DAILY NEWS: When it comes time to stand up and be counted, Philadelphia may not be ready. That’s the evaluation of a new report released yesterday by the Pew Charitable Trusts on the city’s preparedness for the 2010 Census. “Philadelphia is lagging behind other major cities in mounting the kind of local outreach and awareness campaign for the 2010 Census that many experts consider important for achieving a full count,” the report said. According to the report, seven of the other 10 cities surveyed had launched citywide coordinating committees by early October. The other three cities had secured more funding […]
BOB DYLAN: Do You Hear What I Hear?
NEWSWEEK: My take, after one listen (Sony didn’t provide advances of the CD) is that there’s no deep meaning or in-joke to behold here. Anyone attempting a hermeneutical link between Dylan’s new version of “Little Drummer Boy” and his recent rewrite of Willie Dixon’s “I Just Want to Make Love to You” is asking to be made a fool of in the public square. Whatever historian Sean Wilentz says, these new carols and standards don’t sound like part of the same project as the allusive, original compositions on Love and Theft or Together Through Life. There’s not enough context or commentary […]
GREATEST HITS: Today I Saw Revisited
BY JEFF DEENEY Today I saw a wino walking across a trash strewn lot on Ridge Avenue, down the street from the shelter. It was a classic image, a living stereotype stumbling with bagged bottle in one hand while the other waved in the air unsteadily, like he was struggling to get across the deck of ship in rough waters. He slowed and then stalled, as if he might change direction but had to think hard about the decision before continuing. Then he pitched forward, undulating towards the brick wall at the other end of the lot. When he reached […]
MUSSOLINI HEADKICK: ‘Il Duce’ Was A British Spook
THE TIMES OF LONDON: Historians in Cambridge have uncovered details of a lucrative deal struck between a young Benito Mussolini and MI5 in 1917. For at least a year, the young socialist was paid £100 a week by the UK government — around £6,000 today — to write pro-war propaganda for his newspaper Il Popolo d’Italia, one of the slickest media machines the country, and keep Italian troops fighting at the front. “Mussolini wasn’t exactly house-trained,” said Dr Peter Martland, the Cambridge historian who made the discovery. It was unlikely that the young Il Duce was saving for aid packages […]
RIP: Al Martino, South Philly Crooner, Dead At 82
ASSOCIATED PRESS: Singer Al Martino, who played the Frank Sinatra-type role of Johnny Fontane in ”The Godfather,” died Tuesday afternoon at his childhood home. He was 82. Starting in 1952, Martino was known for hit songs including ”Here in My Heart,” ”Spanish Eyes,” ”Can’t Help Falling in Love” and ”Volare.” Besides acting in the Marlon Brando classic ”The Godfather,” Martino sang the 1972 film’s title score, ”The Love Theme From The Godfather.” His Fontane character is a singer and occasional actor and is the godson of Brando’s Mafia boss character, Don Vito Corleone. MORE DAILY NEWS: “He was the […]
YA GOTTA BELIEVE: Phils Kill Rockies Dead
[Photo by crwelling] INQUIRER: When the Phillies allowed three runs in the eighth inning last night, Ruben Amaro Jr. began to think about the trip home. With Game 4 appearing lost, the first-year general manager resigned himself to logistics. “I was thinking about the flight home,” he said an hour later, standing in the corner of a wild visitors’ clubhouse at Coors Field, quiet and exhausted. “Thinking about whether Cole [Hamels] would be ready for a Game 5 start, and about how tough it would be to stop their momentum.” Amaro did not know that Jimmy Rollins, Ryan Howard, and […]
THE DAILY SHOW: The CNN/SNL Smackdown
The Daily Show With Jon Stewart Mon – Thurs 11p / 10c
John Hodgman Is NOT A PC, He Just Plays One On TV
PHAWKER: So just to be up front, your new book, More Information Than You Require, just showed up this morning, so I have barely even skimmed it. But my favorite endorsement is from Justin Long, the guy who plays the Mac dude in your Apple commercials, who says “I love this book so much I almost read it!” But seeing as how I am completely unprepared to discuss your book, we will have to do this on the honor system. Is your book any good? JOHN HODGMAN: I think my book is ‘any good’, yes. I would categorize it as […]
CINEMA: The Two-Way Mirror Between Life And Art
SALON: I am not claiming that a work of art has nothing to do with the person who made it, since that’s a stupid idea, and I’m certainly not claiming that the work of art is somehow co-guilty of its creator’s crimes, since that’s an even stupider idea. (Wagner’s music will always be identified with fascism; it can’t be reduced to fascism.) I am certainly not speaking out in defense of Roman Polanski, who apparently did something that was both heinous and illegal, and should long ago have faced the consequences. I guess I’m saying that it’s hypothetically possible to […]
HORNS OF DILEMMA: Apocalypse Now?
MOTHER JONES: It’s early in 1965, and President Lyndon B. Johnson faces a critical decision. Should he escalate in Vietnam? Should he say “yes” to the request from U.S. commanders for more troops? Or should he change strategy, downsize the American commitment, even withdraw completely, a decision that would help him focus on his top domestic priority, “The Great Society” he hopes to build? We all know what happened. LBJ listened to the generals and foreign policy experts and escalated, with tragic consequences for the United States and calamitous results for the Vietnamese people on the receiving end of American […]
SPORTO: A Confederacy Of Dunces
BY MIKE WOLVERTON SPORTS GUY Has anyone noticed that the Eagles have played four snoozers so far, without an ounce of drama? It’s not likely to change next week when the Birds travel to Oakland to play the dismal Raiders. In other NFL news, Cleveland beat Buffalo 6-3. Browns QB Derek Anderson completed 2 of 17 passes. Two complete passes, and his team won! I have Browns WR Mohamed Massaquoi on my Fantasy team…I’d have been psyched if you told me he accounted for 70% of the Browns’ passing yardage. Well, he did, and it was worth 16 yards.Have you […]
CINEMA: Lost In Adaptation
NEW YORKER: The opening sequences of Spike Jonze’s “Where the Wild Things Are”—a live-action feature based on Maurice Sendak’s 1963 children’s classic—are sensationally good. Max (Max Records) is an angry nine-year-old boy: his teen-age sister has abandoned him for her friends, and his divorced mother (Catherine Keener) noodles on the couch with her boyfriend. The way Max Records plays him—with darting eyes, and lips pressed together in rage—the boy has no idea that anyone’s feelings but his own could be real. He builds forts in his bedroom and an igloo in the front yard. He wants to be enclosed in […]
GAME 3: Ryan Howard Sacrifice Fly Puts Phils Over 6-5
NEW YORK TIMES: The score was tied, 5-5, entering the ninth inning, before Philadelphia’s Ryan Howard hit a sacrifice fly to left-center field that scored Jimmy Rollins. Rollins was 2 for 13 in the series before singling to lead off the top of the inning against Colorado closer Huston Street. He advanced to second on Shane Victorino’s sacrifice bunt, and then to third as Chase Utley reached first on a check-swing bunt that Street had to gather and throw from foul territory. Leading by 6-5, the Phillies turned to Brad Lidge, who closed all 48 save opportunities in 2008, including […]