Rocker Needles

OUT magazine recently got the truth out of ‘Drag Race’ winner, Sharon Needles, and she comes clean about her recent brush with the law.

Lady Bunny

“Earlier this week, after attending drag legend Lady Bunny‘s “Hot Mess” party at Manhattan nightclub XL, RuPaul’s Drag Race winner Sharon Needles found herself in a bit of a quandary: she had to drain the snake.

Unfortunately for Needles, she had already left the nightclub and what she thought was a secluded corner ripe for some natural graffiti turned out to be one of the worst possible places for a queen to take a leak. That’s right, a police station.

“I had gone to Lady Bunny’s show that night because whenever I get a chance, I love to watch other entertainers,” Needles tells OUT exclusively. “I had a couple of drinks with friends, I had a lot of Red Bull. I was on my way home and it hit me: I had to pee so bad.”

And when a drag queen has to pee, folks, it’s no simple matter.

Ryan Reynolds demonstrates

“Drag queens do something that’s called tucking,” Needles explains for those who might not know. “It’s the art of putting your testicles up inside your body and taping your penis near your anus.” Needless to say, tucking makes the act of relieving yourself a bit complicated. In Needles’ own words, “I was literally going to pee into my butt because of where my penis was.”

Having crossed Broadway, the Pittsburgh-based beauty spotted what she thought was an alley and she sidled up between two parked cars and a dumpster to answer nature’s call. Unfortunately, the other line rang in the form of an unexpected visitor.

“I felt a tap on my shoulder—it was a policeman,” a still shaken Needles recalls. “He asked if I usually pee on police stations, and I looked up and there it was: A police station. There were cop cars all lined in a row, but I hadn’t even noticed because I had to pee so bad.”

Non-effected Officer Latrice Royale

An attempt to reason with the officer wasn’t effective.

“I tried to apologize and said I had seen dogs pee on the street a million times and it was just natural,” she says. “I tried to explain tucking to the officer and he didn’t understand, so he took me in.”

The result? A 20 minute wait for the gift of a ticket for public urination. Not, Needles stresses, the arrest that wags have been whispering about.

Looking back on the incident, America‘s Drag Sweetheart can see the humor in the situation.

*insert evil laugh here*

“It wasn’t on purpose, but I think it was funny that it was a police station,” she says. “Because I find theres so much unnecessary angst and brutality from American police officers.”

All in all, Needles says the ordeal wasn’t nearly as bad as has been reported.”

We are glad that she is safe and got nothing more than a public urination charge.  Next time before peeing outside, look up.

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Wile E. Coyote & The RoadRunner

Wile E. Coyote (also known simply as “The Coyote”) and The Road Runner are a duo of cartoon characters from a series of Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies cartoons. The characters (a coyote and a roadrunner) were created by animation director Chuck Jones in 1948 for Warner Bros., while the template for their adventures was the work of writer Michael Maltese. The characters star in a long-running series of theatrical cartoon shorts (the first 16 of which were written by Maltese) and occasional made-for-television cartoons.

In each episode, instead of animal senses and cunning, Wile E. Coyote uses absurdly complex contraptions (sometimes in the manner of Rube Goldberg) and elaborate plans to pursue his quarry.

Wile E. Coyote & Bugs Bunny

The Coyote appears separately as an occasional antagonist of Bugs Bunny in five shorts from 1952 to 1963: Operation: Rabbit, To Hare Is Human, Rabbit’s Feat, Compressed Hare, and Hare-Breadth Hurry. While he is generally silent in the Coyote-Road Runner shorts, he speaks with a refined accent in these solo outings (except for Hare-Breadth Hurry), introducing himself as “Wile E. Coyote — super genius”, voiced with an upper-class, cultured English accent by Mel Blanc.^[1] The Road Runner vocalizes only with a signature sound, “Beep, Beep”, recorded by Paul Julian, and an occasional tongue noise.^[2]

To date, 48 cartoons have been made featuring these characters (including the three CGI shorts), the majority by Chuck Jones.

Starving Coyote

Creation

Jones based the Coyote on Mark Twain’s book Roughing It, in which Twain described the coyote as “a long, slim, sick and sorry-looking skeleton” that is “a living, breathing allegory of Want. He is always hungry.” Jones said he created the Coyote-Road Runner cartoons as a parody of traditional “cat and mouse” cartoons such as Tom and Jerry, which series Jones would work on as a director later in his career.

The Coyote’s name of Wile E. is obviously a play on the word “wily.” The “E” was said to stand for Ethelbert in one issue of a Looney Tunes comic book, but its writer hadn’t intended it to be canon.The Coyote’s surname is routinely pronounced with a long “e” (/kaɪˈoʊtiː/ ky-OH-tee), but in one cartoon short, To Hare Is Human, Wile is heard pronouncing it with a diphthong (/kaɪˈoʊteɪ/ ky-OH-tay). Early model sheets for the character prior to his initial appearance (in Fast and Furry-ous) identified him as “Don Coyote”, a play on Don Quixote.

Another ACME product

Acme Corporation

Wile E. Coyote often obtains complex and ludicrous devices from a mail-order company, the fictitious Acme Corporation, which he hopes will help him catch the Road Runner. The devices invariably fail in improbable and spectacular ways. Whether this is result of operator error or faulty merchandise is debatable. The coyote usually ends up burnt to a crisp, squashed flat, or at the bottom of a canyon (some shorts show him suffering a combination of these fates). Occasionally Acme products do work quite well (e.g. the Dehydrated Boulders, Bat-Man Outfit, Rocket Sled, Jet Powered Roller Skates, or Earthquake Pills). In this case their success often works against the coyote. For example, the Dehydrated Boulder, upon hydration, becomes so large when it crushes him, or the Coyote finding out that the Earthquake Pills bottle label’s fine print states that the pills aren’t effective on road runners, right after he swallows the whole bottle, thinking they’re ineffective. Other times he uses items that are implausible, such as a superhero outfit, thinking he could fly wearing it (he cannot).

RoadRunner, Beeper, Wile E., and Calamity in Tiny Toon Adventures

How the coyote acquires these products without money is not explained until the 2003 movie Looney Tunes: Back in Action, in which he is shown to be an employee of Acme. In a Tiny Toon Adventures episode, Wile E. makes mention of his protege Calamity Coyote possessing an unlimited Acme credit card account, which might serve as another possible explanation. Wile E. being a “beta tester” for Acme has been another suggested explanation. Wile E. also uses war equipment such as cannons, rocket launchers, grenades, and bayonets which are “generic”, not Acme products. In a Cartoon Network commercial promoting Looney Tunes, they ask the Coyote why does he insist on purchasing products from the Acme Corporation when all previous contraptions have backfired on him, to which the Coyote responds with a wooden sign (right after another item blows up in his face): “Good line of Credit.”

The company name was likely chosen for its irony (acme means the highest point, as of achievement or development). Also, a company named ACME would have shown up in the first part of a telephone directory. Some people have said ACME comes from the common expansion A (or American) Company that Makes (or Making) Everything, a backronym of the word. The origin of the name might also be related to the Acme company that built a fine line of animation stands and optical printers; however, the most likely explanation is the Sears house brand called Acme that appeared in their ubiquitous early 1900s mail-order catalogues.

In one Road Runner and Wile E. Coyote short film, “Ajax” was used instead of Acme. In another short, the names “A-1″ and “Ace” are used.

Anyone have an Excedrin?

Laws and rules

As in other cartoons, the Road Runner and the coyote follow the laws of cartoon physics. For example, the Road Runner has the ability to enter the painted image of a cave, while the coyote cannot (unless there is an opening through which he can fall). Sometimes, however, this is reversed, and the Road Runner can burst through a painting of a broken bridge and continue on his way, while the Coyote will instead enter the mirage painting and fall down the precipice of the cliff where the bridge is out. Sometimes the coyote is allowed to hang in midair until he realizes that he is about to plummet into a chasm (a process occasionally referred to elsewhere as Road-Runnering or Wile E. Coyote moment).

The coyote can overtake rocks (or cannons) which fall before he does, and end up being squashed by them. If a chase sequence happens upon a cliff, the Road Runner is not affected by gravity, whereas the Coyote will realize his error eventually and fall to the ground below. A chase sequence that happens upon railroad tracks will always result in the Coyote being run over by a train. Its Formula. If the Coyote uses an explosive (for instance, dynamite) that is triggered by a mechanism that is supposed to force the explosive in a forward motion toward its target, the actual mechanism itself will always shoot forward, leaving the explosive behind to detonate in the Coyote’s face.

Too bad they can't read.

Similarly, a complex apparatus that is supposed to propel an object like a boulder or steel ball forward, or trigger a trap, will not work on the Road Runner, but always will on the Coyote. For instance, the Road Runner can jump up and down on the trigger of a large animal trap and eat bird seed off from it, going completely unharmed and not setting off the trap; when the Coyote places the tiniest droplet of oil on the trigger, the trap snaps shut on him without fail. At certain times, the Coyote may don an exquisite Acme costume or propulsion device that briefly allows him to catch up to the Road Runner. This will always result in him losing track of his proximity to large cliffs or walls, and the Road Runner will dart around an extremely sharp turn on a cliff, but the Coyote will rocket right over the edge and fall to the ground.

Good Book

In Chuck Amuck: The Life and Times Of An Animated Cartoonist, it is claimed that Chuck Jones and the artists behind the Road Runner and Wile E. cartoons adhered to some simple but strict rules:

1. The Road Runner cannot harm the Coyote except by going “meep, meep.”
2. No outside force can harm the Coyote — only his own ineptitude or the failure of Acme products. Trains and trucks were the exception from time to time.
3. The Coyote could stop anytime — if he were not a fanatic. (Repeat: “A fanatic is one who redoubles his effort when he has forgotten his aim.” — George Santayana).
4. No dialogue ever, except “meep, meep” and yowling in pain.
5. The Road Runner must stay on the road — for no other reason than that he’s a roadrunner.
6. All action must be confined to the natural environment of the two characters — the southwest American desert.
7. All tools, weapons, or mechanical conveniences must be obtained from the Acme Corporation.
8. Whenever possible, make gravity the Coyote’s greatest enemy.
9. The Coyote is always more humiliated than harmed by his failures.
10. The audience’s sympathy must remain with the Coyote.
11. The Coyote is not allowed to catch or eat the Road Runner. (The robot that the Coyote created in The Solid Tin Coyote caught the Road Runner so this does not break this rule. The Coyote does catch the Road Runner in Soup or Sonic but is too small to eat him.)

In an interview years after the series was made, writer Michael Maltese said he had never heard of the “Rules.”

In popular culture

Wile E. Coyote and Road Runner have been frequently referenced in popular culture. The Villain (directed by Hal Needham) is a parody of these animated shorts as well as being a spoof of westerns. In The Drawn Together Movie: The Movie!, Road Runner gets run down and dies, after which Coyote commits suicide by shooting himself in the head with a prop gun.

In a sketch on In Living Color (Season 5, Episode 10), Wile E. Coyote (played by Jamie Foxx) is put on trial by Congress for displaying excessive violence in his cartoons; Elmer Fudd (played by Jay Leggett) is his lawyer. In the film UHF, “Weird Al” Yankovic’s character introduces a Road Runner cartoon as a sad, depressing story of a “pathetic coyote” futilely chasing a “sadistic roadrunner”. The characters were referenced in The Simpsons, The Cleveland Show, Bounty Hamster, Kick Buttowski, What’s New, Scooby-Doo?, Robot Chicken, and South Park.

On Family Guy

In an episode of Cheers, some bar patrons discuss the Road Runner cartoons. The discussion continues and builds in intensity as a minor subplot throughout the entire episode until at the end of the show some of the bar patrons are boisterously declaring that the Coyote character is meant to be symbolic of the Antichrist. Wile E. Coyote appeared briefly in an episode of the live-action show Night Court, where he was admonished by Judge Harry Stone for chasing a bird. Wile E. Coyote has appeared two times in Family Guy (voiced by Seth MacFarlane): his first episode, I Never Met the Dead Man, depicts him riding in a car with Peter Griffin; when Peter runs over the Road Runner and asks if he hit “that ostritch”, Wile E. tells him to keep going.^[13] In PTV, Wile E. appears in a flashback when Peter offers a store credit when Wile E. claims a refund for a giant sling shot that “slammed me into a mountain”. In the Dexter’s Laboratory episode “Road Rash” Dee-Dee does an impression of the Road Runner after Dexter falls down a man hole.

Humorist Ian Frazier created the mock-legal prose piece “Coyote v. Acme”, which is included in a book of the same name. Karen Salmansohn wrote an article on The Huffington Post centering on the characters. Guitarist Mark Knopfler created a song called “Coyote” in homage to the cartoon shows of Wile E. Coyote and the Road Runner, on the 2002 album The Ragpicker’s Dream.

These days you can see new Wile E. Coyote & RoadRunner cartoons on Cartoon Network’s The Looney Tunes Show.

Related articles

• The rules of Road Runner and Wile E. Coyote cartoons (kottke.org)
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Miss Alexandra Chase, VT drag queen & BFF

Do you miss a certain drag queen in your life? I know that I do. We used to co-DJ at a gay club that is now closed, shop for her gowns together (the ladies at Fashion Bug loved us.), and even did drag together the year I won my first drag contest singing Billy Joel‘s “Piano Man”. Over 10 years later, we are still good friends. She doesn’t do drag anymore because she doesn’t fit into her old gowns, but that is a different story.

–BUT if you are missing the queens from seasons past of RuPaul’s Drag Race, then have no fear my lovelies! They will be back as guest professors of RuPaul’s Drag U!!!

Check out the promo for it from LogoTV.com.

That’s right, if you love the drag queens from RuPaul‘s Drag Race, then have no worries darlings! You can watch them on the upcoming season of RuPaul’s Drag U, where they are drag professors helping ordinary women became absolutely fab! It’s basically “Queer Eye for the Straight Guy“, but with drag queens instead of gay men and women instead of straight men.

I know I’ll be watching because I can’t wait to see Sharon Needles, Chad Michaels, Raja Gemini, Latrice Royale, and others as teachers of their fabulous aesthetic craft. I hope you tune in as well. June 18th on LOGO. It will also be available for free online.

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Barry toking a Joint

New insight into the early life of Barack Obama has been recently made available in the form of excerpts from his forthcoming biography, “Barack Obama: The Story.” Apparently young Barry Obama, like countless of his contemporaries, enjoyed partaking in the use of marijuana. The president even was a trendsetter amongst his peers:

As a member of the Choom* Gang, Barry Obama was known for starting a few pot-smoking trends. The first was called “TA,” short for “total absorption.”

Roof Hits w/ Cheech & Chong

Along with TA, Barry popularized the concept of “roof hits”: when they were chooming in the car all the windows had to be rolled up so no smoke blew out and went to waste; when the pot was gone, they tilted their heads back and sucked in the last bit of smoke from the ceiling.

He also was unafraid to go against proper smoking protocol:

Barry also had a knack for interceptions. When a joint was making the rounds, he often elbowed his way in, out of turn, shouted “Intercepted!,” and took an extra hit. No one seemed to mind

Barry giving a speech

What is clear from these anecdotes is that not only did Barry Obama try cannabis, but he was what many would refer to as a recreational user, a “stoner” if you will. Which begs the question, when exactly did Barry Obama, who participated in three foot bong hitting contests, become President Barack Obama, who laughs off the issue at town hall meetings and ramps up the war against medical marijuana to new heights?

It is time the President says publicly what he already knows personally: Responsible marijuana use should not be a crime and it is time we put an end to the war on cannabis consumers.

(Personally I’m all for a president that smoked pot over one that smoked crack. Just sayin’…)

*Choom is Hawaiian slang for smoking marijuana.

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So how to celebrate the changing of our culture? I’m looking back at how it changed my life. I was born a year before Return of the Jedi came out. My first Halloween costume was as a baby Princess Leia. My cousins also dressed as the characters that Halloween and we went Trick-or-Treating as the cast. Growing up with my grandmother I vividly remember the year she was given a 12″ Chewbacca doll for Christmas. I was about 4 years old. Around 5 years old my cousin, Paul, began having a Star Wars collection of action figures. I remember wanting to play with all of them, but always getting stuck playing Boba Fett when I really wanted to be Leia or C3-PO.

It was over 10 years later when I finally sat down and watched the movies that my life had evolved around. At age 15 I didn’t really know what to expect when I sat down to watch the first 3 Star Wars movies. I remember sitting with my mother and grandmother on a couch in Florida. It was a cool Summer night and they were showing the movies in a marathon on tv. Strangely enough the first thing I noticed about the first movie was the everyone’s outfits were really plain and uninteresting. I decided then that the future should have color in it.

When Lucas decided to do the prequels I didn’t quite know what to think. I’d never heard of a “prequel” before and it took me a bit to understand that it was an entire movie of backstory. That seemed odd to me at first. Now it is a norm in the movie industry. So I went to the prequels and learned a new story of the characters. What bothered me most was that while I now knew the characters Vader, C3-PO, Chewie, Yoda, the births of Luke & Leia, and R2-D2′s back stories, I wanted to know about Han Solo. I wanted to know how he and Chewie hooked up as friends, what type of life had turned Han into the swaggering, cocky pilot he was in the originals. What made him like fiesty princesses? When was Lucas going to answer these questions?…It’s 2012 and I’m still waiting….

And so today we celebrate the creation of a movie franchise that has found it’s way into every corner of our pop culture, from movies, toys, cartoons and music. Thank you Mr. Lucas for giving us new planets to dream about and new adventures to wonder about.

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Towel Day is celebrated every year on the 25th of May as a tribute by fans of the late author Douglas Adams. On this day, fans carry a towel with them to demonstrate their appreciation for the books and the author, as referred to in Adams’ The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy. The commemoration was first held in 2001, two weeks after Adams’ death on 11 May 2001.

He never got to see his books make it to the big screen. He died right before HGttG made its big screen debut.

Author Douglas Adams

I first read Adams’ books when I was a sophomore in high school. I fell in love with the characters and the vision of Space that I’d never imagined before with 2-headed politicians, book researchers from far off planets, and meals that sold themselves to you. By the time the movie came out in 2001 I had read every book of Adams’ that I could get my hands on. I read the whole Hitchikers “trilogy”, in addition to his other works like “Dirk Gentley’s Holistic Detective Agency”, “The Meaning of Liff“, and “The Deeper Meaning of Liff“. The man knew how to write and how to enrapture the mind in ways no other man could. His work meant the world to me and when he died…I cried.

So to commemorate this man’s great, silly, wonderous works, don’t forget your towel.

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Thomas Lagenbach mug shot, and the target of his scam (AP Chris Ratcliffe)

Thomas Langenbach, vice-president of SAP Labs Integration and Certification Center in Palo Alto, California, very successfully stole expensive Lego sets and resold them on the Internet. His website, “TomsBrickyard” had earned an “excellent” rating from his buyers.

It was all very simple. He copied bar codes from lesser expensive Lego sets and printed them on press-apply labels. Then he would walk into a retail store and plant his less expensive bar code over the actual one. He “bought” the $249 Millennium Falcon set for just $49.

Many of the people commenting on this story on the news site were shocked that the cashiers hadn’t noticed how cheap the orders were. They were saying some very nasty things about cashiers, and those who work at Target in particular. Therefore, this is more about cashiers than about a thief.

In civilized places like Brazil, cashiers have stools to sit on.

Cashiers have to meet a goal of a certain number of items scanned per minute. A sustained failure to reach that goal will result in being written up. Get written up enough times, and you get fired. On rare occasion, there will be a cashier who is exempted from those goals. We have one at a local supermarket. She is 86 years old and if not related to half the city, she certainly knows half the city, and their parents and grandparents. People will ignore other available cashiers to line up for her. Her scan numbers are ignored because keeping her is good public relations. But scan speed is job retention for everyone else. Really nasty companies will slowly raise the scan speed goal in hopes of pushing out older cashiers who have attained a higher per-hour wage rate. Cashiers rarely look at the print-outs on their registers. They listen for the pings. They are too busy trying to keep products from catching on the lip of the scan bed or on the fencing for the out-ramp and slitting open a bag of cat litter. They are trying to avoid carpal tunnel and turkey elbow (caused by pulling and scanning fifty or sixty 25-pound frozen turkeys.) The only time they look is when they need to enter a code number for something like produce, and at the end of the transaction.

Cashiers also do not know the cost of every one of the 10,000 to 30,000 items in a store. And you can bet your last UPC that they cannot afford $250 for a toy. That’s more than a week’s wages.

Cashiers rarely make a living wage. If they are lucky, they make more than minimum. Very rarely are they allowed to work fulltime. That way their employers can duck providing access to health insurance. They may get offered a buy-in to a 401K, but are more likely to get strong-armed into a payroll deduction for the United Way. They get strong-armed into a lot of stuff that makes the company look like it really truly cares about the community, while sitting under a poster in the break room telling them how paternal their company is and please remember to alert a manager if you are ever approached by a union rep.

They have to deal with a whole lot of stupid stuff from customers, and they are never in the right if the customer decides to be offended. They are blamed if the computer malfunctions or the credit card scanner doesn’t work or there is something, anything, that goes wrong.

And if the cashier appears to be in his or her early twenties, the odds are you are looking at a college graduate who find a job in his or her field.

Try to think about all this the next time you are checking out. It’s really marvelous to see how much a cashier appreciates the words, “It’s all right, I have time.”

But, back to the Lego thief….

He was finally spotted on video surveillance and arrested on May 8. Langenbach is free on $10,000 bail, about a third of how much he made in his Lego scam. When the police searched his expensive home in its gated community, they found stacks of Lego sets and sheets of bar codes, all neatly arranged, all very business-like. Langenbach is facing felony burglary charges.

Langenbach is not the first Lego-bar-code felon. In 2005, a man in Reno, Nevada, had pulled the same scam on nearly $200,000 worth of Lego sets..

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• Silicon Valley Executive in LEGO Bar Code Scam(theepochtimes.com)

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• Professional Nerd Uses Scam to Buy More LEGOs (betabeat.com)

Actors Mike O'Malley (L) and Chris Colfer

If you are a fan of Glee and saw the finale, you know what Kurt‘s father, Burt, gave him for his graduation gift. When I first saw it, I laughed my ass off so hard. It was beautiful and funny and sweet. So awesome it is, that I’m sharing it with you. This is how every father with a gay son should show the pride he has for his son. So now, Senator Burt Hummel (Mike O’Malley) performing “All the single Ladies” with the help of 2 Glee members.

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Painting of 11th Dr.

Like most people I know who Dr. Who is. I also grew up on the show back when it was a very different doctor, one that was not making the audience swoon. Long scarf, afro hair, and a very British goofiness about him. It wasn’t until I was an adult that I found out who that silly man was on the tv travelling the universe in his telephone booth actually was. That man was…The Doctor. As an adult I’m a rather huge fan of the show. So let’[s have a look at how others have interpreted the on-going show.

Life of Dr. Who

Port-o-Tardis

Simpsons does Dr. Who

Baby Dr.

Dr. Whoess?

Rory the Roman

The Last 4 Companions

Dalek & Tardis COSPlay

Amy Pond

Who would win?

Nesting Who dolls

Amy & Rory dolls

River Song doll

The Dr., Amy & Rory

Yes, he had a cartoon.

Amy plays with self

River Song

Simpsonised

anime

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Officer Taking Child

At 5:30 a.m. on May 10, armed men broke into the bedroom of Kirk Kyle Farrar’s 12 year-old daughter and shook her awake. The men led her downstairs at gunpoint and forced her to lie on the floor next to her mother and father, with her hands behind her head. Another armed man took Farrar’s two-year-old son from his crib, and would not let his parents hold him. “My son screamed for his mother for what seemed like an eternity,” Farrar wrote in an email to friends, obtained by Reasontv.com. “I will never forget the hopeless feeling of not being able to comfort my son or daughter.”

The armed men who broke into Farrar’s home were officers with the Meridian, Idaho, Police Department and the Drug Enforcement Administration. They were executing a federal warrant for Farrar’s arrest for the crime of selling bongs.

A Bong

Farrar’s wasn’t the only family traumatized that morning. Agents from the Drug Enforcement Administration, the U.S. Marshals Service, the Idaho National Guard, and four Idaho police departments raided the homes of 13 other headshop owners and employees on May 10. All of the headshops had their inventory seized. One shop lost more than $80,000 worth of merchandise (bongs and pipes marketed as “tobacco water pipes”). Another headshop owner had his and and his employees’ vehicles seized.

The investigation into these 13 shops and their employees (two of which are still at large) for selling drug paraphernalia was led by U.S. Attorney Wendy J. Olson, a Barack Obama appointee. Nine of the shops were also accused of selling “Spice,” a synthetic alternative to the prohibited and significantly safer drug marijuana.

In his email, Farrar denies selling spice. “Piece of Mind Boise has never carried these products EVER! We made a commitment from the start not to carry it because we believe it is dangerous and not being used in a legal fashion.” 

He also notes that his cousin, “[who] has never previously committed a crime and has absolutely no criminal record,” has been charged “with 4 Federal felony charges stemming from selling tobacco products.” 

“The open sale of drug paraphernalia promotes unlawful drug use and helps drug traffickers thrive,” Olson said at a press conference on May 10. “These indictments show federal, state and local law enforcement partners will attack drug trafficking on all fronts.”

During a speech at the Center for American Progress earlier this month, Drug Czar Gil Kerlikowske said that the law enforcement-only approach to America‘s drug problem was not “humane, compassionate” or “realistic.” He also said that the Obama administration does not believe it can “arrest its way out of the drug problem.” 

Reasontv.com spoke to one headshop owner. At his attorney’s behest, this owner declined to go on the record, but did say that local police had been aware of the store’s existence and sales of glass pipes for years, but had never threatened charges or discouraged the business from operating. The owner believes that the raids came at the behest of federal law enforcement officials.

According to the Idaho Statesman, “the DEA, Idaho National Guard, IRS and the U.S. Marshals and Attorney’s offices worked on the case,” which the agencies built over the course of an entire year.

Tommy Chong

As if more evidence were needed that President Obama’s drug war looks a lot like George W. Bush’s: The charges against Farrar and the other Idaho headshop owners are reminiscent of the federal prosecution of actor Tommy Chong under Bush’s DOJ. Chong was convicted in 2003 for distributing paraphernalia through his company Nice Dreams Enterprises. Chong was fined $20,000, and made to forfeit his domain name, all of his inventory, and $103,514 in cash.

Related articles

• Penn Jillette SLAMS Obama on Marijuana, Drug War (VIDEO) (blippitt.com)
• Obama’s War on Bongs: Capitol Hemp Edition (reason.com)
• 5 Ways Law Enforcement Has Bungled Drug War Raids (alternet.org)

Elton John

Elton John is in a Los Angles hospital being treated for a serious respiratory infection, CNN reports.

The 65-year-old entertainer became ill last weekend in Las Vegas while performing his “Million Dollar Piano” show at The Colosseum at Caesars Palace. John returned to Los Angeles to undergo testing at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center on Wednesday.

“Those tests resulted in the attending Cedars-Sinai physician recommending that Elton not perform any concerts for approximately seven days with complete rest and antibiotic treatment to cure his respiratory infection and prevent any damage,” a statement from the publicist says.

We hope he recovers quickly.

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Dylan in 2011

Today we wish a very happy 71st birthday to a musical legend, Mr. Bob Dylan.

Born Robert Allen Zimmerman on May 24, 1941, Bob Dylan is an American singer-songwriter, musician and artist. He has been an influential figure in popular music and culture for five decades. Much of his most celebrated work dates from the 1960s when he was an informal chronicler and a seemingly reluctant figurehead of social unrest. A number of Dylan’s early songs, such as “Blowin’ in the Wind” and “The Times They Are a-Changin’”, became anthems for the US civil rightsand anti-war movements.

Leaving his initial base in the culture of folk music behind, Dylan’s six-minute single “Like a Rolling Stone” has been described as radically altering the parameters of popular music in 1965. However, his recordings employing electric instruments attracted denunciation and criticism from others in the folk movement.

Dylan age 19

Dylan’s lyrics incorporated a variety of political, social, philosophical, and literary influences. They defied existing pop music conventions and appealed hugely to the then burgeoning counterculture. Initially inspired by the songs of Woody Guthrie, Robert Johnson, and Hank Williams, as well as the music and performance styles of Buddy Holly and Little Richard,Dylan has both amplified and personalized musical genres. His recording career, spanning fifty years, has explored numerous distinct traditions in American song—from folk, blues and country to gospel, rock and roll, and rockabilly to English, Scottish, and Irish folk music, embracing even jazz and swing.

Dylan with guitar

Dylan performs with guitar, keyboards, and harmonica. Backed by a changing line-up of musicians, he has toured steadily since the late 1980s on what has been dubbed the Never Ending Tour. His accomplishments as a recording artist and performer have been central to his career, but his greatest contribution is generally considered to be his songwriting.

Since 1994, Dylan has published three books of drawings and paintings, and his work has been exhibited in major art galleries.As a songwriter and musician, Dylan has received numerous awards over the years including Grammy, Golden Globe, and Academy Awards; he has been inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, Nashville Songwriters Hall of Fame, and Songwriters Hall of Fame. The Pulitzer Prize jury in 2008 awarded him a special citation for “his profound impact on popular music and American culture, marked by lyrical compositions of extraordinary poetic power.“  In April 2012, President Barack Obama named Dylan as a recipient of the Presidential Medal of Freedom.

Let’s listen to some Dylan together with one of my personal favorites, Tangled Up in Blue from 1974.

Related articles

• Bob Dylan: 20 best lyrics on his birthday (csmonitor.com)
• Bob Dylan to the White House next week (politico.com)
• Bob Dylan, Albright to receive Presidential Medal of Freedom (dawn.com)

However, there is something going dangerously wrong with their electronic control. Somehow, DVDs, USB sticks and file sharing are punching holes in North Korea’s careful control of information.

In the failing days of the Soviet Union, in the late 1980s, where Radio Free Europe had failed to make much of a difference in Soviet society, West German television was rocking the state to its foundation. It was showing the Soviet people the world that they never knew existed, a world that included such American shows as Dallas. This is what is happening now in North Korea.

South Korean television shows are being shared and traded, along with “K-Pop,” Korean popular music.

A 31-year-old North Korean defector confirmed the impact, saying “I was told when I was young that South Koreans are very poor, but the South Korean dramas proved that just wasn’t the case. His statement was part of the InterMedia report prepared for the United States State Department, which surveyed hundred of NK defectors who entered South Korea through China. Chinese merchants smuggle the physical media in and some people along the border illegally access foreign TV channels or radio broadcasts and record them.

If the experience in the Soviet Union is any indication, these little breaks in the wall of isolation will do more damage to the Kim regime than any sanctions anyone can impose. Nothing harms an isolationist regime faster than losing the isolation.

Related articles

• Illegal File-Sharing Opens North Korea to World(livescience.com)

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• North Koreans getting more foreign media than ever, study says(latimesblogs.latimes.com)

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• In the News – N. Korea suspected of involvement in China’s arrest of S. Korean activists(mouonekorea.wordpress.com)

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• China allows N. Koreans to leave for Seoul: reports (vancouverdesi.com)

Kelley Blue Book senior analyst Alec Gutierrez explained that the sales trend is very unusual. “During a typical post-recession recovery, we would expect to see auto sector gains being driven by broad economic growth. In the first quarter, the opposite was true, as auto sales were the primary driver behind GDP growth and have consistently been a bright spot in an otherwise slow-paced recovery. It this point, it is almost as if the tail is wagging the dog.”

A year ago, the earthquake and tsunami virtually stopped all imports of Japanese cars to America. Both companies have recovered. Kelley expects Toyota to pick up some market share, with a corresponding loss of share by General Motors, For, Hyundai-Kia and Nissan, but expects gains for Honda and Chrysler as well as Toyota.

The second piece of crushing news for the Republicans came from the oil industry. The price of oil dropped below $90 a barrel on Wednesday for the first time since November 1, primarily due to increased production in the United States. American oil supplies hit 900,000 barrels last week, the highest level since 1990. It is expected to gain an additional 750,000 barrels this year.

Oil prices had risen because of the problems in the Middle East and difficulties with Iran, but Saudi Arabia lived up to its promise to increase production and the United States has kept pass with that.

U. S. gas prices have dropped 25.8¢ per gallon since the first week of April, and is now 16.5¢ below its price a year ago. Heating oil fell by 4.14¢ and wholesale gas lost 5.1¢. Natural gas has gained 7¢ per cubic foot.

Brent crude, which sets the price for oil imported into the United States, dropped to a new low, losing $2.64 to $101.77 per barrel in London.

The only truly bad thing about all this news is the apparent inability of the Democratic Party to break through the white noise of the right wing and make people hear this news. The DNC really needs to hire better PR people.

Related articles

• Oil prices slide to 7-month low(money.cnn.com)

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• Memorial Day Sales Events Will Drive Auto Industry To 14.2 Million SAAR, According To Kelley Blue Book Analysts (prnewswire.com)
• Oil drops below $90 for 1st time since Nov. 1 (fuelfix.com)
• Whatever happened to $200 oil? (theglobeandmail.com)

Actor Parsons

Award-winning actor Jim Parsons reveals he’s gay and in a 10-year relationship, according to a New York Times profile.

Parsons, best-known as Dr. Sheldon Cooper on the CBS sitcom The Big Bang Theory, discusses his work in last year’s production of The Normal Heart, Larry Kramer‘s searing chronicle of the AIDS epidemic in New York City during the early 1980s. The Times‘ Patrick Healy writes, “The Normal Heart resonated with him on a few levels: Mr. Parsons is gay and in a 10-year relationship…”

Parsons & Spiewak

The 39-year-old (really?) actor publicly thanked his partner Todd Spiewak from the podium of the Golden Globe awards ceremony while accepting the trophy for best actor in a comedy series.

Parsons is currently headlining the revival of the classic comedy Harvey as Elwood P. Dowd which will open June 14 at New York’s Studio 54 theatre.

Related articles

• Theater: Jim Parsons Prepares for His Lead Role in ‘Harvey’ (nytimes.com)
• Harvey’s Jim Parsons featured on the cover of Time Out New York (boneaubryanbrown.com)
• Dr. Sheldon Cooper Does Broadway (lezgetreal.com)

Eugene Polley

Eugene Polley, an inventor whose best-known creation has fostered blissful sloth, caused decades of domestic discord and forever altered the way consumers watch television, died on Sunday in Downers Grove, Ill. Mr. Polley, the inventor of the wireless television remote control, was 96.

His death was announced by the Zenith Electronics Corporation, where Mr. Polley began his career in the stockroom before rising through the engineering ranks to invent the device, called the Flash-Matic, in 1955.

An ad for Zenith’s Flash-Matic. Zenith sold 30,000 televisions with the remote control.

“Just think!,” an advertisement breathlessly proclaimed that year. “Without budging from your easy chair you can turn your new Zenith Flash-Matic set on, off, or change channels. You can even shut off annoying commercials while the picture remains on the screen.”

The Flash-Matic remote, which worked like a flashlight, was shaped like a snub-nosed revolver. The shape was a considered choice on Mr. Polley’s part, as he explained in 2000, letting viewers in the age of ubiquitous TV westerns “shoot out” commercials.

Flash-Matic made the TV audience less captive, though also less active. For the first time, viewers could comfortably exercise dominion over sound and image without simultaneously exercising the body on the march between couch and dial.

B&W TV w/ Dials

(The “dial” was a round thing with numbers on it — all the way up to 13 — by which viewers changed the channel through the direct application of fingers and wrist. One did not so much surf channels in those days as ride their gentle swells with all due deliberateness.)

As Mr. Polley, by then 86, proudly told an interviewer in 2002: “The flush toilet may have been the most civilized invention ever devised, but the remote control is the next most important. It’s almost as important as sex.”

For his invention, Mr. Polley received a thousand-dollar bonus. But his device was soon supplanted by a more efficient, more enduring and far better-selling one, developed by a Zenith colleague, Robert Adler.

News accounts over the years have often described Mr. Adler erroneously as the TV remote’s sole inventor. Mr. Polley, a plain-spoken man who seemed to avail himself of his own internal mute button only rarely, was largely relegated to the margins of history, a condition that rankled.

“Not only did I not get credit for doing anything,” he told The Chicago Tribune in 2006, “I got a kick in the rear end.”

BIOGRAPHY

Eugene Theodore Polley was born in Chicago on Nov. 29, 1915. (He disliked the name Theodore and adopted his confirmation name, Joseph, as his middle name.) His father, a bootlegger, abandoned the family when Gene was about 10.

A Zenith Radio

The young Mr. Polley studied at the City Colleges of Chicago and the Armour Institute of Technology (now the Illinois Institute of Technology), but lacked the money to complete a degree. At 20 he joined the Zenith Radio Company, as it was then known, as a stock boy earning 40 cents an hour.

Mechanically adept, he worked his way into the engineering department. During World War II Mr. Polley, on loan from Zenith, worked for the United States military on bomb fuses and ship-detecting radar.

After the war, as TV sets began to colonize American homes, Zenith’s president, Eugene F. McDonald, faced a quandary. Mr. McDonald, who held a utopian view of the new medium, was certain that viewers would revolt en masse against television commercials, by his lights a growing scourge.

But until that halcyon day arrived, Mr. McDonald knew, he needed to offer consumers a stopgap, and he enlisted the company’s engineers to make it.

Ad of Lazybones remote

The first TV remote, called Lazy Bones, was introduced by Zenith in 1950. It had one profound drawback, however: a cable snaking from the remote to the set, over which users were inclined to trip.

Mr. McDonald enlisted Mr. Polley to build a wireless remote, and the Flash-Matic was born. The hand-held device emitted a visible beam of light, which consumers could point at a compatible TV set.

The new, purpose-built sets had a photo cell embedded in each corner of the screen; the viewer activated the cell by “shooting” it with the remote. One cell changed the channel up, another changed the channel down, a third muted the sound, and the fourth turned the set on and off.

A 1955 Flash-matic remote

The device proved popular: during its first and only year of existence, 30,000 Flash-Matic sets were sold.

But there were difficulties. Because the system was light-activated, sunlight hitting the TV screen could cause the channels to change in spontaneous roulette. Viewers also had trouble remembering which corner of the screen controlled which function.

Mr. Adler improved Mr. Polley’s device by making it responsive to sound instead of light. His remote, called Space Command, used inaudible, high-frequency sound waves to control the set. It, too, had problems — it could be set off by the sound of jangling keys or rattling coins — but was deemed enough of an improvement on its predecessor to be brought to market in 1956.

A Space Command Remote

From that year to the early 1980s, when infrared remotes became standard, more than nine million sets controlled by Space Command technology were sold.

Mr. Polley, a longtime resident of Lombard, Ill., had lived most recently in Glen Ellyn, Ill. He is survived by a son, Eugene Jr., and a grandson. His wife, the former Blanche Wiley, died before him, as did a daughter, Joan Polley.

With other colleagues, Mr. Adler and Mr. Polley represented Zenith when it was given a special Emmy Award in 1997 for its development of wireless remotes.

Mr. Adler died in 2007. Zenith has said publicly that it considers him and Mr. Polley the joint inventors of the device. Mr. Polley begged to differ. “A father has to be present at conception,” he said in a 2002 interview. “And if you’re not, you’re not that father.”

From one lazybones who spend a lot of time in front of the tv, Thank you Mr. Polley. I’d be much more active if it were not for you.

Related articles

• TV Remote Control Inventor Eugene Polley Dead at 96 (outsidethebeltway.com)
• Eugene Polley, inventor of TV remote, dies (variety.com)
• Eugene Polley, Inventor Of The TV Remote, Has Died | Complex (thehiltonburnellfiles.wordpress.com)

Dr. Shakil Afridi

Dr. Shakil Afridi provided vital information to the CIA that helped identify the hiding place of Osama bin Laden. For helping to rid the world of a master terrorist and murderer, the Pakistani government has arrested Dr. Afridi for treason and sentenced him to 33 years in prison, and just for grins and giggles, fined him 320,000 Pakistani rupees ($3,477).

Dr. Afridi was accused of running a fake vaccination campaign and providing the CIA with information gathered in his house-to-house canvas for persons who might need to be vaccinated. In January, Defense Secretary Leon Panetta told a television interviewer that Afridi had played a vital role in the operation, but he had not committed treason or done anything to harm Pakistan. The Pakistanis have a different view. The fact that bin Laden was hiding just blocks away from their premier military academy was extremely embarrassing to them. Relations with Pakistan have been frosty at best since the killing of bin Laden last year.

The United States government is not pleased. The United States government is also trying to settle a little dispute with Pakistan over transportation of equipment and materials to Afghanistan for our troops. The land access has been closed and all our supplies are being airlifted into Afghanistan, ever since a NATO attack on militants on the border killed 24 Pakistani soldiers last November. Intelligence agency co-operation between the two nations has virtually ceased.

Just another beautiful day in the neighborhood….

Related articles

• Doctor who helped US catch Bin Laden jailed for treason(timesofmalta.com)

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• Pakistan jails doctor who helped CIA find Bin Laden – BBC News (bbc.co.uk)
• Pakistani doctor accused of helping U.S. gets 33 years in prison (cnn.com)

Yummmm...

I happen to have a huge sweet tooth and I’m always looking for ways to turn it into a cavity. It doesn’t help that my partner’s sweet tooth rivals mine. We are lucky enough to manage a sweet dessert every night. But for those nights when we have no money, no food and not much else to tame the tooth, we look for simple ideas. I found this one and just may try it. You can too!

What You Need

Pan Cut

Kitchens Tips

Season 1 Promo

I’m a fan of Glee and have been since Season 2. I was in the choir when I was in high school and have bonded with the storyline in many ways. I was a geek. (Still am, but much more confident about it.) I spend my Tuesday evenings with my partner, our baby and our gay friend, Paul (a trained singer) watching and singing along. (Our baby screeches to the songs with us.)

After last night’s finale we had some unanswered questions about the individual futures of the characters we’ve grown to love. The Advocate reported that Fox Entertainment president Kevin Reilly has apparently shed some light on what viewers can expect from Glee season 4 this fall.

Recognize anyone?

According to TVoverMind.com, Glee will go the “show-within-a-show route and have a handful of the graduating seniors move to New York to attend a performing arts school.”  That means the main cast will still be in Ohio, with new incoming high school students filling the cast (from The Glee Project), while several of the show’s current stars will be shown moving to New York and building lives there. From last night’s finale we know that Rachel made it to NY, whilst Finn and Kurt stayed behind. What will happen to the boys left behind? Will Rachel make her dreams come true, or she bound for the night shift wait staff?

And what of the “les-bi-sexual” couple Santana and Britney? Britnay will be repeating her senior year, whilst Santana , with the help of her mother, will be going to NY to be a star, whatever that means for a cheerleader. The question to be asked is, what will happen to their relationship?

Sarah Jessica Parker

Kate Hudson

SPOILER!!! –As for season 4, actresses Sarah Jessica Parker and Kate Hudson have both signed on for multi-episode arcs.

What I want to know is, what will happen to Puckerman, Artie, Finn, Mike, Quinn, Mercedes, Blaine & Kurt, and the others graduating? Will they return for cameos as well? I sure hope so. I’m crossing my fingers now. You should too. ;D

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• Kate Hudson & Sarah Jessica Parker: ‘Glee’ Guest Stars! (justjared.com)
• Glee graduates face tears, fears, uncertain futures (todayonline.com)

Singer Adam Lambert

With the album Trespassing, Adam Lambert confirms his superstar status and makes history as the first openly LGBT vocalist to have an album debut at the #1 position of the Billboard album charts. When a woman first debuted an album at the #1 position, it was Whitney Houston with her album, Whitney. The torch for equality in music has been passed.

Released May 15, Trespassing premiered at the top of both Billboard’s Top 200 chart and digital albums chart. With a mix of dance songs and ballads, including the equality anthem “Outlaws of Love,” the album has also received exceptionally strong notices from music critics.

Lambert’s first album, For Your Entertainment, debuted at number 3 in 2009. Other LGBT recording artists, including Elton John and George Michael, have had number 1 albums, but prior to coming out.

Watch a teaser for the soon-to-be-released video for Lambert’s single “Never Close Our Eyes” below.

To Mr. Lambert, Congratulations!

Related articles

• Adam Lambert Daily Update – May 23, 2012 (onthemeaningofadamlambert.wordpress.com)
• Adam Lambert Music Video Tease: “Never Close Our Eyes” (thehollywoodgossip.com)
• Trespassing Opens #1! What happens next? Radio Show (onthemeaningofadamlambert.wordpress.com)

Personalized keychains

Vases from alcohol bottles

Zombie Feet Shoes

Doodle Rocks

Hybrid Shoes

Abandonment Tissues

Shoes too loud?

Something Really Great

Egg-scape

Cheap fireplace

A Brighter Day

Desk Fort

Chinese dragon

Snailmail Prints

Yum, Tuna.

Expensive taste?

Festival hat

$10 paint job

Hippy Eggs

I want this bathroom.

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Mexican drug cartel territories, red is the Zetas

So, what happens when one is arrogant enough to post a video of oneself dumping 49 mutilated bodied next to a highway near Cadereyta, Mexico, flashing a banner with one’s name on it? On a good day, the Federales come and arrest your ass.

Daniel Elizondo Jesus Ramirez, AKA “El Loco,” tried to evade arrest by firing at the troops and lobbing a fragmentation grenade, but they caught him anyway. The 43 men and 6 women who were dumped have not been identified, but appear to be migrants from southern Mexico and Central America. Still at large are two other leaders of the Zetas drug cartel,”El Gambo” (The Shrimp) and “El Altavoz” (The Speaker) who were also featured on the video.

The banner flashed in the video warned that similar fates awaited rival cartels, the police and the military. While it is possible to hunt up the video, it has been removed from YouTube where it first appeared. Additional messages were posted denying Zeta responsibility for the body dump, but the government believes these were done to confuse the issue.

The Zetas control most of northern and eastern Mexico and are engaged in a war with the Gulf cartel and the Sinaloa cartel for control of the entire country. The Zetas were founded by former members of the Mexican military. Mexican Brigadier General Edgar Ruiz Villegas Melendez said in a press conference that Ramirez had confessed to the body dump on orders from higher officers in the Zetas.

Last year, it was briefly believed that Ramirez had been killed while being hunted for his part in the kidnapping and murder of two women. But he sent a message to the media announcing “I’m still alive….El Loco of the Zetas.”

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• ‘El Loco’ Arrested After 49 Beheaded Bodies Found(undisputedlegal.wordpress.com)

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• Mexican troops capture a top suspect in slayings of 49(edition.cnn.com)

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• Mexico Arrests ‘El Loco’ for Role in Beheading and Mutilation of 49 People (raptureimminent.wordpress.com)
• Mexican army: Zetas leaders ordered killing of 49 (miamiherald.com)

Yesterday, President Obama attended the graduation ceremony for the Joplin High School Class of 2012. Their school was leveled by the tornado. They lost friends, teachers, classmates and their school that day. But they persevered. They survived. They rebuilt their lives and are moving forward. The President was there to honor them and the spirit of the city.

Their principal, Dr. Kerry Sachetta, was on Andrea Mitchell’s MSNBC show this afternoon telling her how honored the students were by the President’s presence. When people bother to listen to him, Barack Obama is a great speaker and can hit the right notes in a time of tragedy or triumph like few presidents before him.

His speech stayed away from politics, and spoke of the “power of community” and the community’s response to the tragedy without “greed and selfishness; ignorance and cruelty.” Not for Joplin the kind the of price gouging we have seen in the aftermath of hurricanes or the exclusion of certain people from assistance, no new zoning laws were passed to prevent the less acceptable from reclaiming their lives. All was good in Joplin last night.

President Obama told the class that what they have done in the past year is “…the same spirit we need right now to help rebuild America. And you, class of 2012, you’re going to help lead this effort. You’re the ones who will help build an economy where every child can count on a good education; you’re the ones who are going to make sure everyone who is willing to put in the effort can find a job that supports a family; you’re the ones who will make sure we’re a country that can control our own energy future and we lead the world in science and technology and innovation. No matter how tough times get, you’ll always be tougher. No matter what life throws at you, you will be ready. You will not be defined by the difficulties you face, but by how you respond – with grace, and strenght and a commitment to others.”

Related articles

• Obama Speaks At Joplin High School’s Graduation One Year After Devastating Tornado(huffingtonpost.com)

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• Joplin: Remember, Rejoice, Rebuild(whitehouse.gov)

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• Obama: “You Are From Joplin And You Are From America.”(duanegraham.wordpress.com)

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• Joplin remembers deadly tornado, one year later (wtvm.com)
• Joplin hospital honors 2011 tornado survivors (miamiherald.com)

Doohan as Scotty

The Dragon has breathed fire – and James Doohan’s ashes are in orbit.

Yes, at long last and after a last-second scuttling over the weekend, the SpaceX Falcon 9 blasted off at 3:44 a.m. this morning from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station. The rocket, owned/funded by the privately held company Space Exploration Technologies, a/k/a SpaceX, is headed toward the International Space Station, carrying 1,000-plus pounds of supplies for the station’s crew, as well as the ashes of more than 300 people, among them Doohan, Star Trek’s beloved Scotty, who passed away in 2005, and Mercury program astronaut Gordon Cooper.

“Feels like a giant weight just came off my back,” tweeted SpaceX founder and CEO Elon Musk. He posted that tweet once Dragon deployed its solar panels, which, according to the Reuters news service, is the first of several major milestones that must be met before the spacecraft is cleared to dock at the station. If all goes as planned, that will occur on Friday. This mission is actually the last test flight for SpaceX under NASA’s COTS (Commercial Orbital Transportation Services) initiative, which finances the development of private vehicles that can launch cargo to the ISS.

Doohan’s ashes – which also were launched to space in 2008 as part of an unsuccessful mission — were part of a secondary payload included on the second stage of the rocket, not on the Dragon itself. That payload separated from the capsule at the 9-minute, 49-second mark and is now orbiting, on its own, above the Earth. It’s expected to stay in orbit for approximately a year before descending back to Earth and disintegrating during re-entry.

Doohan's Daughter

Wende Doohan, James Doohan’s widow, was on hand for the launch with the couple’s daughter, Sarah, now 12. Doohan posted a photo on Twitter and tweeted the following comment early today. “Sarah and I enjoyed watching a beautiful rocket launch this morning – certainly a first for her.” Also, on May 18, Doohan tweeted the attached photo of Sarah at Cape Canaveral with a caption that read “Following Daddy’s footsteps?”.

Related articles

• Trying to Shoot James Doohan’s Ashes into Space . . . Again (nationalreview.com)
• Beam me up Scotty: Star Trek actor’s ashes blasted into space (itv.com)
• Celebrities’ Ashes Launched on SpaceX Falcon Rocket – ABC News (abcnews.go.com)

Awww....

The X-Men, one of the world’s most popular super hero teams, have always been at the forefront of the biggest stories in comic history, and today is no different as Marvel is proud to announce the wedding that has everyone talking!

Today, fans worldwide learned on ABC’s “The View” that Jean-Paul Beaubier, aka Northstar, proposes to his boyfriend Kyle Jinadu in ASTONISHING X-MEN #50, on-sale May 23 (tomorrow!!!) in comic stores, on the Marvel Comics app and at the Marvel Digital Comics Shop.

the happy couple

The creative team of New York Times best-sellers Marjorie Liu and Mike Perkins have put Northstar and Kyle’s relationship to the test—and now they’re about to take their biggest step yet. But will their path to wedded matrimony in New York City be smooth or are there hidden dangers around the corner?

“The Marvel Universe has always reflected the world outside your window, so we strive to make sure our characters, relationships and stories are grounded in that reality,” said Axel Alonso, Marvel Editor in Chief. “We’ve been working on this story for over a year to ensure Northstar and Kyle’s wedding reflects Marvel’s ‘world outside your window’ tradition.”

Then, on June 20, don’t miss the wedding of Northstar and Kyle in the pages of ASTONISHING X-MEN #51! This unforgettable issue features covers by Dustin Weaver and Marko Djurdjevic, along with a special “Create Your Own Wedding” blank variant cover! Select comic book retailers nationwide will host wedding parties at their stores to celebrate this joyous occasion, with special items exclusively available at participating stores!

“The story of Northstar and Kyle is universal, and at the core of everything I write: a powerful love between two people who have to fight for it against all odds,” said Liu. “This is the quintessential Marvel story, one that blends the modern world with the fantasy of super heroes in order to tell an exciting story that begins with a wedding—and continues in ways you can’t imagine.”

comic cover

Northstar was first introduced to comic fans in the pages of 1979’s UNCANNY X-MEN #120, a member of the super hero team Alpha Flight and antagonist to the popular super heroes. A gold medal winning Olympian and successful businessman, the French-Canadian super hero quickly became one of the most popular members of Alpha Flight when its ongoing series launched in 1983.

In 1992’s historic ALPHA FLIGHT #106, Northstar became the first openly gay super hero when he announced his sexual identity through national media. Since then, Northstar has not only joined the X-Men but become one of their most popular new members.

Aren't they cute?

Northstar and Kyle have been a couple since 2009, garnering a large fan following since their first appearance together.“As a long-time fan of the X-Men, it’s not only a true honor to be part of such a historically significant story but also a complete joy,” explained Perkins.

Don’t miss the proposal everyone’s talking in ASTONISHING X-MEN #50, available tomorrow in comic stores, on the Marvel Comics app and at the More on Marvel.com: http://marvel.com/news/story/18770/save_the_date_landmark_x-men_marriage#ixzz1vcOdWXm6

Congrats to the happy couple.

Related articles

• Gay X-Man Northstar Inches Closer To Wedding (towleroad.com)
• Gay X-Man Northstar’s Wedding To Be Announced On ‘The View’? (towleroad.com)
• Marvel to announce landmark Astonishing X-Men #50 story on tomorrow’s The View (comicsbeat.com)

Needles in his hearse

Drag Queen Sharon Needles made news this week with her biggest purchase so far with her prize money from RuPaul‘s Drag Race.

Ru posted about it today on her Facebook, whilst Sharon’s friend, Marsha Mellow Monster, posted a pic of her yesterday in it; her brand new Hearse. Now the queen of spook now has her very own hearse to drive around in. As Ru said herself “THATs f&%king fierce.”

Her fans are not at all surprised, but rather delighted that the reigning queen is treating herself to the best things in life that a queen of spook deserves, like a hearse to carry all her drag gear in!

The news of her hearse purchase sparked conversations amongst fans. I caught myself in one.

Me: Did you hear about Sharon Needles new car?

Friend: Yeah, Thats awesome. I want a hearse.

Me: Me too! I want a bright orange one.

Friend: Mine would be bright purple.

Drive safe, Sharon. Wouldn’t want you riding in the back. ;D

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Moretz as Hit Girl

A sequel to the cult superhero adventure Kick-Ass had long seemed a fevered dream of the comic’s creator Mark Millar, who has developed a notoriety for leaking “news” that is either conjecture or wishful thinking. So when Millar declared that Kick-Ass 2 would go into production this summer, we were a bit leery.

However, with The Avengers showing there’s still a serious love of superhero features among moviegoers, all the studios are looking to capitalize, and so Universal is moving forward on Kick-Ass 2 with Cry_Wolf helmer Jeff Wadlow usurping Kick-Ass director Matthew Vaughn, who is too busy developing X-Men: First Class 2 to return. Nonetheless, Vaughn will help produce the sequel, which is slated to shoot in London this September.

Hit Girl & Kick Ass from comic

Wadlow revealed to the press recently that he penned the screenplay over the holidays, and sought to find a place where the first movie and the second graphic novel intersect. Like its precursor, Kick-Ass 2will take some departures from its source material, Millar’s comic of the same name, as Wadlow explains:

“I think the most important thing that’s gonna’ change from the Kick-Ass 2 comic to Kick-Ass 2 the movie was just really finding an emotional story to tell. Because what I certainly loved about the first film, and what I think elevated it above most comic book adaptations, is the heart and the emotion in the film. It was sort of my challenge as the filmmaker and storyteller to find something as emotional in the second film and I think we have some stuff that people are gonna’ really respond to.”

Actress Moretz

As to specifics, he hopes to play up Hit Girl’s part, despite the fact that her story is “sidelined” in Millar’s second book. As she gives up her superhero alter-ego in the comic, its story instead focuses on Kick-Ass and Red Mist’s evolution to the Motherf–ker, a more vicious villainous incarnation. However, this approach may be problematic, as Moretz hasn’t yet signed on to the sequel, though Wadlow says the two have met, she’s read the script and is by his estimation, “very excited about what we’re doing with Hit-Girl.”

Kick-Ass stars Aaron Johnson and Christopher Mintz-Plasse are also said to be in talks, but it seems far more likely they’d be game to reprise their roles as their careers haven’t exactly blown up as Moretz’s has. Since her brazen breakthrough with pint-sized and foul-mouthed Hit Girl, the starlet delighted horror fans with Let Me In, and dazzled critics with Hugo. However, her most recent efforts aren’t faring so well. Dark Shadows tanked its opening weekend, accruing only $29 million, which smarts with a bloated budget of $150 mil. Plus this batty comedy—as well as the gritty coming-of-age tale Hick—were generally panned by critics. Could this urge her to return to the role that first won her such good will? Let’s hope so, both because her upcoming Carrie remake is a risky venture, and because Kick-Ass 2 wouldn’t be nearly as hard-hitting without her.

WonderWoman & LeopardGirl

Your favorite DC Comics character might be gay.

In an interview at the Kapow Comics Convention, DC Comics Co-Publisher Dan DiDio said that a “prominent” DC Comics character will soon come out of the closet, reversing an earlier statement where he had said DC was more likely to insert a new LGBT character than “out” an existing one.

Aquaman & Aqualad

Twitter users have cited Aquaman and Wonder Woman as the most likely candidates. They won’t be the first gay characters in comics, though. “It’s sad when DC is playing catch-up to Archie. And the entire comics industries of Japan and Europe,” tweeted @Joe_Hunter. Once they start catching up, though, it could happen in a Flash.

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Coach Sue Sylvester

Teacher Will Schuster

Councilor Emma

Rebel Puck

Footballer Finn

Diva Rachel

Token Gay Kurt

Boy Band Blaine

Musical Feet Mike

Lil Lost Tina

Wheelchair-Bound Artie

Ballsy Becky

Sultry Santana

Airhead Brittany

Stripper Sam

Soul sister Mercedes

Cheerleader Quinn

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Fan imagined costuming

So what is the latest in comic book movie news? Well, famous wrestlers are!

ForeverGeek.com has reported that Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson is currently developing the big screen “Shazam” adaptation along with director Pete Segal, and of course, comic book fanboys are quite thrilled about this.

While the project is not listed on his IMDB.com profile yet, fans are a-twitter about the idea.

Black Adam

The great thing about the casting though is Johnson’s decision to let fans dictate which character they wanted him to play. As a big star, it would have been a given for him to play Captain Marvel. But the fans are clamoring for him to play another character — none other than Black Adam himself, and he has announced that he will, indeed go for that role.

Fans even made a mock-up of the costume they want him to be in.

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Entering a store nude

A woman who walked naked into two New York stores and asked for the time has been charged by police with public lewdness, the Times Union newspaper reports.

The woman, who has been identified by Saratoga County District Attorney James Murphy III as Barbara Lafleur, of Saratoga Springs, calmly walked in each store and was captured by security cameras in each.

The first store on Lafleur’s short shopping tour was Curtis Lumber in Ballston Spa, New York. While there, witnesses said she approached two employees before leaving the store of her own accord, telling one employee on the way out, “Have a good day.”

“No one wanted to say much to her,” remarked store manager Bob Eakin to the Times Union. “It’s not a situation you want to be involved in.” It is kinda awkward.

Having failed to score any wood at the lumberyard, Lafleur then walked into a Stewart’s shop nearby, before being asked to leave. One employee told the Union:

“The manager said, ‘Ma’am, are you aware you have no clothes on?’ She was kosher and cool about it, and the manager told her she needed to leave.”

Nudists protesting their rights to be nude

Lafleur has since been charged with public lewdness. In a statement released shortly after charges were pressed, Murphy III gave an insight into Lafleur’s motives:

“While the defendant claimed she was merely expressing her freedom to be fully liberated by walking nude into Stewart’s and Curtis Lumber, this alleged conduct is actually a crime under the penal law. Surprisingly, mental health found no psychiatric issues whatsoever.”

Lafleur could face a maximum of 90 days in jail if convicted.

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The G8 is over, and the leaders of Canada, France, Germany, Italy, and the UK have joined President Obama in Chicago for the NATO summit. There, they are meeting with the leaders of Albania, Belgium, Bulgaria, Croatia, the Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Greece, Hungary, Iceland, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain and Turkey. NATO was formed as the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, consisting of the US, Canada and a group of European countries, as a response to the threat of the Soviet Union and the Eastern European nations the USSR had “liberated” from the Nazis. Today, twelve of the twenty-eight members are former Soviet client states that belonged to the Warsaw Pact.

An additional thirty nations and numerous organizations have sent representatives to the summit to discuss everything from the proposed European missile shield to the Afghan War to humanitarian aid in Africa.

Normally, economic summits like the G8 and G20 attract hordes of protesters, but since the G8 was held at Camp David, the usual suspects moved ahead to Chicago. Economic summit protesters run the gamut from anti-globalization to anti-war with a sprinkling of old-fashioned anarchists and tin-hat-wearers who a warning against the Bilderberg Group and the Jewish bankers who are creating the New World Order right under our unsuspecting noses. The incipient establishment of the New World Order is a conspiracy theory so old it wears a powdered wig.

Last week, Chicago police arrested three men who were planning to use Molotov cocktails during the NATO summit. They have been charged in Federal Court with terrorism conspiracy, possession of an explosive or incendiary device and providing material support for terrorism. Six other men arrested Wednesday have been released. In addition to making flaming cocktails, the three were engaged in making beer. The three men are Brian Church, 20, of Fort Lauderdale, Florida; Jared Chase, 24, of Keene, New Hampshire, and Brent Vincent Betterly, 24, whose address was given as Oakland Park, Massachusetts, but there is no such town. There is an Oakland Park near Fort Lauderdale. The arrived in Chicago in late April to participate in the May 1^st demonstrations, according to Bill Vassilakis, who let them stay in his apartment. Betterly has an arrest record in Oakland Park, Florida, for vandalizing a school with two friends after a night of heavy tequila drinking.

Small demonstrations were held across Chicago on Saturday, without incident. There was even one demonstrator walking a lonely picket line outside the Chicago Board of Trade protesting military spending. There was even a peaceful march on the home of Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel, President Obama’s former chief of staff and the city’s former Congressman. But one demonstration on Saturday was chaotic. The participants seemed to have no specific goal, just wandering the city streets following a zig-zagging path. When police tried to corral them with bicycles and police horses, things got violent. Eighteen protesters were arrested during that clash.

More troubling, however, is the video now circulating around the web showing Chicago policemen using batons on the demonstrators. It is time for Cisco or Skype to come to the aid of the State Department, and Secretary Clinton to teleconference with hundreds of mayors, explaining to them the power of the internet. When pictures of our police beating protesters with batons, spraying them full face with pepper spray while they are peacefully sitting down or lobbing tear gas grenades into demonstrations spreads around the world, it damages America’s ability to take the moral high ground about attacks on protesters or indefinite detention of dissidents in other countries. (She might try explaining that to our conservative Congressmen as well, since they are hellbent to include indefinite detention in our defense authorization bill.)

And, of course, someone needs to make sure that protesters understand that one is not a martyr to the cause if one provokes the cracked skull.

On Sunday, around 2,000 gathered at Grant Park to march 2½ miles to the McCormick Place convention center on Lake Michigan where the summit is being held. The worst clashes occurred at the end of the march, when about 150 protesters tried to push past the police cordon surrounding the convention center. The news cameras caught more attacks precipitated by the protesters than by the police.

Occupy Chicago spokesperson Micah Philbrook, explained that “We want the world to focus on NATO – they’re not important and have no mandate anymore.” Except in Libya where NATO provided the military expertise to carry out the United Nation’s no-fly resolution. Except in Afghanistan, where NATO had been involved in the occupation for ten years.

Though the overt threat of Soviet nuclear or military attack no longer exists, Europe has a pair of problems on their joint doorstep. There is Iran and its on-going blustering about creating a nuclear program that may or may not include weaponization of nuclear materials. And in Russia, President Vladimir Putin seems to be using Soviet practices like the arrest and conviction of opponents to create a very capitalist oligarchy made up of his supporters and friends. As the only European supporter of Syrian, Russia has set itself against the rest of Europe and against NATO. Putin is also have hissy fits over the idea of a missile shield in Europe designed to protect Europe from Iran’s missile capability.

The European NATO partners also have a huge stake in the Arab Spring, unrest and civil war in the Middle East, and Israel’s policies towards the Palestinians. There are tens of thousands, if not millions of Middle Eastern refugees and immigrants in Europe, and known al Qaida and terror cells. Europe has in the past taken a dramatically different tack from the United States where terrorist groups are concerned. By allowing them to operate more or less in the open, Europe maintained greater surveillance over them.

But NATO has served another purpose in the new Europe. The European Union is an economic union with a limited political aspect. It has served one purpose in the transition of the former communist nations into the European community. Membership in NATO has given these nations another avenue to assimilation and inclusiveness.

The most important thing on the agenda at the summit is Afghanistan, and secondly, the use of unmanned drones to attack al Qaida in Yemen and Pakistan. NATO is officially part of these operations and the United States can only do so much unilaterally. Further down the agenda are probably discussions of parameters for future operations like Libya…what would trigger such an operation, what would the conditions have to be on the ground, who could call on NATO for military intervention. Whether the demonstrators like it or not, NATO still has a role to play in the world. At the very least, NATO protects the United States from being called upon to be the lone policeman to the world.

Besides, one can never have too many allies.

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Murray's head

You can always tell it’s Oscar season when films featuring big-name actors portraying famous historical figures start rolling into theaters. Focus Features has gone ahead and released a trailer for one such production on the horizon, titled Hyde Park on Hudson.

The Hyde Park on Hudson cast is headed by Bill Murray as Franklin D. Roosevelt – who is joined by his Rushmore costar, Olivia Williams, as the First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt, Samuel West as King George VI, and Olivia Colman  as Queen Elizabeth.

However, similar to My Week with Marilyn, the film unfolds from the perspective of a more obscure name: Daisy (Laura Linney), FDR’s distant cousin, who also becomes a good friend and confidante to the famous U.S. president – not to mention, partly serves as the audience’s eyes and ears as the film’s major players collide over the course of a colorful weekend gathering.

Judging by this early footage, Murray looks to do a spot-on job channeling the mannerisms and personality of the late FDR; in short, his performance is pure Oscar bait. That also goes for the lovely period production design, old-fashioned musical soundtrack and storyline about the messiness of human emotions – all within the context of a get-together between British royalty and the U.S. First Couple (set against a WW II backdrop). Make no mistake, Hyde Park on Hudson appears to be for the period drama crowd what, say, Battleship is for those who love summer popcorn blockbuster fare. (And there’s nothing wrong with that.)

Actor Murray as FDR

Many Murray fans should be pleased to see the actor continue his trend of working on more artsy and independent fare. Hyde Park on Hudson also looks to have a bit more mainstream appeal than some of Murray’s most recent work, such as his collaborations with Wes Anderson (including, this year’s Moonrise Kingdom) or Jim Jarmusch (Broken Flowers, The Limits of Control). After all, the film was directed by Roger Michell – whose credits include frothy flicks like Morning Glory and Notting Hill, along with more serious dramas, such as Enduring Love and Venus – with a screenplay by Tony Award-winner Richard Nelson.

Focus Features was also wise to settle on the early December date for Hyde Park on Hudson. That will allow it to start building momentum for the big award shows in early 2013, while also serving as counter-programming to the big blockbusters due to hit theaters that month (The Hobbit, One Shot, etc.).

Hyde Park on Hudson begins a limited theatrical release in the U.S. on December 7th, 2012.

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Ned Flanders meets Lady Gaga & her flaming tits of fury.

Tonight is another season finale for the long-running The Simpsons, but its an episode that has been causing a bit of a stir in the geek/freak fan groups. Simpsons and Gaga fans alike are thrilled to see this mash-up and her effect on the almost-normal world of Springfield. Lady Gaga will be doing the voicing of herself as she visits the famous town and encounters the infamous family of …The Simpsons. Don’t miss the season finale featuring Lady Gaga!!! SUN 5/20 at 8/7c on FOX! THAT IS TONIGHT!!!

Jean Grey is on fire!

The Ladies of the X-Men never truly get the credit they deserve. They are just as strong, mutated and awesome as their male counterparts, but rarely are given the screen time or comic pages to show them off. The great thing about X-men is that it opens fans up to create their own characters that would fit into the X-men universe. For today I’m going to share with you some fan art and show you how their fans see them. ;D

Storm in a white outfit

Rogue in green outfit

Shadowcat in Anime

Mystique mid-shape shift

Black Queen Cosplay

a spikey character

Emma Frost

Storm in black outfit

Rogue in Anime

Shadowcat Emerging

Mystique Bobblehead Design?

Jean Gray

Lady Deathstrike

Psylocke

Storm in blue outfit

Rogue in form-fit costume

Kitty Pryde w/ her dragon

Storm in punk attire

Emma Frost Fashion

Mystique cartoonified

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Actor Stahl

“Terminator 3” actor Nick Stahl was reported missing by his estranged wife earlier this week. We have just learned that the actor has made contact with friends via email.

Stahl’s wife, Roseann, filed court papers in February after she believed his alleged drug abuse had escalated, causing her to ask a judge for limited visitation rights to their 2-year-old daughter.

TMZ learned that he sent a note to his pals on Friday, apologizing for scaring them. He added that he is seeking treatment and would be out of contact for the next 30 days.

Stahl’s wife, Roseannn, reportedly was not on the email.

We wish him the best of luck with his recovery and are very glad that he is safe.

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Cast cover

Bluewater Comic’s unauthorized The Cast Of Doctor Who takes a glance into the backgrounds of a few of the actors who have taken on the role of The Doctor through the years. Without a standard comic storyline, the book serves more as an introduction to the series, specifically designed for newer fans that are interested about the Classic Doctor Who series.

The comic book oddly only looks at four official Doctors (plus a fifth outside canon which we will get to later). This limited examination was restricted based on space available for the publication of the comic. Overall, the comic examines William Hartnell as the First Doctor, Tom Baker as the Fourth Doctor, Paul McGann as the Eighth Doctor, and Matt Smith as the current Eleventh Doctor.

The Cast Of Doctor Who functions mainly to provide some background information on the history of the actors who took on this role, giving you a quick glance at their biographical information and highlighting some of their key film, television, and theatrical roles prior to and after Who. Despite its succinct short summary fashion, the details are (for the most part) surprisingly accurate in places.

Tennant as the 1st Doctor

Having said that, it puzzles me as to why the publishers opted to focus only on a few actors instead of all main eleven Doctors. While the space factor may have provided more room to focus on four, I found myself somewhat disappointed that Patrick Troughton, Jon Pertwee, Peter Davison, Colin Baker, and Sylvester McCoy were not given a shot in the book (although Troughton and Pertwee do briefly appear). On top of that, Nu Who fans would be horror-struck at the exclusion of Christopher Eccleston and David Tennant.

The artwork in The Cast Of Doctor Who is adequate for the purpose of the book and the interpretations and likenesses of the featured actors are actually pretty well done. It does, however, take a bit of a morbid turn in the death of William Hartnell, with the artwork becoming not so much non-figurative, but creepily darkened and beyond interpretation.

Cushing as 1st Doctor

A main criticism of the comic, however, is the inclusion of Peter Cushing as the Doctor from the non-canon films made during the 1960s. Cushing’s work in the two Doctor Who films is not part of the overall mythos of the current series. Considering the book seems to be designed as a gateway media to encourage newer fans to discover the classic series, the inclusion of Cushing detracts from this. Furthermore, the writers misspell Tarkin when they get to his Star Wars role – a HUGE no-no!

Newer fans to Doctor Who will notice the biographical pages to be informative, and hopefully it does encourage them to check out the classic series. However, dedicated longtime fans will be disappointed with the book, with the lack of other Doctors, and particularly the manner in which Cushing’s Doctor is upheld in the pages. This one is just for newer fans.

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Bugs & Tweety on Saturday morning

Saturdays are meant for cartoons. They are meant for lazy mornings eating cereal and watching cartoons in your pajamas. Saturday mornings I wake up early with my son, turn on the tv and start my morning.

On Saturdays we find superhero cartoons to watch. Boomerang and Cartoon Network are best for these. Today we are watching the following;

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StarFire in DC comics

Starfire is the name of several fictional comic book characters published by DC Comics, but the most prominent Starfire is Koriand’r, the fourth character to use that name. She debuted in a preview story inserted within DC Comics Presents #26 (October 1980) and was created by Marv Wolfman and George Pérez. Starfire was ranked 20th in Comics Buyer’s Guide‘s “100 Sexiest Women in Comics” list and you can see why. Meee-ow!

Koriand’r, Starfire’s real name, is a princess of the fictional planet Tamaran in the Vegan System, and was in line to rule the planet as Queen.

Like all Tamaraneans, Starfire’s alien physiology constantly absorbs ultraviolet radiation and converts it to energy for flight. The solar absorption experiments performed on her by the alien Psions granted her the ability to channel and project that same energy into destructive blasts called “starbolts”.  As shown in the “Insiders” crossover story arc (Teen Titans and Outsiders),Starfire can also release nearly all of her stored energy as a powerful omni-directional explosive burst, many times more powerful than her standard blasts. The released energy leaves her in a weakened state.

Starfire possesses superhuman strength, which combined with her superior fighting-skills has enabled her to win about two out of three times against the much stronger Donna Troy (as the latter was in the early 1980s) during purely hand-to-hand training matches.

Learning English from Robin in Episode "Go!"

Starfire is also capable of assimilating other languages through physical contact with another person. When she attempts to do so with males, she usually kisses them because it is “more fun” for her. She is proficient in armed and unarmed combat, having been trained in those arts by the Warlords of Okaara.

Starfire appears in the Teen Titans animated series, voiced by Hynden Walch. Elements of her storyline appear in different episodes spread across the show’s five seasons, in which she deals with her arch-foe and sister, Blackfire (also voiced by Walch), the responsibilities of being a princess, and her insecurities about being an alien on Earth.

Tamaranean Race

Starfire was born and raised on the distant planet Tamaran before arriving on Earth and joining the Teen Titans. Her race, the Tamaraneans, are an emotional race who see feelings as the force that drives their very livelihood. Their emotions fuel their natural abilities of flight and superhuman strength, as well as  Starfire’s starbolts. Her race is also highly resilient to radiation and the cold (though the longer she is outside, and the more exhausted she is, the more susceptible she is to sub-zero temperatures). The animated Starfire also has the ability to travel faster-than-light without a ship, as well as the ability to survive in the vacuum of outer space for long periods of time. However, she cannot breathe underwater. Sometimes her powers act beyond her control, such as releasing explosive energy blasts when she sneezes, as well as her strength accidentally bending a street light down to the ground.

Character Design for Teen Titans

Starfire’s Titans character bears some similarities with her comic version. In the flashback episode “Go!”, which tells of the founding of the Titans in their animated continuity, just before meeting the Titans, Starfire is shown being held prisoner as a “prize” by a group of Gordanian slave masters, working for an interstellar power known as the Citadel. Eventually, she manages to escape and flees to the closest planet, which happens to be Earth. Starfire runs into Robin and the other soon-to-be Titans, but after being mistreated for so long, she is aggressive, antagonistic and does not trust the Titans or any one else for that matter. After Robin aids her in taking off the “space cuffs” that bind her wrists, the Gordanians whom she escaped from show up looking for her and the Titans help her fight them off. After winning and driving off her jailers, Starfire elects to stay on Earth with the four heroes and quickly develops feelings for Robin.

Close-up of Starfire's face

Starfire is inherently the most sensitive of the Titans. This kid-friendly version of Starfire is naive, innocent, and somewhat insecure, but it is this trait that endears her to others, especially to Robin. An alien and an outsider, she is still new to Earth and its customs, which serves as a recurring source of comic relief. She also insists on sharing her own customs with other members of the team. Presumably because English is not her first language, Starfire speaks without contractions and misuses idioms. Additionally, she uses several Tamaranean nouns.

Raven & Starfire

Starfire has a pet giant moth larva named “Silkie” in the series, given to her by Beast Boy. Starfire takes friendship very seriously, and is easily distressed when others, especially her friends, argue or fight. Although her naive and slightly overly friendly yet kind nature can sometimes clash with Raven’s more secretive one, she has shown a closeness to her.

First Kiss in Trouble in Tokyo

Reflecting the comic books, the series hints at a potential relationship between Starfire and Robin. In the season 5 episode “Go!”, Robin and Starfire’s first kiss is shown; however (as in the comics), this was for the purpose of assimilating the English language. In the movie Teen Titans: Trouble in Tokyo, moments are shared between the two. Finally, Robin and Starfire share the “actual” kiss after Brushogun is defeated.

Starfire’s run on the Teen Titans animated series, as well as her Anime-type cuteness, gained her a huge fan following. If you are interested in seeing reruns of the show you can find them online or weeknights on Boomerang at 11pm.

Related articles

• Cartoons Reimagined: Teen Titans (lezgetreal.com)
• Starfire Meets Her Nieces And Nephews in ‘New Teen Titans’ Clip [Video] (comicsalliance.com)
• Starfire Babysits In New DC Nation Clips (comicbookresources.com)

Art by Jettila Lewis 2012

Ever wanted to party with Sharon Needles? Who doesn’t?! Well, now may be your chance of a lifetime to party with the drag superstar. Today Drag Race winner, Queen Sharon Needles posted this to her fans on her Facebook page and we thought you might want in on it.

Sharon Needles is going on a AMAZING trip through America’s #1 Gay Travel Specialists, ALandCHUCK.travel, and She wants you to come too!
Go together and you can have even more fun as a group. If you use her GROUP HOST Code (1437737) to book your trip, they’ll put you in her VIP group. You’re gonna have a great time!
EXCLUSIVE BENEFITS: This Deluxe 8 Day CARIBBEAN CRUISE travels from MIAMI to NASSAU, PARADISE ISLAND, ST THOMAS, ST JOHN, SAN JUAN, PUERTO RICO, GRAND TURK, TURKS & CAICOS ! This is the first event of its kind in the world… Exclusively from ALandCHUCK.travel! FREE Two (2) Open Bar Cocktail Parties & Show with the largest collection of LOGO TV & RuPaul’s Drag Race stars in history! Including Celebrity Judge Michelle Visage!
• PRIVATE FREE Cocktail Reception With her!
• PRIVATE FREE Specialty Gourmet Dinner With her! Cover Charge Included!
• FREE Souvenir Professional Photo With her!
• FREE Bon Voyage Bottle of Wine!
XOXO
Sharon Needles
MAKE SURE YOU GIVE MY GROUP HOST CODE (1437737) WHEN YOU MAKE YOUR RESERVATION!
CALL NOW – 1-866-949-1429

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Way back in the golden age of stay-at-home motherhood, the years of my childhood in the 1950s and early 1960s, America was shocked to learn the level of alcoholism and addiction to Valium among suburban mothers. I remember one of my mother’s friends who fixed herself a Bloody Mary mid-morning because it looked like ordinary tomato juice. Learning to hide the addictions was a sad sport. I also remember the backyard fence discussions, the rolling horror, when Mary in the corner house went out and got a job, just because she was fed up with the sham of trying to be happy just being a homemaker. You would have thought the Russians had invaded, the news shook the block so badly. Mary had four children in elementary school. Worse than her getting a job was the realization that waved across the neighborhood that her kids were happier and her husband was happier with her out working. The house didn’t fall down and her kids weren’t wearing filthy rags. Gee whiz, a happy working mom made for a happier family. My mother was next. She dusted off her nursing certification and went back to work part-time.

Gallup polled 60,000 women and learned that stay-at-home moms were more likely to have been diagnosed with clinical depression, reported more feelings of sadness and anger than working mothers, while women in the lower income levels reported the highest levels of depression and stress.

One thing the survey didn’t address is a phenomenon that inflicts stay-at-home mothers.  They develop a belief that they must be “Martha Stewarts” — super cleaners, gourmet chefs, seamstresses, crafters, decorators, community volunteers.   Whether this pressure is self-imposed or complements of a super-critical mother or mother-in-law, it adds to the depression. 

There are no real surprises in this survey. Women with monetary problems, whether they are stay-at-home moms or working moms or have no children are struggling emotionally. They are stressed out and sad. And there is no surprise that women are happiest when they choose the role they will play in society. Staying at home with children just because it is socially preferred makes for stress, unhappy women. Some of us enjoy the role. I’m one of them. I’d have given almost anything to have done nothing for the past forty years but keep my house and raise my children. I’d give anything now to have a whole bunch of grandchildren to bake cookies for, but that’s not going to happen. One daughter cannot have children and the other chooses not to. That is her decision and I do not pressure her in any way. But having to work is just as stressful and staying home if neither is really one’s own choice. And that goes for fathers as well as mothers. Some men are just as happy staying at home as pursuing a career or holding a job.

All of us need the opportunity to choose. Happy parents make for happier children. That’s a lesson I learned from Mary’s kids fifty years ago. But we can only make that choice if we can attain the financial security of the middle class. Without a secure income from a single source, one parent cannot choose to stay home while the other works. Conversely, without a solid partnership of parents, both parents working does not benefit children except financially, and new game consoles do not replace good parenting.

We’re still having this conversation? Really? The better question for pollsters might be, why are we still trying to figure this out?

Related articles

• Murphy Brown Didn’t Lie To Us; Working Moms Have The Healthiest, Happiest Lives(blisstree.com)

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• Stay-At-Home Moms Develop More Depression, Study Finds(inquisitr.com)

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• Poll: Stay-at-home moms less happy(politico.com)

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Budding Author Emer

EMER is a new gay author and is looking for an audience. While I’ve known him as a friend and artist for years, this is his first trip into the world of professional writing. You can find a collection of his short stories (some in process, some completed) on his web page; http://emer420.hubpages.com/.  He is a fabulous young gay man (yes boys, he’s single!) writing from the view of a small town American. When you go to his page you will be greeted by;

Hello world,

I have many interests.  However my main interest is obviously writing.  I love writing horror and sci-fi, but will sometimes dabble in romance, mystery, and comedy.  I am a student at Castleton State College and am very close to achieving a bachelors degree in World Literature and Communications.  I plan on writing books and working behind the camera on film productions after I graduate.

I am currently working on a compilation of short stories that I would like to get published after, or before, I graduate.  It will consist of 18 stories that all take place the same small ocean town.  Some of which will be posted here as a preview.

I hope you enjoy my stories, and I greatly appreciate critiques.  So leave all the coments you can.  My pen name when I write anything is Emer.  Don’t ask why, Haha, it’s a long story.  Just kinda stuck with me a while ago.

So thanks for visiting my page, and I hope you enjoy.

A screenshot from Dracula

Emer writes for many different genres of literature while also being a huge film buff. His faves are Horror and Fantasy. We have watched many a horror movie together that has scarred me for life. (I still can’t look at sheep the same way ever again.) While I’m not a big horror movie fan, Emer has managed to turn his love of the film genre into a writing style filled with intrigue and humor. Here’s an example of one of his stories, A Letter From Count Dracula.

Related articles

• New Dracula 3D Trailer Heavy on CG and Light on Bite (dreadcentral.com)
• Book Review: Dracula by Bram Stoker (ermiliablog.wordpress.com)
• Schlock’s Podcast #12 – Dracula, Pop Culture Destruction – April 2012 (schlockmagazine.net)

A Classic Tennessee Walker

Soft drink maker Pepsi said yesterday that it was dropping sponsorship of the prestigious Walking Horse National Celebration, one day after ABC News broadcast footage from an undercover investigation conducted by the Humane Society of the United States.

The video showed several types of torture used to train Tennessee Walking horses, to create pain in the front hooves to cause the horse to lift its front legs high and touch them to the ground only briefly. This is a process called “soring” a horse, essentially making its feet “sore”, and has been illegal for over 30 years.

Show horse with padded shoes

In addition to soring, there are the “legal” shoes, which also encourage the horse to pick its feet up. The most common of these is the “padded” shoe. The pads force the horse to pick up his front feet and throw them in front of him in order to walk. They also make him stand at an unnatural angle and stress all kinds of things in his legs and back. Keep in mind that the horse must wear them all the time. He can never take them off and get comfortable after a long day. These horses almost always are stall-bound.

Plantation Shoes

This is followed by the Plantation Shoe. Lots of Walking Horse owners think that it’s okay to have these shoes. These shoes weigh between 3 and 5 pounds EACH. The effect is similar to the pads. Both of these practices are acceptable.

Unfortunately, because chemical and mechanical soring is difficult to catch, the practice remains among a substantial portion of professional trainers. For them, winning a show isn’t about the blue ribbon or the prize money; it’s about the millions of dollars in stud fees or foal sales from a champion horse.

The abuse is long-lasting in a psychological sense. Even years after retiring from the show circuit, these horses may still think their front hooves are “heavy”, and pick them up accordingly. They may shy away from items that were used to torture them, or from having their feet handled, or from a particular gender of human. They may be intractable. They may be sick. Yes, sick. Most of the chemicals used on horses cause permanent deep-tissue damage, and long exposure can damage their overall health, if not kill them.

Chemicals being applied

An animal rights activist went to work in a horse barn and secretly taped the abuse in March and April, 2011. It shows the horses being beaten with wooden sticks and poked with electric cattle prods. The horses’ ankles were slathered with caustic chemicals and ankles wrapped with plastic to amplify the pain. One horse can be heard moaning and crying from the pain as a pair of handlers try to force the horse to its feet.

You can watch the ABC News Nightline Report here. Warning: the clips from the undercover video are very graphic and disturbing.

Related articles

• Pepsi Drops Tenn. Horse Sponsorship (abcnews.go.com)
• Horse Community Reacts to Shocking Video of Horse Abuse (wreg.com)
• Horse Training Abuse Case Gains Momentum as PepsiCo Pulls Support from Shows (rtfitchauthor.com)

Age 19

It’s true. I model nude. I’m also not a sex symbol, or a twig, or unfed, or in magazines, or on a runway. I model nude for art classes in the area of my hometown. Why do I do this? Well, for many reasons. I started modeling for art classes at the age of 19 y/o to pay for my college books. My mother had done it when she was in college and introduced me to the teacher she had modeled for. At 19 I was going to model for the art classes she taught at Green Mountain College in Poultney, VT. This modeling gig led to fifteen years (so far) of a modeling career (and to my meeting my partner!).

I’m not the type of person one thinks of when they hear the term “model”. I’m not stick thin, or glamorous, or sexy. I’m an over-stuffed hourglass with wide hips, large breasts, and long curly hair. (Height: 5’7″, Weight 285 lbs. Breasts 44DD) Does that sound like a model to you? Well in the Art Community - I’m more beautiful and graceful than any Size Zero in a magazine. The reason for this is because I have curves.

Age 22

Artists like drawing curves because its easier than drawing lines. When you walk into an art class to model nude you must remember that the people drawing you are not looking at you like you are a sex symbol. To them….you are a bowl of fruit. Simple as that.- No sex appeal. No personality. You are an inanimate object for them to draw.

This evening I returned to nude modeling after a year hiatus to have a child and mend a broken ankle. I model at an art gallery here in Rutland, VT. It is a small group of artists that come to the Life Drawing classes, which aren’t really classes, but more of a free drawing period with a model provided. I get paid $20/hr to sit on a platform nude in different poses that I chose in front of a group of strangers. The only person that talks to me is the person that hired me and gives me my check at the end of the gig, usually a teacher/gallery manager. (This isn’t rude, its a sign of respect to the model. After years of modeling I now speak to some of the artists that have been drawing me for years and have learned that they can actually speak to me like a person and I won’t be offended.)

I arrived 10 minutes before the gig starts because 1.) I like to be early/on time for a gig. 2.) I like to look at the art displayed (because its free!) before I have to sit still for 2-4 hours, depending. I talked to the assistant that ran the gig as I came in. I walked around the gallery, which has 2 floors and 5 rooms dedicated to displaying art. This month’s show was a collection of art done by children around the area ages K-12. As I finished my walk around I went to the bathroom and got out of my clothes.

Painting of me by Anonymous

I usually bring a bag with me because it carries my large bath towel that I wrap around myself during breaks and to walk around, and it also holds the clothing I’m wearing when I arrive (along with my cell phone, wallet, glasses, etc.). I get into my towel, grab my bag and shoes and head to the second floor. The room we use for the class is at the front of the building with the windows covered from prying eyes. It is also one of the rooms they show art in, so every time I model I get to see the latest show. The problem with this is you never know what you will be stuck staring at while people draw you and you can’t move. This evening I got the pleasure of looking at a large amount of artworks by small children. The most imposing piece was a 7 foot tall orange cyclops wearing a blue bathing suit missing one toe on his right toe. I got to look at it for 3 hours. You couldn’t miss it.

So I start the gig and I’m told by The Time Keeper (the before-mentioned gallery assistant) that I will be doing 5 minute poses and she will tell me when I have one minute left in the pose. Its a simple system that works. This evening we began with 3 artists, but ended with 5 (sometimes artists show up late or leave early). I’ve noticed that when I model for a college class that there are many students, but very few if its in a gallery class. I’ve learned to be prepared for either size, but I prefer the smaller classes.

A painting of me found in an art gallery

Posing is harder than it looks. When you see a model in a photograph that person had to stay still for as long as it took for the photographer to set up the shot and push a button. For an art model they have to sit still for 1 minute to 1 hour at a time, depending on the pose. The class I model for does a series of poses for different times. I start with simple 5 minute poses and end my gig doing a 25 minute pose. The only problem you have to look out for is body parts falling asleep. It takes a model YEARS to figure out their body enough to know what poses they can and cannot do and for how long and what will hurt or fall asleep. So you model and you learn.

This evening while only my right hand fell asleep in one pose, I was thanked 3 times for the pose I had done and thanked profusely at the end of the gig for being a good model. This is the highlight of my modeling gigs; getting praise. I’ve been told by complete strangers that I’m beautiful, stunning, gorgeous, voluptuous, curvacious, and the best female model they’ve ever seen. This is my ego boost. This happens after the gig is finished and the artists are packing their supplies up. I walk around and see what they’ve drawn. It is the best feeling for me to see how others perceive me artistically. Being an artist myself I know that everyone sees the world differently, but its only in art when you can actually see how someone else sees the world. To be a part of that is wonderful for me. I like seeing how others see me because it makes me feel better about my own image. I’m reminded that I’m not as ugly and disgusting as I feel sometimes. I’m actually rather …beautiful.

Sketch by Richard Weiss 2012

Over the years I’ve suggested to friends that they also get into nude modeling. None have taken me up on the offer. I don’t know why. It is good money for little work, you are helping artists develop their skills, and you are contributing to the world of Art. Who knows, someday you might be the next Mona Lisa.  Tonight I found out that one of the artists drawing me tonight has been drawing me for 15 years now, just sold a painting of me, and has a gallery at home that has a few framed prints of me. *BLUSH* Stuff like this just makes you feel special knowing that you are so beautiful that you are art.

Related articles

• Sensuality vs. Sexuality in the Modeling World (jasonandthegoldenpose.wordpress.com)
• 14. Life drawing class (foundobjectbeachart.wordpress.com)
• Summer Art Classes (lauradaub.com)

By Alexis Garrett Stodghill

Way back in the 17^th and 18^th centuries, France and England were competing for dominance of the North American continent. In spite of the fact that England had only the population of its islands to draw from for immigrants, and France was recruiting immigrants from the rest of Europe, England was quickly drawing ahead in establishing population on the continent. France had a small problem – damned few people wanted to leave the Riviera to relocate in Canada during the Mini-Ice Age.

So the French came up with an alternative plan – population growth through fecundity. They literally paid young couples to get married and paid for every live birth. And they had established a colonial system that cut the infant mortality rate dramatically below that in the English colonies. The French didn’t forbid marriage to Native Americans out of racism, but because Native women practiced artificial birth control and refused to co-operate with the “baby a year” culture.

We have known for a decade or more that sometime in the first half of the 21^st century, the white majority would no longer be the majority. They will continue to be a plurality if all minorities are viewed separately, but when the so-called minority populations are combined, whites become the minority.

Small explanation of terms here. According to demographics experts and the U. S. Census bureau, “white” means persons of European descent who are not descended from Spaniards who detoured through Latin America. The term is “white, not Hispanic.” It seems that my father was white in skin color only, but because his parents were pure Spaniards born in Chile and Puerto Rico, he was not truly white. It’s a fundamentally flawed view of ethnicity and race.

2012 became the year when minorities were having more babies than white. Welcome to the 21^st century.

Growth in the Hispanic population is down, reflecting the economy, and as a consequence the tipping point for minority majority is expected to be pushed back closer to 2050 than the 2040 date formerly projected. But the impact of the increase in minority presence and minority babies has a more far-reaching influence than just the balance between minorities and the white majority. Younger Americans are and will grow up in a more diverse nation than generations in the past, and that diversity will not be limited to separated neighborhoods or ethnic-specific communities as it was in the past.

Among the descendants of European immigrants, the breakdown of ethnic division began after World War II with the introduction into American culture of the planned suburb for the new families of WWII veterans. Our parents had grown up in ethnically divided neighborhoods in the cities where commercial avenues separated the Irish from the Germans from the Italians from the Poles from the Jews. It was a self-ghetto-ization that had happened as the immigrants arrived, a feeling of familiarity and safety in numbers. But the suburbs were only racially divided. Seriously, even up north African Americans were not welcome in places like Levittown, though Jews were, within limits. So, in Levittown, I had Norwegian neighbors and Italian neighbors and Irish neighbors, and some of our parents had crossed those barriers as my Spanish and German parents had. And the culture of the 1950s was trying very hard to turn us all into WASPs – white, Anglo-Saxon, Protestants, even if we were Catholic.

Minorities consitute 36.6% of the American population, 114.1 million men, women and children. That is all “minorities” – African Americans, Hispanics, Asians, Native Americans, African immigrants, Pacific Islanders, and the multi-racial. Their percentage of the American population is growing while the country is more anti-immigrant and racially divided than it has been in generations.

My favorite chapter in James Michener’s Hawaii is the last one, where he discussed the “Golden People” – Hawaiians of multi-ethnicity and race. Two of these Golden People are well known – former wrestler and actor Dwayne Johnson and actor/Food Network host Mark Dacascos. Both are complex combinations of races and ethnicities and both are beautiful men. Johnson’s ex-wife is Hispanic and his children are literally the genetic products of every racial group on the planet, and then some. They represent what humanity will probably become in a couple of centuries, the Star Trek ideal of “infinite diversity in infinite combination.” And they are very scary to those who still believe that one race or color should dominate the nation and the world. The more we diversify, the more we intermingle, the more the barriers that separate us melt away. That is why fundamentalists of all types hate diversity and tolerance…it removes their power.

cover of 30 Queens

It’s true. If you are a fan of RuPaul’s Drag Race: Season 4 then you can now own a very artistic part of it. http://www.chadsellcomics.com/rupauls-drag-race/

Chad Sell is an artist who has made books featuring the contestants of seasons 3 & 4 of RuPaul’s Drag Race. He seems to be a fan of winner, Sharon Needles as he has done prints of every outfit she wore, which she has shared on her Facebook page when they have come out.

The images of drag queens that he portrays are amazing in that they are not only aesthetically pleasing (pretty), but they also include humor, beauty, and grace in it’s many forms shown through the art of Drag. Here are a few previews of some of the queens featured from his new book 30 Queens. (You can also buy prints of individual queens at the website.)

Queen Sharon Needles

Finalist Chad Michaels

Finalist Phi-Phi O'Hara

Latrice Royale

Dita Ritz

Fan fave Willam

Wigless Milan

Lil' Kenya Michaels

The Princess

Can you name them?

Actress Harmon as Carmichael

Angie Harmon currently stars as Detective Jane Rizzoli in the TNT crime-drama, Rizzoli & Isles, but you may remember her from the long stint she did on NBC’s Law & Order as Assistant District Attorney Abbie Carmichael.

As it turns out, Harmon is itching to get back into law. Superhero law to be more specific. Harmon wants to play Jennifer Walters, a.k.a. She-Hulk. Harmon posted a picture on her twitter feed showing what she’d look like smashing some concrete. Then, one of her followers did a bit of photoshop on the picture to make Harmon look more like the character she’s aiming for. Harmon posted the photo to Instagram but the story doesn’t end there.

Harmon as She-Hulk

Harmon recently did an interview with Entertainment Weekly and couldn’t wait to show off the picture, as well as a few others from the comics, and the research she’s already done into the role.

If you aren’t familiar with She-Hulk from Marvel Comics, she’s the cousin of the more famous Hulk, Bruce Banner. So if they are cousins, how did she become a hulk? Well its simple, but doesn’t make a lot of sense. She got her powers thanks to a blood transfusion from him. (You’d think as a scientist he would have thought of this before giving her blood, but whatever…) She doesn’t get as large as Hulk and can control her transformations. She uses her powers as a criminal attorney to defend super-humans in court and has been a member of The Avengers, S.H.I.E.L.D., and the Fantastic Four among other groups.

During the interview, Harmon mentioned how much she enjoyed The Avengers movie and then let the reporter know just  how much she wants to play She-Hulk and why.

She-Hulk comic cover

“I have to be her,” Harmon said. “You don’t understand. I have to be her. It’s the best quote ever when The Hulk turns around and goes ‘I’m always angry.’ I was like, Ohmygod! I stood up in the theater and literally cheered. I did.”

And she’d be fine wearing She-Hulk’s skimpy costume? ”I would rock that like there is no tomorrow. I would kill that outfit. I’d put these 36Cs on display. Boom!” she said. “And what about her libido? That’s my favorite part. She-Hulk, bed! She-Hulk, screw! Can you imagine? Then she just picks him up and throws him around the room like the Hulk did with the bad guy. [Makes smashing noises.] But apparently, she’s normal size.”

…ROFL!!! (Now, I really want to see Harmon play her.)

She-Hulk comic

I could see myself getting behind this, especially considering how enthusiastic she is about the role. Could Harmon join the ranks of the Avengers in its sequel or perhaps the next Hulk film? It would be an easy introduction for sure. We also know ABC is still planning a Hulk television show so there’s always a chance of her ending up there as well. Stay tuned…

Related articles

• ‘The Hulk’ Might Yet Air on ABC in Fall 2013 (slashfilm.com)
• Did You Know That Lou Ferrigno Helped Voice The Hulk In The Avengers Movie? (firewireblog.com)
• Casting She-Hulk In Today’s Secret Identity (splashpage.mtv.com)

James O'Keefe, by Donkey Hotey

James O’Keefe, the infamous and convicted “investigative journalist” beloved by Fox News is having a really bad year. He lost his financial backing with the death of Andrew Breitbart. He was ID’ed at Occupy Wall Street so he couldn’t get the footage he was hoping for. One of his former associates had her sexual harassment case against him dismissed, but is posting plenty of proof of his bad behavior on her own blog. New Hampshire caught his people committing voter fraud during the primary and now, his big voter fraud video from North Carolina has backfired all over his smug little face.

His “voter fraud” video was supposed to show non-citizens voting. Instead, the star of the video is one Zbigniew Gorzkowski, an American citizen. Gorzkowski and his wife Halina were naturalized in the late 1980s. They own a European grocery store and flower shop.

Then there was the case William Romero. In 2010, Romero was excused from jury duty because he was not a citizen. In 2011, he registered to vote. O’Keefe took those two facts and used them to ambush members of Romero’s family, harassing them in person and over the phone. O’Keefe’s people even ambushed a Romero family member who was coming home to care for a sick child. Romero was naturalized early in 2011. Another real citizen exposed for exercising his Constitutional rights.

Finally, there was the case of Michael Bolton. As they did in New Hampshire, O’Keefe’s operatives tried to vote using the names of persons who had recently died. Michael Bolton, Sr., had died, but Michael Bolton, Jr., is still alive. O’Keefe’s people didn’t do their homework and find out that Bolton, Sr., had a son old enough to vote and the man sent in to usurp Senior’s identity wasn’t old enough to have an adult Junior. The poll worker who asked the operative whether he was Junior or Senior managed to make the operative nervous enough that he left without voting and Junior voted later in the day. Mrs. Bolton is furious at this intrusion into her grief over the recent loss of her husband.

Republicans are getting pretty desperate to prove their allegation that millions of illegal immigrants and non-citizens have voted in the past few presidential elections. The new photo ID laws are facing heavy court challenges.  Unless they can prove the laws are needed, they risk having them overturned.  The far right wing claims that President Obama was elected because illegal immigrants voted for him and that is why they need new photo ID laws for voting. There are just under 11 million illegal immigrants in America and even if they had all illegally voted, the election would still have been won by Obama. One state might have gone to McCain, but it would not have been enough to change the electoral college votes in McCain’s favor.

The right wing cannot see the illogic of their assertion that illegal immigrants vote. Why would an illegal immigrant put him or herself in a position to be discovered? They have taken the fact that some fraud was committed in the voter registration process, especially when groups paid people for the number of voters they registered, but only a handful of real voter fraud has ever been proven and all of those involved ex-convicts who voted using a relative’s or friend’s name. There weren’t enough cases of voter fraud to have swung any election in any direction.

O’Keefe is not a journalist, never has been. He’s just a self-absorbed little dipstick who found fame and funding with his faked ACORN videos. Then he found house arrest and ankle monitors for trying to bug the phones of Louisiana Senator Mary Landrieu. He was so honored and feted by the right wing – Fox News and Breitbart – for taking down ACORN that he came to believe he was important to the world. He’s not. His failure rate is reaching the point where those who have fawned over him are going to have no choice but to seriously scrutinize whatever he produces before backing it.

Though O’Keefe managed to dodge criminal charges in New Hampshire, he may not be as lucky in North Carolina. Let’s see, the Gorzkowskis and Romeros can file charges for slander with malice, the Romeros can file harassment charges against O’Keefe’s company and all three families can file civil suits for emotional distress and invasion of privacy. Oh, please, please, do so. This idiot needs to learn that he is not Bill O’Reilly or Mike Wallace and ambush journalism is only covered under freedom of the press when a public figure is involved.

James O’Keefe needs to consider other career options, preferably before his parents get tired of bailing him out.

And while we’re on the subject, what do you think the odds are that right wing harridan Michelle Malkin (whose parents were immigrants) will apologize to the people O’Keefe wrongly accused of voter fraud?  She plastered their names all over the right wing blogosphere. 

Related articles

• Another James O’Keefe ‘sting,’ another O’Keefe fraud(dailykos.com)

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• New O’Keefe Video Exposes Non-Citizens On Voter Rolls In NC, Voter Fraud Comfort At UNC(thedaleygator.wordpress.com)

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• FACT CHECK: “Non-Citizen” Voter In James O’Keefe’s Voter Fraud Video Is Actually A Citizen(thinkprogress.org)

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• Fake Voter Fraud Filmmaker James O’Keefe Says He Faces Grand Jury Subpoena (thinkprogress.org)
• James O’Keefe Shows Everyone Just How Hard Voter Fraud Is | Mother Jones (tribuneofthepeople.com)
• The hits keep coming: Project Veritas exposes non-citizens, dead people registered to vote in NC – and so much more (michellemalkin.com)