A Sad Diag-nose-is

No doubt by now you have seen this almost gruesome (and truly sad) photo of Michael Jackson. Seems that the king of pop's face has been ravaged by the effects of years of surgical procedures.

Now in this article Plastic surgeons give us the 411 on Jacko's schnoz.

"What he's done is to go from a Negroid or black nose, which is round and broad and flat, to a Caucasian nose that's narrow and projecting," said Dr. Harvey Zarem, a former chief of plastic surgery at UCLA who practices in Santa Monica. "To do that, you have to put cartilage or silicone or bone in the nose like a tent stake to make the nose stick out. But when you do that enough, the cartilage or silicone or bone pokes through."

Mike should have stayed away from the plastic surgeons three or four noses ago.

Gore in '04?

Maybe.

In what Barbara Walters calls his first interview since his devastating defeat, former Vice President Al Gore said on ABC's "20/20" Friday that he has not decided whether to run again for president. "I haven't ruled it out, I won't make a decision until the end of year; after the holidays I'll make an announcement," Gore said.

"I would like to be president, but is it the right thing for me to do?" Gore said that at the moment he is neutral on running on a presidential ticket for a fifth time but that in the end, the decision will ultimately depend on "a gut feeling."

Here is what Daniel Schorr had to say.

As for me, I'd vote for Gore, and not just because he won in 2000.

Above the Law

The Washington Post has this story

The Roman Catholic bishop of Arlington has told a local priest that he will be permanently suspended from the diocese for obeying a subpoena to testify in a civil lawsuit about another priest's adultery with a parishioner's wife.

Bishop Paul S. Loverde informed the Rev. James R. Haley in an Oct. 28 formal notice that he is being removed for violating a gag order a year ago, which barred him from disclosing wrongdoing by priests in order "to avoid scandal, to maintain ecclesiastical discipline and to protect the reputation and privacy of both the faithful and priests of this diocese."

This seems like the total opposite of what should be expected from a church leader. "Removed from office for obeying a subpoena"? This is horrfying ...

Is that Satan I hear laughing in the background, Bishop?

Of course, this doesn't look good for the Vatican that recently approved their revised sexual misconduct guidelines which was then passed by the American bishops

(Repost)

Major Slip-up

Fox News' Anchor Shepard Smith was doing a report on Jennifer Lopez in which he made the following slip-up:

"J.Lo's new song 'Jenny From the Block' is all about Lopez's roots, about how she's still a neighborhood gal at heart," Shepherd declared innocently enough, before veering horribly off his teleprompted script. "But folks from that street in New York, the Bronx section, sound more likely to give her a curb job than a blow job!"

Watch the faux-pas for yourself, the video clip is here. (Windows media)

Oops!

(Via Oliver Willis)

*Repost* I'm reposting this story from 2 days ago. Hits on the website have quadrupled in the last 24 hours from visitors searching this on GOOGLE and elsewhere.

Jenny From the Block?

In this story MTV.Com reports:

A New York newspaper reporting on the "Primetime" visit alleged that Lopez was less than cordial to the peeps from her past. Accounts of bodyguards shoving fans and bringing one to tears were coupled with personal testimonies that claimed when Jenny left the block, she didn't look back, except when shout-outs to the Boogie Down benefited her.

And, by the way, If you missed her interview on "Primetime" with Diane Sawyer of ABC News on Nov. 13th, you can see it here.

Excerpts:

I am such a kind of artist in dat way, you know, just such a flutter bug in dat way. Where it's just like, you know, the idea of love and fairy tales and romance and all dat."

"What I knew that was different this time is that I was just more scared ... It was too powerful ... whereas before it was almost I had control of things, so I wasn't afraid to kind of be in there, in the fire.... This time it was just smothering me and — so hot, you know, that it was just like — it made me afraid."

Uh, sounds like we might be a little out of touch with reality there, J-lo.

Could Nineteen Eighty-Four be Upon Us?

William Safire of the NY Times writes

If the Homeland Security Act is not amended before passage, here is what will happen to you:

Every purchase you make with a credit card, every magazine subscription you buy and medical prescription you fill, every Web site you visit and e-mail you send or receive, every academic grade you receive, every bank deposit you make, every trip you book and every event you attend — all these transactions and communications will go into what the Defense Department describes as "a virtual, centralized grand database."

To this computerized dossier on your private life from commercial sources, add every piece of information that government has about you — passport application, driver's license and bridge toll records, judicial and divorce records, complaints from nosy neighbors to the F.B.I., your lifetime paper trail plus the latest hidden camera surveillance — and you have the supersnoop's dream: a "Total Information Awareness" about every U.S. citizen.

1984 has come and gone, but George Orwell's prophetic nightmarish vision in 1949 of the world we were becoming seems timelier than ever. 1984 is still the great modern classic of "Negative Utopia"—a startingly original and haunting novel that creates an imaginary world that is completely convincing, from the first sentence to the last four words. No one can deny this novel's power, its hold on the imaginations of whole generations, or the power of its admonitions—a power that seems to grow, not lessen, with the passage of time.

Predictions made on a pot high

Remember the Ms Cleo debacle and subsequent lawsuit?

The operators of Miss Cleo's psychic hot line agreed Thursday to cancel $500 million in customer bills to settle federal charges that the service fleeced callers while promising mystical insights into love and money.

The settlement requires Access Resource Services Inc. and Psychic Readers Network Inc. to stop using pay-per-call numbers to sell their soothsaying services, the Federal Trade Commission said. The two Fort Lauderdale, Fla.-based companies, which promoted a national network of "psychic readers" on television and the Internet, also must pay the FTC a $5 million fine.

What I'd like to know is how the heck can such an operation amass $500 million in the first place, is the public that gullible? Geez.

Holiday Events NYC

Radio City Christmas Spectacular starring the fantastic Rockettes.
November 7, 2002 - January 5, 2003
Ticket Prices: $36-$119

With a cast of over 140 people, over 1,300 wonderful costumes and beautiful sets, America's #1 favorite Christmas show is back at it again at New York's Radio City Music Hall. Starring everyone from the Rockettes, Santa, the marching Wooden Soldiers and many others, this annual hit is sure to please all!

______________

Christmas Tree Lighting & Ice Show
December 4, 2002

Where else on earth will thousands and thousands gather for the lighting a single tree? NYC that's where! Join in this fantastic event which is televised nationwide and perhaps even across the seas. Entertainment, Singing etc. Be there.

List of other events, dates, directions etc. here

Oliver laments, in a letter to J-Lo

"Why? You hurt me Jenny. Hurt me real bad. I was there for you before the fame, before the money, damn it - I was there before the lip gloss. And this is how you repay me. Ben Affleck. Ben-freaking-Affleck?" [More]

Signs of Democratic Life

As Nancy Pelosi becomes the new Democratic house minority leader, she has work to do:

Mary McCrory's (The Washington Post) article compares Tom DeLay, the newly elected House majority leader and Nancy Pelosi, she writes:

Both Pelosi and DeLay are formidable personalities. Both can raise money, and both are fervent disciples of grass roots. In 2000, when the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee spent some $90 million to pick up one House seat, Pelosi oversaw the victorious campaigns of five California contenders -- all of whom were reelected on Nov. 5.

Pelosi and DeLay probably could not discuss issues with any profit to either, except possibly child welfare legislation. He is a tiger at protecting poor children. She has stood almost alone in her defense of human rights in China. But they can talk politics.

Says Pelosi:

"I have perfect confidence in my ability to do this job," "They're not electing me because of my ideology or my gender." (She's the first female leader in history.) "I know I can lead the Democrats into a consensus on issues so the Republicans can't mischaracterize what we're doing."

Folks are already asking:

Should the Democratic Party re-fashion itself “Republican-lite” as it reorganizes and seeks to regain political control?

Should Democrats move to the middle?

Or should they move left and re-energize their base?

The middle seems to me the most likely road to success. Republicans are hoping she veers left. Of course, that wouldn't be prudent since it seems that the country lurched to the right during the Nov. elections. And, people seem to be tired of extremist left wing factions.

But, is that really the case? Another spin may be that the Republicans have done a great job crafting their rethoric as to camouflage their real intentions, threreby causing more supporters to flock to their camps.

Many decisions have yet to be made.

Whatever direction Pelosi takes, she must transform the Democrats from their current, dejected state into a team that is hungry for victory.