[Photo by PRETTIE77]
PAPERBOY: ‘The Good, The Bad & The Chutley’ Edition
BY DAVE ALLEN Like time, news waits for no man. Keeping up with the funny papers has always been an all-day job, even in the pre-Internets era. These days, however, it’s a two-man job. That’s right, these days you need someone to do your reading for you, or risk falling hopelessly behind and, as a result, increasing your chances of dying lonely and somewhat bitter. That’s why every week, PAPERBOY does your alt-weekly reading for you. We pore over those time-consuming cover stories and give you the takeaway, suss out the cover art, warn you off the ink-wasters and steer […]
SHAZAM: Phils Win Game One Of World Series
ASSOCIATED PRESS: Chase Utley hit a two-run homer and Cole Hamels pitched out of trouble several times, giving the Philadelphia Phillies a 3-2 win over the Tampa Bay Rays in the World Series opener Wednesday night. MORE ATTYTOOD: The Blow By Blow
WE HOLD THESE TRUTHS TO BE SELF-EVIDENT: Talking Constitutionality With Jonathan Hennesseyy
BY JONATHAN VALANIA Every school boy and girl is taught that the Constitution is the most sacred document in the history of human freedom, that its wisdom is unimpeachable and that its reach and authority shall not be denied by the tyranny of evil men. And then there is the actual history of the U.S. Constitution, which is not quite as tidy and high-minded as they teach you in school. Still, it remains a beacon of democratic hope in a dark and largely un-democratic world. With all this in mind, writer Jonathan Hennessey and illustrator Aaron McConnell bring us this […]
NYT Nails Backstory On Inky Endorsementgate
NEW YORK TIMES: On the same page that the newspaper published a 901-word editorial supporting Mr. Obama, it ran just beneath it a 391-word dissent in support of Mr. McCain. […] So what happened? Brian Tierney, chief executive of the company that owns The Inquirer, Philadelphia Media Holdings, and who sits on the newspaper’s editorial board, would not say. In an interview on Tuesday, Mr. Tierney would only say, “We don’t talk about what goes on on the editorial page.” Harold Jackson, the editor of the editorial page, also would not discuss the deliberations or vote total, but did say […]
SIDEWALKING: Cellphoning It In
PHYSICAL GRAFFITTI: Men’s Room Wall, Drug Court, 1401 Arch St. 3:43 PM [Photo by JEFF DEENEY]
Q&A: The Magnetic Fields’ Stephin Merritt
[Illustration by ALEX FINE] BY JONATHAN VALANIA If there’s anything missing from Stephin Merritt’s encyclopedic oeuvre — a kitchen-sink catchall that includes everything from wry country twang and sincere synth pop to tortured torch songs and prancing show tunes — it’s Stephin Merritt. A remarkably dexterous stylistic quick-change artist — for my next trick, ladies and gentlemen, I’ll pull the Human League out of Cole Porter’s top hat — he’s a master illustrator of character sketches, meticulously cross-hatching two-minute melodramas out of the delicacies and detritus of 20th-century popular song. But for all their rapier-like wit and chameleonic genre-hopping, Merritt’s […]
EARLY WORD: Let’s All Go To The Lobby, The Lobby
And get ourselves some snacks!
ARTSY: Vlad The Impaler Was A Pain In The Neck
Vlad The Impaler [courtesy of the ROSENBACH MUSEUM] ‘Tis the season of the macabre, what with Halloween right around the corner and John McCain trying to scare as many white people as possible, and nobody was more macabre than Vlad The Impaler, the historic template for Bram Stoker’s Dracula. As governor of a region of what is modern-day Romania, Vlad was one of those guys that today we would refer to euphemistically as a ‘strong leader.’ A real hardcore ‘law and order’ kinda guy, Vlad ruled with an iron fist, or, more accurately, a sharp stick. According to Wikipedia: His […]
Inquirer Editorial Page Editor Responds To Our Questions About The Paper’s Split Endorsement
HAROLD JACKSON: To answer your questions: Like most, if not all, editorial boards, we do not divulge our votes. Besides, in most cases, as it was in this one, we reach consensus rather than taking a formal vote. Secondly, like most editorial boards, we do not identify the writers of editorials, because the editorials represent a consensus opinion and not necessarily the opinion of any specific writer. Thirdly, almost every decision the board reaches on any topic is a split decision in that different points of view are expressed before consensus is reached. The Obama endorsement was no different. The […]
THE DUPLICITY OF NOPE: Vetting The Inquirer’s Cruel And Unusual McCain Sub-Endorsement
Today the Inquirer editorial board endorsed Senator Barack Obama, sort of. For reasons that remain unclear, the editorial board saw fit to issue a dissenting opinion, as if it were the Supreme Court. What the Inquirer editorial board is supposed to be is the conscience of a newspaper — in this case, a newspaper that is struggling to maintain relevance in a city that is overwhelmingly pro-Obama. On the day that lifelong Republican Colin Powell put country over party, reached across the aisle and endorsed the Democratic candidate for president, the Inquirer couldn’t even throw a bone to the dogs […]
GAYDAR EXTRA: A ‘Big Time’ At Valanni
BY AARON STELLA GAYDAR EDITOR Never would I have thought that Valanni with its skinny little waist could birth such a heifer of an event as “Big Time” fashion show, but such was the case Thursday night. Designers from around Philadelphia showcased their reinventions of chestnut fashions from the ’80s, from the big hot pink hair, to the clunky jewelry, right down to the pastel spandex. Emceeing the event was interior-design debutante Brini Maxwell, bringing yet another lustrous layer of chic to the homage to retro. Well-wishers, admirers and fashion enthusiasts arrived in droves, dressed to the nines and pack […]
CABARET REVIEW: Dumpster Playin’
[Photos by THOMAS SHEEDER] BY AARON STELLA GAYDAR EDITOR The Dumpsta Players have done it again; this time, with their teaser-Halloween extravaganza. And how utterly timely of them to provide such gritty, yet sophisticated follow-up to an explosive night in Philly: Obama trouncing McCain once again, and the Phillies making a glorious comeback, rousing the city to pitched fever. I just clicked off the final presidential debates myself: McCain, looking like a rotten turnip with passion fruit plumper smeared across his lips, and anthropomorphizing into Darth Sidious whenever he flashed a smile; and Obama, thankfully, remained classy and unflappable to […]