Media
Bruce Springsteen pays tribute to Mandela at first South Africa show
Rocker Bruce Springsteen and his E Street Band wowed fans on Sunday night opening their first concert in South Africa with a rousing tribute to the late Nelson Mandela. He kicked off the show in Cape Town with "Free Nelson Mandela", a song written by…
Damien Chazelle's 'Whiplash' wins big at Sundance
A tense drama about the fraught relationship between a young jazz drummer and a teacher in New York was the big winner at the 30th Sundance Film Festival on Saturday. The highly acclaimed "Whiplash," by writer-director Damien Chazelle, won both the…
Tea Party Republican spews vile, sexist Twitter attacks at Wendy Davis
Former head of the South Carolina Republican Party, Tea Party activist Todd Kincannon has unleashed a vile parade of hateful, sexist insults aimed at Texas Democratic state Sen. Wendy Davis. According to Americans Against the Tea Party, the attacks began earlier this week and have only gotten uglier.
Kincannon has enlarged upon early Republican attacks on Davis, insinuating that because she supports a woman's right to choose, she must be a promiscuous, man-eating tramp. Calling her a "coke whore" and insinuating that she cheated on her then-husband, Kincannon wrote, at one point, "I don’t care if folks attack Wendy Davis unfairly. I just want her attacked."
He has tweeted, variously:
- I don't think I've ever met anyone who was as much of a whore as Wendy Davis. And I've met some epic whores in my travels.- I suspect Texas voters care that Wendy Davis was potentially going to Harvard coke parties instead of caring for her children.
- Make Wendy Davis worry that somebody will dig up a Harvard classmate that she did coke with. Torture her until she begs for it to stop.
- Wendy Davis has an abortion fetish and did in fact abandon her children.
- Make Wendy Davis wish she'd never been born. #InsertAbortionJokeHere
The fusillade of misogynist filth has gone on for days, now, with Kincannon furiously unloading on people defending Davis as well as fellow conservatives begging him not to further damage the party's image.
"Lick my taint," he angrily told one female critic.
Davis is a rising star in Texas politics. She stood firm in the face of Republicans' attempts to curtail women's right to choose in the state, filibustering a draconian Republican law in a show of resistance that brought thousands of supporters to the Austin statehouse. She announced in 2013 that she intends to run for governor.
'Duck Dynasty' ratings tumble to lowest numbers since 2012
Ratings for the A&E show "Duck Dynasty" have fallen to their lowest point since 2012 in the wake of the scandal following racist and anti-LGBT remarks by family patriarch Phil Robertson. According to entertainment industry trade paper Variety, the show is hemorrhaging viewers, with audience numbers falling by about 2 million from week to week.
"One week after returning to kick off its fifth season with a 3.3 rating in adults 18 to 49 and 8.5 million viewers overall," wrote Variety's Rick Kissell, “'Duck Dynasty' slid to a 2.9 in the demo and 6.65 million total viewers, according to Nielsen. This is the smallest same-night crowd for an original episode of the series since the second-season finale drew 6.45 million in December 2012."
As Kissell points out, it's hard to say whether the controversy itself has damaged the show's appeal, or whether it was the revelation that the long-bearded, unkempt millionaires of the Robertson family were once clean-cut country-club preppies before they got a TV deal.
Or perhaps the show is simply a one-note flash in the pan whose popularity has run its course. Kissell suggests the latter, pointing out that ratings were already trending downward at the end of Season Four, which aired before Phil Robertson's now-notorious interview with GQ.
The shows that ranked higher than "Duck Dynasty" in viewers in the key 18 to 49 demographic were "American Idol" -- the reality singing competition that launched the careers of openly gay singers Clay Aiken and Adam Lambert -- and "Modern Family," a comedy series that features a gay married couple and an ethnically diverse cast.
Nervous venture capitalist compares nation's progressive shift to Nazi 'Kristallnacht'
On Saturday, the Wall Street Journal published a bizarre letter from wealthy venture capitalist Tom Perkins warning that the underclasses could stage a Nazi Germany-style pogrom against the wealthy.
In the piece -- titled "Progressive Kristallnacht Coming?" -- Perkins worried that wealthy people like himself could end up being rounded up in the night and forced into camps.
Kristallnacht, also known as the "Night of Broken Glass," took place in early November of 1938. Nazi forces invaded Jewish neighborhoods and homes and forced them out, sending them by foot and rail to concentration camps, where millions perished.
An estimated 30,000 Jews were arrested and imprisoned on Kristallnacht. More than 90 people were murdered by SA forces and thousands of synagogues were burned to the ground. Perkins believes that a similar fate could await the tiny percentage of Americans who hold the bulk of the nation's wealth.
"Writing from the epicenter of progressive thought, San Francisco," Perkins said, "I would call attention to the parallels of fascist Nazi Germany to its war on its 'one percent,' namely its Jews, to the progressive war on the American one percent, namely the 'rich.'"
"From the Occupy movement to the demonization of the rich embedded in virtually every word of our local newspaper, the San Francisco Chronicle, I perceive a rising tide of hatred of the successful one percent," he lamented.
"This is a very dangerous drift in our American thinking. Kristallnacht was unthinkable in 1930; is its descendent 'progressive' radicalism unthinkable now?" he asked.
Perkins is a senior partner in the venture capitalist firm Kleiner, Perkins, Caufield and Byers.
[image of man in storm of money via Shutterstock.com]
Online petition asks White House: Deport Justin Bieber
Justin Bieber's run-ins with the law could potentially get him kicked out of the United States, the nation where the Canadian-born teen idol struck it rich, immigration lawyers said Friday.
Bieber, 19, kept a low profile a day after he was charged with driving under the influence after police caught him drag racing in Miami Beach, Florida, allegedly after drinking and smoking marijuana.
On Twitter, the voice behind hits "Baby" and "Boyfriend" kept an uncharacteristic silence, leaving his 49 million followers to rally behind him with the trending hashtag #WeWillAlwaysSupportYouJustin.
Instead, Bieber let a picture tell 1,000 words with an Instagram of himself in a dark hoodie, waving outside jail, alongside an image of Michael Jackson a decade ago when the King of Pop was fighting child molestation charges.
"What more can they say," read the caption.
Besides the DUI charge, Bieber -- released on a $2,500 bond -- also faces charges of resisting arrest and driving with an expired Georgia state license behind the wheel of a yellow Lamborghini sports car.
He was already under investigation for allegedly hurling eggs at a neighbor's house in Los Angeles -- an incident that led police to search his mansion, where they seized illicit drugs and arrested one of his associates.
By late afternoon (2100 GMT) Friday, nearly 8,000 people had signed an online petition on the official White House website calling for Bieber’s deportation.
"He is not only threatening the safety of our people, but he is also a terrible influence on our nation's youth," said the petition, which needs 100,000 signatures by February 22 to elicit a White House response.
Like many non-American entertainers, Bieber -- who, says Forbes magazine, made $58 million in 2013 -- lives and works in United States under a so-called O-1 visa, according to the Hollywood Reporter, a showbiz trade journal.
"To qualify for an O-1 visa, the beneficiary must demonstrate extraordinary ability by sustained national or international acclaim and must be coming temporarily to the United States to continue work in the area of extraordinary ability," says the US Citizenship and Immigration Services on its website.
Diana Scholl of the American Civil Liberties Union in Washington suggested that Bieber could dodge deportation on account of his fame and fortune.
"If convicted, another immigrant in his situation would very likely languish in immigration detention before being deported," she said on the ACLU.org website.
"That person — like 84 percent of people in immigration detention -- would also likely not have an immigration attorney, let alone a high-priced one."
In their incident report, posted on gossip website TMZ.com, the Miami Beach police department gave Bieber's citizenship as "USA" -- apparently a mistake.
It also named Toronto as his birthplace, rather than the smaller Ontario city of London, and listed his occupation as "other."
Immigration lawyer Stacy Tolchin, quoted in the Los Angeles Times newspaper, said Bieber's alleged offenses in Miami Beach, while "not good," were unlikely to add up to a violation of his O-1B status.
But Tolchin added: "Let's say if it's assault, a felony assault, and he's convicted, that's a big problem... He really needs to get excellent criminal defense and an excellent immigration attorney."
A drug conviction would equally pose "a big problem," she said.
Under the Immigration and Nationality Act, violation of any US or foreign drug law -- apart from the possession of a small personal amount of marijuana -- is grounds for deportation.
So too is "moral turpitude," a catch-all term that can include anything from homicide, robbery and kidnapping to gross indecency, lewdness and adultery, a rarely-prosecuted crime in 23 states.
"If ICE wanted to go after him, they could make a case," New York immigration lawyer Michael Wildes told ABCNews.com, referring to the Department of Homeland Security's Immigration and Customs Enforcement unit.
"That and the eggs is opening files in multiple government agencies and states, and could make it more likely," he said.
In the event that Uncle Sam gives him the boot, Bieber won't be alone.
One in 10 deportees are legal permanent residents, or "green card" holders, a majority of whom had merely committed "minor, nonviolent crimes," said the Immigration Policy Center in Washington in a 2010 report.
[Image via Agence France-Presse]
Conservatives blame Dinesh D’Souza’s indictment on ‘Nazi Germany’-like conspiracy
Defenders of embattled conservative pundit Dinesh D'Souza are alleging that a far-reaching conspiracy on the part of angry liberals is to blame for his recent indictment for campaign fraud. Media Matters has published a round-up of some of the right-wing players who have gone to bat for D'Souza since it was announced that he was indicted on federal campaign finance charges.
Prosecutors allege that D'Souza illegally donated tens of thousands of dollars to a U.S. Senate candidate by asking friends to write checks to the candidate with a promise by D'Souza of reimbursement. The practice is expressly forbidden under U.S. law and the use of so-called "straw donors" to enrich the coffers of a particular candidate is considered a felony.
The New York Times speculated that the candidate in question is erstwhile New York Senate
hopeful Wendy Long, who attended Dartmouth College with D'Souza in the late 1980s and served alongside him on the staff of the college's conservative newspaper, the Dartmouth Review.
Far-right conspiracy theorist Alex Jones announced on his show Thursday night that the Obama administration has begun its "purge" of critics.
"America is going over the edge," Jones warned. "I actually am scared."
The indictments against D'Souza and corrupt former Virginia Gov. Bob McDonnell (R) are evidence that Obama is launching a nationwide putsch aimed at silencing opposing voices.
His words fairly running together with excitement, Jones declared that, "The issue is here, they can find a mistake in your checking account and claim that it was fraud or wire fraud. They can do it to anybody."
"This is like Nazi Germany," he insisted and that "once they're done with these guys, they're coming after you and I." [sic]
Right-wing talk radio doyenne and fellow Dartmouth graduate Laura Ingraham also leapt to D'Souza's defense, calling the charges against him "retribution justice."
The felony charges against D'Souza, she alleged, are "more about stifling political dissent and intimidating other people from speaking out than it is about any real serious allegation of wrongdoing."
D'Souza's election-year, anti-Obama propaganda film "2016: Obama's America" had made him into one of Obama's "most effective critics" and therefore, charges had to trumped up by the government to take him down.
Ingraham failed to mention whether D'Souza's forced resignation as president of a Christian college in 2013 over an extramarital affair with a much younger woman is part of the Obama administration's plot to silence him.
Meanwhile, Matt Drudge of the website Drudge Report bemoaned via Twitter that the Obama administration is "unleashing the dogs" on its critics. Former Tea Party congressman and alleged deadbeat dad Joe Walsh tweeted, "First Christie, second McDonnell, after that, D'Souza, then they came for...?"
Fox News' website called the charges against D'Souza "selective" enforcement of campaign laws and Rush Limbaugh chimed in on Thursday to say that the Obama administration is "trying to criminalize as many Republicans and conservatives as they can."
D'Souza was arraigned in federal court in Manhattan on Thursday.
Quentin Tarantino's 'The Hateful Eight' script compared to 'tense stage play'
Story of bounty hunters transporting prisoners through 19th-century Wyoming would have been shot in 70mm format
Quentin Tarantino's cancelled western The Hateful Eight would have centred on two bounty hunters plying their trade in bloody 19th-century Wyoming, according to reports.
Tarantino was left seething earlier this weak after the draft screenplay for his new film was leaked by an unnamed Hollywood agent. He has declared the project defunct, and says he will publish the script in text form instead.
Now the Wrap reports that it has seen the screenplay, which has now been photocopied a number of times and is said to be circulating in Hollywood. Tarantino planned a film in 70mm, an unusual and expensive format recently used by Paul Thomas Anderson for The Master, and there would have been plum roles for Michael Madsen, Bruce Dern, Christoph Waltz and Samuel L Jackson, the site says.
The Hateful Eight reportedly opens on a sweeping Wyoming vista but soon moves indoors to a stagecoach and a haberdashery. The rest of the film is likened to a "tense stage play". The description recalls Tarantino's debut, Reservoir Dogs, much of which takes place in a single abandoned warehouse space where a gang of criminals have travelled following a botched heist.
"Jackson and Madsen would likely both play bounty hunters returning human plunder to a town called Red Rock in exchange for hefty rewards," reports the Wrap. "Their characters, a former major in the Union army and a man named John Ruth, dominate the first two of the script's five chapters.
"They run into a southerner named Chris Mannix on the road, and three of them, along with their driver – a living prisoner and three dead bounties strapped to the roof – arrive at a haberdashery to take shelter from an oncoming blizzard. Yet the proprietors, Minnie, Sweet Dave and her other colleagues, are nowhere to be found. In their place are four men, a Southern general (likely Dern), an alleged hangman, a Frenchman named Bob and a cowboy named Joe Gage. Mistrust, coffee and violence ensue."
The screenplay is said to be peppered with references to 70mm, indicating Tarantino's determination to proceed in the format. It also features scenes of Russian roulette, and there is plenty of the film-maker's trademark duplicity.
The Wrap's report does not amount to a full script review such as emerged in the wake of the leaking of the screenplay for Tarantino's previous film, Django Unchained. Nevertheless, it seems unlikely to improve the director's current temperament. The Pulp Fiction film-maker has laid into unnamed Hollywood agents who he believes may have leaked the screenplay. It was delivered to just six actors, according to Tarantino. CAA, the agency that works for Dern, has denied suggestions it is responsible for the script's release into the public domain.
Meanwhile, the Wrap also claims to have unveiled details of the film Tarantino could pursue next in The Hateful Eight's absence. It is described as a prison movie based on the life of the actor Robert Blake, who was acquitted of killing his wife in 2004 but later found guilty in a civil case.
Blake, 80, the star of In Cold Blood and the Baretta TV series, was accused of involvement in the death of his wife Bonnie Lee Bakley, who was shot outside a Los Angeles restaurant in May 2001.
guardian.co.uk © Guardian News and Media 2014
CNN lays off more than 40 senior journalists
Zucker aims to regain lead from Fox News
CNN has laid off more than 40 senior journalists as part of a reorganisation of its business by the company's president, Jeff Zucker, reports the Financial Times.
Zucker is trying to regain CNN's 24-hour cable news leadership from the Fox News channel. He has made a number of changes to the network's programming, including new presenters.
CNN recently hit a 20-year low in prime time ratings in the United States, attracting an average of just 78,000 viewers across the whole day and 98,000 in prime time.
Source: Financial Times
guardian.co.uk © Guardian News and Media 2014
'Murder, She Wrote' star Angela Lansbury returns to London's West End after 40 years
British-American actress Angela Lansbury, star of "Murder, She Wrote", is returning to London's West End for the first time in nearly 40 years -- in the same theatre where her mother made her debut in 1918. Lansbury will reprise her Broadway role as…
Goldie Hawn and a Buddhist monk teach meditation to the elite at Davos
Eyes closed tight, the delegates of the World Economic Forum in Davos have queued devotedly for half an hour for this early morning session
Aside from the business suits, it could be an ashram in the foothills of the Himalayas. Sixty or so Davos movers and shakers are being urged to gaze at their thoughts by a French Buddhist monk swathed in robes of red and yellow. "Meditation is about mastering your thoughts, it's about being in charge of your mind. It's real freedom" said Matthieu Ricard.
"You are not the slave of your thoughts. One way is to just gaze at them ... like a shepherd sitting above a meadow watching the sheep," added the monk, a man who speaks, lectures and writes about being happy.
Eyes closed tight, the delegates of the World Economic Forum in Davos have queued devotedly for half an hour for this early morning session.
The attraction is not just by the chance to learn how to mediate at one of the most respected masters of the art, but also to do in the presence of movie star Goldie Hawn. Davos is not just about power meetings and deals – on Thursday it was also where the secrets of eastern religion met Hollywood: Hawn is in Davos on a mission to explain how she believes children can benefit from meditation.
Those who have queued long enough to get into the room – 10 round tables, coffee and pastries in the corner – are completely silent as they receive instruction on how to be "in charge of their minds". They are learning the art of meditation even as President Hussan Rouhani, the Iranian president, is pledging in the main hall not to use his nuclear power to create weapons.
Two bits of advice are being offered to those gazing at their difficult thoughts. Do not try to hide away from the problem and equally do not try to explode it like a time bomb. Much better to let it melt away – "slowly melting like the frost under the morning sun".
Ricard leads three short moments of meditation, each one accompanied by soothing, reassuring words. Each of those present is studiously following the advice. They appear hooked. And would not be alone.
The delegates are told how Steve Jobs of Apple mixed business with meditation. An article in Fortune magazine recently outlined how traders at Goldman Sachs – more widely known for their animal spirits – have also been coached in how to train their minds. Forget Leonardo di Caprio and the Wolf of Wall Street: these guys have got their karma together.
Hawn has been meditating since 1972 and probably needed all the calm she could muster just a few hours after sharing her experiences at WEF after she posted pictures of herself with Nigerian president Goodluck Jonathan – then hastily had to take them down again – after running into a Twitter storm focused on his anti-gay views.
Goldie's session is not just all about the practical side of mediation. Charts flash up on the wall – this is Davos after all – showing lines that could be profit and loss charts, but actually represent brain activity.
An academic – Richard Davidson of the center for investigating healthy minds at the University of Wisconsin – has a chart showing flu vacines work better on those who have meditated. And he encourages everyone to give it a go and make it as commonplace as physical exercise did after the 1950s. "The same thing will happen with mental exercise. You can begin with every small periods of exercise. Start with bite sized chucks ... We need a massive worldwide media campaign to teach people the fact that wellbeing can be learned," Davidson said.
guardian.co.uk © Guardian News and Media 2014
[Image credit: Featureflash / Shutterstock.com]
Fox News contributor: Angry blacks to blame for rise in 'American Anglo-Saxon' racism
A Christian radio host insisted last week that white people were no longer racist, and even if they were, it’s the fault of racist black people.
Sandy Rios, of American Family Radio, was offended when a listener suggested she was racist toward black people, who she blamed for inciting white racism.
“I think the racist garbage coming from the -- uh, a lot of blacks right now who are just filled with bitterness and rage is just amazing to me,” Rios said. “It is racism, I am seeing it constantly here in D.C., you know, I think -- and it’s causing white citizens to become more racist than they ever were.”
She continued, referring to white people using the term for Germanic tribes that once dominated England and is now generally associated with British-American Protestants and white supremacists.
“I think for the most part, the American Anglo-Saxon crew really has moved past racism, they did it quite a long time ago,” she said.
Rios, a Fox News contributor, said racism had demonstrably ended because segregation was no longer legally enforced and the nation had elected a black president.
“I mean, they did elect Barack Obama twice, so I think it’s not nearly the issue in the white community that it was in the 50s, sure it isn’t, or the 60s – it just isn’t," she said. "But it seems to be raging, racism seems to be absolutely raging in the black community.”
She blamed this rise of racist feelings among whites on this same black president who signaled the end of American racism.
“I think what’s causing it is people like Barack Obama and (Attorney General) Eric Holder, who can’t say enough and stir the pot enough to create anger and hatred and bitterness,” Rios said. “You know, they do the same thing with women, it’s the same thing in feminism, that’s why I’ve never been a feminist. I hate feminism.”
Listen to audio of Rios' comments posted online by Right Wing Watch:
[Image via SandyRios.com]
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