POLITICO: Good news for rich people, corporate power players and labor bosses who want to buy some real influence with members of Congress: It just got a lot easier. Many voters assume it’s always been easy to buy influence with lawmakers: Send a few contributions their way and suddenly, you get special treatment. But the fact is, that’s pretty rare. Up until recently, individuals could give a couple thousand bucks to candidates or $5,000 to political action committees each election, while companies and labor unions could give $5,000 — but only through their PACs. For members raising millions of dollars each […]

[Portrait by CHUCK CLOSE] On Saturday, October 29 at 12:30 PM, Occupy Philly will march from 15th and Market to Temple University where William Jefferson Clinton will be speaking on behalf of Mayor Nutter’s re-election. They will be standing up for all the American workers who have lost their jobs as a result of The North American Free Trade Agreement, which was signed by then-President Clinton. H Ross Perot, then a wild card third party candidate, warned that if NAFTA was signed there would be ‘a giant sucking sound’ where American jobs used to be and we all laughed. But […]

NEW YORK DAILY NEWS: The rebels who captured Moammar Khadafy visited a final humiliation on the brutal Libyan dictator while dragging him from a drainage pipe to his doom – they tortured him with a knife, disturbing new footage revealed Monday. Graphic footage released Monday by GlobalPost.com shows a rebel jabbing a helpless Khadafy in the backside with what appears to be a U.S.-made combat knife called a BK&T – and which the Libyans called a “Bicketti.” Khadafy, who used rape to terrorize political opponents, appears bloodied and terrified. And screams in Arabic can be heard amid the vengeful cries […]

[Illustration by RUSS WHITE] POLITICO: In an interesting policy-political joust Sunday with CNN “State of the Union” host Candy Crowley, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell stuck by his assertion that stopping federal funding to stave off local police, teacher and firefighter layoffs is the right thing to do – and that federal regulations are the country’ top economic problem. Last week, McConnell and fellow Republicans, along with a few Democrats scuttled a measure supported by President Barack Obama that would have pumped $35 billion to cash-starved localities. “I’m sure Americans do — I certainly do — approve of firefighters and police,” the […]

PREVIOUSLY: In a more accurate world, if you looked up anthemic in the dictionary, you would invariably find a picture of the Arcade Fire. Rousing, heartfelt and everyone-can-sing-along have been, heretofore, the hallmarks of the Montreal band’s recorded output. The just-released The Suburbs, which largely eschews the fist-pumping chorales of previous outings in favor of low-boil brooding, may well change all that. But Monday night at the Mann Music Center The Arcade Fire got back to what they do best: passionately pounding out sweeping, densely-layered, stadium-shaking soundtracks for people who have long ago made peace with the fact that sooner […]

Girls Rock Philly, The Friends of Rosetta Tharpe and The Pennsylvania Historical & Museum Commission are proud to present the dedication of an official State Historical Marker commemorating Sister Rosetta Tharpe’s Philadelphia home with a free screening of the BBC documentary “Godmother Of Rock N’ Roll: Rosetta Tharpe” tonight at 7:30 in the auditorium at the Central Library, 1901 Vine St, Phila, PA 19103. PREVIOUSLY: Sister Christian Gets Her Due PREVIOUSLY: SEE THAT MY GRAVE IS KEPT CLEAN: 35 Years After Death, Sister Rosetta Tharpe Finally Gets A Headstone

FOOBOOZ: The local music scene got a bit of bad news over the weekend when word began trickling out that Tritone, the small music venue/neighborhood bar at 1508 South Street, was set to close. The club debuted in 2001, when current owner Dave Rogers (a veteran of Fergie’s), and his late partner, music promoter and bartender Rick Dombrowolski (who understandably went by “Rick D.”), joined forces. While a bartender at neighboring Bob & Barbara’s, Dombrowolski, who died of a heart attack in 2007, invented what has become known throughout the city as the “Citywide Special,” a can of Pabst and […]

Neither snow nor rain nor heat nor gloom of night nor right wing greedhead assholery stays these couriers from the swift completion of their appointed rounds.

DAVID CARR: If you were looking for bonus excess despite miserable operations, the best recent example I can think of is Gannett, which owns USA Today. The week before the editorial ran, Craig A. Dubow resigned as Gannett’s chief executive. His short six-year tenure was, by most accounts, a disaster. Gannett’s stock price declined to about $10 a share from a high of $75 the day after he took over; the number of employees at Gannett plummeted to 32,000 from about 52,000, resulting in a remarkable diminution in journalistic boots on the ground at the 82 newspapers the company owns. […]

BY BRANDON LAFVING As the name suggests,Lantern Theater Company’s New Jerusalem, The Interrogation of Baruch de Spinoza at Talmud Torah Congregation: Amsterdam, July 27, 1656, transports the audience to a 17th Century trial setting. You might also be able to guess that Spinoza, a rationalist philosopher, is both the protagonist and the defendant. And you may also know how it ends: he will be excommunicated. Sorry if I ruined that for you, but, honestly, a good friend would have done their job and told you. It only makes the play more interesting. Lantern’s rendition of this dramatic David Ives screenplay […]

BY PETE MARSHALL This past summer my big brother Tom told me that if there is one show that I absolutely should not miss, it’s Gillian Welch.  “Pay special attention to Gillians’ partner David Rawlings.” Tom says,  “His harmonies are strange and beautiful.” Living on opposite coasts, Tom and I don’t talk a whole lot.  But when we do get the chance, we often talk music.  It’s one thing we usually agree on.  Growing up in central Ohio, just beyond the foothills of Appalachia, I think the love of traditional bluegrass, country and folk music just became part of our […]

Hunstsman Hall, Wharton School Of Business, 3:05 PM RELATED: Eric Cantor Is A Pussy