ASSOCIATED PRESS: Banks that are getting taxpayer bailouts awarded their top executives nearly $1.6 billion in salaries, bonuses, and other benefits in 2007, an Associated Press analysis reveals. The rewards came even at banks where poor results last year foretold the economic crisis that sent them to Washington for a government rescue. Some trimmed their executive compensation due to lagging bank performance but still forked over multimillion-dollar executive pay packages. Benefits included cash bonuses, stock options, personal use of company jets and chauffeurs, home security, country club memberships and professional money management, the review of federal securities documents found.The total […]
WEEKEND UPDATE: The Good News Flower Hour
The Good News Flower Hour #4 Folks, here’s the latest installment of The Good News Flower Hour, wherein I provide the voice for a flower that reads the news. The debut is HERE and the last couple episodes are HERE and HERE. We are still tweaking the concept and streamlining the production schedule on these — it takes a LONG-ass time to make these little three-minute suckers — but we hope to make this a weekly feature in the very near future. Enjoy.
NPR 4 THE DEF: Giving Public Radio Edge Since 2006
FRESH AIR Washington Post reporter Bob Woodward talks about FBI Deputy Director W. Mark Felt — a.k.a. “Deep Throat,” the secret source who helped Woodward and his partner Carl Bernstein break the Watergate story, which eventually led to the resignation of President Richard Nixon. Felt died Dec. 18 at the age of 95. A long-kept secret, Felt’s identity as Woodward’s source was revealed in the July 2005 issue of Vanity Fair magazine. Woodward later detailed his clandestine meetings with Felt in the book The Secret Man: The Story of Watergate’s Deep Throat. Woodward’s latest book is The War Within: A […]
ALL THE PRESIDENTS MEN: ‘Deepthroat’ Dead At 95
NEW YORK TIMES: W. Mark Felt, who was the No. 2 official at the F.B.I. when he helped bring down President Richard M. Nixon by resisting the Watergate cover-up and becoming Deep Throat, the most famous anonymous source in American history, died Thursday. He was 95 and lived in Santa Rosa, Calif. In 2005, Mr. Felt revealed that he was the one who had secretly supplied Bob Woodward of The Washington Post with crucial leads in the Watergate affair in the early 1970s. His decision to unmask himself, in an article in Vanity Fair, ended a guessing game that had […]
ALL OVER BUT THE SHOUTING: Papers Declare Al Franken ‘Projected Winner’ Of Minnesota Senate Seat
HUFFINGTON POST: Democratic challenger Al Franken finds himself on the cusp of winning a seat in the United States Senate after Minnesota’s canvassing board awarded him a host of challenged votes during deliberations on Thursday. As of 8PM ET, the Minneapolis Star Tribune projected that Franken would finish the recount process with a lead of 89 votes, positioning him to become the 59th senator caucusing with Democrats in the upcoming Congress. The gains came as the canvassing board sifted through hundreds of ballots that Coleman had contested during the recount process. On Friday, the canvassing board will consider another 400 […]
MUST SEE: The Three Stooges As Iraqi Journalists
[TheFlickeringWindow: At a news conference with President Bush, three knuckleheads are caught in a custard conspiracy involving pies and cream puffs. The three men are identified as Howard, Fine, and Howard.] * ASSOCIATED PRESS: The investigating judge in the case of the Iraqi journalist who threw shoes at President George W. Bush says the man shows signs of being beaten. Judge Dhia al-Kinani said Friday that the journalist had bruises on his face and around his eyes.The journalist, Muntadhar al-Zeidi, was wrestled to the ground after throwing the shoes during a Sunday news conference with Bush and Iraqi Prime Minister […]
NPR 4 THE DEF: Giving Public Radio Edge Since 2006
FRESH AIR Composer Erran Baron Cohen‘s latest CD Songs in the Key of Hanukkah offers a new take on traditional sounds. He talks about the album — and about collaborating with his brother Sacha Baron Cohen on the movie Borat. Recorded in London, Berlin and Tel Aviv, the compilation of songs combines klezmer, reggae, electronica and hip hop as it reinterprets classics. The album even features New York rapper Y-Love rhyming in Yiddish. Erran is a founding member of ZOHAR Sound System and DJ’s internationally and in London clubs. ALSO, you have to be pretty dedicated to your work to set […]
GAMBLOR: The Donald Sues For Second Chance
PHILLY CLOUT: Donald Trump sued the state Gaming Control Board in federal court this afternoon for rejecting in 2006 his bid to build a casino on the site of the former Budd Co. plant in Nicetown with a group of investors*. Trump is asking a federal judge to overturn the state-awarded gaming licenses for SugarHouse in Fishtown and Foxwoods, which was approved for a South Philly site but is now considering relocation to the Gallery at 11th and Market streets. The lawsuit says Trump and his investors spent more than $10 million in planning for their Nicetown location and were rewarded […]
TURN THE OTHER CHEEK: Obama Picks Anti-Gay, Anti-Choice, Anti-Stem Cell Pastor For Inauguration
FAITH IN PUBLIC LIFE: Rick Warren, whose recent remarks on issues ranging from war and torture to sexuality and abortion have generated some justifiable pushback lately, will give the invocation at the inauguration. The pick was news to us. But he’s not the only one who will be praying from the podium on January 20. Rev. Joseph Lowery a civil rights icon and supporter of same-sex marriage, is giving the benediction at the end of the event. I can’t read the administration’s mind, but my guess here is that they’re crafting an inauguration meant to appeal to voters who voted […]
WORTH REPEATING: Man Bites Blog
BY KELLIE C. MURPHY Rebelling against the machine comes naturally to Skwire. Born in Newport, R.I., he grew up during the Reagan years and became an early frequenter of the local punk rock music scene, learning how to rage with political groups like the Dead Kennedys and MDC. He moved to Philly in 1999 to pursue his musical ambitions and settled in Kingsessing, one of the oldest settlements in the city. He says the area was the perfect fit, because he wanted homeownership and a yard—without going broke. Skwire realizes how out of place he looks in his predominately black […]
BREAKING: Obama Is TIME’s ‘Person Of The Year’
TIME: David Von Drehle’s masterly story on our Person of the Year not only sketches out what’s on Obama’s mind but also reveals new details about how and when he realized that his first 100 days had to start on Nov. 5, the day after voters elected him to become the 44th President of the United States and the first African American to hold the office. Von Drehle also tells us — with Obama’s help — how we should hold the new President accountable. Beyond his mastery of the issues, Obama revealed a more personal note: a slightly rueful sense […]
TONITE: Enjoy Yourself, It’s Later Than You Think
ABC NEWS: New home starts fell to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 625,000 from a downwardly revised level of 771,000 in October, the Commerce Department said Tuesday. That is a drop of 18.9 percent, the steepest since March 1984. The total is far below the 740,000 pace that Wall Street economists expected. MORE CBS NEWS: U.S. consumer prices in November plunged by the largest amount on records going back 61 years as energy costs posted nearly double the decline of the previous month. The Labor Department reported Tuesday that consumer prices fell 1.7 percent in November, surpassing the previous […]
CHENEY: I Love The Smell Of Waterboarding
[In an exclusive interview with ABC News, Vice President Dick Cheney issued an unapologetic defense of the Bush administration’s anti-terror policies, including the use of waterboarding, and said the prison at Guantanamo Bay should remain open as long as there’s a war on terror.] Smells like…victory.