'd sooner watch 'Brady Bunch' reruns than that display of nationalistic commercialism. Besides, they're all doped up anyway...
Send your response, and a (short) explanation, to BadtotheBoneBob ( BCEpoll 'at' aol.com )
The previous question was:
What's your choice for the best Drama Series?
'Boston Legal' 4 votes based mostly on it's anti-Bush attitude (something to be said for that)
'Damages' 0
'Dexter' 1 vote
'House' 3 votes
'Lost' 0
'Mad Men' 3 votes
Haven't watched any of these shows 2 votes
There was one responder who wanted to give it to three different programs simultaneously. Sorry, your vote(s) didn't count. I don't give thirds in such a poll and I doubt they will for the Emmy either.... Thanks to all for voting!
BadtotheboneBob
Recommended Reading
from Bruce
Paul Krugman: A Slow-Mo Meltdown (nytimes.com)
Even a slow-mo economic crisis can do a lot of damage if it goes on for a year and counting.
Two Books about Our Bungled Brains: A Review by Doug Brown (powells.com)
Our brains like to think they are flawless, unbiased masters of precision, but the reality is sadly not so. We form conclusions and beliefs with little or no reason and then seek evidence which supports the conclusions we've already reached. Our brains perceive the world in ways that make ourselves look better than others.
"Media Matters" by Jamison Foser (mediamatters.org)
The media debunk McCain smears, then promote them.
Jack Shafer: The Untouchable (slate.com)
Why nothing the press throws at Obama sticks.
Susan Estrich: Just One (creators.com)
It was early in the morning - very early if you add in the fact that it was a weekend. We had changed gates three times already, hordes of people racing across the terminal as if those who got there first and claimed their space would also get to New York first.
FROMA HARROP: Live Man Dying (creators.com)
Fascination with Heath Ledger no doubt swells the mobs going to see "The Dark Knight," the new Batman movie. Ledger's brilliance as the psycho Joker has spawned speculation that the actor's own descent in drug madness had fueled his demonic performance.
MICHAEL RUSSNOW: "Ed McMahon's Money Problems: Should We Really Care About Millionaires in Financial Distress?" (huffingtonpost.com)
For the past couple of months we have been subjected ad nausea to the financial woes of Tonight Show announcer and TV pitchman Ed McMahon, and with all the legitimate concerns of ordinary citizens, who've lost their jobs and/or homes, I have to ask who really gives a damn?
Kate Goldsworthy and Kelsey Truman: Lesbian Olympic Torch-Runner (curvemag.com)
Amidst the controversy surrounding the games in Beijing, lesbian torch-runner and LGBT activist Helen Zia speaks out about her take on this year's Olympics, China and her decision to participate.
Dave White: Trite Lights, Big City (advocate.com)
Sandra Bernhard is the guest judge this week. She likes Terri. That's because Sandra Bernhard knows everything that's right and true.
Sheela Lambert: "Big Gay Sketch Show's Julie Goldman: Exclusive Interview" (curvemag.com)
She makes us bust our guts as the hilarious star of Logo's Big Gay Sketch Show. Now Julie Goldman gives us the scoop on what goes into making our favorite TV comedy show, her stand-up act Offensive Women and what might come next.
Malinda Lo: A Quickie With Mary-Louise Parker (afterellen.com)
The "Weeds" star talks about the de-gaying of "Fried Green Tomatoes."
Linda Villarosa: "Outside the Lines: Elizabeth Ziff" (afterellen.com)
The BETTY band member talks about that "L Word" theme song and more.
Selected Readings
from that Mad Cat, JD
In The Chaos Household
Last Night
Humidity is way up.
Added a new flag - Burkina Faso 
Documentary Censured
Michael Palin
In Michael Palin's New Europe, the former Monty Python star visited 20 countries that were once behind the Iron Curtain. The first programme in the seven-part series saw Palin, 65, explore Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia, Serbia and Albania.
A viewer complained that the episode, entitled War And Peace, was a political commentary rather than a travel programme and an inaccurate account of the wars in former Yugoslavia. The BBC Trust partially upheld the complaint in relation to accuracy and impartiality.
As a result, Richard Tait, the chairman of the Trust's Editorial Standards Committee, has written to the deputy director-general, Mark Byford, to remind programme-makers to check facts and "contextualise statements in order not to mislead viewers".
Palin, a veteran of popular BBC travel documentaries such as Around The World In 80 Days, sparked anger in the programme by stating that "there was no reason for the destruction" of the Mostar Bridge. The committee said there had been a reason for the bridge's destruction, to isolate the Muslim community in West Mostar.
Michael Palin
American in Hiroshima
Steven Leeper
For years, Steven Leeper took the view of many fellow Americans about the nuclear bombing of Hiroshima -- that it was an inevitable part of war.
But after a lifetime of reflection, he is now the first foreigner to head an anti-nuclear foundation in the western Japanese city -- and has set his sights on persuading his country to agree with him.
"When I first came here, I completely did not think about or worry about or care about the atomic bombing," Leeper, 60, told AFP in an interview.
"In war, you just kill your enemy. And the atomic bomb is a big bomb and kills a lot of the enemy. So what's wrong with that?"
Steven Leeper
Highest Paid TV Star
Charlie Sheen
Charlie Sheen, who plays a wealthy, womanizing bachelor on the top-rated sitcom "Two and a Half Men," made more than any other TV actor this year with earnings of $825,000 per episode, including money from his ownership rights in the show.
Trailing Sheen in the No. 2 spot on TV Guide's list is fellow CBS star William Petersen, who takes home $600,000 an episode for portraying investigator Gil Grissom on the hit police drama "CSI: Crime Scene Investigation."
Among the top-paid women, Mariska Hargitay was No. 1 for TV drama, earning $400,000 an episode for her Emmy-winning role as a New York detective on NBC's "Law & Order: Special Victims Unit." Cable network TNT's "The Closer" star Kyra Sedgwick, also portraying a cop, earns a cool $275,000 per episode.
Simon Cowell, the sharp-tongued judge on the Fox network's mega-hit talent show "American Idol," earns $50 million per year, and CBS late-night host David Letterman has an annual salary of $32 million, according to TV Guide.
Charlie Sheen
Space Is Not His Final Frontier
James "Scotty" Doohan
If James "Scotty" Doohan from "Star Trek" was alive today, he wouldn't be happy with what just happened to his ashes.
Doohan's ashes, along with 200 other people's remains, were supposed to be released into space on Saturday night by a rocket also carrying three satellites -- but the rocket never made it into orbit. Where it exactly is, however, is a mystery. No one at the company could tell us what happened to the rocket. Skylab is that you??
Real-life astronaut and original Mercury 7 crew member Gordon Cooper's ashes also were lost during the botched mission.
James "Scotty" Doohan
Hospital News
Morgan Freeman
Oscar-winning actor Morgan Freeman was hospitalized in serious condition Monday after the car he was driving left a rural road in the Mississippi Delta and flipped several times.
The actor "has a broken arm, broken elbow and minor shoulder damage, but is in good spirits," according to a statement from Donna Lee, Freeman's publicist. A hospital spokeswoman said Freeman was in serious condition but would not discuss his injuries.
Mississippi Highway Patrol spokesman Sgt. Ben Williams said rescuers had to use the jaws of life to remove Freeman from the car.
"He was lucid, conscious. He was talking, joking with some of the rescue workers at one point," said Clay McFerrin, editor of Sun Sentinel in Charleston, who arrived at the scene soon after the accident happened.
Morgan Freeman
`Idol' Producer Moving On
Nigel Lythgoe
A key "American Idol" producer who's guided the top-rated TV show since its debut is leaving the job as the Fox juggernaut faces the challenge of staying on top in its eighth season.
Nigel Lythgoe is negotiating a joint-venture deal with "American Idol" creator Simon Fuller and 19 Entertainment, the company announced Monday.
The smiling, blond-haired Englishman, who could often be spotted on-camera sitting behind the "American Idol" judges' row, is familiar to viewers on "So You Think You Can Dance?", which he produces and helps judge.
Nigel Lythgoe
Seeks Immunity
Mary Kate Olsen
Federal investigators want to question actress Mary Kate Olsen about how Heath Ledger got two powerful painkillers that contributed to his accidental overdose death, but she wants immunity or she won't talk, a law enforcement official said Monday.
Olsen's lawyer has twice refused requests to have her sit down with investigators probing the death of the scene-stealing star of "The Dark Knight" earlier this year in a Manhattan apartment, said the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because the investigation has not been concluded.
The official confirmed a report that Olsen - a close friend of Ledger who learned about the 28-year-old actor's death in a frantic phone call from a masseuse - wants a promise of immunity before she speaks to the Drug Enforcement Administration.
Mary Kate Olsen
Windsor-Detroit Border
Elvis Mitchell
Film critic Elvis Mitchell is accused of illegally trying to return to the United States with nearly $12,000 stashed in a cigar box.
Mitchell was entering Detroit in a cab from Windsor, Ontario, on April 26 when a luggage search turned up $11,817 in U.S. currency and 15 Cuban cigars, according to Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
Anyone carrying more than $10,000 outside the country or into the United States must report it.
Mitchell said his lawyer, Otis Culpepper, is trying to get the money returned. When the government seeks to take control of property - money, real estate, cars - there is an opportunity for people to file a claim in federal court.
Elvis Mitchell
Earaly Retirement
Novakula
Unindicted conservative political commentator Robert Novak announced his immediate retirement Monday because of his diagnosis of a malignant brain tumor.
Novak told the editor and publisher of the Chicago Sun-Times that he plans to focus on his treatment and recovery, said Sun-Times spokeswoman Tammy Chase.
He was the first to reveal the name of CIA operative Valerie Plame. His 2003 column came out eight days after Plame's husband, Joseph Wilson, said the Bush administration had twisted prewar intelligence to exaggerate the threat posed by Iraq.
Novakula
2nd Largest In The World
New US Embassy
A massive new U.S. Embassy, the second-largest in the world after the heavily fortified compound in Baghdad, formally opens in the Chinese capital this week, a testament to the depth and breadth of the ties binding the trading partners and sometimes rivals.
Resident Bush, who will be attending the Beijing Olympics opening ceremonies Friday, is to preside over the ribbon-cutting at the $434 million, 500,000-square-foot compound that same day. Embassy personnel will not move in until after the Olympics in case there are glitches in communications or other systems.
The eight-story main building, wrapped in an outer envelope of freestanding transparent and opaque glass, was designed with traditional Chinese elements in mind. Narrow walkways lined with bamboo link diplomatic "neighborhoods."
But the new embassy is already projected to be too small. Work will begin soon on a 70,000-square-foot annex for another 230 staffers and 10 more agencies.
New US Embassy
Faces More Litigation
Abbott Laboratories
When Abbott Laboratories Inc. hiked up the price of a popular AIDS drug by 400 percent in 2003, executives prepared for the inevitable public relations hit, but assured themselves the backlash would be brief.
Nearly five years later, the accusations against Abbott are still flying.
The North Chicago, Ill., drug company stands to lose hundreds of millions of dollars in several pending antitrust lawsuits. It settled only its first - and likely its cheapest one - last week.
The lawsuits, all filed in Oakland federal court, accuse Abbott of raising the price of the HIV-fighting Norvir to illegally stifle competition and boost sales of its own alternative, Kaletra. Embarrassing internal communications between executives plotting how to thwart their rivals in the lucrative HIV drug cocktail market have been made public in the process.
Abbott Laboratories
More Spun Intel
N Korea
In circumstances echoing the Iraq war controversy, hardliners in US resident George W. Bush's administration spun intelligence and triggered a nuclear crisis with North Korea, says a new book to be released this week.
Intelligence on a North Korea effort to acquire components for uranium enrichment was politicized to depict the hardline communist state running a full-fledged production facility capable of developing a nuclear bomb, said the book by former senior CNN journalist Mike Chinoy.
Now with the Los Angeles-based Pacific Council on International Policy, Chinoy wrote "Meltdown: The inside story of the North Korean nuclear crisis" after gaining unprecedented access during his 14 trips to North Korea and conducting 200 interviews in Washington, Seoul, Tokyo and other Asian capitals.
Colin Powell, the US secretary of state at that time who discovered he had used questionable American intelligence on Iraq's weapons of mass destruction ahead of the Iraq invasion in 2003, also found himself in a predicament with intelligence on North Korea.
N Korea
Ancient Moss, Insects Found
Antarctica
Mosses once grew and insects crawled in what are now barren valleys in Antarctica, according to scientists who have recovered remains of life from that frozen continent. Fourteen million years ago the now lifeless valleys were tundra, similar to parts of Alaska, Canada and Siberia - cold but able to support life, researchers report.
Geoscientist Adam Lewis of North Dakota State University was studying the ice cover of the continent when he and co-workers came across the remains of moss on a valley floor.
The moss was essentially freeze dried, he said. Unlike fossils, where minerals replace soft materials, the moss tissues were still there, he said.
"The really cool thing is that all the details are still there," even though the plant has been dead for 14 million years. "These are actually the plant tissues themselves."
Antarctica
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