Recommended Reading
from Bruce
Paul Krugman: Where Government Excels (NY Times)
Americans aren't saving enough for retirement, and Social Security isn't currently big enough to fill the gap. So why not make it bigger?
Andrew Tobias: I Want One
This will be the first time I pay more than $50 for a watch in my whole life. (Charles, as you may recall my telling you, had a watch that cost THREE HUNDRED dollars . . . wait for it . . . wait for it . . . wait for it . . . to clean! Which he had to do every year or two. And is why he was the fashion designer and I was the guy telling you to buy cans of tuna in bulk on sale.
M. Asher Cantrell: 6 Songs That Were Decades Ahead of 'Groundbreaking' Music (Cracked)
Most great bands are considered revolutionary in some sense: You wouldn't expect anyone in the 60s to sound like Radiohead or Nine Inch Nails, just like you wouldn't expect anyone in the '30s to sound like The Beatles. That's why the songs on this list are so bizarre to listen to; they were so far ahead of the curve that their genres weren't even invented yet.
Adrian Deevoy: Beach Boy Brian Wilson: 'Punk rock? I don't know what that is' (Guardian)
The legendary musician on the Beach Boys biopic Love & Mercy, incontinent dogs - and why 70s music really wasn't his bag.
Danny Leigh: "Ryan Gosling: 'If I had to shake it like a showgirl, I was going to do it'" (Guardian)
Hollywood's most-memed star began his career as a Disney Mouseketeer to avoid a future of factory work. A year after his directorial debut was panned at Cannes, he explains how he coped with the critics - and why Lost River was inspired by his friendless childhood and his parents' divorce.
CECILIA CAPUZZI SIMON: Why Writers Love to Hate the M.F.A. (NY Times)
"Before," he says, "I had no contacts in the literary world, no sense of the process a book must go through, no ability to discuss the craft of literature, and on a day-to-day basis, no time to dedicate myself to it. At N.Y.U., I got those things." At the same time, he harbors no illusions about the road ahead. "I definitely need employment very soon," he says. "Do you know of anything?"
David Bruce's Amazon Author Page
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David Bruce has over 80 Kindle books on Amazon.com.
, wrote:
said:
has returned to semi-retired status.
Reader Suggestion
Michelle in AZ
From The Creator of 'Avery Ant'
from Marc Perkel
BartCop
Hello Bartcop fans,
As you all know the untimely passing of Terry was unexpected, even by
him. We all knew he had cancer but we all thought he had some years
left. So some of us who have worked closely with him over the years are
scrambling around trying to figure out what to do. My job, among other
things, is to establish communications with the Bartcop community and
provide email lists and groups for those who might put something
together. Those who want to play an active roll in something coming from
this, or if you are one of Bart's pillars, should send an email to
active@bartcop.com.
Bart's final wish was to pay off the house mortgage for Mrs. Bart who is
overwhelmed and so very grateful for the support she has received.
Anyone wanting to make a donation can click on this the yellow donate
button on bartcop.com
But - I need you all to help keep this going. This note
isn't going to directly reach all of Bart's fans. So if you can repost
it on blogs and discussion boards so people can sign up then when we
figure out what's next we can let more people know. This list is just
over 600 but like to get it up to at least 10,000 pretty quick. So
here's the signup link for this email list.
( mailman.bartcop.com/listinfo/bartnews )
Marc Perkel
Selected Readings
from that Mad Cat, JD
In The Chaos Household
Last Night
Sunny and warmer than seasonal.
Hollywood Bookkeeping
Richard Dreyfuss
Over 20 years after the comedy came out, the Oscar winner wants his accountants to take a look at the studio's books to see what he could be owed - and he's taking the House of Mouse to court over their refusal. What About Bob co-star Richard Dreyfuss today sued Walt Disney Pictures for breach of contract and other claims over the defendants not letting the firm of Robinson & Company do an audit for him and the widow of Turner & Hooch producer Raymond Wagner, who also wants a look at Disney's ledgers.
"Based on information and belief, Disney refused to let Robinson Inc. perform these audits on behalf of Christine Wagner and Richard Dreyfuss because Robinson Inc. is a particularly effective and aggressive auditor who is usually able to achieve large recoveries for its clients," says the jury-seeking filing (read it here) over why they think Disney won't let the auditors see their ledgers on the 1991 and 1989 pics.
Dreyfuss, Wagner and Robinson & Company are also very blunt about how studios try to push "talent," as the lawsuit says, to handle things in private arbitration and not lawsuits like theirs. Some don't even dare go that route to pursue potential funds for fear of "the implied threat of a blackball," the complaint says. "It's a one-sided world where corporations assert their control over talent who do not have the leverage to otherwise protect themselves," Dreyfuss, Wagner and Robinson & Company say. Obviously the Jaws star has decided he does have the leverage to try to chew into what's his. Though it's a long wait - remarkably, today's filing claims that there is a 3-year waiting list to do an audit on Disney properties.
Richard Dreyfuss
Not A Puti Fan
Garry Kasparov
Chess champion Garry Kasparov outplayed nearly everyone in the world for 22 years. Today the Russian grandmaster is taking on his most formidable opponent, President Vladimir Putin.
"Putin's Russia is a virus. You don't engage the virus, you have to contain it," he told me.
Kasparov is one of four debaters Friday night in Toronto questioning the West's response to Russia: 'engage or isolate?'
He's been fiercely critical of the west's "failure" to effectively take on Putin. He likens the Russian leader's political tactics and power to Adolf Hitler's in the years leading up to the Second World War.
"Putin has his finger tip on a nuclear button," says Kasparov. "The only thing he cares about today is staying in power, and staying in power for him means he must demonstrate himself as the only saviour of Russia."
Garry Kasparov
Recreates Prehistoric Paintings
France
Jean-Marie Chauvet noticed air whistling out from a crack on a plateau in southern France, so he and fellow cave enthusiasts went to investigate. What they found that Sunday in 1994 still fills Chauvet's voice with wonder: an immense cave covered with prehistoric paintings of horses, mammoths and rhinos - paintings so vivid, he says, it felt like the Stone Age artists had just moments ago put down their ochre and walked away.
The discovery of the long-hidden artwork created a sensation, but the site was quickly closed to the public. Just by breathing, tourists could erode the images.
Since most modern humans will never get to see the masterpieces in what is widely known as the Chauvet Cave, scientists, artists and the French government have spent 56 million euros (about $60 million) and several years creating the next best thing: a near-exact replica of the cave about two kilometers (1.2 miles) away, including more than 400 paintings of horses, bears, rhinoceros and mammoths, hand prints and carvings. Experts even recreated stalactites and stalagmites from the original site, as well as the cool temperatures and thick smell of humidity.
French President Francois Hollande unveiled the site Friday, and it opens to the public later this month.
France
Disputed Play
Shakespeare
A play called "Double Falsehood" published in 1728 by a man who claimed it was based on a lost Shakespeare play but has long been dismissed as a forgery may indeed be the real deal.
University of Texas researchers have unveiled a sophisticated new study of "Double Falsehood" that used text-analyzing software that helped create a "psychological signature" of the playwright.
"I am quite confident that Shakespeare had a direct hand in writing 'Double Falsehood.' Put me down for 97 percent confident," University of Texas social psychologist James Pennebaker, co-author of the study published in the journal Psychological Science, said on Friday.
"Double Falsehood" was published by Shakespeare expert Lewis Theobald, who said it was based on Shakespearean manuscripts later destroyed in a fire. Many experts considered it an original work by Theobald that he sought to pass off as Shakespearean. The lost play is thought to be "The History of Cardenio."
Recent scholarship has reopened the debate. In 2010, Nottingham University literary expert Brean Hammond said he was convinced the play was Shakespearean.
Shakespeare
Mystery Moneymen
Teddy Cruz
A Texas billionaire who moved his residence to Puerto Rico after its island government carved out a lucrative new tax haven for wealthy U.S. investors is a prime fundraiser for a network of super-PACs backing Texas Sen. Ted Cruz for president, according to sources close to Cruz's campaign.
Toby Neugebauer, the co-founder of Quantum Energy Partners, a Houston-based private equity firm, and the son of a Texas congressman, is playing a key role as donor and fundraiser for an unusual super-PAC arrangement that grabbed attention in political circles this week for raking in $31 million within a few days of being formed - an unprecedented haul for a new presidential candidate, the sources said.
In papers filed with the Federal Election Commission early this week, and first reported by Bloomberg, four separate super-PACs - all with variations on the name "Keep the Promise" - were registered to back Cruz's candidacy. "The PACs will operate as a single team with one ultimate goal," Dathan Voelter, an Austin lawyer who registered three of the committees and listed himself as their treasurer, told Yahoo News in an email.
So far, little is known about who is behind the super-PACs, and Voelter declined to discuss the identities of any donors, noting that the committees are not required to make any disclosures until mid-July.
But sources familiar with the arrangement identified two key players, both with close ties to Cruz. One is David Panton, an Atlanta-based private equity manager who was Cruz's college roommate at Princeton, his classmate at Harvard Law School and later his business partner in a Caribbean holding company registered in the British Virgin Islands and operating out of Kingston, Jamaica.
Teddy Cruz
Judge Orders Arrest Warrant For Justin Bieber
Argentina
An Argentine judge has issued an arrest warrant for Justin Bieber on Friday, saying the singer failed to respond to summons related to allegations he ordered bodyguards to attack a photographer in 2013.
Judge Alberto Julio Banos ordered the "immediate detention" of Bieber and bodyguards Hugo Alcides Hesny and Terrence Reche Smalls.
Bieber is accused of sending the bodyguards to attack photographer Diego Pesoa outside a Buenos Aires nightclub. Bieber never returned to Argentina to respond to questions about the incident.
Under Argentine law, Bieber would face from one month to six years in prison if convicted on a charge of causing injuries.
Argentina
Yeah, Sounds Like Burglary To Me
Arthur Baldwin
A U.S. Secret Service officer was arrested by police in Washington on Friday for allegedly trying to break into the home of a woman while carrying a handgun, according to a police report.
The officer, Arthur Baldwin, was charged with destruction of property and burglary, said D.C. Metropolitan Police Department spokeswoman Gwendolyn Crump.
Baldwin, 28, damaged the windows and back door of a 23-year-old woman's apartment in Southeast Washington while off duty shortly after midnight, the police report said.
The Washington Post reported that Baldwin's ex-girlfriend lived in the apartment.
Baldwin was carrying a 357 caliber handgun, according to the police report.
Arthur Baldwin
Sons Sentenced
Mellencamps
A judge has sentenced the sons of rock star John Mellencamp after they both pleaded guilty to misdemeanour battery charges stemming from a July 2013 altercation.
The Herald-Times reports 19-year-old Speck Mellencamp was sentenced to four days in jail and 20-year-old Hud Mellencamp must serve 50 hours community service. They entered the pleas Friday after the charges were reduced from felonies. They allegedly punched and kicked a 19-year-old man in Bloomington who they believed had hit Speck Mellencamp.
Both also were sentenced to one year of probation.
Monroe County Chief Deputy Prosecutor Bob Miller said the charges were downgraded because medical records did not substantiate "serious bodily injury" as charged in the felony cases.
The Mellencamps' mother, model Elaine Irwin, attended the hearing, but their father did not.
Mellencamps
Levels Increase Near Fracking Sites
Radon
Levels of cancer-causing radon have reportedly been on the rise in Pennsylvania ever since fracking picked up in the state.
Researchers at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health say there is an alarming correlation between the unusually high levels of the colorless, odorless radioactive gas indoors and hydraulic fracturing, or fracking.
While pursuing her PhD, environmental health scientist Joan Casey and her colleagues at Bloomberg wanted to determine the sources of radon in Pennsylvania homes.
"We decided to do the study because historically Pennsylvania has had this big radon problem. We were doing house studies in the state for about the past decade. When the unconventional natural gas industry moved into the state, people were concerned," Casey said in an interview with Yahoo News.
Radon
Fox Ending Seasonal DVD Production
'The Simpsons'
The Simpsons, which debuted in 1990, is the longest-running scripted show in TV history.
But seasonal DVDs of the animated sitcom are being discontinued as Fox Home Entertainment instead shifts distribution of The Simpsons to digital platforms.
Series showrunner Al Jean on Wednesday told fans on his Twitter account that Fox Home Entertainment is ending production of DVDs for the series. "I personally am [very] sorry to see DVDs discontinued. We did them purely for the love of hearing ourselves talk," Jean tweeted.
A distribution source close to the series confirmed seasons of The Simpsons will no longer be released on DVD now that nearly every episode of the animated sitcom is available online at the touch of a button. "There's so much happening in the digital space, it made more sense to focus on that," the source said.
'The Simpsons'
Discovery Paves Way
Liquid Metal
It may look like nothing more than a small ball of metal, but the shape-shifting and self-propulsion abilities of a liquid metal alloy discovered by scientists at China's Tsinghua University has captured the imaginations of scientists and science-fiction fans across the world.
Professor Liu Jing and his team have created what they believe could prove the first step toward developing a robot similar to the infamous T-1000 shape-shifting, liquid metal assassin from the Terminator movies.
The device is made from a drop of metal alloy consisting mostly of gallium, which is a liquid at just under 30 degrees Celsius. Last year they discovered that an applied electrical current causes the gallium alloy to drastically alter its shape. Changing the voltage applied to the metal allowed it to 'shape-shift' into different formations. When the current was switched off, the metal returned to its original drop shape.
But the team made their biggest breakthrough when they realized that bringing it into contact with a flake of aluminium caused a reaction creating hydrogen bubbles that allowed it to move of its own accord. Liu said it was able to 'fuel' itself for about an hour.
Liquid Metal
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