Posted 6:52 PM by Gene

Schwarzenegger's hints fuel expectation he'll run for re-election

Will he announce it on Letterman? Pffffffffffffffffffffffft!

Posted 5:08 PM by Gene

Get ready and ROLL YOUR EYES AGAIN:

"We have people on the platform and working to restore communication right now," said Mark Bugg, scheduling manager at New Orleans-based Loop LLC, the port operator. "A tanker may dock this afternoon and possibly offload by this evening."

The oil port stopped unloading tankers on Aug. 27 as Kristina [SIC!!!!!] approached. Port Fourchon in Louisiana, a staging area for workers who staff Gulf oil and natural-gas production platforms, opened this morning after damage was cleared.

Kerr-McGee Corp. said today that most of its facilities avoided serious damage and 55,000 barrels of daily oil and gas production was restored at production platforms....

Traders are watching the Colonial Pipeline, the world's biggest network of petroleum-product pipelines, which carries gasoline and distillate fuels from Houston to New York harbor. Colonial Pipeline Co., owner of the network, said today two lines shut on Aug. 29 because of power failures will be started this weekend. Distillates include heating oil and diesel....

"The biggest issue is getting power to these facilities," said Chris Ovrebo, a broker with FC Stone LLC in Eden Prairie, Minnesota. "Most of these refineries didn't sustain heavy damage," he said. "It's not going to take them six months to get back on line."

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRGGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!

Posted 5:03 PM by Gene

Newly decoded, chimp DNA holds promise for humans

Finally we can be smarter than apes.

Posted 3:45 PM by Gene

"IT WILL TAKE FIVE YEARS TO FIX THE SUBWAY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"

SHUT UP, ALREADY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Posted 3:37 PM by Gene

Get ready and ROLL YOUR EYES:

There's a "surfeit of worry over gasoline supplies to much of the U.S. and gasoline prices have acted accordingly," said John Kilduff, an analyst at Fimat USA....

And "$4 gasoline will likely be visited upon consumers in many areas," he said....

There's a "huge crisis in gasoline -- our worst fears are recognized," said John Person, president of National Futures Advisory Service.

Near term, he believes prices at the pump may reach $3 -- "possibly as high as $3.20 as a national average as early as late next week," he said.

But in late September, he sees prices backing down toward $2.35 to $2.50 for regular unleaded "as long as these refineries get on-line and we do not have further disruptions," he said.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRGGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!

Posted 3:21 PM by Gene

And how many months do you suppose it will take for GUVMENT to get its REAR in GEAR?

Posted 3:16 PM by Gene

Forecasters at Economy.com, a West Chester, Pa., firm, says Katrina will create a modest drag on the economy in the third quarter and give it a modest kick in the fourth quarter due to reconstruction.

We need the HUMUNGOUS INFORMATIVE POWER of the WEB to tell us THIS?

This is going to be an EXASPERATING next two weeks. Beyond the press's CRYING JAG and all sorts of pundits RESTATING THE OBVIOUS our NATIONAL SANITY is at stake.

Posted 2:55 PM by Gene

Dow 36,000 decries environmental PC -- having mourned Louis Farrakhan's friend without bothering to mention Mr. Nation of Islam.

Don't you hate knee-jerk lock-step KLUMPH! KLUMPH! thinking of ALL STRIPES?

Posted 2:51 PM by Gene

Here's a story to shake the HACKS out of their MOURNING:

FDA Official Resigns In Protest Of Morning-After Pill Decision

Now maybe we can get back to telling people how to think!

Posted 2:30 PM by Gene

Fed's Santomero: Economy will survive Katrina

SHUCKS.

Posted 2:12 PM by Gene

ROMY GOES ON THE WARPA -- ROMY GETS MAD!

Letters: WHY DO BLACKS "LOOT" AND WHITES "FIND" GROCERIES??????????

AND….

NPR OMBUD GETS COMPLAINTS AFTER GOLDBERG FILLS IN FOR SCHORR!!!!!!!!!!

Hey ROM, after about another week of KATRINA KILLED AMERICA people might START to get slightly MAD at YOU.

Posted 10:43 AM by Gene

WHEN WILL THEY LEARN?!?!?

Today's Doonesbury: All hole and no donut [SIC].

Posted 10:32 AM by Gene

Imagine if Kos were a knee-jerk seething conservative. Imagine if little were a braggartly blaggarty liberal. Imagine, in other words, the shoes on the other feet. Not too hard to imagine. Now imagine a world without "BLOGGERS." A little more PEACEFUL.

Posted 10:27 AM by Gene

I had not mentioned Jude Wanniski, one of these idiot public-policy savants known largely in the Beltway and little else, but he was proof everyone in Washington has a price, and Louis Farrakhan paid it.

Posted 10:20 AM by Gene

It's THE CORNER, and a BIG FAN of John "The Acquitted Killer" Landis, but even SHE can have a point:

RE: GOVERNORS [Kathryn Jean Lopez]
Readers watching more of her are critical:

Sorry, but I ain’t buying it. This woman is lost and looks lost. She may have won the election but she has no business being in charge of anything. Watching her on TV the last two days has made this pretty clear. Now is not the time to be sobbing. She sure as hell should not be doing it on the tube in front of her fellow citizens – the ones looking to her for leadership.

Compare her performance to Barbour in MS. You just know his state will come at way ahead of her state when it is all said and done.

Posted at 10:10 AM

I have NOT watched television, but I have read of the gov's oh-woe-is-me-the-sky-is-falling-our-state-has-died routine, and I've had it too.

Posted 10:07 AM by Gene

Corps senior project engineer Al Naomi said they would bring in more sandbags on Wednesday and perhaps build a temporary dam around the breach.

But the biggest ally in the fight to save the city may be nature itself, he said.

"The flow has pretty much eased mainly because the lake is dropping in elevation," Naomi told Reuters.

In 36 hours, the lake, which was whipped high by the storm, should return to normal levels and the water now flooding New Orleans would begin to drain, Naomi said.

He said the historic French Quarter, the hallmark of New Orleans and the main draw for its huge tourist industry, should escape with only minor flooding because it sits five feet above sea level.

I don't want to be a babbling blithering optimist, but there MUST be a hopeful side to this story. Whether we'll get it is another matter as NEWS HACKS bury hope much as they bury CONSERVATIVES and REPUBLICANS. (This was near the END of the story.)

Posted 9:08 AM by Gene

It's amazing how the same HACKS who want to stomp our morale into the ground pound their feet and scream and yell, "MOVIES ARE BETTER THAN EVER!" This article throws down the gauntlet: there will be some high-pressure sales pitches this fall, and lots of raves, because MOVIEMAKERS are the HACKS' BRETHREN, and we must NEVER see them fail, regardless of what happens to THE PEOPLE.

Posted 8:47 AM by Gene

Thank GOD for E&P and the obsolete Philly DAILY NOOZ for telling us the TRUTH: DUBYA was to blame for NAWLANS!!!!!

Hey ATTYTOOD, go jump in LAKE PONTCHARTRAIN.

Posted 6:55 AM by Gene

The lame lame-duck gov of New York and his fellow Democrat the Honorary Mayor talk up big plans for Ground Zero but, as is their specialty, do nothing.

Posted 6:50 AM by Gene

How the future ONE-COMPANY STATE helps America:

Trucks use too much fuel per mile, and with traffic congestion growing, they will operate even more inefficiently as time passes (bumper-to-bumper driving guzzles fuel). The demand for diesel fuel for trucks is placing extreme pressure on refined fuel stocks, which helps push the rise in fuel prices and increases cause for concern each passing day.

We are, in the foreseeable future, stuck with this gross use of nearly 40 quadrillion British Thermal Units of petroleum derived energy per year.

Railroads aren't a viable alternative. U.S. commercial railroad capacity is stretched: We continue to lose rail track, hubs like Chicago and Kansas City don't have contemporary technology, and, whereas in 1975 there were 76 major railroad companies there are now six....

Posted 6:36 AM by Gene

You can almost hear the hacks going BWAHAHAHAHAHAHA as they use "public-opinion polls" to pin gasoline prices on Dubya, something he has little control over -- and if he could do anything about them he'd make the situation worse.

But then this a golden time for the hacks to be going BWAHAHAHAHAHAHA, harping on bad news and lowering our morale, their specialty.

Posted 6:29 AM by Gene

It is becoming increasingly obvious that Louisiana is living up to its reputation for such divine political figures as Huey Long and Edwin Edwards (not to mention Sleazeball Gumbo), and it may take a GRAND JURY to get the clowns who run this state off their duffs.

And after the flood -- THE GRAFT.

Posted 6:28 AM by Gene

Hundreds reported killed in Iraq stampede

1. Do the news-hack math: that's equal to ten Americans. 2. Did WE do this too?

Posted 7:28 PM by Gene

Ban on extreme internet porn

Like it or not, the "PRUDES" are getting louder -- because SOCIETY FORCES THEM TO.

Posted 7:23 PM by Gene

The Indianapolis Colts, city and state negotiators apparently are ready to announce a lease agreement today, a major step toward building a new football stadium Downtown.

Ka-CHIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIING!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

P. S. When do the SAINTS start the "negotiations"?

Posted 5:46 PM by Gene

Eight in 10 Americans--including overwhelming majorities of Democrats, Republicans and political independents--say Sheehan's protest has had no impact on their attitudes toward Iraq. While one in 10 say she has made them less likely to support the war, the same proportion say she has made them more likely to back the conflict.

TRANSLATION: ST. CINDY'S CRUSADE IS A TOTAL WASHOUT.

Posted 5:40 PM by Gene

Mark Steyn has a thought or three:

[T]he real test of this hurricane is whether, after the event, there's still the will to tackle the long-term questions. For example, as further refutation of the Diamond thesis, in 1981 America had 315 oil refineries in operation; today, it has 144.

Louisiana has 17 of them, operating - pre-hurricane - at capacity. Which is why petrol will be up 20 cents a gallon by the weekend. Why, in the middle of a war centred on unstable foreign oil regimes in the Middle East, is it still politically impossible to upgrade the capacity of the domestic oil industry?

As the tsunami and Hurricane Katrina demonstrate, mankind has got very good at responding to acts of God. We're not so hot at responding to the acts (political and cultural) of man.

Posted 5:35 PM by Gene

SAT math scores hit record high

How often has this holy grail of testing been tweaked so that we cannot be believe one word of that, and behind the news lies the suspicion that more kids are testing for the test?

Posted 5:15 PM by Gene

For some reason I am forcibly reminded of Mencken's story in one of his memoirs about how he achieved manhood covering the now forgotten Great Baltimore Fire of 1904, an event so CATACLYSMIC the city's mayor may have killed himself. The city rebuilt, just as Frisco rebuilt from the far worse earthquake two years later. So will Nawlans.

Haven't we had enough tub-thumping doom and gloom for the day?

Posted 5:09 PM by Gene

Camille Paglia drives me bananas -- she's a cultist, a precursor of the SOUTH PARK CON-SER-VA-TIVE and the Pauline Kael of deep thought -- but who can deny that "we are getting worse writing, worse art"? To do so is to run head first into today's awful cultural trends...or to be an ad-blurb copywriter.

Posted 4:59 PM by Gene

If it's any solace, and if the Weather Service is to be believed, it's going to be dry in southeastern Louisiana for a week, which should help pump out all that water.

Posted 3:46 PM by Gene

People may have dressed up to go to the casino in the days of the Rat Pack, but today's dress code is more honest: gambling is for slobs.

Posted 3:23 PM by Gene

Whatever happened to the Asian tsunami?

Posted 8:36 AM by Gene

Yesterday I rolled my eyeballs because everybody had CATASTROPHE on his lips. Well wouldn't you know, the head of FEMA used it, although in this case it might be justified because of the famous botch his agency's made of disaster relief in the past. CATASTROPHE implies something so overwhelming as to be unrecoverable. People died, yes, and a few buildings collapsed, but within weeks the recovery will be full bore (unless of course GOVERNMENT AGENCIES and GREEDY BUSINESSMEN interfere), and God knows more than several of the devastated neighborhoods could BENEFIT from rebuilding. Certainly the swiftness of the evacuation was enough to restore one's faith in government, and without that we WOULD have said CATASTROPHE.

Indeed the LAST thing we need is people moping and declaring how irremediably BAD the situation is because that gets people thinking they're beyond help.

Posted 8:28 AM by Gene

This massacre we unintentionally inspired might make news except it happened in Haiti, and as all news hacks know, Haiti doesn't matter anymore.

Posted 6:56 AM by Gene

And the simple-minded hacks MUST look for a reason -- ANY reason -- why gas prices are high, and this is as good a reason as any, never mind that it may be a brief and minor reason.

Posted 6:53 AM by Gene

Well, back to the more PRESSING business, HACKS:

Study: Few Gay Characters in New TV Season

And since most would be swishy or weepy that may not be a bad thing.

Posted 6:47 AM by Gene

One reason too many Jews intermarry is that for too many Judaism is no longer a religion, it's a neurosis.

Posted 6:42 AM by Gene

Do I smell a KLUMPH! KLUMPH! SPEECH CODE in the form of an HONOR CODE at Jeff's university?

What would he think of PC?

Posted 7:36 PM by Gene

I'm surprised the hacks aren't jumping over this one, and playing petty politics with it. If the Pope can make amends with Cardinal Lefebvre he is surely aligning with the FORCES OF REACTION. But Benedict XVI is not a man to confirm the scribblers' base prejudices, and he acknowledges returning to Latin is hardly a panacea for the Catholic church. Nevertheless that he is eager to reach out like this is a sign his church lost more than strange words when it all but ditched the glory that was the language of Rome.

Posted 5:15 PM by Gene

Survey SAID:

MOVIES STINK!!!!!!!!!!!!

"Going to the movies used to be fun and exciting. It used to be an event. It's none of those anymore."

That sums it up, doesn't it.

Posted 5:09 PM by Gene

Only the VERY MAINSTREAM ROMY would link to a typist who thinks 1. The GLIBERAL isn't left-wing enough -- and 2. THE DEMOCRATIC PARTY isn't left-wing enough.

Taking another Friday off, Romy? Can't wait!

Posted 5:02 PM by Gene

Mike Myers, Andy Richter, Rachel Dratch and Amy Poehler -- the leading lights of improv and sketch comedy -- were improvising gamely on stage, drawn back to Sweet Home Chicago by their love of their comedic alma mater, ImprovOlympic. But due to a jaw-dropping lack of technical planning and a sound failure of CATASTROPHIC [SIC!!!!!] proportions, most of the sold-out Chicago Theater could hear hardly a single, made-up word.

HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA!!!!!

That's the funniest joke since the people ran screaming from THE GREATEST COMEDY DOCUMENTARY OF ALL TIME!

Betcha Mike Myers was almost as mad as the subordinates of the many CEOs who boasted they knew him after AUDREY'S MONSTER!

Posted 5:01 PM by Gene

The FUTURE for POPCORN RESTAURANTS:

Firm Tests Gaming on Movie-Style Screens

Posted 4:54 PM by Gene

And with the hurricane having failed to knock down every building in Nawlans, CNN looks on the bright side:

Life-threatening flooding next fear

Posted 4:52 PM by Gene

I guess all that CATASTROPHE talk was good for SOMETHING:

The Weather Channel Earns Greatest Sustained Increases in Viewership During Extensive Coverage of Hurricane Katrina

Posted 4:51 PM by Gene

Giving awards to FRINGE THEA-TAH is rather like adding documents to your circular file.

Posted 3:31 PM by Gene

Here's one reason the talk of CATASTROPHE quickly grew tiring:



That old building on the right got it badly, to be sure, but the skyscraper on the left probably escaped with nothing more than broken windows and maybe some water in the lobby. Good solid construction by itself should hold down hurricane damage -- and talk of CATASTROPHES.

Posted 9:43 AM by Gene

EXCELLENT: Starting today, VIACON NETWORK NEWS has an om-BUDS-man.

It's 9:43 a.m. HAVE YOU SEEN YOUR PUBLIC EDI-TOR?

Posted 9:36 AM by Gene

When the Professor points his billions of fans to a webcam in the middle of a hurricane you KNOW it won't work.

Posted 9:13 AM by Gene

CNN PANICS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

REPORT: ROOF OF SUPERDOME IN NEW ORLEANS, WHERE THOUSANDS EVACUATED AHEAD OF HURRICANE KATRINA, IS LEAKING RAIN!!!!! DETAILS SOON!!!!!!!!!!

My guess is the only practical outcome of this news is that the Saints will be asking half-a-trillion bucks for a new stadium.

"NEW ORLEANS MAY NEVER BE THE SAME!!!!!!!!!!" warned National Hurricane Center Director Max Mayfield.

Spare us the melo, Max. Nawlans hasn't been the same since SATCH left.

And who, or WHAT, is EQECAT?

Posted 9:10 AM by Gene

This IS NRO, but if this is true it seems the looneys support neither the war NOR our soldiers.

Here is the soft underbelly of leftism, shielded from view by the iron armor of media and academe.

Posted 8:57 AM by Gene

Did the Cindy Sheehan vigil succeed?

Yes: she generated hundreds of millions of column inches in the Charmin rolls and tens of thousands of hours on video and NOT ONE CRITICAL WORD.

Posted 8:50 AM by Gene

More news about our FAVORITE Web site:

MORRISVILLE, N.C. — A man who used to work for farm equipment-maker John Deere is accused of stealing more than 100 miniature tractors and selling them online.

Timothy Paul Weekes, 25, was charged with embezzlement and the theft of 104 miniatures worth a total of more than $2,000. He was arrested Thursday and freed on bond, a day after police seized hats, gloves and other merchandise with the John Deere logo from his home.

He had worked at the John Deere training center in Morrisville until March 17, according to court records.

The company, based in Moline, Ill., sells memorabilia including the pewter equipment models, T-shirts and hats that are popular with collectors, said Bill Klutho, a John Deere public relations manager.

A tipster had called a company hotline in July to report that someone was selling the toy tractors on eBay.

Posted 8:03 AM by Gene

Romy, back from his day off of a computer, gets MAD because the HACKS were "FAWNING" over DUBYA.

To which we say, 1. We're only supposed to fawn over a DEMOCRAT? and 2. You'll have PLENTY of opportunities for REVENGE.

Posted 6:50 AM by Gene

Microsoft Corp. is on the prowl for a store in Times Square.

What will it sell besides BUGS?

Does that mean all the famed signs on the Square go on the fritz?

Microsoft is looking for a large space to create a "branding experience" a la Apple's showroom and information center.

Isn't it enough for the BUGMEISTER to BRAND people?

Posted 6:42 AM by Gene

Speaking of Saints, some FREE-ENTERPRISE CON-SER-VA-TIVE lets ST. WARREN have it for being ANTI-AMERICAN. This is a thin, crumbling reed to base an argument on. If He is "ANTI-AMERICAN" it's only as an investment strategy. No, I've said it before: St. Warren became God because NEWS HACKS put their skepticism away -- easy enough for them -- and the shenanigans surrounding His insurance investments make it clear they've let Him get away with SOMETHING.

Also, one must suspect He's hitting a law of diminishing returns at $90,000 A SHARE.

Posted 6:24 AM by Gene

I would rather read OMERTA genuflecting to St. Cindy or his hacks calling Hiroshima the crime of the millennium than read this naked PLUG for somebody's casino development. If all you frauds can do is hype and sell, why do we need you? Most stories can be told in one paragraph, or in charts, but we can't do that, no -- we have to PANIC PEOPLE, or we have to make our CONNECTIONS.

A NEUHARTHISM OF THE WEEK AWARD TO JERRY HIRSCH FOR A SALES PITCH WELL DONE.

Posted 6:22 AM by Gene

EXPERTS WARN OF DISASTER OF BIBLICAL PROPORTIONS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Let us judge for ourselves. News hacks must put everything in caps, boldface and italics, and we never know until after the fact. Please guys, take a deep breath and take your meds.

Posted 3:04 PM by Gene

When a SHEIK talks of EASING OIL PRICES it approaches the level of a PRACTICAL JOKE.

Posted 2:56 PM by Gene

I live within spitting distance of our RENDELLTORIUM-- and I have no desire to see a concert. Why? Who needs the expense or the impatience of squirming in a seat, all for something performed no better than on a budget CD? This is why fewer people are going to movies and concerts; real life, alas, has become a pale imitation of an imitation.

Posted 2:42 PM by Gene

Sorry Rich, but when it comes to the economy both sides are full of it. Yes, liberals have their MALAISE shtick, and their we-should-all-ride-bicycles shtick, but you FREE-ENTERPRISE TYPES have your bigger-is-better-and-BIGGEST-IS-BEST shtick. I don't want to live in Vietnam or Cuba -- and I don't want to live in A ONE-COMPANY STATE EITHER.

Posted 1:25 PM by Gene

I have HAD IT with these [C]RAP publicity stunts. The whole purpose of the scene is to glorify violence and death, and too many of the PIMPS who run the recorded-SOUND trade must have patted themselves on the back and said, "GOOD CAREER MOVE." If VIACON has "zero tolerance" for guns (PFFH-HH-HH!), we must have zero tolerance for [C]RAP.

Posted 12:59 PM by Gene

I'm surprised Kyle didn't mention Capote, which is sure OSCAR®-arthouse fodder -- the story of an ar-TISTE who boozed and talk-showed his way through life, a society upsucker who published a "fictional" account of Bill Paley's sex life while his wife Babe was dying of cancer, whose bold writing wound him up in the friendly arms of -- ALLAN CARR.

A HERO FOR ALL TIME.

P. S. A brief tour through Amazon.com shows most of his books aren't selling very well. Oh, the fate of the Johnny Carson guest.

Posted 12:53 PM by Gene

America's NAZIS support St. Cindy -- and STILL THE NEWS HACKS WON'T LISTEN.

Possibly because THE CORNER linked to it?

Posted 12:48 PM by Gene

And speaking of landfills, another down weekend for the BEEEEEEEEEEEEOOOOOOOOOOOOH!

Posted 12:38 PM by Gene

And since we mention the men who inspired LORD KOPPEL of ESPNCORP, here's another tribute to the REALISM of the Hollywood Toxic Landfill:

Rosie's Nephew:



Fred W. Friendly:



Good night, and good luck.

Posted 10:45 AM by Gene

Our fad of the moment: Just because Starbucks has become the NPR of the food biz doesn't mean turning stores into glorified multimedia kiosks is a good idea; and when retailers latch onto such a fad you know they're desperate to turn their eyes away from their operational shortcomings, which with companies like MICKEY D's are CONSIDERABLE.

Posted 10:03 AM by Gene

It is a measure of how willing the HACKS are to BEND OVER for their brethren in SHOW-BIZ (the only difference is their scrolling credits are bylines) that they'll call anything OSCAR® material. Somehow though their lists look slightly less inviting after the fact. Still, let us look over Kyle's (man? woman?) list and make a few guesses ourselves:

Good Night. And Good Luck (Oct. 7)

I don't know how Rosie's nephew can tie the photogenic story of Ed and Fred into the EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEVIL of Dubya and Iraq, but he'll manage, he'll manage. A BO bomb, needless to say, just like his take on the CIA (PFFH-HH-HH!!!!!).

Elizabethtown (Oct. 14)

This sounds like a comic weepie, and if the tragic tale of Cinderella Man says anything it's that the very few adults who attend movies anymore have a limited tolerance for anything that's stamped AN ADULT MOVIE, and especially for weepies. They can see through the strategem of trying to justify all those comic books with OSCAR® BAIT. A lot, however, depends on how the HACKS sell it, and if they can say WORD OF MOUTH often enough it will probably be a hit.

Northcountry (Oct. 14)
Walk the Line (Nov. 18)

Seems to me we've done a few movies on SEXUAL HARASSMENT before --well, we ARE the EXPERTS -- but that's not what I'm interested in; I'm interested in what is sure to be an EXTREEEEEEEEMELY SERIOUS TAKE on JOHNNY CASH, turning him from a country superstar into a Jesus who boozed and drugged for our sins, and BANGS HIS HEAD AGAINST A BEDPOST in repentance. This may be the most self-serious bio in years -- and Joaquin Phoenix will GET his @#$%&* OSCAR®.

That was a shrewd PR stunt, RUPERT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! The film's gone WAY UP on HSX, as if that matters.

Jarhead (Nov. 4)

Not only is our EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEVIL war in Iraq wrong -- SO WAS THE FIRST ONE!

It was new for LUCAS SPIELBERG to turn D-Day into a theme park, but one suspects the public is getting sick of these anti-war movies.

The New World (Nov. 9)

Didn't ESPNCORP already give us a PC take on POCAHONTAS?

Breakfast on Pluto (Nov. 18)

When I saw the words Pluto and Murphy I thought, OH, NO! A REMAKE?!?!? Sadly it's just another arthouse film, and thus a possible OSCAR® nominee no matter how droopy and boring it is, as it no doubt will be.

Rent (Nov. 23)
The Producers (Dec. 21)

These two will get lots of fatuous raves from the ad-blurb copywriters, who will think they're bringing Arthur Freed back from the dead, but here's guessing they both get disrespectful reviews from the very few discerning critics left, the first because Puccini did it better, the second because mugging may not be comedy -- especially the THIRD time around.

Memoirs of A Geisha (Dec. 9)
Brokeback Mountain (Dec. 9)

Several years ago there was a SURE FIRE BEST-PICTURE-OSCAR® WINNER!!!!! called Warm Mountain or something, some sort of period piece the blurbists proclaimed the next Gone With the Wind or something, and it tanked at the B.O. because as it happened somebody already did Gone With the Wind. There've been enough bombs made of LI-TE-RA-RY novels that I might want to wager our geisha tale would be in that category. As for the second, how can a proud arthouse season be without a GAY MOVIE?

All the king's men [SIC] (Dec. 16)

Why remake a BEST-PICTURE-OSCAR® WINNER that starred BRODERICK CRAWFORD?

Munich (Dec. 23)

Here is your winner for 2005: it's PC, it makes the JEWS villains, and it explains that the MILITANTS of Munich were depraved on accounta they were deprived. Plus, it's the MASTER. (!!!!!) The 50-strong PAPER OF RE-CORD movie-blurbist staff must DREAD its arrival; on the one hand, raving it may unleash the fierce pain of much of its readership; on the other hand, panning it will unleash the fierce screaming of THE LORD GOD PINCH. When the time comes these folks will tread such a fine rope they could unbalance a Wallenda. Then again Luke isn't stupid; He knows if He tweaks something the right way with the blurbists He can make the greatest movie of all time. Yes, there is no upstaging destiny:

®

ACCEPT THE AWARD, LUCAS SPIELBERG!

Posted 9:53 AM by Gene

War Critics Have Backing, but Not Much of a Following

OMERTA! COME HOME!!!!!

Posted 9:51 AM by Gene

And in more news of economic BOOM, our local BABBITTS at the InkyDinkyDooDoo are in a bind because they have to proclaim NON-PROFIT ORGS a GROWTH ENGINE!

Between hospitals and restaurants it's a wonder every city in RENDELLIA doesn't declare bankruptcy.

Posted 9:49 AM by Gene

Yet despite the mass of visitors--23,000 on a recent weekday in August, roughly the population of Darien--many from the Chicago area still dismiss Navy Pier as an overpriced strip mall with a beautiful view.

"I think it's nice, but parking is ridiculous. Twenty-two dollars for one car?" said Scott Salerno of Downers Grove, who was at the pier recently to celebrate his daughter's 5th birthday. "It's a bit of a tourist trap."

Hey, ask Mayor Truckin'! ASK EDDIE! Cities are COMING BACK because they've REPOSITIONED THEMSELVES AS TOURIST TRAPS!

Posted 9:41 AM by Gene

Well, Mr. Mark and his gang are taking a long weekend off, so I had to turn elsewhere for laughs, and it didn't take long to find them: as the TWXSTERS were selling a cover on how high-tech can foresee heart attacks, what popped up on the screen but an ad from Altria MOtive urging parents keep their kids from smoking?

Nah, no relation.

Posted 8:34 PM by Gene

Look who's demanding GOVERNMENT ACTION -- in ENGLAND:

The increasing dominance of Tesco in Britain needs to be probed by the government, Lee Scott, president and chief executive of Wal-Mart has declared.

Figures published last week by TNS, the market-research company, showed that under Sir Terry Leahy Tesco’s share of the food market had increased to a record 30.5% over the past three months.

In an interview with The Sunday Times, Scott, who owns Asda in Britain, said that it was time for the government to act.

"As you get over 30% and higher I am sure there is a point where government is compelled to intervene, particularly in the UK, where you have the planning laws that make it difficult to compete," said Scott.

"At some point the government has to look at it," he added.

I thought you oligopolists -- er, RETAILERS stood for FREE ENTERPRISE, whatever that is.

Posted 8:19 PM by Gene

The code word of the week is DIVIDED. If we can spin that the parents of Iraq war dead are as split down the middle as the 7 and 10 pins in bowling, then we can negate both sides to the benefit of our own propagandizing. These idiots REFUSE to admit that St. Cindy thinks we're fighting this war for ISRAEL and JOOOOOOOOOOOOS -- because there IS NO CONTRADICTING THE LORD GOD PINCH.

Posted 4:30 PM by Gene

See liberals, the problem with SUING FOR YOUR RIGHTS IS eventually -- you get THE OTHER SIDE to do it.

So remember, when "crackpots" try to push creationism, remember, YOUR CRACKPOTS DID IT FIRST.

Posted 4:22 PM by Gene

Hmmm...and speaking of the STOOGES, a...MILITANT group has released a video press kit to -- no, you'll never guess.

JERNALISM IS PR WITH A DIFFERENT NAME.

Posted 4:07 PM by Gene

To CURLEY'S (Nyuk! Nyuk! Nyuk!) STOOGES, the comedians who just put out a FAQ on Iraq, I must ask -- what was the point of THIS comedy? It's a double-joke -- a plug for NASCAR and a plug for our favorite moviemaker. How much time and salary and expense accounts are wasted excreting these worthless press releases? What is the point of a wire service when it does JUNK like this?

Reading this totally useless conglomeration of vowels and consonants I think, a FAQ isn't ENOUGH for YOU folks.

And another disadvantage of the Web for CURLEY'S (Nyuk! Nyuk! Nyuk!) STOOGES is that their by-lines DON'T REMAIN ANONYMOUS. A NEUHARTHISM OF THE WEEK AWARD TO JENNA FRYER.

Posted 10:14 AM by Gene

Another stirring moment for Bowel Movements, Inc.:

U.S. performing rights organization BMI saluted the premier r&b, rap and hip-hop songwriters, producers and publishers at its 2005 BMI Urban Awards, staged tonight in the Grand Ballroom of the Fontainebleau Resort in Miami Beach.

Lil Jon and R. Kelly were named Songwriters of the Year, each receiving four "most performed song" awards. "Yeah!," written by Sean Garrett, Lil Jon and Patrick "j.Que" Smith, was named Song of the Year, Kanye West received Producer of the Year honors, and EMI Music Publishing was awarded the BMI Crystal for Urban Publisher of the Year. The first Urban Ringtone Award went to Lil Jon and Craig D. Love for "Freek-A-Leek." A highlight of the gala was a tribute to urban funk legends Charlie Wilson and The GAP Band, who were named BMI Icons for their "enduring influence on generations of music makers."

The ceremony was hosted by BMI President & CEO Del Bryant and Vice President, Writer/Publisher Relations Catherine Brewton, who presented awards to the 70 songwriters of the 35 most performed songs of 2004 in the urban music format.

Lil Jon, who was honored with three major BMI awards -- Songwriter of the Year, Song of the Year and Urban Ringtone of the Year -- was also named one of BMI's top songwriter/producers of the year. Lil Jon was also named Songwriter of the Year at BMI's Pop Awards held in May, marking the first time that a songwriter earned both Pop and Urban Songwriter of the Year honors in the same year.

R. Kelly received his second BMI Crystal as Urban Songwriter of the Year (he also won in 2002) with four songs on the most-performed list -- "Gigolo," "Hotel," "Step In The Name of Love" and "Thoia Thoing" -- and was also named one of BMI's top songwriter/producers. His latest CD, TP.3 Reloaded, debuted at #1 on the Billboard Top 200 the week of its release, instantly becoming his fifth #1 album.

"Yeah!," recorded by Usher featuring Ludacris and Lil Jon, was named Urban Song of the Year for tallying the most U.S. broadcast performances in 2004. The #1 Billboard Hot R&B/Hip-Hop song earned awards for songwriters Sean Garrett, Lil Jon and Patrick "j.Que" Smith, and music publishers Christopher Matthew Music, Hitco Music and White Rhino Music, Inc.

BMI Producer of the Year honors went to Kanye West for logging the most producer credits on charting songs. The BMI Top Urban Producers list also included Cool & Dre, Eminem, Fat Joe, Jazze Pha, R. Kelly, John Legend, Lil Jon, Mannie Fresh and The Neptunes (Pharrell Williams & Chad Hugo).

On the list of BMI's 35 most-performed urban songs, four songwriters contributed three songs each: Eminem, Sean Garrett, Kanye West and Pharrell Williams.

EMI Music Publishing was named BMI Urban Publisher of the Year by accumulating the highest percentage of copyright ownership in award songs. Big Jon Platt, Executive Vice President, Urban Music, U.S., accepted on behalf of the publisher.

The evening culminated with The GAP Band being honored as BMI Icons. Four of the band's nine albums were certified Platinum plus (The GAP Band II, The GAP Band III, The GAP Band IV and GAP Band V - Jammin') and featured 15 Top Ten and four #1 r&b hits, including "You Dropped a Bomb On Me," "Party Train," "Burn Rubber," "Outstanding," "Oops Upside Your Head," "Early in the Morning," and the smooth love song, "Yearning for Your Love." "Outstanding" alone remains one of the most sampled songs in history and has, astonishingly, been used by over 150 artists.

In addition to the BMI performance awards, music trade magazine Billboard recognized the BMI-affiliated writers who had #1 songs on the R&B/Hip-Hop Songs, Hot Rap Tracks, Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Airplay and Hot 100 charts during the past year.

Now marking its 65th year in business, BMI is an American performing rights organization that represents more than 300,000 songwriters, composers and publishers in all genres of music. With a repertoire of more than 6.5 million musical works from around the world, the non-profit-making corporation collects license fees from businesses that use music, which it then distributes as royalties to the musical creators and copyright owners it represents.

For a complete list of 2005 BMI Urban Awards winners, please visit bmi.com/urban.

Somebody MUST keep these interns away from computers! They spread disease.

Posted 10:01 AM by Gene

We have not honored our own injunction to follow the marvelous world of the indentured-sports-servitude police blotter, so rather belatedly we learn that a member of Baylor's champion women's hoops squad (who knew) was arrested for possessing pot and some cute driving, and an Oklahoma State fullback was arrested on first-degree burglary!

This should be a wonderful year in professional college sport!

P. S. at 4:30 P.M.: Here's another one: a Kansas fullback "charged with assault"!

Yes, this promises to be a RICH year!

Posted 9:40 AM by Gene

In the fruit-and-nut state, the AG is suing to stop fast-food, ostensibly because its purveyors violated a law regarding some supposed carcinogen. If this AG had had GUTS (and we rather don't expect it of pols) he would have sued the companies for being the FAST FOOD BIZ, the ultimate goal of certain liberals. Now the con-SER-va-tives will make a cause of this, and both these INFERNAL sides will have made EATING POLITICAL.

Posted 9:37 AM by Gene

Crawford hasn't seen this big a crowd since the scathing documentary Fahrenheit 9/11 was shown last summer on a screen at the football field, drawing about 3,000 people. The screening was organized by the Crawford Peace House, which also is helping Sheehan. Earlier that night, more than 300 Bush supporters held a rally to counter the showing of the film.

We know where that went, and we know where this will go, but in the meantime news hacks have nothing to do but play with themselves.

Posted 1:57 PM by Gene

Hmmm....

C.I.A. Report Said to Fault Pre-9/11 Leadership

I guess that means THE INCOMPETENT MR. TENET was "responsible." But what about Mr. Goss? There's something to be said for not serving on an INTELLIGENCE COMMITTEE.

Posted 11:43 AM by Gene

G000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000GLEBLOGGER!!!!! WHY DID YOU TURN OFF THE NEXT BLOG BUTTON ON ME?

Posted 11:21 AM by Gene

The next time the HACKS consider their IMMORTALITY, they should conjure this:

Samir Husni, chair of the journalism department of the University of Mississippi, and popularly known through the trade as "Mr. Magazine," says, "If we go back historically to the 1920s and ‘30s, there were some magazine editors who were better known than their publications — like Henry Luce at Time and Dewitt Wallace at Reader’s Digest. Tina Brown did recreate the importance of the 'star editor' to some degree. But that was really an East Coast and, to some extent, a West Coast phenomenon." The truth of that sentiment was demonstrated once, at the height of Tina’s popularity in the media, when the Magazine Publishers of America conducted man-in-the-street interviews asking people if they knew who Tina Brown was. Nobody did. But one did think she was the love child of Tina Turner and James Brown.

Posted 11:07 AM by Gene

The Wizard of Oz peeks from His control room warning of -- a HOUSING BUBBLE?

Didn't He help inflate it in the first place?

Posted 10:59 AM by Gene

"College athletics is about big-time entertainment, and college is about education."

With most big schools run by ESPNCORP we can challenge that second assertion.

Posted 10:45 AM by Gene

The HERO (NEVER say HEROINE; it's sexist) of NEWS HACKS everywhere sounds increasingly unhinged, which in the world of the HACKS means she's increasingly TRUTHFUL.

Or maybe she's just being BOASTFUL.

CAVEAT: This is WORLDNETDAILY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!, linked from a "blog" of FRONTPAGE MAGAZINE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Posted 8:05 AM by Gene

These Congressclowns forget they had a commission make these TOUGH DECISIONS because they wouldn't do it THEMSELVES.

Posted 6:04 PM by Gene

The next con-SER-va-tive cause celebre: Tennessee's state AG blasts a country singer for plugging [SIC] CHEWING TOBACCO.

They'll say, smokin' and drinkin' and CHAWIN' go with country music. I say oral cancer goes with chewing tobacco.

Posted 5:55 PM by Gene

As Air Force cadets return to classes this month, they are seeing a new system for handling rape allegations — reforms put in place throughout the military in response to the sex scandal that rocked this prestigious school more than two years ago.

Isn't the Air Force Academy ALWAYS reforming?

Posted 5:31 PM by Gene

The circus is moving to WASHINGTON -- and (can we doubt this) A DAY-LONG STANDING O!

It should be MUCH easier to file those CREDULOUS PLUG -- REPORTS.

Posted 5:26 PM by Gene

GOODY!

The FBI and the Pentagon are investigating whether Chinese spies have been hacking into U.S. government computer systems, U.S. officials said Thursday.

If the Fumblers, Bumblers and Incompetents are looking it into it, think how much longer the Chinese have been DOING it.

Posted 5:21 PM by Gene

In news from a place somehow called the DESERT Southwest:

Arizona braces for water war

Hey BOOBS McKEATING! Here's something for your negotiating skills! Maybe you could get your running mate Sen. Hole-in-the-Bagel to help! Tell him he could win a NOBEL PEACE PRIZE! Think we can work ETHANOL into it?

Posted 5:09 PM by Gene

What is the difference between FRINGE festivals and Internet TV?

Think hard. Think VERY hard.

Posted 4:51 PM by Gene

After flailing around for a TV outlet for their obsolete pageant, the Miss America people are now (not unexpectedly) flailing around for a site. Without TV some things would cease to exist, like zillion-dollar salaries for athuhletes, and while we would not wager this is the end of an institution, it got here through blithe disdain for its sugar daddies' slow decline, followed by trendy rejiggering and panic. Firing Bert Parks was strike one; launching the immortal entertainer Vanessa Williams was strike two. The bat is moving.

P. S. The P. T. Barnum of beauty pageants is kidding himself. Miss Universe (born after a swimwear maker's dispute with Miss America) broadcast out of Miami Beach for years before moving from venue to venue. That doesn't seem to have helped its ratings of late.

P. P. S. How do they rewrite THE SONG?

Posted 2:17 PM by Gene

We would have paid no mind that the OSCAR® people have a new boss, but for something he said:

"I think the motion picture business is safe and sound....Through it all, good films are there and will always have a presence."

Thus proclaimeth the producer of the upcoming [SIC] FILM version of I Dream of Jeannie.

Posted 2:10 PM by Gene

We understand why Curley's (Nyuk! Nyuk! Nyuk!) STOOGES put this LAST in their FAQ:

Q: Where do AP reporters get their information? Do they rely on just one side?

A: The AP's reporters reach out each day to a wide variety of officials and other sources -- including the U.S. military, the Iraqi national government, Iraqi local officials, officials at private hospitals, eyewitnesses and regular Iraqis.

Often, each side tells a different story -- for example, the U.S. military and Iraqi local police often release significantly different casualty counts after some type of violence or incident. The AP attempts to sift through the various, conflicting accounts to get the most-accurate facts.

The AP always includes both sides of the story. It never publishes any allegation against the U.S. military unless it first tries to obtain the military's side of the story. In 2003, for example, a claim by Iraqis in Fallujah that American soldiers had killed a civilian was investigated for more than a week by AP journalists. No story was ever written after exhaustive interviews uncovered holes in the claimants' story.

The AP does attempt to also get information from insurgents, or from their sympathizers -- for example, the AP sometimes describes insurgent propaganda posted at mosques. This is an important part of the story. It is impossible for Western readers to get a clear and complete idea of events in Iraq without knowing the insurgents' strategy and morale.

The AP never works with, cooperates with or protects insurgents. The AP does not pay money for material (except for salaries to its own staff), and thus guards carefully against inadvertently providing any financial resources to insurgents.

We will not second-guess reporters who put their lives on the line to report from Iraq, although putting your life on the line as a reporter is not quite the same as doing it as a SOLDIER. Nor will we automatically assume the STOOGES side against us, though the THE OSAMA CHANNEL's shenanigans prove how easy that is. But CURLEY & CO. would not have issued a FAQ if they were doing a job BEYOND REPROACH.

Posted 11:35 AM by Gene

On DOW 36,000's site, a GLIBERTARIAN EXPOSES HIMSELF:

I believe that the human instinct for reciprocity -- to respond positively to those who treat us well and negatively to those who treat us poorly -- is generally a sufficient basis for a moral and social order. Private business transactions and contracts, reinforced by reciprocity, can induce a virtuous cycle of increased ethical behavior, greater rewards for ethical behavior, and better institutional arrangements.

TRANSLATION: Business relationships guarantee ethical behavior.

Pffh-hh-hh hh hh hh hh hh hh ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA!!!!!

Posted 10:21 AM by Gene

GE agrees Turkish bank stake [SIC]

Ho-hum, one bank buying another.

Posted 10:01 AM by Gene

I figured out what it is about MIKE THE BABBITT GEEK DELL that bothers me: he looks like a professional golfer, and you figure he spends a LOT of time rubbing elbows with golfers -- when he's not shaking down governments or outsourcing things.

Plus there's a little bit of DILBERT in that face, which makes for the best of TWO worlds.

Posted 9:55 AM by Gene

Con-SERRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR-va-TIVES:

Luxury home builder Toll Brothers Inc. said Thursday its earnings doubled in the fiscal third quarter, due to the company's strong land position and pricing power in its affluent markets....

Robert I. Toll, chairman and chief executive officer, said, "While the supply of buildable lots seems increasingly to be constrained by governmental regulation, demographics-driven demand continues to grow. We believe strong job numbers and an improving economy are positive factors for the housing industry, in general, and our luxury niche in particular."

Larry KUUUUUUUUUUUUUUDlow! Get out those AIR TANKS!

Posted 8:41 AM by Gene

That BELLOWING FOGHORN for PEEPING BLOGGERS is at it AGAIN with that GODFORSAKEN MOVIE -- only the first time we tried clicking the link we got this:

Microsoft OLE DB Provider for SQL Server error '80004005'

Timeout expired

/BanMan/banmanfunc.asp, line 1414

Somehow that is more edifying than reading ANOTHER tantrum over this lost cause.

Posted 8:15 AM by Gene

If the news biz were a simple unpretentious dispenser of half-truths one could tolerate it. But the moment it got that HIGHER CALLING it acquired a smell, a smell intensified by its biases, which again wouldn't be so bad except the HACKS forever assure us they HAVE NONE, rather like a bum exulting in his underarms. The smell further reeks with the biz' constant sales pitches, which allow it to make money while pretending to be populist, and thus avoid having to meet its readers' PREJUDICES so much as half-way.

The BIZ has suddenly decided in this Kane or Can or whoever it is has a good thing going. We are suspicious enough when a NEWSRAG cover-plugs it, but when the biz does the SHEEHAN or the ROBERTSON -- that is, when it sells the thing with ONE GOEBBELSIAN VOICE -- we are quite ready to SCREAM. And we KNOW the thing can't be any good because Robert "Over the" Hilburn, a man who has contributed his own few percentage points to LALA's circ GAINS, is SELLING it.

Why must consuming the news be a test of who cries UNCLE first?

Posted 8:11 AM by Gene

If he didn't already have YOU-KNOW-WHO Mrs. Gotti (and I cannot help thinking of her in the old sense of the word, MISTRESS) would be RUPERT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!'s perfect "girlfriend": a trollop, over make-upped and cosmetic-surgeried, and in the end, not very bright.

Posted 6:29 AM by Gene

Pat Robertson's Gift

He allows us NEWS HACKS to call Christians poor, stupid and easily led again.

Posted 5:47 PM by Gene

BLITHERING IDIOT REV APOLOGIZES.

But we know of his insatiable taste for SOLE FOOD.

Fear of death squads do it, Rev?

Posted 5:39 PM by Gene

The format wars in high-tech have gone beyond asinine. Already you can feed your DVD burner's maw with a zillion different types of discs. One may give up counting the different varieties of flash cards. This nonsense further goes to show when it comes to technology, the last thing these battlin' maniacs have in mind is the USER.

Posted 5:30 PM by Gene

Dell opens a plant in AMERICA?

I guess Meh-HEE-co didn't have $37.2 million.

MIKE THE BABBITT GEEK IS A REPUBLICAN.

Posted 5:25 PM by Gene

ART cost LA's Metropolitan Transit Authority $7.3 million in its last fiscal year.

SORRY YOUR HOLINESS PINCH, "FREEDOM OF EXPRESSION" HAS A PRICE.

Posted 5:16 PM by Gene

And speaking of airheads with nothing to do, Google News has 1,506 links to stories about that senile Rev, compared to 1,716 links to stories on George Bush and Iraq, and 1,383 links to stories on that Peruvian plane crash.

IMBECILES.

Posted 5:06 PM by Gene

More hype in the holy name of entertainment:

A household with 300 cable or satellite channels has access to 7,000 hours of programming a day, almost 3 million per year. That's a lot, but it's only a fraction of the 31 million hours of total annual programming. Every major cable company is making investments to allow TV to be distributed over the Internet, giving you access to each one of those 31 million hours. And then there's this year's 36-fold explosion in consumer-generated video on the Internet.

31 million hours is the sort of number that comes from anywhere and nowhere, and too often substitues for reporting. That said, the audience for most homemade Internet video will be between negligible and nil, and the few lucky ones will be professionals -- as with BLOGS. And even the most huffy effusions of ad-blurb copywriters cannot erase the notion that the more there is to watch, the less there is.

Posted 4:58 PM by Gene

I suppose on one level we should be happy USAOKAY!!!!! finds space to devote 1,548 words (counting captions and credits) to cheerleading; that means the news is slow. On the other hand if USAOKAY!!!!! can devote 1,548 words to cheerleading it may also mean we do not live in an age of ferment. I find a slight relationship between OKAY!!!!! devoting so many words to cheerleading and the showy, forced ennui enveloping Hollywood, a drear that, unbeknownst to our superiors in that toxic landfill, is based on their lack of inspiration and talent.

As for cheerleading, isn't it a little late in the day to be talking about sex? The spectacularly unfunny National Lampoon ran a cover almost three decades ago.

Posted 2:04 PM by Gene

Carly Fiorina, the Hewlett-Packard Co. CEO deposed last winter for failing to deliver enough benefits from the company's acquisition of Compaq Computer Corp., is writing a book about her career....

In February 2005, directors ousted Fiorina. HP's stock at the time was down two-thirds from its peak in 2000.

Yes, I'd say that's reason enough!

Posted 12:29 PM by Gene

And so the smell of photo chemicals in Rochester may slowly give way to the even sweeter aroma of hot dogs, popcorn, and nachos.

And it probably will too -- as Kodak slowly goes out of business and the town relies more heavily on its SPORTS GIMMICK for SALVATION, like TOO MANY DYING SMALLER TOWNS.

(More later.)

Posted 10:53 AM by Gene

And in more ROMYISM, when the new MR. BIG of MEDIA CW trashes GONZO's bash, why do I hear yet another sound -- the sound of somebody patting himself on the back?

Posted 10:48 AM by Gene

That squeaky noise you hear is the sound of ROMY's head bobbing up and down again:

We take a Cindy Sheehan, who has an honest argument to make for herself and people who may hear her and agree....

...that we're fighting in Iraq for ISRAEL and JOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOS.

I have no brief for the damfool Ted Nugent and the dammerfool Rev Robertson. But it is amazing how SELECTIVE people's outrage is. Yes it's true on the right -- but it's also true at the LALATIMES, which may explain that hissing noise you hear -- the sound of AIR SEEPING OUT OF ITS CIRCULATION.

Posted 10:44 AM by Gene

Hup-two-three-SLASH! Hup-two-three-BANG! Hup-two-three-OUCH!

I love a parade, don't you?

And I love NEWSMAX!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! even more!

Posted 6:49 AM by Gene

OoooooooooooOOPS:

IN RE: PAT ROBERTSON [Rick Brookhiser]

What an offense that this man was a serious candidate for the presidency. He was our Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton.

My Robertson moment came when I read a book of his that was recycling anti-Masonic propaganda from the 18th century (no kidding). I happened to see Ralph Reed, who was then working for him, and asked about it. Reed said, in effect, that Robertson almost certainly hadn't read it.

Great, so a man signs crapola he hasn't read.
Posted at 12:55 AM

Don't forget the OTHER PAT!

Posted 6:43 AM by Gene

When is a presidential vacation not a vacation?

When NEWS HACKS support the forces of RIGHT and JUSTICE and make SURE it's not a vacation.

And though Dubya always does seem to be on break, NEWS HACKS NEVER ARE.

Posted 6:29 AM by Gene

Relax, Bill Gates; It's Google's Turn as the Villain

Pffh-hh-hh hh hh hh ha ha ha ha ha ha HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA!!!!!

Posted 6:25 AM by Gene

Duhhhhhhhhh, support a guy with a "history of poor graduation rates and player arrests" who was convicted of drunk driving, DUHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH.

Follow-up at 5:45 P. M.: The man we should support for his graduation rates and player arrests and drunk driving is now "AT LEAST" $2.77 MILLION RICHER.

Posted 8:14 PM by Gene

Nadia and Robert McCaffrey, whose son Patrick was killed in Iraq in June 2004, said "Operation Iraqi Freedom" ended up on his government-supplied headstone in Oceanside, Calif., without family approval.

"I was a little taken aback," Robert McCaffrey said, describing his reaction when he first saw the operation name on Patrick's tombstone. "They certainly didn't ask my wife; they didn't ask me." He said Patrick's widow told him she had not been asked either.

"In one way, I feel it's taking advantage to a small degree," McCaffrey said. "Patrick did not want to be there, that is a definite fact."

-------------------------------------------------------------------

McCaffrey did not consult his father, with whom he discussed most important things in his life. "If he had asked me I would have advised him against it," Bob McCaffrey says. Nadia McCaffrey, who now operates a nonprofit grief counseling program and has become a leader in the Northern California antiwar movement, has been a lifelong pacifist and opposed her son's enlistment from the beginning. She says, though, that she was powerless to stop it. "He was like a lion in a cage," she recalls of her son's reaction to watching the terrorist attacks on television. "He just wanted to do something."

CURLEY'S (Nyuk! Nyuk! Nyuk!) STOOGES do NOT KNOW WHAT THE INTERNET IS, and if they DID, they would not know that YOU CAN LOOK UP WORDS BY HIGHLIGHTING THEM in FIREFOX.

Or maybe they DO KNOW -- AND DON'T CARE.

Posted 6:59 PM by Gene

And let us express NO DOUBT, as we've expressed this before, that if KNEE-JERK CONSERVATIVES ran the NEWS BIZ it would be NO DIFFERENT save for the SLANT. On Monday the FLAMING SUN for NIGHT-LIGHT BLOGGERS blamed the collapse of HIS FAVORITE RECENT MOVIE on "AGENDA JOURNALISM." Though AD-BLURB COPYWRITERS are the WORST WRITERS in the BIZ, and they tilt even further than their brethren in truth, so much so as to be PARALLEL to the GROUND with their FEET FIRMLY PLANTED on IT, our SUN refuses again to countenance that this masterwork lay in ESPNCORP's VAULT for THREE YEARS. He should take solace in all the bad -- CON-SER-VA-TIVE GEMS the likes of THE CORNER has unearthed. He forgets too the many egregious movies LIBERALS celebrate SOLELY out of POLITICS -- and in this number we include TAXI DRIVER. If everything must pass a litmus test right or left we must ALL fail. Thanks to INTOLERANT KNEE-JERKS RIGHT AND LEFT, THAT'S where we're HEADED.

Posted 6:15 PM by Gene

Expect NEVER to hear the end of THIS. Between this and the NEWS HACKS' screaming for PAT ROBERTSON'S EXECUTION, can anyone doubt REPORTING IS POLITICKING WITH ANOTHER NAME?

Posted 5:48 PM by Gene

MORON:

The former head of a suburban Chicago school system stole thousands of dollars -- including milk money and library fees -- from one of the poorest districts in the state so he and his family could live the high life, prosecutors said Tuesday.

Police raided Thomas Ryan's house last week and seized $730,000 in cash from a basement safe and envelopes scattered throughout the home, prosecutor Richard Devine said. Officers had to use laundry baskets to cart out the wads of cash.

Ryan spent about $70,000 in stolen money to pay for three daughters' college tuition, prosecutors said. He also reimbursed himself for about $1,000 in Chicago Blackhawks hockey tickets and gave his daughters thousands in cash as graduation presents, Ryan [SIC?] said.

DOUBLE-, TRIPLE- and QUADRUPLE-MORON:

Ryan, who had been superintendent since 1990 and earned $183,000 a year....

WHATSA MATTA? COST OF LIVING WENT UP?

Posted 5:36 PM by Gene

More proof THE WOMAN of COURAGE, VISION and STRENGTH represents THUH PEE-PUL:

Jackson Lee visits anti-war campers

Pulling our forces from Iraq would be the greatest national triumph since WE LANDED MEN ON MARS.

Posted 5:06 PM by Gene

Interesting that Terry Teachout calls this review of THE GREATEST COMEDY DOCUMENTARY OF ALL TIME "unexpected." We can see why: Its utterly CW P-Ulitzer-winning author (who wrote the REVIEW OF THE YEAR thus far) has the gall to say most of the tellings of the HILARIOUS JOKE are unfunny, and worse, that the joke boils over with "hatred" of the audience, and he calls the tellers "losers." If mere comedians are losers who hate the audience, what of the other people who bombard us everyday in every medium with their NON-STOP CONTEMPT?

P. S. THE GREATEST COMEDY DOCUMENTARY OF ALL TIME doubled its theatres and saw its gross decline by 23 percent. No doubt THAT joke's funnier than the "movie."

Posted 4:52 PM by Gene

G000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000GLEBLOGGER!!!!! WHY DID YOU TURN OFF THE NEXT BLOG BUTTON ON ME?

Posted 4:51 PM by Gene

The NPCPCAA becomes very slightly less PC.

Posted 2:11 PM by Gene

The computer I recently bought is certainly way faster than my old one; yet it doesn't really seem much faster than my old one did when I first got it. Does Intel think people are who aren't incurable GEEKS will gladly climb back on the upgrade treadmill for gains in performance that are increasingly theoretical?

Posted 1:50 PM by Gene

Abbas salutes Israel president over Gaza exit

Great. May we now refrain from the middle-finger salute?

Posted 1:32 PM by Gene

Further cribbing from ROMY, I see the consicence of the NEWS BIZ is mad because BOB YOU-KNOW-WHO's adding to his Volpone-like PILE OF GOLD. Of course THAT's not the reason he posts this; the reason he posts this is because Bob's a con-SERRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR-va-tive. It might never occur to ROMY that Bob is far more an ASS, Romy frequently being one himself; but we will concede he is a far GREATER ASS because he BELCHES for ZILLIONS -- and you KNOW he wouldn't have pulled that STUNT with the CARMAN if he didn't feel what his FORT-KNOX REWARDS justify him thinking -- that like ALICE, he's THE GREATEST.

Posted 12:23 PM by Gene

As no one reads us except by accident, and then for two seconds with a grumpy click to another site, we confess to huge pangs of jealousy at how other bloggers can affect the course of history. Just the other day, for instance, the great melodramatist ANDY's guest host Walt managed to ruin a friendship with another writer. At times like these we pine and sigh, but then we take comfort in realizing that to posterity, there is not a wooden nickel's difference between a blogger like me who types for nothing, and a BIG NAME SUCCESSFUL BLOGGER'S GUEST HOST who in the end, typed for nothing.

Posted 10:27 AM by Gene

Here's the problem with Rev. Pat: he expresses an impolitic impatience that, at its core, is not altogether without sense -- the president of Venezuela is NOT a nice guy -- but like too many right-wing religious leaders he is, to put it politely, a CRACKPOT, and he lets his mouth scoot WAY ahead of whatever brains he has, giving NEWS HACKS another excuse to make fun of him, and the poor, stupid, EASILY-LED CHRISTIANS, and gloat over the SUPERIORITY of their OWN NARROW TINY BIGOTRIES.

Isn't his six-shooter out of bullets to aim at his foot?

Posted 10:21 AM by Gene

We had the Singing Nun, then the Flying Nun -- and now the DANCING NUN!

Posted 5:50 PM by Gene

DOUBLE-WHAMMY:

The new civilian leadership team that has moved into place under Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld over the past few months is shaping up to be less ideological, more balanced and more attuned to Congress than the first-term group it has succeeded, according to defense analysts and lawmakers.

CODE WORDS for MORE AMENABLE TO RUN SCREAMING FROM IRAQ?

Although Rumsfeld has resisted calls from some in Congress and elsewhere to resign over his handling of the Iraq conflict....

Has anyone mentioned THAT lately? Or has someone spread The Gospel in ST. WARREN'S NEWS HEAVEN again?

Posted 5:16 PM by Gene

MICKEY!!!!! made a thing of the declining talk-radio ratings in the STRIB zone. I wouldn't. There'll always be loudmouths -- witness the FRED FLINTSTONES of SPORT, to whom too many seem to be turning. Still it might not be too much to hope people would shut up the braggarts of all stripes; perhaps they're starting to think for themselves.

Posted 5:05 PM by Gene

Poland's last communist leader, Gen. Wojciech Jaruzelski, said Monday he regretted his country's part in the 1968 invasion of Czechoslovakia but that the decision to send troops was dictated by the realities of the era.

Did you have to return from your oblivion?

Posted 5:04 PM by Gene

Let us just hope the thing works.

Posted 2:48 PM by Gene

"[T]he public outcry that greeted (the ruling) is some evidence that the political process is up to the task of addressing such policy concerns."

That being the case NINE-FINGER STEVENS, why can't we elect YOU GUYS?

Posted 11:53 AM by Gene

Golly gee! I didn't know so many people liked ISRAEL!

Posted 11:38 AM by Gene

The LORD GOD PINCH's executive editor's wings combusted in fury that someone would accuse HIS industry of bias, so what happens? Readers of E&P let him have it.

TIME FOR A COUNTER-LETTER-WRITING CAMPAIGN, ROMY! And you, St. Bill, BACK TO SLEEP.

P. S. It's 11:38 A.M. DO YOU KNOW WHERE YOUR PUBLIC EDI-TOR IS?

Posted 11:25 AM by Gene

Explainer: What's the Point of Consecutive Life Sentences?

Why bother with an article?

Posted 9:50 AM by Gene

"When you look at these magazines, do you think, 'Are we a country at war and facing the threat of terrorism?' or do you think, 'Gee, is this Big Mac really hurting my belt size?'"

When I look at these magazines I think, why I am looking at these magazines?

P. S. Why is it the newsrags' single-copy sales have gone down but their circulations remain the same? I don't want to guess how many "subscriptions" are cut-rates, nor how many are forced on unwilling students.

Posted 9:44 AM by Gene

Having failed to raise cable rates by buying ESPNCORP, BRIAN ROBBER has decided to raise our cable rates by BUYING ESPNCORP'S PROGRAMMING!

WAY TO GO, ROBBER BARON!

Posted 9:30 AM by Gene

G000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000GLEBLOGGER!!!!! WHY HAVE YOU SHUT OFF THE NEXT BLOG BUTTON ON ME?????

Posted 9:24 AM by Gene

We're glad the hacks had a blast; but why do they have to bomb US?

When you read that fatuous rave, remember -- RENEE PAID ZERO FOR HER TICKET.

Posted 9:15 AM by Gene

Having abandoned in loco parentis a long time ago, colleges try to stop drinking because otherwise it would look bad.

Look guys, if your students can do anything, why can't they drink?

P. S. Florida is a par-TY school. Who knew?

The par-TY school is a hollow, sad place.

Posted 6:50 AM by Gene

We'll credit the great OJ for lots of things, but "killing" the soaps isn't one. Watching a daytime serial demands patience, something the Manhattan Masters of the Universe have been fraying with increasing success for many years. More recently the hard-core among the fans got SLUTSVILLE, and anything so ew-yuck-gross is sure to make all else look like watered-down oatmeal by comparison. Why should we mourn the decline of the soap opera anyway? It's just one more bad kind of entertainment out the window. The thing is, lots of good kinds went out that way first.

Posted 6:40 AM by Gene

The Bionic Woman's love life gets less than a ringing endorsement:

Demi Moore apparently loves 'sharing a bath' and 'snuggling up naked' with boy toy Ashton Kutcher.

Too much information, Demi.

And I don't even know you. Imagine what your poor kids have to deal with in homeroom.

Rumer, 17, Scout, 14, and Tallulah, 11, must have flipped when flipping through the pages of September's Harper's Bazaar, where Mommy, 42, blabbed about her steamy love life with her twenty-something boyfriend of two years.

Yuck.

TRANSLATION: I PAID FOR THESE BREASTS AND I INTEND TO KEEP THEM!

Posted 6:35 AM by Gene

And here's a problem:

Whatever the effect may be on the 2006 and 2008 elections, the war must be prosecuted with all the speed and force we can muster -- and that is more than we now use -- toward victory. The President needs to explain to us, in detail, what defeat would mean to us and the rest of the civilized world. He needs to tell us where we are fighting, and how. We need not know every covert operation that may be going on, but we need to be told how many nations we fight in, and why. He needs to say that the fight continues, under many covert guises, and that we mean to defeat the enemy wherever he may be, whichever regimes must be destroyed, and by whatever means, fair or foul, we must use to achieve the defeat of Islamic terrorism. And when the President tells us these facts, they must be accompanied by decisive action that carries out these intents.

All true -- but we're talking the most famously dyslexic of presidents, one who would rather hide behind the lectern than make a speech, who couldn't write a paragraph without his brain hurting, who can't say a sentence of two words without gumming it up. A great leader would do these things.

Posted 6:29 AM by Gene

Hmmm....

Democrats say a long-standing rift in the party over the Iraq war has grown increasingly raw in recent days, as stay-the-course elected leaders who voted for the war three years ago confront rising impatience from activists and strategists who want to challenge President Bush aggressively to withdraw troops.

Amid rising casualties and falling public support for the war, Democrats of all stripes have grown more vocal this summer in criticizing Bush's handling of the war. A growing chorus of Democrats, however, has said this criticism should be harnessed to a consistent message and alternative policy -- something most Democratic lawmakers have refused to offer.

TRANSLATION: Our side doesn't know what it's doing.

FURTHER TRANSLATION: Our side is doing the best it can to ignore that the EEEEEEEEEEEEEVIL DUBYA still has OVER THREE YEARS IN OFFICE.

Posted 8:21 PM by Gene

Odd that while Mr. Mark addresses his SPIRITUALITY in Germany they have none.

Many young people feel no connection with the values of the late 1960s and early 1970s. "Emancipation and self-fulfillment" -- weren't those the ideas that led to their parents getting divorced?

Nope, I don't THINK we'd see THAT in an AMERICAN newsrag.

Posted 8:05 PM by Gene

Here's the deal: You do more YAKETY-YAKETY-YAKETY-YAK-YAK-YAK-YAKKING of your PRIVATE LIFE on CELL PHONES and you'll get more UGLY CELL-PHONE TOWERS.

Posted 7:42 PM by Gene

Hmmm, GLIBERAL, you don't mention ISRAEL. Not surprised. Does the word DISHONEST mean anything to you? No. It means nothing to most NEWS HACKS.

We may guess too that your LORD has come to have second thoughts about JOOOOOOOOOOS too.

'Bye GLIBERAL! Don't scream too hard when the WALL encloses you.

P. S. Unfortunately, GLIB, the Web doesn't take THAT long.

Posted 4:32 PM by Gene

Most times we think of HHHWWWALTER CRRRONKITE as full of bluff and bluster and bull, but then he was like a little boy covering the moon landings, and you can't get entirely mad at a guy like that.

Posted 4:21 PM by Gene

Nc.eurosunsa.com disappeared -- replaced by a bigger nuisance:

c1.zedo.com!!!!!

Posted 1:36 PM by Gene

Another reason THIS TIME might be different: the EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEVIL OTHER SIDE might NOT be prepared to take it LYING DOWN.

Posted 1:04 PM by Gene

TRANSLATION: CHEAP CHANNEL's going to fork over $1 BILLION in FREE AIR TIME to MOVEON.ORG when the HACKS learn they've stiffed our FAVORITE CONSCIENCE.

Broadcasters oughtn't to be so skittish about advocacy ads. On the other hand, news hacks oughtn't to be so skittish about reporting that CINDY THINKS WE'RE FIGHTING FOR EEEEEEEEEEEEVIL ISRAEL AND JOOOOOOOOOOOOS.

Posted 12:50 PM by Gene

Thunkthunkthunk mike on? Testing 1-2-3 testing 1-2 okay hear me? We're losing in Iraq! Did you hear that in the BACK? WE'RE LOSING THE WAR IN IRAQ! LOUDER? All RIGHT -- WE'RE LOSING THE WAR IN IRAQ!!!!! CAN YOU HEAR ME UP THERE IN THE PEANUT GALLERY????? WE'RE LOSING THE WAR IN IRAQ!!!!!!!!!! Hey thank you for the TREMENDOUS STANDING OVATION -- I can ALWAYS count on you.

Either Hole-in-the-Bagel should be taken out to the SHED -- or he should SWITCH to Dr. YAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGH'S PARTY.

OR:

Hagel, Nelson pump Ethanol

Posted 9:49 AM by Gene

I don't know what's gotten into STERNO. I've lately turned to his blog and found no mention of his GOD, no mention of PRUDES, no mention of JIHADISTS, no mention of all the things that got me to call him STERNO in the first place. True, he can be tiresome in his evangelism for the Web, and we really don't need to know Dell STINKS, and he's taking ads (to be sure, he was forthright and sensible in stating his reasons). But I'll admit even on his many bad days he always did have a (heavily-hidden) vein of common sense. Who knows? If he keeps it up maybe I'll stop calling him STERNO.

Posted 9:34 AM by Gene

As Romy and other blithering NEWS HACKS trembled with a profound mixture of self-centered anguish and megalomaniacal pride, somebody shot what they credulously imagined to be GONZO'S ASHES into the sky, thus hastening his trip to oblivion.

Goodbye Gonzo -- and GET LOST!

Come to think of it, he already got there.

Posted 9:25 AM by Gene

Was John's heart really into this column? We've read too much of NEWSRAGS to suspect how they're written. We too are mad at the NPCPCAA and its politically-correct call to ban Indian (NATIVE AMERICAN) mascots, and the people who would ban junk food; we too are mad at the self-righteousness that has pervaded our private realms since the coming of John Banzhaf, but this past week also disclosed a survey that rather strongly linked R movies to juvenile delinquency. Does any time someone complains about a societal malfunction we now call it NANNYISM? This is the detritus of some forgotten scribbler named Kilpatrick, a faux-Mencken who probably didn't believe half what he wrote so long as he had his conservative shtick. Pills have always been part of American life, and for the most part they've made things better; today's pills largely suffer from the law of diminishing returns.

Posted 9:18 AM by Gene

A newsrag owned by -- the LORD is "searching" for -- SPIRITUALITY?

Skimming this typing I found nothing too controversial, but who wants to do more than SKIM a NEWSRAG?

Posted 7:13 PM by Gene

Let us not deny it: Internet television is the future. I wouldn't bank on it soon as TV's bound to look lousy on a monitor for a while, but it won't always, especially as HD settles in. The money questions should be settled rather quickly. Question: How will the BRIAN ROBBERS and KING RICHARDS bust their way in and screw the public?

Posted 4:57 PM by Gene

We didn't put enough troops in Iraq, but Max knows who runs his party, and judging from the downer tone (remember his "speech" introducing the NEXT PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES?) it isn't clear he'd be unhappy with a precipitate withdrawal, and all the good things that would mean for Democrats and NEWS HACKS.

Max, PUT UP OR SHUT UP. We suspect it is time for the LATTER.

Posted 4:38 PM by Gene

The Pope spoke. Will Muslims listen?

Posted 1:02 PM by Gene

It is a wonder Toenail.com hasn't commissioned some typical devil's-advocate fakery saying there IS no malaise in show-biz -- it's BETTER THAN EVER! That malaise sounds like mayonnaise and has a powerful rep from JIMMAH does not negate its usefulness. Aside from the fact that we're FED THAT BETTER-THAN-EVER LINE ALL THE TIME, there are several reasons why show-biz stinks. Last night, for instance, I could not keep a certain song from playing and replaying in my head -- "Moonlight Becomes You," the work of two HACKS named Johnny Burke and Edward Chester Babcock (Jimmy Van Heusen to you), as done definitively by Glenn Miller, with an all-too-little known baritone called Skip Martin (who had a really thick Italian name and performed with Chico Marx -- yes, Chico Marx had a big band), and the Modernaires with their odd lead falsetto. When Miller, who's chastised way too often for his sweet work, had a superb ballad, you could tell in the arrangement he knew it. We might not put this on exactly the same plane as Schubert or Chopin, but we suspect either genius would have found inspiration in Burke's lyric, as certainly Van Heusen did. (And let us not forget Burke had to write it this way because Der Bingle, who introduced the tune in Road to Morocco, didn't like singing "I love you," three little words that don't appear until towards the end.) We would wager the only difference between this immortal tune and a high-art specimen is that this one was "commercial."

Indeed now we think of the elegy Joseph Epstein wrote for Commentary which contains this stirring note:

In "Writing for the Movies," published in the February 1962 issue of Commentary...[the screenwriter Daniel Fuchs] asked if it was really fitting, in the name of highbrow snobbery, "to pass by so indifferently the work of [Hollywood directors and producers like] Ford, Stevens, Wilder, Mankiewicz, Huston, Zinneman, William Wellman, Howard Hawks, Sam Wood, Clarence Brown, Victor Fleming, William Van Dyke, King Vidor, Raoul Walsh, Henry Hathaway, Henry King, Chaplin, Lubitsch, Goldwyn, Selznick, Milestone, Capra, Wyler, Cukor, Kazan?” The accomplishments of these men, he argued, had had a world-wide effect, and their achievement was of a magnitude equal to that of the best American architects and inventors. "Generations to come, looking back over the years, are bound to find that the best, most solid creative effort of our decades was spent in the movies, and it’s time someone came clean and said so."

Yes, we know why David Thomson closed his book on the biz' prospects with a chapter titled "That's All, Folks." At least no one can take our huge achievements away from us, and we always have songs like "Moonlight Becomes You" to remind us of when we could be proud of our national culture -- and Burke and Van Heusen worked in the movies too.

P. S. It appears the BEEEEEEEEEEEEE-OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOH is going to have another justly deserved down weekend, despite the best hopes of those who root for Cindy Sheehan and SLEAZY MOVIES at the same time.

P. P. S. And shucks Size XXXXL for the Size SSSSS guy, looks as if all those tens of millions of movie goers never materialized, unless of course they were GHOSTS, and they paid in UNSEEN DOLLARS.

Posted 12:00 PM by Gene

Isn't Robert "Over the" Hilburn the last person who should talk of retreads?

Of course not. When we have the computer and the money we can do as we please. And if people stop reading, we can always say it's THE DO-NOT-CALL LAW.

Posted 11:21 AM by Gene

We take the subway.

Posted 11:18 AM by Gene

Is it possible THE PAPER OF RE-CORD has TOO MANY DRAMA AD-BLURB COPYWRITERS?

How about it, MIA PUBLIC EDI-TOR?

Posted 11:05 AM by Gene

Really Jake, we wish you'd make these impolite noises in PRIVATE.

Posted 11:03 AM by Gene

In other NORTS SPEWS:

The National Collegiate Athletic Association created some wiggle room yesterday in its recent decision to ban American Indian imagery, announcing that it would give latitude to universities whose "namesake" tribe supports the mascot.

A newly formed staff committee charged with reviewing appeals to the Aug. 5 ruling will take into account the university's relationship with the tribe as a "primary factor," according to a statement released yesterday by the NCAA.

DIMWITS.

Posted 9:27 AM by Gene

A "highly-touted product" of St. JoePa is on indefinite suspension for making nasty phone calls.

Between this and Jim "The Used Car Dealer" Calhoun's hoopsters I think we're in for a golden age of juvenile sports delinquency -- and we haven't even started play yet!

And that follows a couple of guys shooting ARROWS through the wall of an apartment.

"You're freshmen, sophomores, you sometimes act like jerks. But when you get to be a fourth-year guy, a fifth-year guy, and you're still acting like a jerk, then I've got problems with it."

But that's the thing about professional college sport -- you're SUPPOSED to be the BIGGEST JERK YOU CAN!

And here's a Nebraska defensive end arrested for drunk driving!

That's what we should do EVERY day: enter "player arrested" in Google News.

Posted 8:58 AM by Gene

When Sony and Bertelsmann merged their recorded-SOUND operations they laid off 2,000. Judging from this press release we post in full they may not have laid off enough:

Bow Wow's Everybody's Most 'Wanted'!

Hip-Hop Heartthrob's Latest Album RETURNS To The Top 10!

Bow Wow Conquers Nation's Airwaves with Two Smash Singles
'Let Me Hold You' (Featuring Omarion) & 'Like You' (Featuring Ciara)

NEW YORK, Aug. 19 /PRNewswire/ -- The multi-platinum hip-hop heartthrob Bow Wow is living up to his status as a bona fide superstar as his sizzling new album, Wanted (available as a traditional CD or as a DualDisc) returns to the Top 10 on the Billboard 200 bestselling albums chart while his latest pair of singles, "Let Me Hold You" (featuring Omarion), and "Like You" (featuring Ciara), continue to light up the nation's airwaves reaching tens of millions of listeners coast-to-coast. Both Bow Wow's current singles are riding high on the nation's Hot 100 with "Let Me Hold You" holding steady at #4 and "Like You" bulleting its way up to #12.

Though only 18, Bow Wow's already a veteran rapper with a string of multi-platinum successes behind him. Wanted, his eagerly-awaited fourth album, debuted at #3 on the Billboard 200 best-selling albums chart and has already sold more than 328,000 copies. With sales of more than 50,000 copies this week alone, Wanted has returned to the Top 10 and is the nation's #2 Rap Album and #3 R&B Album. Bow Wow's latest has generated two smash singles to-date: "Let Me Hold You" (featuring Omarion) and "Like You" (featuring Ciara).

Produced by superstar hit maker Jermaine Dupri, "Let Me Hold You," a collaboration with fellow hip-hop heartthrob Omarion, has been the #1 record on the Urban Mainstream Monitor and the #1 record on the Top 40 Rhythm chart for the past four weeks.

The artist's new single, "Like You" (featuring Ciara), also produced by hit maker Jermaine Dupri, is extending the building buzz on Bow Wow as the Heart Throb Tour continues to sell out venues across the country (full itinerary following).

Bow Wow's provocative video for "Like You" has been the #1 downloaded clip on Launch.com and is AOL's #1 video worldwide, with more than 1.4 million plays to-date.

Bow Wow's singles are Sony BMG's two top-selling ringtones this week: #1: "Let Me Hold You" (more than 700,000 sold) and #2: "Like You" (more than 200,000 sold).

A recent New York in-store appearance celebrating the release of Wanted was the scene of pure pandemonium with thousands of delirious and frenzied fans lining up for hours for their chance to meet Bow Wow in person. New York's Mayor Michael Bloomberg was reportedly "met with a mob of screaming teenage girls on his way to work...." (New York Daily News (Wednesday, July 13, 2005). [We didn't know you were so sexy, Mr. Honorary Mayor Mike!]

The fan-driven hysteria at the Bow Wow in-store provided a fitting prelude to the hip-hop icon's SRO "Scream Tour IV Presents: The Heart Throb Tour," which opened in Trenton, New Jersey on July 20.

For the Scream Tour IV, Bow Wow has joined forces with fellow superstar Omarion for a series of historic North American concerts. Other acts on the Scream Tour IV include Bobby Valentino, Pretty Ricky, Marques Houston, and B5.

2005 is shaping up to be a very big year for Bow Wow. In addition to the release of his new album and the Scream IV tour, Bow Wow will light up the big screen this fall with a starring role in the feature film, "Roll Bounce," a teenage skater-dramedy set in the late 1970s. A Fox Searchlight release, "Roll Bounce" is slated to open nationwide on September 23, 2005.

Bow Wow first burst on the scene back in 2000 -- under the wing of super producer Jermaine Dupri -- with his debut album, Beware of Dog, which went on to sell more than three million copies while solidifying his status as an authentic hip-hop heartthrob.

Bow Wow took his brand of rap to the next level with 2001's Doggy Bag, hitting the road in support of his multi-platinum sophomore CD with the sold-out "Scream Tour II," wowing fans all over the country with hits like "Take Ya Home" and "Thank You."

Bow Wow's undeniable star power led to starring roles in the box office triumph "Like Mike" (one of the 50 Top-Grossing films of 2002) and the subsequent hits "All About The Benjamins" (2002) and "Johnson Family Vacation" (2004).

With his third album, 2003's Unleashed, Bow Wow became more directly involved with writing and producing his music, creating a collection directly from the heart, conveying a more personal overview of life from Bow Wow's perspective.

He is the youngest musician to open the Grammy Awards, is the first "kid" to be included in Vanity Fair's prestigious annual music issue (October 2001), and entered the "The Guinness Book of World Records" as the youngest solo rapper to hit #1 on the U.S. charts.

Having recently turned 18, with several hit singles, platinum-plus albums, sold-out tours, starring roles in hit films, and a place in "The Guinness Book of World Records" already on his resume, Bow Wow continues to prove that he's the 100% real deal with the indisputable goods: a bona fide teen superstar blessed with burgeoning talent, tenacity, and a deep connection to his audience.

Bow Wow's Scream IV: Heart Throb Tour

07/20/05 Trenton, NJ Sovereign Bank Arena
07/21/05 Bridgeport, CT Arena at Harbor Yard
07/23/05 Hampton, VA Hampton Coliseum, Arena
07/24/05 Baltimore, MD 1st Mariner Arena
07/27/05 Cleveland, OH CSU Arena
07/28/05 Columbus, OH Value City Arena
07/29/05 Detroit, MI Cobo Arena
07/30/05 Champaign, IL University Of Illinois Assembly Hall, Arena
07/31/05 St. Louis, MO Savvis Center
08/04/05 Los Angeles, CA Gibson Amphitheatre
08/06/05 Oakland, CA Oakland-Alameda Co. Coliseum
08/08/05 Denver, CO Coors Amphitheatre
08/10/05 Kansas City, MO American Royal Center/ Kemper Arena
08/12/05 Houston, TX Toyota Center
08/13/05 New Orleans, LA New Orleans Cultural Center, Hall
08/14/05 Dallas, TX Nokia Arena
08/17/05 Greenville, SC Bi-Lo Center
08/18/05 Nashville, TN Gaylord Arena
08/19/05 Birmingham, AL BJCC Arena
08/20/05 Memphis, TN FedEx Arena
08/21/05 Atlanta, GA Philips Arena
08/24/05 New York, NY Madison Square Garden
08/25/05 Philadelphia, PA Wachovia Center
08/26/05 Washington, DC MCI Center
08/27/05 Greensboro, NC Greensboro Coliseum Complex, Special Events
Center
09/01/05 Jacksonville, FL Memorial Coliseum
09/02/05 Tampa, FL St Pete Times - Forum
09/04/05 Miami, FL Miami Arena

Good luck! (Pffh-hh-hh!)