Recommended Reading
from Bruce
David Bruce: Wise Up! Education (Athens News)
Movies can have a major effect on private life. For example, Cary Grant starred in many romantic movies. According to movie critic Pauline Kael, boys of her day learned from Cary Grant's movies, His characters were always suave when they went on dates with women, and she remembers, "Every boy became a better date."
Robert Reich: The Limping Middle Class (greatrecessionconspiracy; scroll down)
The 5 percent of Americans with the highest incomes now account for 37 percent of all consumer purchases, according to the latest research from Moody's Analytics. That should come as no surprise. Our society has become more and more unequal.
Paul Krugman's Blog: The Peasants are Revolting (New York Times)
Look, I don't want to wax all sentimental about the genius of the common man. But the fact is that both the origins of this crisis and its perpetuation overwhelmingly reflect the errors of the very people now lamenting the annoyances of democracy that keep them from imposing their preferred policies.
Noam Chomsky: The Responsibility of Intellectuals, Redux (Boston Review)
Using Privilege to Challenge the State.
Froma Harrop: Beware Easy 'Fixes' for Entitlement Programs (Creators Syndicate)
Please, everyone, stop monkeying around with Social Security and Medicare. We mean you, Republicans, and you, Democrats. No one's saying that Social Security can't be slightly recalibrated to keep the program on a sound footing or that significant savings can't be found in Medicare waste. We're saying that if Americans are not vigilant, these programs can be undermined by seemingly small "fixes."
Andrew Tobias: First Day of School
"Let me speak for all public school educators when I say unequivocally … send us your poor, send us your homeless, the children of your afflicted and addicted. Send us your kids who don't speak English. Send us your special-needs children, we will not turn them away." - John Kuhn, Superintendent of Perrin-Whitt School District in Texas
J.C. Sciaccotta: "Living the Blues: An Interview with Todd Rundgren" (PopMatters)
I've worked with a lot of acts that weren't able to survive the long haul of the music business. … they never achieved the success that everybody expected. And often, it's just because you get involved with the wrong kind of label ... a label who puts their priorities elsewhere when it's time to promote your record, and squanders the opportunity. Then you wind up, years and years later, on some critic's Top Ten list, long after it could have done any good.
David Lynch's strange new influence on underground music (Guardian)
Tim Jonze talks to the pop musicians who cite the director's unsettling films as a key influence, and asks: will this be the autumn of David Lynch?
David Bruce has 42 Kindle books on Amazon.com with 250 anecdotes in each book. Each book is $1, so for $42 you can buy 10,500 anecdotes. Search for "Funniest People," "Coolest People, "Most Interesting People," "Kindest People," "Religious Anecdotes," "Maximum Cool," and "Resist Psychic Death."
wrote:
answered:
Reader Suggestions
Michelle in AZ
From The Creator of 'Avery Ant'
Selected Readings
from that Mad Cat, JD
In The Chaos Household
Last Night
Hot. Humid. Unpleasant.
Class OF 2011
Kennedy Center
The good times never seemed so good for Neil Diamond.
Known for his songs that have become anthems at ballparks and bars, Diamond was chosen Wednesday to receive the Kennedy Center Honors this year along with some of the biggest names from Broadway, jazz, classical music and Hollywood.
Diamond will be honored with Broadway singer Barbara Cook, cellist Yo-Yo Ma, saxophonist Sonny Rollins and actress Meryl Streep for their contributions to American culture through the arts. President Barack Obama will salute the artists and others will perform in their honor at a ceremony at the Kennedy Center on Dec. 4. CBS will broadcast the show Dec. 27.
Diamond said he used to get distracted when people sang along with him to hits like "Sweet Caroline," which was written for presidential daughter Caroline Kennedy who hosts the show.
"But I realized pretty quickly that it was a compliment, and I had no choice in the matter anyway, so I got with the program and just learned to love it," said Diamond, who earlier this year was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. He said he's planning another U.S. tour next summer after performing abroad recently.
Kennedy Center
Rps Media
Jon Stewart
Fresh from vacation, "The Daily Show" host Jon Stewart finally weighed in on the petty debate over the scheduling of President Obama's jobs speech -- the one that would have been held Wednesday night but was moved to Thursday at the request of House Majority Leader John Boehner.
Playing clips in which talking heads said Obama had caved to Republicans, Stewart offered another possibility: He had made a reasonable accommodation. But conflict-hungry reporters could never accept such a thing, he said.
"See, this is why I hate the 24-hour news cycle. Well, among the reasons," Stewart said. "They've turned our Tale of Reasonable Accommodation into a Tale of Manufactured Conflict."
Correspondent John Oliver explained why the decision about whether to watch the speech or the debate would have been harder than "Sophie's Choice."
You can see clips of both Stewart and Oliver here:
Jon Stewart
New Monument
Les Paul
Music legend Les Paul is getting a new granite memorial to mark his gravesite in southeast Wisconsin.
His family and friends are planning a public dedication ceremony on Saturday at his grave at Prairie Home Cemetery, Waukesha.
The Les Paul Estate commissioned Rock of Ages of Vermont to design, build and install the 500 square foot granite monument. Ford Construction of Waukesha laid the foundation and New Eden Landscape Architecture of Milwaukee designed the landscaping.
The site will include granite slabs containing Paul's biography.
Les Paul
Donates Instruments
Jazz at Lincoln Center
Members of the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra are in Cuba for the second time in a year, this time to distribute a planeload of instruments to promising young musicians at four Havana schools.
The Horns for Havana project grew out of a much higher profile visit to Cuba last year that was headlined by Jazz at Lincoln Center legend Wynton Marsalis.
Carlos Henriquez, a composer and arranger for the New York-based troupe who organized the project, said Wednesday that he and other musicians on the earlier trip were deeply affected by the talented young musicians they met but disturbed by their lack of good instruments.
Many of the youths had broken or worn-out instruments, including guitars without strings, trumpets without valves and violins with cracked wood.
This timed, Henriquez and other musicians brought enough equipment for four complete acoustic jazz orchestras. They valued the instruments at $250,000.
Jazz at Lincoln Center
Hosting Lifetime's "Project Accessory"
Molly Sims
Model and former "Las Vegas" star Molly Sims will host Lifetime's new competition series "Project Accessory," Lifetime announced Wednesday.
The eight-episode, hour-long series will find 12 aspiring artists vying to break new ground in the world of accessories.
Lifestyle expert Eva Lorenzotti will serve as mentor, and designer Kenneth Cole and InStyle editor Ariel Foxman will fill the judges' posts.
"Project Accessory" will premiere later this year, following "Project Runway All Stars."
Molly Sims
Hit By Car
Reese Witherspoon
Actress Reese Witherspoon was struck by a car while jogging near Los Angeles on Wednesday morning and suffered minor injuries.
Santa Monica police Sgt. Richard Lewis says the Oscar-winning actress was hit by a car driven by an 84-year-old woman.
Witherspoon was jogging in an unmarked crosswalk in Santa Monica when the driver struck her at about 20 mph (32 kph). The 35-year-old actress was taken to a local hospital for treatment.
Lewis says the driver was cited for failing to yield to a pedestrian in a crosswalk.
Reese Witherspoon
Hospital News
Andrea Mitchell
Andrea Mitchell, NBC's chief foreign affairs correspondent and wife of former Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan, said on her TV program on Wednesday that she has breast cancer.
"I had planned to be hiking in Wyoming last week, but instead discovered that I am now among the one in eight women in this country -- incredibly, one in eight -- who have had breast cancer," she announced at the end of "Andrea Mitchell Reports" on MSNBC.
Mitchell, 64, reported the cancer was found during a recent annual screening and had been caught in its early stages.
Andrea Mitchell
Ex-Playmate Gets 9 Years
Angela Dorian
A former Playboy Playmate of the Year who appeared in the horror movie "Rosemary's Baby" has been sentenced to nine years in state prison for shooting her husband in the back at their Hollywood apartment.
Los Angeles County prosecutors say 66-year-old Victoria Rathgeb was sentenced Wednesday. She pleaded no contest to attempted voluntary manslaughter.
Authorities say Rathgeb shot and wounded her husband last October during an argument. Prosecutors say he recovered and was in court for the sentencing but did not make a statement.
Rathgeb was 1968's Playmate of the Year under the name of Angela Dorian. She had TV and movie roles in the 1960s and 1970s and played a recovering heroin addict in the 1968 hit "Rosemary's Baby."
Angela Dorian
Apologizes For Racist Video
Fox Sports
It's a good thing for Fox that it already locked up a 12-year deal to broadcast Pac-12 sporting events since one of its cable networks may have just offended a large segment of the conference's student body.
Comedian Bob Oschack, in a segment filmed for Fox-owned Fuel TV, sought to "welcome" Colorado and Utah to the newly expanded conference.
His version of an "All-American welcome" consisted of finding Asian students at USC, which sports the conference's signature football program, and having them stumble through their welcomes.
Oschack appears to have only sought out Asian students who do not follow sports and speak English as a secondary language. And his tone is unmistakingly mocking. For example, one student thought that when Oschack said "Utah" he actually said "you talk." Others had difficulty even understanding the directions.
Fox Sports
Members Rake In Health Money
Debt cCommission
Doctors, drugmakers, hospitals and health insurers have spent millions over the years wooing lawmakers who now are on the powerful congressional panel charged with finding a formula to control deficits and debt, a new analysis finds.
Those very same industries would get hit hard if the supercommittee succeeds.
The industry campaign contributions, compiled by the nonpartisan Center for Responsive Politics, reinforce doubts that the 12-member panel will issue a sweeping plan to curb federal spending, an equation that can't be solved without major Medicare and Medicaid cuts.
The analysis found that health professionals - a category dominated by doctors - rank among the top 10 sources of campaign dollars for all but two of the panel's members.
Debt cCommission
Show Boots Contestants After Background Checks
Simon Cowell
Crime doesn't pay on Simon Cowell's most recent game show. At least, not anymore, it doesn't.
British network ITV, which broadcasts the Cowell-developed series "Red or Black?" confirmed to TheWrap that it has dropped three contestants, after it was discovered that the show's first big winner had served time for assaulting a man.
Nathan Hageman, who won 1 million British pounds (roughly $1.6 million) on the series September 3, served 2 1/2 years for assaulting another man, British newspaper the Sun reports.
Hageman was allowed to keep his winnings, but in response to the publicity generated by Hagemen's story, ITV has taken a second look at the current contestants' background checks.
Apparently, ITV didn't like what it found, because the network chose to have three competitors taken out of the game.
Simon Cowell
Judge OK's Neighbor's Noise Suit
Madonna
Madonna has lost a bid to get rid of a neighbor's lawsuit claiming the superstar made a racket by using her New York City apartment as a rehearsal studio.
A judge turned down Madonna's request to dismiss the suit. Her publicist and lawyer didn't immediately respond to requests for comment Wednesday, after the Aug. 24 decision was reported in the New York Law Journal.
Karen George says Madonna's dance and exercise routines subjected neighbors to "blaring music, stomping and shaking walls" for up to three hours a day. Madonna took steps to dampen the sound in 2009, but George says they didn't work.
The judge says the dispute warrants a trial.
Madonna
Celine Dion
A 36-year-old man has been charged after he allegedly broke into singer Celine Dion's home near Montreal, raided the fridge and even took the time to pour himself a bath, police said Tuesday.
He was nabbed by police in the Montreal suburb of Laval on Monday afternoon after the alarm system went off.
The international pop superstar and her husband, Rene Angelil, were not at home at the time. Dion and Angelil usually live in Florida but use the Laval residence when they come home to Quebec.
Laval police spokesman Franco Di Genova said the suspect was getting ready to take a nice hot bath when police arrived with a canine unit.
Celine Dion
Nick Jonas To Replace
Daniel Radcliffe
Nick Jonas is heading back to the Great White Way.
The Jonas Brothers guitarist, who lately has been returning to his stage roots in productions of "Les Miserables" and "Hairspray," has signed on for the lead role in the Broadway Production of "How to Succeed in Show Business Without Really Trying."
The tween sensation made the announcement on his Twitter account Wednesday, writing, "It's official. I'm coming back to Broadway ... So excited and honored to play the role of J. Pierrepont Finch in 'How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying' next year!"
Jonas will inherit the role of the ambitious window-washer from "Harry Potter" star Daniel Radcliffe, who assumed the part in March and will vacate the revival of the show on January 1. According to MTV, Jonas will begin his run in the part on January 24 and hold the gig until July 1 of next year. "Glee" star Darren Criss will serve as interim star in the production between Radcliffe and Jonas.
Daniel Radcliffe
Astronauts Tracks & Trash
New Moon Photos
A spacecraft circling the moon has snapped the sharpest photos ever of the tracks and trash left behind by Apollo astronauts in their visits from 1969 to 1972.
Images taken by NASA's Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter from 13 to 15 miles up show the astronauts' paths when they walked on the moon, as well as ruts left by a moon buggy. Experts could even identify the backpacks astronauts pitched out of their lunar landers before they returned to Earth.
The pictures were taken two weeks ago and show the landing sites for Apollo 12, 14 and 17. The closest images are of the 1972 Apollo 17 site, the last moon mission.
Two years ago, images from the same spacecraft from 30 and 60 miles out showed fuzzier images. But this year the orbiter dipped down to take about 300,000 more close-ups. The trails left by the astronauts are clear, but the places where backpacks were discarded, Apollo 17's moon buggy, and the bottom parts of the three lunar landers are blurry.
New Moon Photos
Starving Dogs
Revenge
Seven dogs starved of food and water for two weeks are suspected of eating their Indonesian owner after he returned to his hometown in Manado from a holiday, local media reported on Tuesday.
A neighborhood guard was curious when he saw luggage lined up at the front of Andre Lumboga's house, days after the 50-year old arrived back home. He approached the house, smelled something foul and called the police, according to a report.
"His skull was found in the kitchen, and his body was found in the front of his house," Eriyana, a local police chief in Batam, an island off Sumatra, told VIVAnews website.
Lumboga arrived home last Wednesday, but his body was just discovered on Monday.
"We suspect that the dogs were hungry, so they attacked Andre, because they had not been fed for 14 days," he said. Police also found bones of two other dogs, believed to have also been eaten by the hungry canines.
Revenge
Jewels To Auction
Elizabeth Taylor
Elizabeth Taylor dazzled the world with her luminous beauty, lavish lifestyle - and an unquenchable passion for diamonds and jewels that was fueled by the great loves of her life.
The late Hollywood star amassed one of the foremost jewelry collections in the world, including a 33.19-carat diamond ring and a 16th century pear-shaped pearl from one of her seven husbands, Richard Burton.
The Associated Press recently viewed about two dozen of her most iconic pieces at Christie's auction house, which is selling her complete jewelry collection, valued at $30 million, in New York on Dec. 13-14.
The stories behind them are as priceless as the gems themselves. In a 2002 memoir, "My Love Affair with Jewelry," Taylor took readers on a personal journey of her collection, describing in her own words how she came to own each piece.
Elizabeth Taylor
Prime-Time Nielsens
Ratings
Prime-time viewership numbers compiled by Nielsen for Aug. 29-Sept. 4. Listings include the week's ranking and viewership.
1. "America's Got Talent" (Tuesday), NBC, 11.14 million.
2. "America's Got Talent" (Wednesday), NBC, 10.65 million.
3. "NCIS," CBS, 8.94 million.
4. "NCIS: Los Angeles," CBS, 8.64 million.
5. "Big Brother 13" (Wednesday), CBS, 8.34 million.
6. NCAA Football: Oregon vs. LSU, ABC, 7.75 million.
7. "NCIS" (Tuesday, 10 p.m.), CBS, 7.29 million.
8. "Big Brother 13" (Sunday), CBS, 6.66 million.
9. "Bachelor Pad," ABC, 6.48 million.
10. "Big Brother 13" (Thursday), CBS, 6.25 million.
11. "Hell's Kitchen," Fox, 6.21 million.
12. "60 Minutes," CBS, 6.04 million.
13. "Wipeout" (Tuesday), ABC, 5.93 million.
14. "CSI: Crime Scene Investigation," CBS, 5.86 million.
15. "Dateline NBC," NBC, 5.53 million.
16. "Minute to Win It" (Wednesday), NBC, 5.5 million.
17. "Blue Bloods," CBS, 5.37 million.
18. "Two and a Half Men," CBS, 5.33 million.
19. "48 Hours Mystery" (Friday), CBS, 5.32 million.
20. "Hawaii Five-0," CBS, 5.31 million.
Ratings
In Memory
Wardell Quezergue
Wardell Quezergue, the composer and teacher known as the "Creole Beethoven," has died. He was 81.
He died Tuesday.
Songwriter and pianist Allen Toussaint gave Quezergue his nickname. He describes Quezergue as a superb musician and band leader who raised the bar in rhythm and blues and rock 'n' roll, and who always inspired people to their best performances.
Quezergue's career included arrangements for Army bands, the Dixie Cups and Dr. John. Shortly before his death, he finished recording his newest composition - a setting of the story of Christ's death and resurrection for narrator, instrumentalists, soloists and small chorus.
Wardell Quezergue
| CURRENT MOON lunar phases |
