'Best of TBH Politoons'
Recommended Reading
from Bruce
Max B. Sawicky: Offset This (tompaine.com)
The fact is that Republicans have already raised taxes, big-time. They have raised spending consistently since their accession to power, and they have ratified commitments to future spending growth as well, particularly under the Medicare prescription drug benefit. All of this spending will have to be paid for sooner or later. Borrowing merely delays the payment; it does not preclude it, even if the debt incurred is never repaid. The reason is that paying interest on a debt indefinitely is tantamount to repaying the debt itself. In short, the Bush tax cuts are an illusion.
New Accounts of Torture by U.S. Troops: Soldiers Say Failures by Command Led to Abuse (hrw.org)
U.S. Army troops subjected Iraqi detainees to severe beatings and other torture at a base in central Iraq from 2003 through 2004, often under orders or with the approval of superior officers, according to accounts from soldiers released by Human Rights Watch today.
Leadership Failure: Firsthand Accounts of Torture of Iraqi Detainees by the U.S. Army's 82nd Airborne Division
Nick Claussen: Scripps director recalls his time working for William Rehnquist (athensnews.com)
Former U.S. Supreme Court Chief Justice William Rehnquist always seemed very serious and stern on television, and that's how most people saw him.
David Bruce: Wise Up: Children (athensnews.com)
Feminist comedian Kate Clinton often bashes George W. Bush during her stand-up comedy. Of course, some people will get up and leave when she does that, so she likes to pretend that they have tiny bladders. As you would expect, she has been known to speak harshly of Mr. Bush when she is among her friends. One day, as Ms. Clinton was talking about Mr. Bush, her friend's 3-year-old daughter gently touched her arm and said, "Please use your inside voice."
The National Debt: Graph
Reader Contribution
Mean Talkin' Blues
Hey Marty,
I tried my hand at creating a movie/slideshow thing. It's scenes of New
Orleans and our fearless leaders in a not too flattering setting. I set
to the music of Woody Guthrie's Mean Talking Blues. Here's
the link to
it, if you'd like to take a look.
Keep in mind it's my first attempt, but who said you can't teach old dogs
new tricks?
Peace --Joe
"I am interested in the fleeting moment, the gesture, that action that can
be found in the everyday. Moments that are often missed, that are nothing
and at the same time part of a greater rhythm of our life on earth. In
these there is something specific to the time and place, yet universal.
These are the spaces in-between. These are the moment of action and
reaction, of new beginnings, a complete story. Or they are just as they
appear - a simple glance, a wave, a walk."
-Morgan Showalter-
P.S. The hawk thing was fun, thanks for doing all that!
Hubert's Poetry Corner
Andrew Jackson & George W
Remedial American History 101 for George W (no credit)
Pass or Fail
Selected Readings
from that Mad Cat, JD
In The Chaos Household
Last Night
Still sunny, bit warmer.
Attended 'Back To School Night' with the kid. The turnout was a bit disappointing.
NYTimes Caught Embroidering, Again
Geraldo Rivera
The New York Times acknowledged Tuesday that Geraldo Rivera didn't nudge aside a Hurricane Katrina rescue worker on TV, and although Rivera called the statement "grudging and ungracious," he considered the case closed.
Rivera had been angry since critic Alessandra Stanley, in a column that ran on Sept. 5, said Rivera had "nudged an Air Force rescue worker out of the way so his camera crew could tape him as he helped lift an older woman in a wheelchair to safety."
Fox News Channel distributed a tape of the telecast where no such nudge was visible.
The Times ran an item under "Editors' Notes" on Tuesday - not a correction - that said editors understood Stanley's comment to be a "figurative reference to Mr. Rivera's flamboyant intervention."
Geraldo Rivera
Attends Film Center Inauguration
Martin Scorsese
Directors Martin Scorsese and Wong Kar-Wai joined hundreds of film buffs at the inauguration of a new home for La Cinematheque Francaise film center.
The center moved Monday into a stylish building designed by Frank Gehry in eastern Paris, ending a two-decade hunt for a new location.
French Culture Minister Renaud Donnedieu de Vabres called the cinematheque a place "where films won't be consumed like products, but preserved, watched, studied, compared and loved, as works."
Martin Scorsese
'Firefly' Relaunched
'Serenity'
Justin Dobbs stood up in front of a packed movie theater and called out, "OK, everybody! `The Ballad of Serenity.'"
The crowd burst into the defiant theme song of a failed little TV show called "Firefly," which burns brightly again through the tenacity of creator Joss Whedon, its cast of unknowns and legions of sci-fi fans like Dobbs who lobbied for its resurrection.
Dobbs was among fans attending advance showings of "Serenity," the big-screen continuation that follows the exploits of the lovable rabble aboard a rickety spaceship 500 years in the future.
Universal Pictures - which plucked the tale from the heap of beloved, acclaimed (and canceled) TV shows - began preview screenings five months before "Serenity" opened to fire up interest among devotees and let them spread the word on the film.
'Serenity'
Sotheby's To Auction 30 Photographs
Dorothea Lange
Bill Hendrie rescued 30 photographs of "Okie" migrants from a garbage bin at the San Jose Chamber of Commerce in the late 1960s because his family also came from Oklahoma and he said he could relate to them.
This spring, Hendrie's daughter, Marian Tankersley, rediscovered them when she was emptying out her parents' house after their deaths. She contacted experts who confirmed her suspicions: They are original prints made by the legendary Dorothea Lange.
Among them is "Migrant Mother," the legendary photo that symbolizes the era.
On Oct. 11, Sotheby's in New York will open bidding on Tankersley's set of 30 vintage, unretouched Lange photographs at its annual fall auction. The pre-bid estimate for the lot: $50,000 to $70,000.
Dorothea Lange
Wedding News
Leigh - Baumbach
Jennifer Jason Leigh and director Noah Baumbach are married, People magazine reports. The actress married Baumbach over the Labor Day weekend, People said Tuesday. It is the first marriage for both.
Leigh - Baumbach
Supreme Court Takes Up Case
Anna Nicole Smith
The Supreme Court shed its staid image Tuesday, giving stripper-turned Playboy model Anna Nicole Smith a new chance at a piece of the fortune of her 90-year-old late husband.
The court said it would hear arguments early next year as part of Smith's effort to collect as much as $474 million from the estate of J. Howard Marshall II. The oil tycoon married her in 1994 when he was 89 and she was 26.
The case is Vickie Lynn Marshall v. E. Pierce Marshall, 04-1544.
Anna Nicole Smith
Gay News Web Portal
BladeWire
BladeWire culls news items of interest to the GLBT (gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender) community and packages them in a wire service format. Window Media, the parent company of the D.C.-based gay weekly, is offering BladeWire free to other Web sites.
Justin P. Smith, Window Media's internet content manager, said in an interview during last week's National Lesbian and Gay Journalists Association annual convention that the news ticker was launched on the D.C. gay paper's Web site, and was expected to be on all other Window Media sites by the end of this week.
Information about BladeWire is available at washingtonblade.com/areyouready/
BladeWire
Scientists Capture On Camera
Giant Squid
Japanese scientists have taken the first photographs of one of the most mysterious creatures in the deep ocean -- the giant squid.
Until now the only information about the behavior of the creatures which measure up to 18 meters (59 feet) in length has been based on dead or dying squid washed up on shore or captured in commercial fishing nets.
But Tsunemi Kubodera, of the National Science Museum, and Kyoichi Mori of the Ogasawara Whale Watching Association, both in Tokyo have captured the first images of Architeuthis attacking bait 900 meters (yards) below the surface in the cold, dark waters of the North Pacific.
The Japanese scientists found the squid by following sperm whales, the most effective hunters of giant squid, as they gathered to feed between September and December in the deep waters off the coast of the Ogasawara Islands in the North Pacific.
Giant Squid
Divorce News #1
Bush - Murray
"One Tree Hill" co-stars Chad Michael Murray and Sophia Bush said Monday they are calling it quits after five months of marriage.
Bush, 23, and Murray, 24, were married in April during a seaside ceremony in Santa Monica. The two met while filming the WB's television show. She plays feisty cheerleader Brooke Davis and Murray plays Lucas Scott, a brooding intellectual struggling to find peace.
Bush - Murray
Divorce News #2
Griffin - Moline
Comedian Kathy Griffin has filed for divorce after 4 1/2 years of marriage, citing irreconcilable differences, court documents show.
The divorce papers were filed Friday in Superior Court. Griffin asks that the couple's assets be divided and that Matt Moline be denied spousal support.
Griffin - Moline
Eight Charged In Theft
'Star Wars: Episode III'
Federal officials on Tuesday charged eight people with several crimes related to the illegal theft, copying and Internet distribution of hit movie, "Star Wars: Episode III -- Revenge of the Sith."
But before it ever opened, an illegally made copy could be downloaded from the Internet, and that copy was traced back to an editing facility in Lakewood, California.
The U.S. Attorney in Los Angeles filed a copyright infringement charge against Albert Valente, 28, of Lakewood, California, for taking the "Star Wars" copy from the post-production house where he worked. He has pleaded guilty, the U.S. Attorney's office said in a statement.
For the rest, 'Star Wars: Episode III -- Revenge of the Sith'
Prime-Time Nielsen
Ratings
Prime-time viewership numbers compiled by Nielsen Media Research for Sept. 19-25. Top 20 listings include the week's ranking, with viewership for the week and season-to-date rankings in parentheses. An "X" in parentheses denotes a season debut or one-time-only presentation.
1. (1) "CSI: Crime Scene Investigation," CBS, 29.0 million viewers.
2. (2) "Desperate Housewives," ABC, 28.4 million viewers.
3. (3) "Lost," ABC, 23.5 million viewers.
4. (X) "Criminal Minds," CBS, 19.6 million viewers.
5. (4) "CSI: Miami," CBS, 19.2 million viewers.
6. (5) "Grey's Anatomy," ABC, 19.0 million viewers.
7. (9) "Survivor: Guatemala," CBS, 17.0 million viewers.
8. (8) "Law & Order: SVU," NBC, 16.8 million viewers.
9. (10) "Invasion," ABC, 16.4 million viewers.
10. (12) "Extreme Makeover: Home Edition," ABC, 16.4 million viewers.
11. (8) "60 Minutes," CBS, 16.3 million viewers.
12. (6) "NFL Monday Night Football: Washington at Dallas or New Orleans vs. N.Y. Giants," ABC, 16.1 million viewers.
13. (14) "NCIS," CBS, 15.5 million viewers.
14. (X) "Destination: Lost," ABC, 15.2 million viewers.
15. (15) "My Name Is Earl," NBC, 15.2 million viewers.
16. (13) "Two and a Half Men," CBS, 15.0 million viewers.
17. (11) "NFL Monday Showcase," ABC, 14.8 million viewers.
18. (16) "ER," NBC, 14.4 million viewers.
19. (19) "Cold Case," CBS, 13.7 million viewers.
20. (16) "House," Fox, 13.6 million viewers.
Ratings
In Memory
Steve Marcus
Steve Marcus, a jazz saxophonist who recorded and toured with Stan Kenton, Herbie Mann and Buddy Rich, died Sunday. He was 66.
He was a pioneer of the jazz fusion movement of the late 1960s, a musical movement that combined elements of rock 'n' roll and jazz.
Marcus had been touring lately with the quintet "Steve Smith and Buddy's Buddies," a tribute band to the music of Buddy Rich, said fellow saxophonist Andy Fusco, a member of the group.
Several of Marcus' recordings have been recently reissued, including "The Count's Rock Band," and "Tomorrow Never Knows," which garnered five stars from Down Beat Magazine when it was released, Fusco said.
Steve Marcus
In Memory
Michael Wittenberg
Michael Wittenberg, husband of Broadway musical-theater star Bernadette Peters, died Monday in a helicopter crash in Montenegro. He was 43.
Wittenberg, an investment adviser, was on a business trip. Three other people were killed in the crash, which occurred when the aircraft struck a high-voltage cable, police in Podgorica, Montenegro said.
Wittenberg married the Tony Award-winning actress in July 1996. They wed at the home of Mary Tyler Moore, a longtime friend of Peters.
Michael Wittenberg
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