Baron Dave Romm
Live from Mpls
Baron Dave Romm is an accredited journalist for the RNC!
Watch his LiveJournal for updates.
The Weekly Poll
The current question:
Who would make the best Secretary of State when (not if) Obama takes the helm in January 2009?
A. Hillary Clinton
B. Zbigniew Brzezinski
C. Bill Richardson
D. Chris Dodd
E. Evan Bayh
F. Your choice
Send your response to BadtotheBoneBob ( BCEpoll 'at' aol.com )
Recommended Reading
from Bruce
PAUL KRUGMAN: John, Don't Go (nytimes.com)
It's an ill wind that blows nobody good. Three years after Hurricane Katrina, another storm is heading for the Gulf Coast - and this has given Republicans a reason to cancel President Bush's scheduled appearance at their national convention. The party can thus avoid reminding voters that the last man they placed in the White House did such a heckuva job that he scored the highest disapproval ratings ever recorded.
Daniel Gross: The Death of the Credit Card Economy (slate.com)
Car leases, student loans, no-money-down mortgages, and high credit limits are vanishing.
Scott Burns: The Power of Attentive Spending (assetbuilder.com)
Yes, there is a silver lining in the gigantic cloud that surrounds us. It's small, but it has a value far greater than most people realize. I call it the Power of Attentive Spending.
Scott Burns: Gifting, Feasting and Sharing (assetbuilder.com)
Spending goes in only one direction. Up. This is a fundamental law of the universe. It is always possible to spend more money. This was true when I got my first job out of college, a whopping $500 a month in 1962. It is still true 46 years later. My wife and I can easily spend more income than we have, in spite of enjoying an income far larger than we ever expected.
Harvard School of Public Health: "The Nutrition Source: Excess Weight Is Not Good for You" (www.hsph.harvard.edu)
There's just one small problem with this study: Its conclusions are almost certain to be wrong. Serious flaws with the study led to an underestimation of the impact of obesity; furthermore, its findings are inconsistent with many other larger studies conducted over the past 20 years.
Mark Ravenhill: Adverts are the enemy of art. We should be keeping them out - not sneaking them in (guardian.co.uk)
Yes, I want to tell stories about our world of dizzy consumerism. But the advert is the enemy of art.
Charlie Brooker: I am increasingly concerned that at the centre of my soul lurks a terrifying blankness. Any suggestions? (guardian.co.uk)
I've tried cultivating a passion for the arts but that didn't work.
Boy wonder (guardian.co.uk)
Will Ferrell has become one of the top comic actors in Hollywood playing dorky, immature weirdos. Could it have something to do with his habit of walking into doors as a child? Ryan Gilbey finds out.
Dennis Hopper's life: hell of a ride (timesonline.co.uk)
Small and neat, but looking dangerous, his wild life hurt his acting career, but he has no regrets, reports Garth Pearce.
Mike Farley: A Brief Chat with Marti Dodson, Saving Jane singer (bullz-eye.com)
"I don't think there is anything wrong with being aware of your sexuality. But I don't think that is anybody's only selling point. And so I think you should just be aware and pay attention to everything you have to offer, and don't let anybody put you in a box."
Standard Body Mass Index Calculator
Photo from Marsha
Spur Throated Grasshoppers
Reader Comment
Leno
Gee, Jay Leno had McCain on the first night of the Democratic Convention. I sure don't see Obama or Biden on his guest list for Monday or Tuesday. Figure he'll give a Democrat a chance before the week is over, or does that only go for scheduling Republicans to try to thwart the Democratic message???
Linda >^..^<
Thanks, Linda!
That's why he's earned the (R-Enabler) tag.
Selected Readings
from that Mad Cat, JD
In The Chaos Household
Last Night
Sunny and pleasant.
The kid goes back to school in the morning.
Rock Hall Will Honor
Les Paul
The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame will pay tribute to the "father of the electric guitar" this fall.
Les Paul will be honored at the annual American Music Masters series, a weeklong event that begins Nov. 10, Rock Hall officials said Tuesday. A tribute concert - artists will be named later - is scheduled Nov. 15 at Cleveland's State Theater.
Paul began playing guitar as a child and by 13 was performing semiprofessionally as a country-music guitarist. He later made his mark as a jazz-pop musician, recording hits like "How High the Moon" with his wife, singer Colleen Summers, better known as Mary Ford. They divorced in 1964.
He built a solid-body electric guitar in 1941 - an invention born from his frustration that audiences were unable to hear him play.
Les Paul
Library of Congress To Honor
Stevie Wonder
The Library of Congress will honor Stevie Wonder with its second Gershwin Prize for Popular Song.
Librarian of Congress James Billington, who announced the prize Tuesday, noted that the prize honors an artist whose work transcends musical styles to bring diverse listeners together and foster mutual understanding. It recognizes a musician's lifetime of work.
Wonder, 58, will receive the award on Feb. 23, 2009. The first Gershwin Prize was awarded in 2007 to Paul Simon.
Stevie Wonder
Obama Fundraiser In Geneva
George Clooney
George Clooney has raised hundreds of thousands of dollars for U.S. presidential candidate Barack Obama by headlining an exclusive event for Americans in Geneva, one of the world's most affluent cities.
The Hollywood actor and director, fresh from the world premiere of the Coen brothers' comedy "Burn After Reading" in Venice, slipped without fanfare into the Swiss city on Tuesday for his first appearance on behalf of the Democratic nominee.
Some 170 contributors have paid $1,000 a head to attend a cocktail party with Clooney at a museum in Geneva's Old Town on Tuesday evening.
And 75 high-rolling supporters have spent $10,000 each to attend "an intimate seated dinner" with the 47-year-old star which follows at the organizer's nearby apartment, according to the American lawyer who organized the twin "private" events.
George Clooney
New Film Footage Found
Marilyn Monroe
An amateur film of Marilyn Monroe on the set of "Some Like It Hot" has surfaced in Australia almost 50 years after it was shot and is being put up for auction.
Auctioneer Charles Leski said the 2.5-minute-long, 8mm film shows Monroe and co-star Tony Curtis on the set ahead of shooting a beach scene in which the actress is bouncing balls to get the actor's attention.
The footage, which also shows director Billy Wilder, was taken in early 1959 by a U.S. naval officer who was invited to the set of the movie after Monroe visited his base in San Diego.
The film, in its original Kodak box, was passed on to his daughter who lives in Melbourne, Australia, when he died and she decided to put it up sale, thinking it may be of some significance to the film world.
Marilyn Monroe
Show Tunes Catalog For Sale
Rodgers & Hammerstein
The Rodgers & Hammerstein Organization is in talks to sell its catalog of Broadway musical show tunes and standards to major music companies for between $150 million and $200 million, according to people familiar with the matter.
EMI Music Publishing, Sony Corp's Sony/ATV Music Publishing, Vivendi's Universal Music Publishing and Warner Music Group Corp's Warner/Chappell Music Publishing are all looking over the catalog, which includes songs from shows including "The Sound of Music," "The King and I" and "South Pacific."
The catalog includes over 3,000 songs by founder songwriters Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein II and nearly 100 other writers like Irving Berlin and Lorenz Hart.
Rodgers & Hammerstein
Looking To Settle
Great White
Members of the 1980s rock band whose pyrotechnics sparked a nightclub fire that killed 100 people have agreed to pay $1 million to survivors and victims' relatives, according to court papers filed Tuesday.
The settlement offer from Great White is the latest stemming from the February 2003 fire at The Station nightclub in West Warwick. Roughly $175 million has now been offered by dozens of defendants to settle lawsuits over the blaze, which also injured more than 200 people and was the fourth-deadliest nightclub fire in U.S. history.
Though the band members were never charged, the band's tour manager, Daniel Biechele pleaded guilty in 2006 to 100 counts of involuntary manslaughter and was paroled in March after serving less than half of his four-year prison sentence.
Besides Biechele, the only people charged as a result of the fire were the club owners, who pleaded no contest to 100 counts of involuntary manslaughter in 2006. Michael Derderian will be out on parole next year. Jeffrey Derderian was spared jail time and given community service and probation. The brothers have been sued but have received bankruptcy protection.
Great White
Mushroom Poisoning
Nicholas Evans
The author of the best-selling novel "The Horse Whisperer" is recovering in a hospital after eating poisonous mushrooms during a holiday in Scotland, his agent said Tuesday.
Nicholas Evans' agent said the writer, his wife, her sister and the sister's husband became sick after cooking and eating mushrooms they had picked in the woods Aug. 23.
The A.P. Watt literary agency said tests established that the mushrooms included the highly toxic variety Cortinarius speciosissimus, which attacks the kidneys.
The agency said in a statement that all four had received dialysis treatment at Aberdeen Royal Infirmary and responded well. It they were "walking about and were in a cheerful and positive frame of mind."
Nicholas Evans
They're Already Here
(Send In) The Clones
Food and milk from the offspring of cloned animals may have entered the U.S. food supply, the U.S. government said on Tuesday, but it would be impossible to know because there is no difference between cloned and conventional products.
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration said in January meat and milk from cloned cattle, swine and goats and their offspring were as safe as products from traditional animals. Before then, farmers and ranchers had followed a voluntary moratorium on the sale of clones and their offspring.
While the FDA evaluated the safety of food from clones and their offspring, the U.S. Agriculture Department was in charge of managing the transition of these animals into the food supply.
"It is theoretically possible" offspring from clones are in the food supply, said Siobhan DeLancey, an FDA spokeswoman.
(Send In) The Clones
British Museum Buys Artwork
Rolling Stones
London's Victoria and Albert Museum announced Tuesday that it bought the original artwork for The Rolling Stones' famous "lips" logo, inspired by the singer's mouth.
The museum said it bought the work at an auction in the United States for $92,500.
The lips-and-tongue logo was designed by London art student John Pasche in 1970, and first used on the band's "Sticky Fingers" album the next year.
Rolling Stones
Won't Face Charges - IOKIYAR
Alberto
The Justice Department refused to prosecute former Attorney General Alberto Gonzales for improperly - and possibly illegally - storing in his office and home classified information about two of the Bush administration's most sensitive counterterrorism efforts.
The report by Inspector General Glenn A. Fine found that Gonzales risked exposing at least some parts of the National Security Agency's terrorist surveillance program, as well as interrogations of terrorist detainees. Some aspects of the surveillance program explicitly referred to in the documents were "zealously protected" by the NSA, the report found.
The report also found that Gonzales took some SCI documents - specifically, notes about the surveillance program - to his house in suburban Virginia when he was moving from his secure counsel's office at the White House in early 2005 to the Justice Department.
Although he initially said he believed he kept the documents in a safe at his home, Gonzales later told investigators he did not know the combination of the safe. He said he may have kept the papers in his briefcase and did not always lock it.
Alberto
Chickens Endorse Colonel
Log Cabin
The Log Cabin Republicans endorsed Arizona Sen. John McCain's bid for the presidency on Tuesday, four years after the gay Republican group refused to back resident George W. Bush's bid for reelection.
The endorsement may boost McCain's reputation as a maverick who reaches across partisan lines, but it may not go down well with his party's conservative Christian base.
"Sen. McCain is no George Bush when it comes to gay issues. We are much more optimistic and enthusiastic about Sen. McCain," Patrick Sammon, the group's president, told Reuters.
Log Cabin
Weekend Box Office
'Tropic Thunder'
"Tropic Thunder" defended its position at the top of the box office with $14.6 million in ticket sales over the long Labor Day weekend. Vin Diesel's sci-fi thriller, "Babylon A.D.," debuted in second place.
The top 20 movies at U.S. and Canadian theaters Friday through Monday, followed by distribution studio, gross, number of theater locations, average receipts per location, total gross and number of weeks in release, as compiled Tuesday by Media By Numbers LLC:
1. "Tropic Thunder," Paramount, $14,602,121, 3,473 locations, $4,204 average, $86,935,945, three weeks.
2. "Babylon A.D.," Fox, $11,541,571, 3,390 locations, $3,405 average, $11,541,571, one week.
3. "The Dark Knight," Warner Bros., $11,127,290, 2,750 locations, $4,046 average, $504,798,337, seven weeks.
4. "The House Bunny," Sony, $10,177,701, 2,714 locations, $3,750 average, $29,728,944, two weeks.
5. "Traitor," Overture Films, $10,006,327, 2,054 locations, $4,872 average, $11,507,654, one week.
6. "Death Race," Universal, $7,889,755, 2,537 locations, $3,110 average, $24,739,285, two weeks.
7. "Disaster Movie," Lionsgate, $6,945,535, 2,642 locations, $2,629 average, $6,945,535, one week.
8. "Mamma Mia!" Universal, $5,421,815, 1,968 locations, $2,755 average, $132,512,495, seven weeks.
9. "Pineapple Express," Sony, $4,448,782, 2,047 locations, $2,173 average, $80,832,163, four weeks.
10. "Star Wars: the Clone Wars," Warner Bros., $3,764,410, 2,444 locations, $1,540 average, $30,672,432, three weeks.
11. "Vicky Cristina Barcelona," MGM, $3,525,970, 692 locations, $5,095 average, $13,309,881, three weeks.
12. "The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor," Universal, $3,443,120, 1,713 locations, $2,010 average, $98,671,990, five weeks.
13. "Mirrors," Fox, $3,326,853, 1,820 locations, $1,828 average, $25,395,133, three weeks.
14. "The Longshots," MGM, $3,041,255, 2,089 locations, $1,456 average, $8,190,879, two weeks.
15. "College," MGM, $2,619,730, 2,123 locations, $1,234 average, $2,619,730, one week.
16. "Journey to the Center of the Earth," Warner Bros., $2,415,283, 801 locations, $3,015 average, $95,194,543, eight weeks.
17. "Hamlet 2," Focus, $2,126,310, 1,597 locations, $1,331 average, $3,152,510, two weeks.
18. "Fly Me to the Moon," Summit, $2,050,645, 630 locations, $3,255 average, $6,783,708, three weeks.
19. "Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants 2," Warner Bros., $1,864,131, 1,252 locations, $1,489 average, $41,536,342, four weeks.
20. "Step Brothers," Sony, $1,668,902, 1,036 locations, $1,611 average, $98,237,639, six weeks.
'Tropic Thunder'
In Memory
Ike Pappas
Ike Pappas, a longtime CBS newsman who was a few feet from presidential assassin Lee Harvey Oswald when he was fatally shot and reported the chaotic scene live on the air, has died at 75.
A New York City native, Pappas was in Dallas after John F. Kennedy's Nov. 22, 1963, assassination, reporting for New York radio station WNEW, when police brought the manacled Oswald into the police station basement two days later to be transferred to the jail.
He had just asked the suspect, "You have anything to say in your defense?" when someone shoved Pappas, a gunshot sounded and Oswald crumpled, mortally wounded.
The person who had elbowed Pappas aside turned out to be Jack Ruby, the nightclub owner who was convicted of killing Oswald. Pappas told the story in testimony at Ruby's trial and later to the Warren Commission that investigated the Kennedy assassination.
Born April 16, 1933, Icarus N. Pappas served in the U.S. Army, joined CBS News as a radio writer in 1964 and became a network correspondent in 1967. Besides the Vietnam War, he covered the 1967 Six Day War in Israel, the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr. in 1968, the Kent State shootings in 1970, and coups in Greece, Bolivia and Chile, according to records provided by CBS.
Based in Washington, he was assigned to cover the Pentagon, the CIA, labor and other beats. One of 200 CBS News employees laid off by the network in 1987, he formed his own video production company, known as Ike Inc., writing and producing TV documentaries for PBS and other outlets.
Pappas lived in McLean, Va. He is survived by his wife, Carolyn; two sons, Theodore and Alexander; a daughter, Sara Thomason; and two grandchildren.
Ike Pappas
In Memory
Jerry Reed
Jerry Reed, a singer who became a good ol' boy actor in car chase movies like "Smokey and the Bandit," has died of complications from emphysema at 71.
As a singer in the 1970s and early 1980s, he had a string of hits that included "Amos Moses," "When You're Hot, You're Hot," "East Bound and Down" and "The Bird."
In the mid-1970s, he began acting in movies such as "Smokey and the Bandit" with Burt Reynolds, usually as a good ol' boy. But he was an ornery heavy in "Gator," directed by Reynolds, and a hateful coach in 1998's "The Waterboy," starring Adam Sandler.
Born in Atlanta, Reed learned to play guitar at age 8 when his mother bought him a $2 guitar and showed him how to play a G-chord.
He first established himself as a songwriter. Elvis Presley recorded two of his songs, "U.S. Male" and "Guitar Man" (both in 1968). He also wrote the hit "A Thing Called Love," which was recorded in 1972 by Johnny Cash. He also wrote songs for Brenda Lee, Tom Jones, Dean Martin, Nat King Cole and the Oak Ridge Boys.
He won a Grammy Award for "When You're Hot, You're Hot" in 1971. A year earlier, he shared a Grammy with Chet Atkins for their collaboration, "Me and Jerry." In 1992, Atkins and Reed won a Grammy for "Sneakin' Around."
Reed continued performing on the road into the late 1990s, doing about 80 shows a year.
Jerry Reed
In Memory
Don LaFontaine
Don LaFontaine, the man who popularized the catch phrase "In a world where..." and lent his voice to thousands of movie trailers, has died. He was 68. LaFontaine died Monday at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center from complications in the treatment of an ongoing illness, said Vanessa Gilbert, his agent.
LaFontaine made more than 5,000 trailers in his 33-year career while working for the top studios and television networks.
In a rare on-screen appearance in 2006, he parodied himself on a series of national television commercials for a car insurance company where he played himself telling a customer, "In a world where both of our cars were totally under water..."
LaFontaine went on to work in the promo industry in the early 1960s. As an audio engineer, he produced radio spots for movies with producer Floyd Peterson.
When an announcer didn't show up for a recording session in 1965, LaFontaine voiced his first narration, a promo for the film, "Gunfighters of Casa Grande." The client, Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, liked his performance.
LaFontaine remained active until recently, averaging seven to 10 voiceover sessions a day. He worked from a home studio his wife nicknamed "The Hole," where his fax machine delivered scripts.
LaFontaine is survived by his wife, the singer and actress Nita Whitaker, and three daughters.
Don LaFontaine
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