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Sean Penn Celebrates Colon Cancer Awareness Month By Wishing It On His Foes
Mediaite - 5 min 38 sec ago
CBS Sunday Morning last weekend actually produced a newsworthy moment that has got people talking, when actor/activist Sean Penn discussed with host Lara Logan about those critical of his recent efforts in Haiti to aid those affected by the earthquake. “Do I hope that those people die screaming of rectal cancer? Yeah, you know, but I’m not going to spend a lot of energy on it.” Was he was speaking hyperbolically to make a point? Of course. But does the fact that March is Colorectal Cancer awareness month make it a tad more insensitive? Yup.
Categories: The Media
'The Good Wife'
Politico Blogs - 12 min 14 sec ago
Great show. And I would have said that even before its political operative character, Eli Gold, gave a shout-out to this blog's Remainders feature l
Rubio denies back waxing
Politico Blogs - 15 min 14 sec ago
Also in Florida.<br /> <br /> Thanks for clearing that up!
Rubio: 'Children'
Politico Blogs - 20 min 14 sec ago
Marco Rubio's first ad is a soft-focus spot with a mix of personal narrative, concern for his kids and yours, and a message to the party faithful: &
Flacking after the fall
Politico Blogs - 24 min 14 sec ago
Marin Cogan considers a tough job: Press secretary to a politician who is flaming out:<br /> <br /> Hours before Rep. Eric Massa announced his res
Hill Staffers Urged to Avoid Drudge, “Potential Viruses”
Mediaite - 32 min 40 sec ago
Earlier this week, the Senate Sergeant-at-Arms, the body’s official gatekeeper, levied a warning to staffers to avoid such sites as Matt Drudge’s DrudgeReport.com and several other online destinations, such as WhitePages.com. The rationale? Apparently the Senate Help Desk has been dealing with a large number of viruses, and these sites were possible sources of computer problems. In a statement reported on FoxNews.com, a representative of the Environment and Public Works Committee indicated that the request to avoid the sites originated from a non-partisan systems administrator.
Drudge came back at the report with some statistics, indicating that there was no problem on his end when it came to delivering links and headlines to staffers coming from Congressional and other D.C. Internet servers. As noted in a post yesterday morning on the Drudge Report, there were no errors reported even though his volume of traffic remained high. According to the post, the site served 29 million pageviews on Monday, and it was seen 149,967 times since the beginning of the month from users at Senate.gov, and 244,347 times over the same time from house.gov.
Seems harmless, right? Of course not – this is Washington. Fox quoted the Media Research Center’s Vice President of research and publication, Brent Baker, who wondered why a conservative news site was used as the example instead of one of its liberal counterparts. Even Drudge thought the timing was convenient for the request to steer clear was “just as the healthcare drama in the capitol reaches a grand finale.”
Not to be missed here is the lede-battle between The Huffington Post and Fox News as both media outlets document the story. I’ll just post them both below and let you guess which one belongs to which organziation:
In the very body sworn to protect and defend the Constitution, an e-mail is circulating warning U.S. Senate staffers not to view one of the most popular news sites on the Web, claiming it could spread computer viruses.
A Senate committee has taken steps to black list the Drudge Report on Capitol Hill computers over concerns that the site may be “responsible for the many viruses popping up” recently.
(Just so there’s no confusion, the first is Fox, the latter is HuffPo).
So, legitimate threat or convenient timing by the Senate staff?
Categories: The Media
Rather responds to watermelon 'controversy'
Politico Blogs - 43 min 14 sec ago
Rather responds to critics.
David Letterman Begins Week With Win Over Jay Leno
Mediaite - 53 min 23 sec ago
Remember how the storyline when Conan O’Brien hosted the Tonight Show was that he could win in the younger demographics but would lose in total viewers?
Well, after a first week back of big ratings and victories over CBS, Jay Leno and the new old Tonight Show lost to David Letterman in the demos Monday night.
TVByTheNumbers reports Letterman began the week on Monday with victories over Leno in the A18-49 demo as well as in the A25-54. Leno still won in total viewers (4.36 million to 4.19 million).
James Hibberd of THRFeed gave this explanation:
So why the upset? Lead-in! CBS won Monday night primetime, NBC was a distant fourth place with the likes of “Trauma” and “Law & Order.”
Oh interesting – lead-in caused the loss! Sounds like Leno is getting a little taste of his own medicine.
It doesn’t appear to be a case of winning guests – Leno had Simon Cowell and Letterman had Kelly Ripa, cross network visits that appear to cancel each other out. Instead, this exposes what may become a storyline down the road: Leno’s former Tonight Show viewers have not yet found their way back to the program. It shouldn’t be seen as a reflection on the audience’s opinions on how the Conan/Leno situation shook out, but simply a matter of waiting until the old NBC viewership finds its way home. Or not. But it’s a slow start for Leno so far.
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Categories: The Media
TMZ Reports Corey Haim Dead Of Overdose
Mediaite - 1 hour 14 min ago
This is a sad way to start the day. TMZ has reported (CBS followed up) that Eighties teen star Corey Haim was found dead in his home this morning from an apparent drug overdose. From TMZ:
Actor Corey Haim died this morning of an apparent overdose — possibly accidental — according to LAPD. He was 38.
Police tell us they were called to St. Joseph’s hospital in Burbank, CA shortly before 4AM PT to investigate.
Haim shot to fame in the 80s — when he co-starred in a number of films, including “The Lost Boys,” with Corey Feldman.
According to IMDB, Haim had a number of movies lined up, and a couple already completed. More details as they come.
Categories: The Media
Massa Fallout: Arianna Declares Sympathy For Glenn Beck
Mediaite - 1 hour 21 min ago
Eric Massa’s tour de ‘tickle’ hour with Glenn Beck last night has left the host with some unlikely bedfellows (no pun intended!). While, one can only imagine the enjoyment of Rahm Emanuel as it became clearer and clearer that actually, Massa had no intention of accusing the Dems of coercion and conspiracy, an equally unlikely ally voiced her support on Anderson Cooper last night.
Behold Arianna Huffington declaring her sympathy for Glenn Beck. Said Arianna:
“To his credit Glenn Beck….apologized at the end of the hour to his audience for wasting their time. I mean, I never thought anything would make me feel sympathetic towards Glenn Beck, but having to interview Eric Massa for an entire hour made me really feel for him and it was clear not only didn’t he deliver but his story is becoming more and more preposterous.”
Anderson Cooper concurs: “I think Glenn Beck is an enormous talent at what he does, but he clearly seemed to be clutching at straws.”
So there you have it. Eric Massa may have been a complete failure as a congressman but he was able to unite the cablers…if only for a night. Video below.
Categories: The Media
No end in sight.
The Confluence - 2 hours 3 min ago
This is supposed to be the morning news post but I didn’t put any news in it because it’s all bad and I’m too fucking depressed to even skim the headlines right now.
You may have noticed that I haven’t been around here much the last week or so and the reason for that is I’ve been in a very dark and depressed mood and I needed a break. I think what triggered it was Joe Cannon’s announcement that he was closing his blog. In the big scheme of things somebody deciding they don’t want to blog anymore is not a major catastrophe but his announcement was the straw the broke the camel’s back.
I don’t know if I’m drinking too much or not enough but I’m still feeling pretty gloomy. The real reason for my emotional recession is partly due to all the bad news we’ve been getting steadily for years now. Pick a topic, it’s all bad, but some of it’s worse than others. We didn’t even get to enjoy the end of the Bush administration.
Another thing that has been bothering me is that I really wanted to be wrong about Obama but I wasn’t, and saying “I told you so” doesn’t make up for having my worst nightmares become true. If anything, he’s even worse than I feared.
But what really has me bummed out right now is the realization that there is no end in sight for the mess this country is in. The single biggest problem facing our nation is the illness in our political system. When I say “illness” I mean the equivalent of an inoperable cancer that has metastasized. If we fixed our political system then we would actually be able to do something about those other problems.
For most of my adult life I believed that the Democrats were the good guys so even when they were getting slapped around by the Republicans I could support them and hope that after the next election they would grow a pair and start standing up for the liberal ideals they campaigned on.
I finally realized that the majority of the Democrats who hold elected office are not only corrupt but they have the same agenda as the Republicans. Oh, the say they’re on our side, and when it’s time for them to represent us they might make some speeches andr play some parliamentary tricks but when the nitty meets the gritty they lose on purpose. Lots of times they don’t even bother to put on a dog and pony show anymore, they just vote to bail out Wall Street or take away our civil rights as if that’s what we wanted them to do.
Now as far back as I can remember the Republicans were corrupt and they tended to be pricks or assholes, and sometimes both, but they weren’t insane. Nowadays there’s a lot of GOPers that are crazy as shithouse rats. That not only includes the elected ones but the voters too. Then you got the tea baggers who don’t think the Republicans are crazy enough.
On the left side they’re getting just as bad, they’re just insane about different things. If you read both the left and right blogs on a regular basis you’d think think they inhabit completely different worlds. It’s almost like they don’t speak the same language.
Next fall we’re gonna have and election and right now it looks like the Republicans will gain seats in Congress, and maybe even get control of one or both houses. But no matter who wins, we lose. The same thing in November of 2012. – If either the Democrats or Republicans win, we’re screwed.
Sooner or later Obama will be out of office, but will whoever the Democrats nominate to replace him be any less corrupt?
When does this shit start to get better?
No news is good news so y’all have a nice day.
PS: If anybody fucking tells me to cheer up I’m sending a clown car to their house.
Filed under: General
Categories: Our Friends
Elinor Burkett Defends Her “Kanye Moment” To Joy Behar
Mediaite - 2 hours 25 min ago
Elinor Burkett made headlines last Sunday when she interrupted Roger Ross Williams‘ acceptance speech for producers of the Academy Award-winning short-subject documentary Music By Prudence. Last night she explained her “Kanye Moment” with Joy Behar and seemed to ignore the graceful route of explanation, choosing instead to remind us all of why we didn’t like her to begin with.
Her explanation begins at roughly 1:55 and includes her line “maybe I’m just a middle-aged crazy person?” I disagree, after watching this clip, I don’t think there is any “maybe” about it.
Categories: The Media
Graham wants bipartisan 'gang' for health reform -- Obama pushes anti-fraud plan -- GOP works Dem divisions -- Lincoln opposes reconciliation -- HCAN marches in D.C.
Politico Blogs - 2 hours 33 min ago
Graham wants a bipartisan "gang" for health reform.
Another health care attack ad
Politico Blogs - 9 hours 58 min ago
Audio of radio spot hitting seven vulnerable Democrats.
Are Dems waiting for Godot?
Politico Blogs - Tue, 03/09/2010 - 11:24pm
John Larson should watch what he says.
Campbell intensifies condemnation of Al-Arian
Politico Blogs - Tue, 03/09/2010 - 11:08pm
Former Rep. Tom Campbell, who's running in the California Republican Senate primary, is stepping up his condemnation of virulently anti-Israel langu
Dems discuss pairing health with loan reform
Politico Blogs - Tue, 03/09/2010 - 10:40pm
House and Senate leaders discuss pairing student loan reform with health care
International Women of Courage Awards: Watch Live March 10
State Department Dipnote - Tue, 03/09/2010 - 9:59pm
First Lady Michelle Obama and Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton will host the annual International Women of Courage Awards on March 10, 2010, at 3:00 p.m. EST at the Department of State. You may watch the ceremony broadcast live on DipNote.
To mark International Women's Day, the annual International Women of Courage Award recognizes women around the globe who have shown exceptional courage and leadership in advocating for women's rights and advancement. This is the only Department of State award that pays tribute to emerging women leaders worldwide, and offers a unique opportunity to recognize those who work in the field of international women's issues.
Secretary Clinton announced the 10 winners of this year's International Women of Courage (IWOC) award. The awardees are: Shukria Asil (Afghanistan), Col. Shafiqa Quraishi (Afghanistan), Androula Henriques (Cyprus), Sonia Pierre (Dominican Republic), Shadi Sadr (Iran), Ann Njogu (Kenya), Dr. Lee Ae-ran (Republic of Korea), Jansila Majeed (Sri Lanka), Sister Marie Claude Naddaf (Syria), and Jestina Mukoko (Zimbabwe).
Read more about the honorees here.
Categories: Our Government
Eric Massa Refuses To Answer Larry King’s “Are You Gay?” Question
Mediaite - Tue, 03/09/2010 - 9:36pm
Tonight on Larry King Live, Eric Massa refused to answer the CNN host’s question about his sexuality, instead side-stepping the issue by saying “It insults every gay American because it classifies people. Why would anyone even ask that question?”
Categories: The Media