Beverly C. Lucey: History Lessons (irascibleprofessor.com)
It has been my experience that too many schools do not do history well. While the cliché is: those who do not study history are condemned to repeat it, public schools and their haphazard history texts are designed not to offend anyone. Therefore, they perpetuate the reality that: children who study history are doomed to keep reading about the same dang events.
Froma Harrop: "I Call You My Base" (creators.com)
President Bush's new budget will top $3 trillion. It envisions massive deficits for fiscal years 2008 and 2009 - nearly matching the record in 2004, when the federal budget went $412 billion into the hole. The average American might...
Susan Estrich: Lucky Fella (creators.com)
John McCain is one lucky guy. A funny thing happened to him on the way to the Republican nomination. He was forced to run as himself. He had no choice but to try to win without the support of the hard-core conservatives he initially set out to court.
Now that people can talk to their
cars, demanding Elvis Costello or where to turn left, I say it's time for
the Passenger Psychiatrist. You know, someone to have a conversation with who's
really interested in you and what you think and what your problems are. I think
drivers without passengers would turn off their radios and unplug their iPods in
order to have an intelligent conversation with their car. They'd end up
saying things they never say to real people who would be bored silly.
"Where you going?"
"To work.
"That's General Dynamics?"
"Yeah."
"Take the next left."
"God damn it."
"What's wrong?"
"I'm really pissed off."
"Why are you pissed off?"
"I hate my family."
"Tell me more about your family."
Nobody ever says "Tell me more about your family." Only your psychiatrist
and your car.
There's already a basic computer psychiatrist program, only 200 lines of
code, called Eliza that
only works in print. There's even a
sarcastic version. Make it talk, add vocal recognition and a shitload more
conversational possibilities, and you're off and running. Make RECORD the
default mode and people will say to each other, "Man, you gotta hear this talk I
had with my Toyota yesterday. It really gets where I'm coming from." They'll
sell Fords that include Dr. Phil as your default passenger. The worse the
traffic, the longer it takes to get to your destination, the more mentally
healthy you'll be when you arrive. You'll work out that problem you've always
had because of something your mother said to you when you were three. Buy a
Prius and get Ed Begley Jr. as your constant companion. Buy a Hummer and get Dr.
Ruth.
Big legal questions in the future. Can your car testify against you in
court and can getaway vehicles be arrested for aiding and abetting?
This is some complicated shit. I say cars get legal immunity, just like a
real psychiatrist. That way the Tony Sopranos of the world won't have to worry
about confessing who they wacked, unless someone else is in the car, in which
case, what the fuck, wack 'em. Believe me, there's gonna be big money to be made
in defending VW buses for distributing mushrooms.
You read it here first. Why aren't I rich? Send money.
Marian the Teacher was first, but wrong, guessing:
Based on all that he has written, I guess Bachelor Father. If it isn't, he is still a wonderful Dad!!
mj was second, and also wrong, writing:
But they say if onc can elimate a couple of obvious answers, one's chances get better.
Bachelor Father was a series with John Forsythe and teenager...hmmmmmm
Bachelor Mother was a theatrical bit with Debbie Reynolds.
The Bachelor's Bany wouldn't cover enough of his intersting issues.
I'll go with A. Because the the irony of it's truthfulness would escape the TV execs.
But, Sally nailed it, answering:
The made-for-TV-movie based on Michael Dare's life was, "D" or "The Bachelor's Baby."
PS Hey Vic, did you catch the piece on, "Leno" last night with your pal, "Karlos Borloff?" Brief but FUNNY. Think Ross Mathews did the piece look for the blog of Ross in Vegas covering a convention hawking "new shows" for TV. Yup, your friends were there, doing their thang. (Smile)
Please try to get your answers in by 9pm (pst) so I can start uploading - uploading takes (at least) a couple of hours with my crappy dial-up.
On a good night, the page is up by 12:30am (pst) - if it's a bad night, I quit around 3am (pst).
zEN mAN (observing my favorite fairies flitting about the political arena angering and embarassing the right wing war mongers with colorful humor and yes beauty...reminds me of the commie pinko flower children from the 60's)
Usually January and February is a terrible time for movies playing in the theater. All the good flicks peak in December to compete for the Oscars cut offs. So I find myself surfing the cable channels for old good and bad shit…..for instance…..Kirsten Dunst goes into re-hab and I watch "Elizabethtown" ……I see Paris Hilton get booted off the stage at a 50cent concert but I refuse to go see "The Hottie and the Nottie"….so I'm back on the bed/couch watching Cinemax and what do I see is playing next….
Popcorn in the microwave with a big glass of Welch's grape juice for the next 93 minutes!
Sometimes you're just not prepared for ……
What a Fucking Mess
It starts with the unlikely Cuba Gooding Jr. screwing his violent dead father's mistress/partner/stepmom (Helen Mirren) a cigarette afterwards (oh and she's dying of cancer too).
Then we get Stephen Dorff breaking a pool cue and shoving it up the spread eagled ass of an underling.
How about a condom covered Stephen Dorff doggying a fully nude bent over the pool table whore, and when being interrupted by people outside talking…. killing them all.
Vanessa Ferlito fingering herself to Cuba Gooding Jr's ass in the shower (she is pregnant with bad boy Dorff's baby and Cuba along with Mirren, is protecting her)
Macy Gray floating around totally stoned and semicomical.
Helen getting head in the garden.
Cuba behind the bare ass of an anonymous man/date before shooting him in the back of the head (this is Cuba's last hit for the "man")
I can't tell you about the final scene where there's a showdown between Dorff and Gooding Jr. and Ferlito and her young son…suffice is to say…not real deep !
If this movie sounds like a mess….it really is. I kept saying to myself "Why is Helen Mirren in this film…..she went on to receive an Emmy and a Golden Globe for her role in "Prime Suspects: Final Act (2006) and an Oscar for her Role in "The Queen" (2006).
Purple Gene gives "Shadowboxer" 4 filthy fucking full frontal nude shots out of 10 for being so boringly blatant and I've gotta say that Helen Mirren saved this movie from being just another late night Shannon Tweed tittie twister .
CBS starts the night with '60 Minutes', followed by the LIVE on the East Coast (tape-delayed & edited on the left coast) 'Grammy Awards'.
NBC opens the night with a RERUN'American Gladiators', followed by another RERUN'American Gladiators', then the FRESH'Top 100 Most Outrageous Moments'.
ABC begins the night with a FRESH'America's So-Called Funniest Home Videos', followed by a FRESH 2-hour 'Extreme Makeover: Home Edition', then a FRESH'Brothers & Sisters'.
The CW offers 'CW Now', followed by a RERUN'Everybody Hates Chris', then another RERUN'Everybody Hates Chris', followed by a RERUN'Aliens In America', then a RERUN'Girlfriends', followed by a RERUN'The Game'.
Faux has a RERUN'Are You Smarter Than A 5th Grader', followed by a RERUN'Simpsons', then a FRESH'King Of The Hill', followed by a RERUN hourlong 'Family Guy'.
MY has 'Married...With Children', followed by another 'Married...With Children', then the movie 'Austin Powers: International Man Of Mystery'.
A&E has 'The First 48', another 'The First 48', still another 'The First 48', and 'The Sopranos'.
AMC offers the movie 'Die Hard', followed by the movie 'Striking Distance', then a FRESH'Breaking Bad'.
BBC -
[12:00 PM] Doctor Who - Ep 3 Gridlock;
[1:00 PM] Torchwood - Episode 3;
[2:00 PM] Top Gear - Episode 4;
[3:00 PM] Ramsay's Kitchen Nightmares - Ep 3 The Priory;
[4:00 PM] Four Weddings and a Funeral;
[6:00 PM] Four Weddings and a Funeral;
[8:00 PM] The British Academy Film Awards;
[10:00 PM] The British Academy Film Awards;
[12:00 AM] The British Academy Film Awards;
[2:00 AM] Torchwood - Ep 3 To The Last Man;
[3:00 AM] Changing Rooms - Episode 1;
[3:30 AM] Changing Rooms - Episode 4;
[4:00 AM] Bargain Hunt - Ep. 35 Harrogate 42;
[4:30 AM] Bargain Hunt - Ep. 36 Oakington 58;
[5:00 AM] Cash in the Attic - Episode 9;
[5:30 AM] Cash in the Attic - Episode 8;
[6:00 AM] BBC World News. (ALL TIMES EDT)
Bravo has all 'Law & Order: Criminal Intent' all night.
Comedy Central has the movie 'Joe Dirt', followed by the movie 'Office Space', then the movie 'American Pie Presents: The Naked Mile'.
FX has the movie 'The Italian Job', followed by the movie 'Saving Private Ryan', then 'Nip/Tuck'.
History has 'Gangland', 'The Kennedy Assassination: Beyond Conspiracy', and 'UFO Files'.
IFC -
[06:15 AM] Love's Labour's Lost;
[08:00 AM] The Barbarian Invasions;
[09:45 AM] Wild Strawberries;
[11:20 AM] Kingdom Come;
[01:00 PM] Tapeheads;
[02:35 PM] Love's Labour's Lost;
[04:15 PM] Kingdom Come;
[06:00 PM] Tapeheads;
[07:35 PM] Human Nature;
[09:15 PM] Broken Lizard's Club Dread;
[11:00 PM] The Whitest Kids U'Know #201;
[11:30 PM] The Whitest Kids U'Know: The Best of Season One;
[12:00 AM] IFC News: 2008, Uncut;
[12:05 AM] Wonderland;
[02:00 AM] The Whitest Kids U'Know #201;
[02:30 AM] The Whitest Kids U'Know: The Best of Season One;
[03:00 AM] Broken Lizard's Club Dread;
[04:50 AM] The Barbarian Invasions. (ALL TIMES EST)
SciFi has the movie 'Jeepers Creepers II', followed by the movie 'Hallowed Ground'.
Sundance -
[05:30 AM] Assisted Living;
[07:00 AM] Open City;
[09:00 AM] Kasabian, Josh Groban & The Good The Bad and The Queen;
[10:00 AM] Emir Kusturica, A Tender Barbarian;
[11:00 AM] Howard Schultz + Norman Lear;
[12:00 PM] The Keys to the House;
[02:00 PM] Episode 2: Geoffrey's Return;
[03:00 PM] Episode 1;
[03:35 PM] Energy War;
[05:00 PM] Fuel;
[05:35 PM] Philip and His Seven Wives;
[06:45 PM] Alice et Martin;
[09:00 PM] Kasabian, Josh Groban & The Good The Bad and The Queen;
[10:00 PM] Vampyros Lesbos;
[11:30 PM] Comedy Short Cuts;
[12:00 AM] Shutter;
[01:40 AM] Assisted Living;
[03:00 AM] Episode 5;
[03:30 AM] Episode 2;
[04:00 AM] Episode 2;
[04:30 AM] Episode 3;
[05:00 AM] Butterfly. (ALL TIMES EST)
Tony Bennett poses with his wife Susan Crow, left, and his daughter Antonia Bennett at the MusiCares tribute to Aretha Franklin as they honor her as their person of the year, Friday night, Feb. 8, 2008, in Los Angeles.
Photo by Mark J. Terrill
"Queen of Soul" Aretha Franklin added another jewel to her illustrious musical crown on Friday night when she was honored at the annual MusiCares dinner, a Grammy-related event that raises money for musicians in need.
"There may be a debate about who is the president, but there is no debate on who is the queen," said civil rights leader Al Sharpton, one of many luminaries on hand to pay tribute to the 65-year-old Franklin.
The singer, who has garnered 17 Grammy Awards and the Presidential Medal of Freedom in a career spanning four decades, will perform this Sunday at the Grammy Awards, where she is also nominated for best gospel performance for a duet with Mary J. Blige.
A gourmet rat was the big cheese Friday, winning 10 Annie Awards, which recognize achievements in feature film and television animation.
Disney and Pixar's rodent tale "Ratatouille" won the award for best feature production, beating out DreamWorks' insect story "Bee Movie," Sony Pictures' penguin-powered "Surf's Up," Sony Pictures Classics' coming-of-age chronicle "Persepolis" and 20th Century Fox's "The Simpsons Movie."
Among "Ratatouille"'s awards were best writing and directing for Brad Bird, best voice acting for Ian Holm, best character animation, music, storyboarding, production design and best animated video game.
The Annie Awards are presented by The International Animated Film Society. The best-picture winner has gone on to win the Academy Award for animated feature every year but one since the Oscars added the category in 2001. Last year's Annie winner, the Disney-Pixar auto-racing comedy "Cars," lost at the Oscars to the penguin musical "Happy Feet."
Dave Koz (L) and Angie Stone (3rd L) perform with Dan Aykroyd and Jim Belushi (R) as The Blues Brothers during the 2008 MusiCares Person of the Year dinner and concert in honor of Aretha Franklin in Los Angeles February 8, 2008.
Photo by Danny Moloshok
A swimsuit left at a Swedish pool by Australian movie star Nicole Kidman was sold on Saturday at auction to buy cows for poor families in India.
"The swimsuit went to the highest bidder for 16,200 kronor (2,500 dollars, 1,720 euros). That's enough to buy nine cows," the suit's previous owner Zlatko Nedanovski, 32, told AFP.
Last Wednesday, a day into the week-long auction, Nedanovski said he hoped to raise enough to buy five cows, or around 9,000 kronor, as part of a project run by the Swedish aid organisation Erikshjaelpen.
If Barack Obama becomes the next US president he will surely be assassinated, British Nobel literature laureate Doris Lessing predicted in a newspaper interview published here Saturday.
Obama, who is vying to become the first black president in US history, "would certainly not last long, a black man in the position of president. They would murder him," Lessing, 88, told the Dagens Nyheter daily.
Lessing, who won the 2007 Nobel Literature Prize, said it might be better if Obama's Democratic rival Hillary Clinton were to succeed in her bid to become the first woman president of the United States.
"The best thing would be if they (Clinton and Obama) were to run together. Hillary is a very sharp lady. It might be calmer if she were to win, and not Obama," she said.
In the animated video for They Might Be Giants' song "One Everything," a singing globe helps a little boy deal with his overwhelmingly messy room by invoking the unity of the omniverse: "If you go out and count up everything, it all adds up to one."
The song is from TMBG's new children's release, "Here Come the 123s," but it plays with the kind of braininess that has attracted loyal adult fans -- many now parents -- to the duo of John Flansburgh and John Linnell throughout their 25-year alternative-rock career.
Success in the kids' market, however, has fed rather than replaced the band's adult music output, and Linnell says he and Flansburgh take a nearly identical musical approach for both audiences. "A lot of parents want their kids to like the same thing they like, so they're pushing this stuff on the kid and the kids are going along with it," he says.
Comedian Bill Cosby performs during the 2008 MusiCares Person of the Year dinner and concert in honor of Aretha Franklin in Los Angeles February 8, 2008.
Photo by Danny Moloshok
When British violinist Tasmin Little announced in January that she would be giving away her "Naked Violin" album as a free download, she tapped into a growing trend: classical music artists and retailers utilizing digital formats and business models.
Since the album features Little performing the works of such little-known composers as Ysaye and Paul Patterson, listeners were unlikely to "buy it on the off-chance," Little says. But the response to the free download, she says, has been "phenomenal."
Thousands of tracks have been downloaded, and monthly page impressions on Little's Web site have increased from 5,000 to 150,000 since the announcement.
After the Sunday service in Westminster Chapel, where worshippers were exhorted to wage "the culture war" in the World War II spirit of Sir Winston Churchill, cabbie James McLean delivered his verdict on Charles Darwin's theory of evolution.
"Evolution is a lie, and it's being taught in schools as fact, and it's leading our kids in the wrong direction," said McLean, chatting outside the chapel. "But now people like Ken Ham are tearing evolution to pieces."
Ken Ham is the founder of Answers in Genesis, a Kentucky-based organization that is part of an ambitious effort to bring creationist theory to Britain and the rest of Europe. McLean is one of a growing number of evangelicals embracing that message - that the true history of the Earth is told in the Bible, not Darwin's "The Origin of Species."
Europeans have long viewed the conflict between evolutionists and creationists as primarily an American phenomenon, but it has recently jumped the Atlantic Ocean with skirmishes in Italy, Germany, Poland and, notably, Britain, where Darwin was born and where he published his 1859 classic.
Darwin's defenders are fighting back. In October, the 47-nation Council of Europe, a human rights watchdog, condemned all attempts to bring creationism into Europe's schools. Bible-based theories and "religious dogma" threaten to undercut sound educational practices, it charged.
Canadian singer and director Neil Young poses during a photocall to present the film 'CSNY: Deja Vu' running at the 58th Berlinale International Film Festival in Berlin February 8, 2008. The 58th Berlinale, one of the world's most prestigious film festivals, will run from February 7 to 17 in the German capital.
Photo by Hannibal Hanschke
Mediation talks collapsed between Tim Burton and his ex-girlfriend, who claims she was cheated out of her rights to assets that the director promised her during their nearly decade-long relationship, attorneys said.
Lisa Marie, a former Calvin Klein model, met Burton at a club in 1991 and went on to star in several of his movies while the couple lived together. Burton broke up with her nearly 10 years later.
In December 2006, Marie sued Burton, saying he promised her that they would "combine their efforts and earnings and would share equally any and all" accumulated property. The lawsuit also claimed that Burton said he would financially support her for the rest of her life.
After the split, Marie said she consulted with an attorney who told her she would have little chance of prevailing in a palimony suit, the lawsuit said. Marie claims the lawyer colluded with Burton and persuaded her to enter into contracts with the director that deprived her of her rights.
Comedian George Lopez points to the crows as he walks the fourth fairway during the third round of the AT&T Pebble Beach National Pro-Am golf tournament at the Pebble Beach Golf Links in Pebble Beach, Calif., Saturday, Feb. 9, 2008.
Photo by Marcio Jose Sanchez
The Warsaw Uprising Museum has acquired a collection of rare World War II-era postcards, stamps and letters from Polish insurgents who fought their Nazi occupiers during the Warsaw Uprising.
Included in the 123 items are postage stamps printed by insurgents with seals made from potatoes, and letters and postcards that describe the fighters' plight. Some of the letters had never been opened.
During fierce fighting, the insurgents - largely ill-armed teenagers - organized a postal service to help city residents get information to relatives who were often cut off by the street-to-street fighting that erupted in Warsaw on August 1, 1944, and raged for 63 days.
Some 250,000 civilians were killed in the revolt, which was waged in the hope of liberating the capital from the Nazis. Ultimately, though, it was crushed, the survivors were deported to concentration camps and the city razed.
A supporter of Democratic presidential candidate US Senator Hillary Clinton (D-NY) attends a town hall meeting at University of Puget Sound in Tacoma, Washington February 8, 2008.
Photo by Jim Young
International Falls is officially the "Icebox of the Nation."
The city on the Canadian border had been fighting the ski town of Fraser, Colo., for the legal right to the trademark. International Falls claimed victory this week when the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office sent the city attorney a certificate granting the community Reg. No. 3,375,139.
"I ran over to the attorney's office and kissed the certificate," Mayor Shawn Mason said Friday. "Fraser's actions had sent a chill down my spine."
Mason said more was at stake than bragging rights. She said International Falls has used the icebox title to market itself to industry as the nation's premier site for cold-weather testing.
Verita Bouvaire Thompson, the reputed longtime mistress and confidante of Humphrey Bogart, has died. She was 89.
Thompson died of natural causes at JoEllen Smith Living Center on Feb. 1, according to her boyfriend, Dean Shapiro, a 58-year-old New Orleans writer.
In 1982, Thompson wrote a revelatory book called "Bogie and Me: A Love Story" in which she described a 14-year secret love affair with Bogart that overlapped his marriage to Lauren Bacall. Subsequent Bogart biographies corroborated her story.
She was described as Bogart's "toupee-minder, bartender, boat-mate, traveling companion, confidante, adviser and mistress," in Jeffrey Meyers' biography "Bogart: A Life in Hollywood."
Born in 1918 in Nogales, Arizona, Thompson was raised by her paternal grandparents and lived most of her youth in northern Mexico. After being named runner-up in the 1935 Miss Arizona Pageant, she moved to Hollywood and got a small part in a Western film before taking up residence in Mexico City where she studied wig making.
She found work as a hairstylist in Hollywood and worked for Gary Cooper, Charles Boyer, George Raft and Ray Milland.
When the affair began, Bogart was married to actress Mayo Methot and Thompson to her first husband, Robert Peterson, Shapiro said. He said the clandestine affair lasted until Thompson's marriage to cinematographer Walter Thompson in 1955, overlapping Bogart's marriage to Bacall. Bogart died in 1957.
Later, she entered the restaurant business and opened Verita's La Cantina on Sunset Boulevard in Hollywood and followed that with several other restaurants. She moved to Natchez, Mississippi, in the late 1980s and began living in New Orleans in the 1990s, where she opened a piano bar in the French Quarter called "Bogie and Me."
Humboldt penguins stand in their quarantined enclosure in Mexico City's Chapultepec Zoo February 8, 2008. Higashiyama Zoo in Nagoya, Japan donated five penguins to the zoo, which are being kept for routine quarantine checks before being displayed to the public.
Photo by Daniel Aguilar
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How about a favorite TV show, movie, book, play, cartoon, or legal amusement?
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