OBAMA SAYS: Be Cool. UPDATE: WASHINGTON — With a deadly hurricane aimed at Texas, Barack Obama cancelled his appearence on Saturday Night Live this evening, spokesman Jen Psaki in a statement. “In the light of the unfolding crisis in Texas, Senator Obama has decided it is no longer appropriate to appear on Saturday Night Live tomorrow evening,” she said. WALL STREET JOURNAL: Barack Obama will make his second appearance on “Saturday Night Live” this weekend for the season premiere, hosted by Olympian Michael Phelps. “The details of the sketch are still being worked out,” an Obama campaign spokesperson told People […]
FRINGE REVIEW: Show Must Go On Is Must See
BY AARON STELLA FRINGE CORRESPONDENT The stage is dark. Two soundtracks have played their course, and still no sign of the dancers. Finally, in the middle of the third song, the lights flicker on, and the dancers, who look quite pedestrian, saunter on stage and are met with thunderous applause. What!?! They haven’t even done anything—wait, I’m applauding too—and now they’re just staring at us. What’s going on? Why is the audience having such a grand old time? Hmm. Now the fourth song has switched on: it’s “I like to move it. Move it.” After the first “Move it!” the […]
HEAR YE:Brightblack Morning Light Motion To Rejoin
Now playing on Phawker Radio! BY JONATHAN VALANIA Back in the early- to mid-’80s that today’s hepcats so lovingly fetishize and recycle, there were two kinds of bands: those that looked forward and those that looked back. The forward-lookers were going for the shock of the new, of course, while the backward-lookers opted for the comfort of the past. The forward-lookers were usually British, had pouffy hair and billowy pastel clothes that snapped and zippered in weird places, and all of them seemed to get their names from either A Clockwork Orange or Barbarella — Duran Duran, Heaven 17, Ultravox. […]
FRINGE PICK: One Louder
louder Verdensteatret Norwegian collaborative Verdensteatret presents the U.S. Premiere of louder, a highly experimental audiovisual installation that incorporates video art, sculptural scenery, puppetry, and live music at The Festival Bar’s black box theater (626 North 5th Street) located in Northern Liberties. (Word is, it’s visually stunning and damn loud, but you’ll get ear plugs.) Last winter, Verdensteatret sailed Vietnam’s Mekong Delta, the same river that plays the veins and arteries around the heart of darkness in Francis Ford Coppola’s Apocalypse Now. Inspired by their journey, louder is a symphonic collage of music and visual art: massive video projections of the […]
SAY IT OUT LOUD: John McCain Is Lying To America
Routinely. Without blinking. Without apology. Possibly without even knowing it sometimes. Just watch. Time to end the misguided moratorium on calling a liar a L-I-A-R. People only stop lying when you call them a liar. And no, ‘less than truthful’ ain’t cutting it. Video by TheRealMcCain.com: There’s no question John McCain is getting a free ride from the mainstream press. But with the power of YouTube and the blogosphere, we can provide an accurate portrayal of the so-called Maverick. We can put the brakes on his free ride! UPDATE: Thank you ladies of The View. We’ll take the Fourth Estate […]
INDEPENDENCE DAY: Answer Blowing In The Wind?
CNN: In another sign of growth in the ocean wind business, the American Wind Energy Association — the leading trade group for wind in the U.S. — drew more than 400 participants this week at an offshore wind conference in Delaware, about double the expected attendance, Bornholdt noted. In terms of the first possible offshore project in the U.S., Delaware appears to have jumped to the front of the line to tap into nation’s vast ocean wind resource, some 15 years after Europe led the way with the world’s first major offshore projects. Bluewater Wind of Hoboken, N.J., which proposes […]
CINEMA: After Burner
BURN AFTER READING (2008, directed by Joel & Ethan Coen, 96 minutes, U.S.) BY DAN BUSKIRK FILM CRITIC In the opening shot of the Coen Brother’s cynical-hearted new comedy the camera descends from the Heavens, zeroing in on the surface of the Earth until it swoops into the hallways of C.I.A. headquarters in Langley, Virginia. There a medium-grade analyst named Osgood Cox (John Malkovich) is getting demoted, which will set into motion a ripple of high crimes and misdemeanors that reverberate violently through a group of loosely-connected malcontents in the D.C. suburbs. The Coen’s have been down this road before, […]
ANGRY IKE: Houston, We Got A Problem
ABC NEWS: Cars and trucks streamed inland and chemical companies buttoned up their plants Thursday as a gigantic Hurricane Ike took aim at the heart of the U.S. refining industry and threatened to send a wall of water crashing toward Houston. Nearly 1 million people along the Texas coast were ordered to evacuate ahead of the storm, which was expected to strike late Friday or early Saturday. But in a calculated risk aimed at avoiding total gridlock, authorities told most people in the nation’s fourth-largest city to just hunker down. Ike was steering almost directly for Houston, where gleaming skyscrapers, […]
KILLADELPHIA: 2 Dead In Playground Massacre
INQUIRER: A “vicious and cowardly attack” at a West Philadelphia playground last night left two men dead and three others in critical condition, Deputy Commissioner Richard Ross said at a morning news conference. At about 10:30 p.m., two men in hoodies started firing as trophies were being presented after the championship game of a youth basketball league at McAlpin Playground, 36th and Aspen Streets, in the city’s Mantua section. At least 15 shots were fired. The organizer of the league – Miles Mack, 42, of the 3400 block of Spring Garden Street – was taken to the Hospital of the […]
LIPSTICK ON A WARPIG: Palin Tells ABC News’ Gibson That War With Russia Might Be Necessary
ABC NEWS: When Gibson said if under the NATO treaty, the United States would have to go to war if Russia again invaded Georgia, Palin responded: “Perhaps so. I mean, that is the agreement when you are a NATO ally, is if another country is attacked, you’re going to be expected to be called upon and help. “And we’ve got to keep an eye on Russia. For Russia to have exerted such pressure in terms of invading a smaller democratic country, unprovoked, is unacceptable,” she told Gibson. MORE OBVIOUS FOLLOW-UP QUESTION THAT WAS NEVER ASKED: Governor, you are aware that […]
THE EARLY WORD: Time For Action, Jackson
[Click image to activate Internets] Sarah Palin Is Definitely NOT F*cking Matt Damon
NPR 4 THE DEAF: We Hear It Even When Bush Can’t
FRESH AIR Andrew J. Bacevich, a professor of history and international relations at Boston University and a retired Army colonel, discusses his new book, The Limits of Power: The End of American Exceptionalism. He argues that pragmatic realism has always been the core of American foreign policy, and current politicians would do well to remember that. Excerpt: ‘The Limits of Power: The End of American Exceptionalism’ by Andrew J. Bacevich Chapter One The Crisis of Profligacy Today, no less than in 1776, a passion for life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness remains at the center of America’s civic theology. […]
FRINGE REVIEW: Another Sleepy Dusty Delta Day
BY AARON STELLA FRINGE CORRESPONDENT Caged live canaries hang from the ceiling above an ominously lit stage; on the floor miniature electric trains thread through scattered piles of coal, winding and encircling and passing through tunnels. To the right side of the stage is Ivana Jozic, performer and partner choreographer to the interdisciplinary art-lion Jan Fabre. Clothed in a yellow sundress and cap, Jozic sits in a rocking chair and moves between kissing a suicide note and pressing it endearingly to her bosom. All this, and the performance hasn’t even started. As the performance begins, Jozic recites the suicide note, […]