INQUIRER: A double shooting at a Catholic elementary school early this morning left a man and a woman dead before dawn. Gunshots rang out at 4:10 a.m. at the Holy Innocents Catholic School in Philadelphia’s Juniata section, police said. Two women were sitting in a van parked on the school’s grounds when a gunman approached and opened fire. The shots fatally wounded a 19-year-old a woman. The man, 27, then turned the gun on himself, police said. * The Archdiocese of Philadelphia cancelled classes today for several hundred students who attend Holy Innocents and the adjoining St. Lucy Day School […]
THE HILLARYCRATS: Still Bitter, But Not Stupid
[Illustration by ALEX FINE w/ apologies to Shep Fairey] BY AMY Z. QUINN I’m gonna go out on a limb here and say Alice Paul, OG suffragist and Jersey Girl nonpareil, would not vote for John McCain as some protest of how the Democratic primary played out. Women’s rights and the struggle against racism were — are — too inextricably linked to think she’d hold a grudge against Barack Obama. Neither should we. Hillary Clinton always said, and I believe her, that she would enthusiastically support the Democratic nominee — even if it wasn’t her. I told someone Wednesday that […]
Five Things U Should Know About M.I.A. Last Night
1. Last time I saw a show at The Armory, the Breeders were opening for Nirvana. Now I remember why it’s been 14 years before I went back for more. Leaning into the slight incline of 33rd and Market like a rigid salute, the Armory was literally designed to shelter tanks, thus it is built like a brick shithouse — and it sure sounds like one, too. 2. Still, there is something fitting about an fundamental peacenik like M.I.A. transforming this mouldering edifice of the military-industrial complex into roiling rave of shock-and-awe dance jams and kaleidoscopic hip-hop and packing it […]
WORTH REPEATING: The Trouble With The Roots
[Illustrations by ALEX FINE] BY JONATHAN VALANIA A friend of mine has a funny-ass I-met-the-Roots-and-made-an-ass-of-myself story. This friend, for obvious reasons, shall remain nameless, but for sheer entertainment value, let’s refer to him hereafter as Horsecock.Around the release of 2002’s wonderfully artsy-fartsy Phrenology, good ol’ Horsecock and his girl went to see the Roots perform at Indre Studios. Joining the Roots for said performance was one Cody ChesnuTT, the dirty South rubber-band man who lent his Smokey Robinson-like pipes to the single “The Seed (2.0).” Later Horsecock and his girl ventured up to an impromptu VIP after-party on Indre’s roof […]
How Hillary Becomes Chief Justice Of SCOTUS
VIA NEW YORK TIMES: WHEN a majority of Supreme Court justices adopt a manifestly ideological agenda, it plunges the court into the vortex of American politics. If the Roberts court has entered voluntarily what Justice Felix Frankfurter once called the “political thicket,” it may require a political solution to set it straight. When the court overreaches, the Constitution provides checks and balances. In 1805, after persistent political activity by Justice Samuel Chase, Congress responded with its power of impeachment. Chase was acquitted, but never again did he step across the line to mingle law and politics. After the Civil War, […]
LOSING MY RELIGION: Advertising The Enlightenment
INQUIRER: Mounted by a consortium of local atheists, it is an invitation to the area’s atheists, agnostics, skeptics, rationalists and religious freethinkers (no one label fits them all) to overcome their differences and form a coalition. “Our mission is not to convince fundamentalists to change their position,” Steve Rade, a Huntingdon Valley businessman, said last week. He donated the $22,500 needed to mount the billboard, which appeared May 1 and is to remain until the end of August [on I-95]. “What we want to do is give people questioning their beliefs a place to go for more information and to […]
HEAR YE: Ladies & Gentlemen We Are Floating In Place
Now playing on Phawker Radio! Why? Because we love you! RELATED: Spiritualized play TLA July 29; tix go on sale Friday INTERVIEW: Spaceman 3 VIDEO: Interview with jason and sonic about spacemen 3 breaking up
THE BEATDOWN: Cops Find Gun
INQUIRER: Hidden beneath a blanket of high weeds, detectives found the gun used in a triple shooting that led to a videotaped police beating on May 5, authorities said yesterday. The gun — a Glock 9 mm — was found last week in an overgrown, wooded area along North 2nd Street, not far from where cops stopped three shooting suspects in a gold Grand Marquis and delivered a barrage of kicks and punches in an incident that sullied the city’s reputation. Ballistic tests matched the gun to fired shell casings found at 4th and Annsbury streets, North Philadelphia, where police […]
WELCOME TO THE OCCUPATION: Leakers Spill The Beans On The Secret Plan To Stay In Iraq Forever
THE INDEPENDENT: A secret deal being negotiated in Baghdad would perpetuate the American military occupation of Iraq indefinitely, regardless of the outcome of the US presidential election in November. The terms of the impending deal, details of which have been leaked to The Independent, are likely to have an explosive political effect in Iraq. Iraqi officials fear that the accord, under which US troops would occupy permanent bases, conduct military operations, arrest Iraqis and enjoy immunity from Iraqi law, will destabilise Iraq’s position in the Middle East and lay the basis for unending conflict in their country. But the accord […]
SURRENDER: Things 2 Do In Denver When You’re Dead
HUFFINGTON POST: The Clinton campaign issued a statement at around 9pm saying they will be hosting an event to announce her support for Sen. Obama on Saturday, as opposed to Friday: Senator Clinton will be hosting an event in Washington, DC to thank her supporters and express her support for Senator Obama and party unity. This event will be held on Saturday to accommodate more of Senator Clinton’s supporters who want to attend. Multiple news organizations reported early Wednesday evening that Hillary Clinton is expected to officially suspend her campaign and drop out of the Democratic race on Friday. THE […]
NPR 4 THE DEF: Giving Public Radio Edge Since 2006
My brother need not be idealized, or enlarged in death beyond what he was in life; to be remembered simply as a good and decent man, who saw wrong and tried to right it, saw suffering and tried to heal it, saw war and tried to stop it. — Ted Kennedy, June 8th, 1968 A BRIEF HISTORY OF AMAZING LETDOWNS: U.S. Counsel (1953-1960) Robert Kennedy joins the Senate Subcommittee on Investigations in 1953 under the tutelage of Sen. Joseph McCarthy. He eventually resigns from the committee over disagreements with Senator McCarthy’s anti-communist campaign against federal officials. Once McCarthy is deposed […]
HELL HATH NO FURY: You’re Damn Right I’m Bitter
[EDITOR’S NOTE: The following views do not represent the views of the Editor.] BY AMY Z. QUINN Yes, it smarts. Yes, I’m angry and disappointed today. And yes, I’ll still vote for Barack Obama in November. But you should understand why I’m not feeling great about it this morning. Now that it’s over, now that everybody’s been able to run their ecstatic headlines, can we all just admit that the MSM and the Yes! We! Can!-crazed online world had a deep desire to see Obama win, if only so everyone can soak in the aura of the New Kennedy or […]
ART BRUT: The Sudden Death and Heroic Life Of Ann d’Harnoncourt, Director Of Philadelphia Museum Of Art
NEW YORK TIMES: By any measure, Anne d’Harnoncourt’s tenure as director of the Philadelphia Museum of Art, cut short by her sudden death on Sunday at 64, was distinguished. It shone forth in major acquisitions, successful fund drives, vast gallery renovations, a marvelous rehang of the collection and, above all, her refusal to let the museum become a three-ring circus. Having seen the Philadelphia museum — or at least its steps — become a destination after the 1976 film “Rocky,” she did not succumb to showy architecture; the new wing being planned at the time of her death has been […]