BOSTON GLOBE: It didn’t take long for academics to realize punk was interesting?—?that there might be real ideas lurking under the crashing and banging. Before the ’70s were even over, a young cultural theorist from England named Dick Hebdige had published a book called “Subculture: The Meaning of Style,” in which he analyzed punk among working-class youth in Britain, and traced its intellectual roots to avant-garde movements like Situationism and Dada. A handful of other writers took their shots at defining what seemed like an exciting, if brief, cultural moment. Then, instead of burning out, the punk tribe splintered in […]
RIP: Goodnight Smokin’ Joe, Wherever You Are
ASSOCIATED PRESS: Joe Frazier, the former heavyweight champion who handed Muhammad Ali his first defeat yet had to live forever in his shadow, has died after a brief final fight with liver cancer. He was 67. The family issued a release confirming the boxer’s death on Monday night. Frazier, who took on Ali in three momentous fights in the 1970s — including the epic “Thrilla in Manilla” — had been under home hospice care after being diagnosed just weeks ago with the cancer that took his life, a family friend said. Until then, Frazier had been doing regular autograph appearances, […]
TONIGHT: Death, Where Is Thy Sting?
EDITOR’S NOTE: Yes, I am one of the ‘celebrity judges’ for tonight’s Literary Death Match at World Cafe Live. Not sure what to expect but in the immortal words of Private Psycho in Stripes: “All I know is, finally I get to kill somebody.” LDM: Ever since our wonderfully raucous LDM Philly debut in May, we’ve been counting the seconds until we could return to the land of cheesesteaks and Brotherly Love for an epic showcase at World Cafe Live with designs on trumping our debut! Join us for a night of revelry in the written and spoken word as four […]
STICK A FORK IN IT, HE’S DONE: Herman Cain Is F*cked, Just Not In The Way He Was Hoping For
WASHINGTON POST: Sharon Bialek, a Chicago woman who worked at the National Restaurant Association in the late 1990s has come forward to say that Herman Cain sexually harassed her while she was looking for a job. In graphic detail, Bialek described an encounter with Cain that happened in July of 1997 in Washington D.C. that left the woman shaken and embarrassed. After being let go by the NRA foundation, Bialek, who had met Cain on several occasions during conferences and at a dinner, reached out to Cain to obtain guidance on getting a new job.?Former Godfather’s Pizza chief executive Herman […]
NPR FOR THE DEAF: We Hear It Even When U Can’t
FRESH AIR In 14 years on Saturday Night Live, Darrell Hammond did many impressions, including Bill Clinton, Al Gore and Sean Connery. Few of his cast members knew that Hammond struggled with drugs, alcohol and self-cutting as the result of childhood abuse. In his memoir God, If You’re Not Up There, I’m F——-: Tales of Stand-Up, ‘Saturday Night Live’ and Other Mind-Altering Mayhem, Hammond details the systematic brutality he suffered at the hands of his mother, who beat him, stabbed him and tortured him with a hammer and electrical outlet. “I’ve been in treatment since I was 19, and I’m […]
WORTH REPEATING: PA Progressive Voter’s Guide
KEYSTONE PROGRESS: The fate of Pennsylvania and our nation is in your hands. This year’s election has huge implications for our families, our communities, and our Commonwealth. Our goal is to make smart, informed voting based on progressive values easier for you. So we surveyed PA’s leading progressive organizations to produce a Progressive Voter Guide based on their endorsements — one-stop shopping for highly informed recommendations about the races on your ballot. The Progressive Voters Guide identifies the candidates with the most progressive track records in Pennsylvania. We recognize that there are other progressive candidates on the ballot, but we […]
Q&A With Climate Change Denier/Fracking Enthusiast/Koch Brothers Stooge Ann McElhinney
BY JONATHAN VALANIA Ann McElhinney and her husband Phelim McAleer describe themselves as journalists/documentary filmmakers whose only agenda is to tell the stories that aren’t being told: That environmentalists like Al Gore, James Cameron and Gasland director Josh Fox are (in order of appearance) liars, cheaters and hypocrites; that global warming/climate change is scam; that scientists who insist otherwise are only in it for the money; that fracking is harmless; and fossil fuel consumption is a wonderful, wonderful thing. I would call her a paid shill for Big Energy. Her latest film, Not Just Evil But Wrong, argues that decades […]
MUST SEE TV: We Love Free Except When We Don’t
Amen, brother.
SIDEWALKING: Statue Got Me High
Please Touch Museum, 11:22 PM last night by JONATHAN VALANIA
EARLY WORD: Occupy Mitt Romney
“I don’t worry about the top one percent. I don’t stay up nights worrying about ‘gee we need to help them.’ I don’t worry about that. They’re doing just fine by themselves. I worry about the 99 percent in America. I want America, once again, to be the best place in the world to be middle-class. I want to have a strong and vibrant and prosperous middle-class. And so I look at what’s happening on Wall Street and my own view is, boy I understand how those people feel…The people in this country are upset.”— MITT ROMNEY RELATED: Romney is […]
TO PROTECT & SERVE DECEIVE: Cop Caught Lying Under Oath On The Witness Stand About Pot Bust
INQUIRER: It looked like an open-and-shut case. A cop pulls over a car, walks up to the driver’s door, and sees a plastic baggy of marijuana. He brings in a drug-sniffing dog to prove probable cause for a search, gets a warrant, and finds a kilo of weed in the trunk. That’s what Officer Steven Lupo put in his report and testified to in Philadelphia Municipal Court. Then defense attorney Michael Diamondstein produced the video. Turned out reality was different. The video taken from nearby surveillance cameras contradicted key facts in Lupo’s report and sworn testimony. Most crucially, Lupo and […]
NPR FOR THE DEAF: We Hear It Even When You Can’t
FRESH AIR Our universe might be really, really big — but finite. Or it might be infinitely big. Both cases, says physicist Brian Greene, are possibilities, but if the latter is true, so is another posit: There are only so many ways matter can arrange itself within that infinite universe. Eventually, matter has to repeat itself and arrange itself in similar ways. So if the universe is infinitely large, it is also home to infinite parallel universes. Does that sound confusing? Try this: Think of the universe like a deck of cards. “Now, if you shuffle that deck, there’s just […]
TRANSCENDENTALISM: Eternal Bliss In Our Time
[Artwork by MIGEL-GRASE] THE GUARDIAN: The director began meditating on the set of his debut feature, Eraserhead, back in the 70s and recently wrote a book (Catching the Big Fish) about the influence of TM on his creative process. Ask him about specific films, songs or paintings, and Lynch’s responses come swathed in shadow. Shift him on to the subject of transcendental meditation, however, and it’s though the lights have come on. It’s beautiful, he insists. We’re beautiful. Happiness lies within. Enlightenment is our birthright.Is it pedantic to note the obvious paradox here? Fair enough that Lynch, via the magic of […]