CITY PAPER: Two knowledgeable sources tell City Paper that former Superintendent Arlene Ackerman ran a School District communications team dedicated to promoting and defending her personally, and which coordinated and assisted public rallies in her favor, communicated regularly with private supporters, and spent taxpayer time and money on various kinds of “propaganda,” including protest signs and a farewell tribute video. Since Ackerman’s departure after negotiating a nearly $1 million buy-out of her contract, one source says the same team continues to manage Ackerman’s antagonistic public relations campaign against Mayor Michael Nutter and others. The three Communications staffers who allegedly orchestrated […]
THE DECEMBERISTS: The Calamity Song
NEW YORK TIMES: The video, which made its online debut on Monday, depicts the playing of Eschaton, a game invented by Wallace that he describes about 325 pages into “Infinite Jest.” Adolescents from a New England tennis academy are seen ritualistically serving balls on a court onto which a map of the world has been superimposed. The balls, which represent five-megaton nuclear warheads, are aimed at objects labeled as military targets — power plants, missile installations — while a lone child oversees the game from a nearby computer terminal. All in all, it ain’t exactly Battleship. Wallace himself wrote that […]
CIVICS: How Social Security Is SO Not A Ponzi Scheme
CHRISTIAN SCIENCE MONITOR: Texas Gov. Rick Perry is at it again, expressing himself pungently on a hot-button issue. This past weekend, it was Social Security. The front-runner for the GOP presidential nomination called the retirement program for seniors a “monstrous lie” and “a Ponzi scheme for … young people.” Add that to Governor Perry’s comments on man-made global warming: “a scientific theory that has not been proven.” On evolution: “just a theory” with “gaps.” And on the Federal Reserve’s practice of printing more money to boost the economy: doing so again would be “almost treasonous.” Many conservatives applaud Perry, even […]
SIDEWALKING: Goodnight Irene
Lancaster, 9:01 AM Sunday by JEFF FUSCO
Phawker Editor Kills Cowbell With A Single Stephen Malkmus Cover Story; Magnet Back From Dead
That’s a joke, but the truth of the matter is the Cowbell issue with the Stephen Malkmus cover story, penned by yours truly, will be its penultimate, and the forthcoming issue with Beirut will be it’s last. Just heard from Cowbell editor Brian Howard that the magazine will discontinue service in favor of a new partnership with Eric T. Miller to revive Magnet as a print property. Miller will helm the new project and Howard is, reportedly, moving on to whatever comes next. Stay tuned. BRIAN HOWARD: Cowbell, the gritty little indie mag we’ve all come to love so well […]
URBANISM: A Park Grows In The Reading Viaduct?
DAILY NEWS: High above the shadowy streets of Callowhill and Chinatown North, a lush green wilderness of weeds, thick grasses and purple flowering bushes thrives amid the rusted railroad tracks of the old Reading Viaduct. From atop the viaduct, the city’s modern skyline of towering glass and steel shimmers to the south, but one can also get a close-up glimpse into the city’s industrial past: the area’s brick former factory buildings that once made textiles or bicycles or held printing presses. “We have all these beautiful urban views, and yet you feel like you’re in a country meadow,” said Hamilton […]
LIFE LESSONS: The Kernel Of Truth
With your life coach, AP Ticker.
HURRICANE PORN: The Weather Industrial Complex
WILL BUNCH: Longtime media writer Howard Kurtz, now with the Daily Beast, nailed the disparity when he said that although Irene did prove to be a Category 1 storm, causing significant disruption, it received Category 5 coverage into the weekend. Jason Samenow, chief meteorologist with the Washington Post‘s Capital Weather Gang, which is receiving kudos for its accurate and restrained reporting, said last night that some cable anchors were still reporting that Irene could strike New Jersey and New York as a major hurricane long after his team determined that it clearly was weakening. “You want to raise awareness of […]
REVIEW: Jay-Z & Kanye Watch The Throne
BY MATTHEW HENGEVELD Jay-Z is the biggest, baddest, most livin’ largest persona to loom over the skyline of New York City since Sinatra. He went from shooting the shit in BK with Memph Bleek and Jaz-O to dining in Africa with Bono and sharing plane rides with the President of the United States — not bad from a reformed drug dealer from the projects. His wealth exceeds his Mafioso attitude, and he is the only true rapper-turned-businessman in the world of hip-hop. He’s the rapper that every rapper wants to be. Plus, he wifed-up that chick from Destiny’s Child. After […]
SPECIAL REPORT: The Top 10 Drug Corners 2011
[Illustration by JAY BEVENOUR] EDITOR’S NOTE: The following report — the product of a partnership between Phawker and PW and funded by a grant from J-Lab and the William Penn Foundation — ranks the city’s 10 worst drug corners the way Philly Mag ranks pizza or bars or bikini wax salons. Sarcasm aside, the story is no joke, rather it is the product of six months of old fashioned shoe leather reporting, arrest statistics crunching, and and dozens of interviews with the police,academics, neighbors, drug dealers and drug buyers. The hope is that we can spark a new conversation about […]
PBS: Can Marijuana Really Cure Cancer?
RAW STORY: The cancer-killing properties of marijuana were the subject of discussion in a PBS documentary that aired this week to little media fanfare. While using marijuana to kill cancer may sound like a wild claim to some, it struck Dr. Prakash Nagarkatti as a great idea. In his studies as professor of pathology and microbiology for the University of South Carolina, he tested synthetic cannabis drugs on cancer cells and developed a formula that was able to completely eradicate cancer cells in a test tube. A follow-up on mice afflicted with cancer found that up to 30 percent in […]
CONCERT REVIEW: My Morning Jacket At The Mann
[Illustration by ALEX FINE] BY JONATHAN VALANIA FOR THE INQUIRER Opening for a band that draws seven or eight times as many people as you do seems like a no-brainer. After all, if you win over just a quarter of the crowd, you’ve more than doubled your draw in this particular market. The downside is that nobody shows up for the opening act at The Big Rock Show. Never have, never will. Tuesday night at the Mann Center was no exception. Neko Case opened for My Morning Jacket and delivered a game but faintly glum set to mostly empty seats […]
The Hagiography Of Dr. Arlene Ackerman
Posted two days ago to Dr. Arlene Ackerman‘s YouTube account, this video looks like a million bucks, or at least $905,000. Either way Cgraham915 is just not feelin’ it. His comments below were mysteriously deleted this morning and commenting disabled. Some things never change with Dr. Ackerman. This video fails to mention the almost weekly embarrassments in the press about her and the School District. It doesn’t mention her lies about “I’m not leaving” and “I have had no discussions about leaving.”, and? is then reported that she has been in negotiations for a buy-out settlement since June. Lastly, this […]