WALL STREET JOURNAL: MUMBAI — India has accused a senior leader of the Pakistani militant group Lashkar-e-Taiba of orchestrating last week’s terror attacks that killed at least 172 people here, and demanded the Pakistani government turn him over and take action against the group. Just two days before hitting the city, the group of 10 terrorists who ravaged India’s financial capital communicated with Yusuf Muzammil and four other Lashkar leaders via a satellite phone that they left behind on a fishing trawler they hijacked to get to Mumbai, a senior Mumbai police official told The Wall Street Journal. The entire […]
SHRINKAGE: Newspaper Ad Revenue Down $2 Billion
ASSOCIATED PRESS: U.S. newspaper advertising revenue collapsed by nearly $2 billion, or 18 percent, in the third quarter, according to the Newspaper Association of America, an industry group. Even online ad revenue made a small U-turn for the second quarter in a row. The year-on-year quarterly percentage decline is the worst since since the NAA has been keeping such records and represents an increasingly rapid deceleration that began in the third quarter of 2006, when total ad spending dropped 1.5 percent. The figures, updated on the day before Thanksgiving, show total ad spending at newspapers fell 18.1 percent to $8.94 […]
OBAMA: ‘Ello Guv’ner!
NEW YORK TIMES: President-elect Barack Obama turned from national security to domestic concerns on Tuesday, telling the country’s governors that his administration would not delay in pushing an economic recovery plan that would bring relief to the states, 41 of which are forecasting budget shortfalls this year or next. Speaking at a conference of the National Governors Association in Philadelphia, Mr. Obama said his background in the Illinois state senate made him particularly sympathetic to the needs of state and local governments. And he declared himself open to good ideas that work, whether they come from Democrats or Republicans. “We […]
NEWS CLUES: Like A Drunk-Ass Mascot Of The Truth
GUNCRAZY: Shooter On The Loose, 4 Schools Locked Down INQUIRER: An argument between a man and his girlfriend at a Kmart store at 8800 Frankford Avenue today left a 35-year-old store worker in critical condition with three gunshot wounds. Police issued an arrest warrant for Anthony Birch, 30. Birch fled the scene after arguing with the unidentified woman, another Kmart employee. The victim was trying to intervene in the argument, which occurred around the store’s loading dock, police said. The argument occurred around 9:45 a.m. at the Kmart in Northeast Philadelphia. Police requested that four schools in the area be […]
PHOTON BAND: Where Did The Love Go?
[Dir. by SCOTT COLAN]
SCHOOL OF HARD KNOCKS: Whatever Happens In Room 315 Stays In Room 315, Part 4
BY JEFF DEENEY As the morning wears on in room 315 cabin fever sets in. The students don’t leave the classroom at any point during the day except for brief staff-accompanied bathroom visits and for a short lunch break that doesn’t come until 1:30. On some days the group’s restlessness builds to a breaking point right before lunch that results in dangerous outbursts like students throwing furniture across the room out of frustration with their confinement. On other days the boys spirits’ are worn down enough by the slow passage of time that they become briefly willing to listen to […]
THE NEW DEAL: Obama Announces Nat. Sec. Team
NY FISHBOWL: Barry Blitt, the cartoonist responsible for the New Yorker‘s controversial terrorist fist-jabbing cover, among others, returns this week to “vet” Barack Obama. Of course this time around “Vetting” refers to the all important decision of picking a “first” puppy — thus far we know they want a mutt, but that it needs to be hypoallergenic and won’t be a girly dog. MORE LOS ANGELES TIMES: Reporting from Chicago — President-elect Barack Obama unveiled his national security team today, including formally announcing his intention to nominate his onetime rival for the Democratic nomination, Sen. Hillary Clinton of New York, […]
All Of This Happened While You Were Sleeping
BY JONATHAN VALANIA FOR THE INQUIRER There are few greater pleasures in this American life than watching a young, gifted rock band in the prime of its youth burn through its set before an adoring hometown crowd with the confidence of five young men who’ve come to realize that — after all the blood, the sweat and the tears that got them to this point — they are making their mark on the world. It’s even better when the young, gifted band is local. Such was the case Friday night at the way-sold-out Starlight Ballroom, where Dr. Dog staged an […]
BUZZKILL: Twilight Star Caught Roastin’ A Bowl
TMZ: Tsk, Tsk, Tsk PHAWKER: This Is A Teachable Moment NORMAL: The FBI has released its annual report on Crime in the United States 2007. Once again, the number of people in the United States arrested for marijuana has gone up. 872,721 Americans were arrested for marijuana in 2007, and of those arrests, 89% or 775,138 were arrests for simple possession – not buying, selling, trafficking, or manufacture (growing). This represents an increase in marijuana arrests of 5.2% from the previous year and the fifth straight year marijuana arrests have increased from the previous year. Now a marijuana smoker is […]
KILLADELPHIA: Mother Killed In Hit On The Father
INQUIRER: At a news conference today at Philadelphia Police Headquarters, authorities released new information about a triple shooting this morning on the 3300 block of Mutter Street in Hunting Park that left a 19-year-old woman dead and her husband and young son seriously injured. The injured boy is a 5-year-old who was shot twice, police said. There was another child, 2, inside the house when the gunfire erupted, but that toddler was not injured. Two assailants entered the rowhouse through the basement. They found the four members of the family – a 20-year-old father, 19-year-old mother, and the two young children — […]
FORTRESS AMERICA: Pentagon Plans To Station 20,000 Troops Inside The U.S. Homeland
WASHINGTON POST: The U.S. military expects to have 20,000 uniformed troops inside the United States by 2011 trained to help state and local officials respond to a nuclear terrorist attack or other domestic catastrophe, according to Pentagon officials. There are critics of the change, in the military and among civil liberties groups and libertarians who express concern that the new homeland emphasis threatens to strain the military and possibly undermine the Posse Comitatus Act, a 130-year-old federal law restricting the military’s role in domestic law enforcement. The Pentagon’s plan calls for three rapid-reaction forces to be ready for emergency response […]
Ex-City Paper Editor Gravely Injured In Hit And Run
Brian Hickey (pictured above with Danny Devito, on the set of It’s Always Sunny In Philadelphia), formerly editor of the City Paper and spokesman for John Dougherty’s unsuccessful bid for Vincent Fumo’s state senate seat (not to mention a trusted colleague during our staff writer days at PW), was seriously injured by a hit and run driver in Collingswood last night, according to his wife Angela. He is currently in the Trauma-ICU of Cooper University hospital and in stable condition after emergency surgery to alleviate swelling of the brain. INQUIRER: Hickey, 35, was walking to the PATCO station on Atlantic […]