On Vacation

heading to Barcelona for a couple of weeks. Just returned from Laramie. More to come on that one (chalk eating, discovering my inner child, etc.).

Quickest Way to Ensure Utah Jazz Mediocrity

Apparently the utah jazz are considering re-hiring the man who wrecked the New York Knicks franchise?

More on Rove

From the same reporter who "broke" the story that Newsweek would mention that Time Reporter Matthew Cooper was protecting Karl Rove as a source. Kind of confusing at first, but read further down to see the defintions of "subject" and "target." Interesting take.

Best Article Ever

Republished in this week's Onion. One of the best articles ever.

even peter gammons bags on W

couldn't resist. Scroll down to the item about the Cleveland Indians and how they are 28th in league attendance with one of the more exciting teams in the league. Gammons sees fit to mention a depressed Ohio economy where "280,000 jobs" in Ohio were lost during the first 4 years of the Bush administration.

Gammons, perhaps my favorite baseball writer, is no political ideologue. At the end of his column, he gives props to Carl Everett, a White Sox player who last week spoke against the emergence of gays in sports and the teaching of evolution in schools (props were not for these comments, but for his play on the field). If Gammons were a political ideologue he'd probably not want to give Carl Everett any credit at all for anything.

So, as Peter Gammons goes, so goes the nation? right, he's a regular Walter Lippmann.

P.S. Why does Peter Gammons rock so much? In a previous column, he gave props to a Social Distortion remake of the Clash's "Death or Glory." Rock indeed.

Live 8 Coverage Eats My Ass

And not in a good way, either. Alterman also does a good job of expressing my thoughts on the concert by MTV and VH1. Not sure how many of you caught Live Aid in 1985 on MTV, but as a 9-year-old, it was incredible. The concert opened my eyes to world problems and to root for bands that cared about the human condition. The coverage was tip-top: the network showed complete songs and sets, it alternated between Wembley Stadium and the U.S. for important acts. My brother and I actually videotaped the concert on 6 Betamax videotapes (it's a shame that they're lost).

This past weekend? Had to hear the fucking inane bantering of Sway and the VJ who wants to look like Fergie from Black Eyed Peas cutting into what were to be great musical moments. After the bantering, they'd cut to a commercial. WTF!!!? Can you imagine if J.J. Goodman interrupted Freddie Mercury performing "we are the champions" at Live Aid in '85? It would be blasphemy. I know, I know, they did this so that one couldn't TiVo the concert and then record it to DVD, and thus cutting into the inevitable DVD sales of the concert. Isn't commericalism and global consumerism exacerbating the problems that Live 8 sought to address? Additionally, although he's a blowhard and a so-so musician (but I still love his band), Oasis frontman Noel Gallagher said it best:

"Correct me if I'm wrong, but are they hoping that one of these guys from the G8 is on a quick 15 minute break at Gleneagles (in Scotland) and sees ANNIE LENNOX singing SWEET DREAMS and thinks, 'Fuck me, she might have a point there, you know?'

"KEANE doing SOMEWHERE ONLY WE KNOW and some Japanese businessman going, 'Aw, look at him... we should really fucking drop that debt, you know.'

"It's not going to happen, is it?"

And then, of course, Noel appears in the Live 8 commercials that were shown. Bloody hell.

Karl Rove to Experience Joys of Man Love in Federal Prison?

Maybe not, but this story should be getting a little bit more traction than it is (along with the Downing Street Memo, more on that later). Note the carefully worded responses of Rove's lawyer. "Rove did not disclose to any reporter" (but did Rove disclose to a non-reporter or authorize someone else to disclose?) "He did not knowingly reveal classified info" (did he unknowingly do it?). C'mon press, ask some better questions and make Rove answer definitively. BTW, nothing bars Rove from testifying about what he said before the grand jury. He could come forward and say exactly what he told them, unless he fears that his words could be used in some sort of criminal prosecution against himself (perhaps a perjury indictment for lying to a grand jury?). For more on this, check out this post on the Huffington Post

Imagine if you will that it was Clinton who was in power and that in response to an article that was critical of Clinton policies, a columnist sympathetic to Clinton revealed that the writer of the critical article had a wife that was working undercover for the CIA. There would be hell to pay. But with W and the Bushies, the press have given yet another free pass. (By the way, why isn't Robert Novak, the writer of the Sun-Times article that outed Valerie Plame, not facing criminal charges for revealing classified info?)

Not that the press should necessarily engage in a tit-for-tat, but I'm looking for at least some critical questioning of any presidential policies or actions. The Downing Street Memo should provide the press with a wealth of questions for the president. However, it seems that the press is a little more interested in comets, tom cruise, brad pitt and angelina jolie (that last one might be justified), and "intelligent" design theory (BTW, all you rabid conservatives should read George Will's column in Newsweek on intelligent design theory.) Remember all of the "Wag the Dog" talk that occurred when Clinton was in power and sent missiles to Afghanistan and the Sudan? Clinton was in the middle of his impeachment battle and many conservatives accused him of ordering the attacks to deflect attention from his political troubles. (A scenario, by the way, that Richard Clarke exposed as nonsense in his book "Against All Enemies" and that post 9/11 we discovered was a quick, justified move.) However, the press, latched on to the story and let it play out. Not to mention even the impeachment itself! Can we get some critical perspective in our press? Seriously, what's more deserving of press coverage: being misled (some say lied) into war or lying about a hummer in the oval office?

Oh yeah, happy July 4th. Let's celebrate our freedom of the press.

Sci Fi and such

Beck and Scientology

Man, it's like pulling the curtain on the wizard in oz. Beck is actively being promoted on the scientology celebrity website. Also, he's apparently being a little more like Tom Cruise and actively speaking about it here.

Perhaps the best analysis (although admittedly very anti-scientology) is from this site. It's a background briefing for any future reporters on how to deal with the subject when interviewing Beck. The piece is informative for its many footnotes and references to previous instances where Beck has publicly addressed his association with Scientology.

This whole round of my investigation on this topic was set off by a recent article in Stylus Magazine.

I think that this whole reassessment by me is being brought on by Tom Cruise's recent, public , militant attacks on psychiatry. Because TC bashes psychiatry due to his adherence to scientology, I have developed a distaste for scientology. The analogy might be crude, but those who seek to criticize a particular field of scientific study because their "religion" teaches that the particular science is a lie are not unlike fundamentalist christians who teach that dinosaurs didn't really exist. Is Beck now one who fits in this category of teachers? WTF?

I didn't really have a problem with scientologists before. I though Travolta was killer in Pulp Fiction, Juliette Lewis good in Natural Born Killers, and Tom Cruise all right in Mission Impossible and Magnolia. But for this most recent round of Tom Cruise generated publicity regarding its beliefs, I prolly would've never had a problem with it. But now, with all that's come out recently, I suppose I do have a problem.

Also, just found that someone else is wrestling with whether one can still be fan of Beck knowing of his connections to scientology.

Damn. Things would be much easier if it as Karl Rove and George W. who were the scientologists.