Just the Two of Us. Ain’t No Sunshine. Lean on Me. The man who wrote the songs that defined a decade walked away from showbiz without a look back. For 23 years, Bill Withers shunned the spotlight and refused all interviews — until filmmakers Damani Baker and Alex Vlack convinced him to tell his surprising story. Still Bill gives us an inside look at Bill Withers’ life and personality, tells why he stopped performing at the peak of his career and who he is today. An amazing portrait of an icon who never gave up his soul. First Person Arts […]
SWEET JESUS: J-Lo’s Ex Is Shopping Spanking Vid
PEOPLE: Jennifer Lopez has filed a $10 million lawsuit against ex-husband Ojani Noa, whom she claims is violating a confidentiality agreement in place since 2004 by shopping around a sexy honeymoon video the two made in 1997. MORE NEW YORK POST: The hot footage, which reportedly also includes scenes of an embarrassing, ugly argument between J.Lo and her mom, is allegedly part of a movie titled “How I Married Jennifer Lopez: The J.Lo and Ojani Noa Story.”The National Enquirer reported that it had seen 11 hours of Noa’s footage of Lopez and that the kinky material included: * A sizzling […]
THE WORM TURNS: Judge Rules Against Credit Bid In Inky/DN Auction, Paving Way For Local Ownership
INQUIRER: Philadelphia Newspapers L.L.C. can bar its lenders from using $300 million in debt they are owed to try to purchase the company at auction next week, a federal judge ruled today. The decision by U.S. District Judge Eduardo C. Robreno reverses a ruling by Chief Bankruptcy Judge Stephen Raslavich. Lawyers for the company’s senior lenders — which include Angelo, Gordon & Co., the CIT Group, Wells Fargo and Eaton Vance (Citizens Bank put the deal together) — had argued that it would be unfair if they had to bid cash, like other potential buyers, for property that served as […]
NPR FOR THE DEAF: We Hear It Even When You Can’t
FRESH AIR As an American journalist in Japan, Jake Adelstein uncovered a world unknown to many of the Japanese public, let alone to foreigners: the world of organized crime. For 12 years, he investigated for Japan’s largest newspaper, the Yomiuri Shinbun. In his final story, Adelstein went toe-to-toe with one of the country’s most notorious crime bosses, a discovery that led to death threats for him and his family — death threats that have yet to be lifted. His new memoir about his experiences is called Tokyo Vice: An American Reporter on the Police Beat in Japan. After leaving the […]
WORTH REPEATING: The Illegal World Of Mr. Cheng
DAILY NEWS: AT 4:15 A.M., “Mr. Cheng” gets a call on his cell phone, signaling him to head outside to the light-blue van that will take him and other illegal workers to a mail-packaging factory in Montgomery County, to jobs that pay just above the minimum wage. It’s dark and quiet on the streets of South Philly as the van drives around, picking up other workers, who greet each other in Indonesian. Cheng is ethnically Chinese, but was born in Indonesia and lived there until he came to the United States about eight years ago. “I was dreaming of a […]
THE INTERWEBS: Jim Carrey Has A Badass Web Site
[Click image to activate Internets] No, really.
FIRST AMENDMENT: Fox News And Glenn Beck Lose Case Against GLENNBECKRAPEDAGIRLIN1990.COM
THR, ESQ: Fox News’ Glenn Beck has lost a claim that a website called glennbeckrapedandmurderedayounggirlin1990.com was registered in bad faith and in violation of his trademark rights. The website was founded by Isaac Eiland-Hall earlier this year in response to a joke on odd-news site Fark about Beck’s lack of denial for a non-existent murder/rape. Eiland-Hall argued to WIPO hat he registered the website as a satirical critique of Beck’s conspiratorial politics. WIPO’s arbitration panel agreed that the website appeared “to be engaged in a parody of the style or methodology that (Eiland-Hall) appears genuinely to believe is employed by […]
CHEEKY: ‘Twilight’ Star Goes Lady Godiva For PETA
HOLLYWOOD CRUSH: “The Twilight Saga” human Christian Serratos is a supporter of animal rights. You might have known that — I didn’t particularly — but now everyone will be aware of Christian’s cause. The young actress posted her ad for PETA on her Twitter account this afternoon, and her advocacy was a bit more revealing than we would have expected. “I’d rather go naked than wear fur,” the ad proclaims in some very “Twilight”-esque font. The photo is set in the woods (a la Forks, Wash., obvs) and even has same color scheme “New Moon” has had in advertising (to […]
MEDIA: Rupert Murdoch Vs. The Internets
THE GUARDIAN: Rupert Murdoch says he will remove stories from Google’s search index as a way to encourage people to pay for content online. In an interview with Sky News Australia, the mogul said that newspapers in his media empire – including the Sun, the Times and the Wall Street Journal – would consider blocking Google entirely once they had enacted plans to charge people for reading their stories on the web. In recent months, Murdoch his lieutenants have stepped up their war of words with Google, accusing it of “kleptomania” and acting as a “parasite” for including News Corp […]
MASERATI: Live At First Unitarian Church
Video: Maserati Interview [Breakfast at Sulimay’s] on Scrapple TV NEW YORK POST: An indie-band drummer from Brooklyn fell to his death today after trying to leap from a freight elevator at a tony Williamsburg fund-raiser, police said. Jerry Fuchs, 34, who drummed for West Coast dance-punk band !!! (pronounced “chk chk chk”) and the Georgia-based psychedelic instrumental ensemble Maserati, tumbled five stories shortly after 12:30 a.m. inside 338 Berry St., cops said. “It’s a manual freight elevator, and it stopped somewhere above the fifth floor,” said Buildings Department spokesman Tony Sclafani. Sources said Fuchs and his pal opened the elevator […]
SPORTO: The 700 Level Of The Mind
BY MIKE WOLVERTON SPORTS GUY Last night’s game was there for the taking, but it didn’t get took. Here’s my positive spin: the Eagles don’t start playing their best football until their backs are against the wall (see last year, the Garcia year, more). Well, their backs are much closer to the wall now than they would have been if they had finished off the Cowboys last night. Another positive: tackle Jason Peters got hurt, got x-rayed, got re-taped, sucked it up and got back in there. And Peters played a good second half. This in contrast to the game […]
KUCINICH: Why I Voted Against Health Care Reform
DENNIS KUCINICH: We have been led to believe that we must make our health care choices only within the current structure of a predatory, for-profit insurance system which makes money not providing healthcare. Clearly, the insurance companies are the problem, not the solution. They are driving up the cost of health care. Because their massive bureaucracy avoids paying bills so effectively, they force hospitals and doctors to hire their own bureaucracy to fight the insurance companies to avoid getting stuck with an unfair share of the bills. The result is that since 1970, the number of physicians has increased by […]
SEPTA STRIKE: Is Over!
INQUIRER: The strike by SEPTA workers that had paralyzed much of the region since last week ended this morning with a signing of an agreement by SEPTA officials and leaders of Transport Workers Union Local 234. Buses, subways, and trolleys, idled since 3 a.m. Tuesday, should be running in time for this mornning’s rush. The end to the six-day walkout came in dramatic fashion, as union leaders joined SEPTA officials about 12:45 this morning at a news conference outside the Center City office of Gov. Rendell, who brokered the deal a day after he said he was giving up on […]