Christiern

I don't think it matters to "these guys," they are thieves.

Whew!

Interesting that neither Conrad nor Dan G. watch "West Wing." It is well-written, superbly produced series with a first-class cast--I would think that, alone would warrant tuning in. I sometimes watch murder mysteries and yet I don't support murder. Closed minds keep so much good stuff out.

He was, IMO, one of the best in West Wing's stellar cast.--CA 'West Wing' actor John Spencer dies at 58 Actor John Spencer, from the television series "The West Wing," gives a thumbs up as he arrives for the 59th Annual Golden Globe Awards in Beverly Hills, Calif., in this Jan. 20, 2002, file photo. Spencer, 58, died of a heart attack Friday, Dec. 15, 2005, at a Los Angeles hospital, his publicist Ron Hofmann said. (AP Photo/Kevork Djansezian) By LYNN ELBER AP Television Writer | December 16, 2005 LOS ANGELES --John Spencer, who played a tough and dedicated politico on "The West Wing" who survived a serious illness to run for vice president, died of a heart attack Friday. He was 58. Spencer died after being admitted to a Los Angeles hospital during the night, said his publicist, Ron Hofmann. He would have been 59 on Tuesday. He was "one of those rare combinations of divinely gifted and incredibly generous," said actor Richard Schiff, who played Toby Ziegler on the NBC series. "There are very few personal treasures that you put in your knapsack to carry with you for the rest of your life, and he's one of those," Schiff said. He said Spencer had been struggling with health issues but seemed to have rebounded. Spencer played Leo McGarry, the savvy and powerful chief of staff to President Josiah "Jed" Bartlet (Martin Sheen). In a sad parallel to life, Spencer's character suffered a heart attack that forced him to give up his White House job. McGarry recovered and was picked as a running mate for Democratic presidential contender Matt Santos, played by Jimmy Smits; the campaign against Republican Arnold Vinick (Alan Alda) has been a central theme for the drama this season. "John was an uncommonly good man, an exceptional role model and a brilliant actor," said Aaron Sorkin, who created the series, and Tommy Schlamme, one of the original executive producers, in a joint statement. "We feel privileged to have known him and worked with him. He'll be missed and remembered every day by his many, many friends," they said. Actress Allison Janney, C.J. Cregg on the series, described Spencer as a consummate professional actor. "Everyone adored him," she said. NBC and producer Warner Bros. Television praised Spencer's talent but did not address how his death would affect the Emmy Award-winning series, in production on its seventh season. Spencer, who also starred on "L.A. Law" as attorney Tommy Mullaney, received an Emmy Award for his performance on "The West Wing" in 2002 and was nominated four other times for the series. The actor, whose world-weary countenance was perfect for the role of McGarry, mirrored his character in several ways: Both were recovering alcoholics and both, Spencer once said, were driven. "Like Leo, I've always been a workaholic, too," he told The Associated Press in a 2000 interview. "Through good times and bad, acting has been my escape, my joy, my nourishment. The drug for me, even better than alcohol, was acting." Spencer grew up in Paterson, N.J., the son of blue-collar parents. With his enrollment at the Professional Children's School in Manhattan at age 16, he was sharing classes with the likes of Liza Minnelli and budding violinist Pinchas Zukerman. As a teenager, he landed a recurring role on "The Patty Duke Show" as the boyfriend of English twin Cathy. Stage and film work followed. Then his big break: playing Harrison Ford's detective sidekick in the 1990 courtroom thriller "Presumed Innocent." That role led to his hiring for the final four years of "L.A. Law." Spencer played a streetwise lawyer on the David E. Kelley drama that was in sharp contrast to the show's otherwise glamorous cast and setting. After attending the Manhattan performing arts school, Spencer studied at Fairleigh Dickenson University. He then began working on stage in New York and in regional theaters, in plays including David Mamet's "Lakeboat" and Tennessee Williams' "The Glass Menagerie." Spencer won an Obie Award for the 1981 off-Broadway production of "Still Life," about a Vietnam veteran, and received a Drama Desk nomination for "The Day Room." His made his feature film debut with a small role in "War Games," which was followed by roles in "Sea of Love" and "Black Rain." Spencer said his work in "Presumed Innocent" represented a "watershed role." In recent years, he worked both in studio and independent films, including "The Rock," "The Negotiator," "Albino Alligator," "Lesser Prophets" and "Cold Heart." Spencer, an only child, is survived by "cousins, aunts, uncles, and wonderful friends," Hofmann said.

Here's lookin' at ya and wishing you a...

Rosco nails it. BTW, perhaps I am wrong, but it occurred to me that comics of the raw, biting, in-your-face variety that Lenny Bruce, Richard, and Carlin were might be uniquely American. I have great admiration and respect for British comedians (have also worked with Kenneth's Williams and Horne, Marty Feldman, and others), but their approach is very different. The Goon Show and Monty Python had me roaring with laughter, as does the current Little Britain--sometimes outrageous social commentary, to be sure, but still more polite. Can anyone think of a non-American comic who has taken it as far over the fence of acceptability as the ones I mentioned? I should add that I am in some agreement with Stanley C. when it comes to not finding humorous the "comedy" that relies solely on four-letter shock value--Def Jam, etc. What with women being "in trouble" rather than pregnant, and people being stricken with "the big C," American were conditioned to veiling reality. U.S. audiences went for decades without hearing such words uttered publicly by performers, so they continue to shocked into nervous giggles when they do. My European upbringing has allowed me to see this from both sides and I recall us (Danes) thinking how sexual repression had created the "panty raids," and how it was unthinkable that such nonsense would take place outside of the U.S. The "this"-word and "that"-word practice of avoiding bluntness is very silly, IMO, and it just proves that we are not as liberated as we would like to think we are. Yes, I know it's a matter of PC, but while I am all for tact, I think PC is too often an insult to our intelligence, and that it stunts our mental growth. There, I feel so much better.

Sock it tome?

One of my favorite Pryor moments came when he was being interviewed by the world's most asinine TV hostess, Barbara Walters. Walters: There is a word you use and I don't understand why. Its very difficult for me to say. Uh, (lowers voice), nigger. Pryor: Oh, you say it very well--sounds like you've said it before!

It is a matter of priorities, Conrad. I write about Bush and the Sleeza because they pose a current threat to our country and other parts of the world--I don't know if you have been following the news for the past 3 years, but they are sending thousands of young people to their death, dimming the futures of Americans (young and old), and--in general--making life miserable for millions of people who have not the means to withstand their faux-Christian crusade. These are also the people whose ineptitude and callous class discrimination is making many Iraqis long for the return of a brutal dictator. You should check it out. Once they have been de-fanged, I will refocus on jazz and more pleasant subjects. Now, was that so hard to understand?

Don't be so disappointed, Conrad, I do not doubt that you will have a future opportunity to deplore anti-Jewish remarks. It is, I sometimes think, your raison d'etre. For now, however, why complain over things not said and, instead comment on Amiri's assessments of Crouch and Murray? I think he is right on the mark, how about you? Or is anything Amiri says now nullified by a controversial poem of old? Interesting quotes, Marcello. Interesting, too, that Crouch and Murray are no longer on speaking terms.

Stanley doesn't have a sense of much, including humor. He is a very insincere opportunist, so I am not sure if what he writes is what he really believes, but going against flow has worked for him. It is a tried and true ploy that a late friend of mine, Orde Coombs, used to get bylines back in the 1970s. Orde, however, was not the total sellout that Wynton shill Crouch is.

Poor Stanley becomes more twisted by the hour.--CA Monday, December 12th, 2005 Pryor's flawed legacy Richard Pryor's world was filled with prostitutes, pimps, winos and those others of undesirable ilk. This past Saturday Richard Pryor left this life and bequeathed to our culture as much darkness as he did the light his extraordinary talent made possible. When we look at the remarkable descent this culture has made into smut, contempt, vulgarity and the pornagraphic, those of us who are not willing to drink the Kool-Aid marked "all's well," will have to address the fact that it was the combination of confusion and comic genius that made Pryor a much more negative influence than a positive one. I do not mean positive in the way Bill Cosby was when his television show redefined situation comedy by turning away from all of the stereotypes of disorder and incompetence that were then and still are the basic renditions of black American life in our mass media. Richard Pryor was not that kind of a man. His was a different story. Pryor was troubled and he had seen things that so haunted him that the comedian found it impossible to perform and ignore the lower-class shadow worlds he had known so well, filled with pimps, prostitutes, winos and abrasive types of one sort or another. The vulgarity of his material, and the idea a "real" black person was a foul-mouthed type was his greatest influence. It was the result of seeing the breaking of "white" convention as a form of "authentic" definition. Pryor reached for anything that would make white America uncomfortable and would prop up a smug belief among black Americans that they were always "more cool" and more ready to "face life" than the members of majority culture. Along the way, Pryor made too many people feel that the N word was open currency and was more accurate than any other word used to describe or address a black person. In the dung piles of pimp and gangster rap we hear from slime meisters like Snoop Dogg and 50 Cent, the worst of Pryor's influence has been turned into an aspect of the new minstrelsy in which millions of dollars are made by "normalizing" demeaning imagery and misogyny. What is so unfortunate is that the heaviest of Pryor's gifts was largely ignored by so many of those who praised the man when he was alive and are now in the middle of deifying him. The pathos and the frailty of the human soul alone in the world or insecure or looking for something of meaning in a chaotic environment was a bit too deep for all of the simpleminded clowns like Andrew Dice Clay or those who thought that mere ethnicity was enough to define one as funny, like the painfully square work of Paul Rodriguez. Of course, Russell Simmons' Def Comedy Jam is the ultimate coon show update of human cesspools, where "cutting edge" has come to mean traveling ever more downward in the sewer. In essence, Pryor stunned with his timing, his rhythm, his ability to stand alone and fill the stage with three-dimensional characters through his remarkably imaginative gift for an epic sweep of mimicry. That nuanced mimicry crossed ethnic lines, stretched from young to old, and gave poignancy to the comedian's revelations about the hurts and the terrors of life. The idea of "laughing to keep from crying" was central to his work and has been diligently avoided by those who claim to owe so much to him. As he revealed in his last performance films, Pryor understood the prison he had built for himself and the shallow definitions that smothered his audience's understanding of the humanity behind his work. But, as they say, once the barn door has been opened, you cannot get all of the animals to return by whistling. So we need to understand the terrible mistakes this man of comic genius made and never settle for a standard that is less than what he did at his very best, which was as good as it has ever gotten.

That's the real problem. The Mac OS is in many ways way ahead of Windows, so people who are used to the latter have a problem with the former. Action that requires several steps in the Windows environments are often a single click or drag on a Mac. I used to give instructions on the use of Macs to employees of companies that had made the switch from PC. The problem was often that the former PC users were looking to do complex maneuvers and simply couldn't imagine that anything was as easy as the Mac OS had made it. Today's Windows has incorporated many of the Mac innovations, but Apple still keeps ahead, and only very rarely does an idea flow the other way.

Jim remembers correctly, it's under the old (rainbow) Apple logo.

If it's an older Mac, your father needs to find PrintMonitor (in the Applications menu), bring it up, and select the unwanted files, then hit delete. Note to Jim: It's really not so stupid. There have been many occasions when I took advantage of this feature. The PrintMonitor is only found in old OS versions. With OS X, it became an application called Print Center and it is particularly handy when one has more than one printer hooked up--as I do.

It was around 1965 and I had a weekly all-night radio show ("The Inside") that started at midnight on Saturdays. The show was an eclectic mix of music and comedy, an audio collage with unexpected mood shifts. From time to time, comedians contributed to the show, sometimes live--as in the case of Lenny Bruce and Severn Darden--but mostly via recordings made expressly for the show. One of my faithful listeners was a young lady named Francine. She called me every week during the show and never failed to tell me about her very funny friend, Richard, who could use the exposure and--she guaranteed--would be an asset to the show. I finally agreed to go with Francine and meet Richard at a favorite hang-out if his, a comedy club on the West Side. I thought Richard would be performing there, but he was just hanging, so we caught a couple of stand-up wannabes and went somewhere else for coffee. After that, we just walked around and talked about this and that, but Richard was (too) obviously auditioning, so he tried to inject humor into everything. Tried is the key word here, because it was a strained effort that just didn't get to me. We (Francine, Richard, and I) were wandering around in Central Park when the sun showed up. Richard had a friend who lived on Central Park West and, at his suggestion, we paid a very early morning visit. Great apartment with a balcony facing the park. Richard's friend was, as I gathered, an unofficial agent for him, so the comedy lines continued to flow and our host laughed at Richard's every word, usually followed by "Isn't he great?" At this point, I found myself wondering how I diplomatically could get out of using Richard on my show without hurting him or Francine. As I recall, I took the cowardly route and simply put my decision off. I eventually told Francine that I did not think Richard's comedy was right for my show--she disagreed, but took it well and, presumably, informed Richard. Fast forward a few months. I was on assignment at the Apollo Theater, to interview the Temptations. Richard, who was beginning to attract attention, was the opening act. His routine was very funny, and the Apollo audience--then known for its gloves-off responses--loved it. After the show, I ran into Richard backstage. He asked me if I had caught his act and I told him I had, adding that I thought he was a very funny guy. "Well," he said, with a broad smile, "we win a few and we lose a few!" I am still kicking myself for losing that one.

The same poster has posted this on JC and AAJ, also without giving any source or detail. She's obviously keen on getting word out there. I also hope it isn't true.

I checked his official web site and got this... Ironic, if the report is true.

Yes, many women have hosted news shows, but, IMO, not since Linda Ellerbe has there been a truly informed female anchor with real brains and wit.

Yes, yes, it is Maureen Dowd and she does mention a politician, but let us not get carried away, this time!--CA OP-ED COLUMNIST December 10, 2005 Can Mommy Know Best? By MAUREEN DOWD Can the network nightly news anchor evolve from the Daddy chair to the Mommy chair? Will Americans ever trust a petite, pretty woman in jewel tones to deliver the news as much as they trusted tall men with dark suits and deep voices, like Edward R. Murrow, Walter Cronkite and Tom Brokaw? Can high heels match the venerable trench coat? The network news anchor career path is laden with the same sort of gender tripwires as the one for the presidency. Who do we want to lead us through a crisis? "Does Mommy know best?" a longtime TV industry analyst mused. "If there's a gigantically frightening news event, people want to turn on the TV and see someone guiding them through it. Will they be comfortable with Elizabeth Vargas or even Katie Couric?" Last summer, when ABC needed a replacement for Peter Jennings, I asked a top network executive whether the 43-year-old Ms. Vargas had a shot to be the first woman to get a solo network anchor gig. Shouldn't that barrier have been broken long ago? I mean, women can read off a teleprompter as well as men. At first he sounded optimistic: she is not a news division heavyweight, but she is a lovely, competent Hispanic woman, which could mean a more diverse audience. And she might draw in younger viewers, instead of the dinosaur evening news demographic that mostly attracts sponsors like Viagra and Depends. Within 30 seconds, though, the executive got jittery. "I know this is going to sound really sexist," he admitted with breathtaking candor, "but if there were another 9/11, I'm not sure if she has the gravitas to hold that anchor chair. ... Maybe it's not even sex. Maybe it's age. I just think we'd need someone with a little gray in their hair." (The network pushed Ms. Vargas out of the anchor seat in favor of Charlie Gibson when terrorists bombed London twice in July 2005, even though his day job was doing fluff on "Good Morning America.") I pointed out that Brian Williams was only three years older than Ms. Vargas, and not noticeably gray. Network executives hire babes, not old ladies with wrinkles. Now that high-definition TV makes faces with plastic surgery look so weird, the women will have to be even younger. "He's not 50?" the exec asked about Mr. Williams. "But doesn't he have some gray? ... Maybe we could let Elizabeth do it Monday through Friday and then someone else could do it if there was a crisis." I had to laugh. They'd allow a woman to present the news as long as there wasn't any news. If serious news breaks out, send for the guy in pants. So this week, it all came to pass. Despite the track record of the other two women who had to co-anchor the evening news with resentful men - Barbara Walters and Connie Chung - ABC teamed Ms. Vargas with the pretty-boy android Bob Woodruff. TV and newspaper moguls are trying a less authoritarian news format. Brian Williams, who broke out of android status with his brilliant coverage of the administration's attention deficit disorder during Katrina, blogs to show he's a man of the people. Anderson Cooper knocked off Aaron Brown by emoting during Katrina, and being fetching enough to make People's Sexiest Man Alive list. Les Moonves, head of CBS, is looking for pizazz. "On the one hand," he told The Times's Lynn Hirschberg, "we could have a newscast like 'The Big Breakfast' in England, where women give the news in lingerie. Or there's 'Naked News,' which is on cable in England. I saw a clip of it. It's a woman giving the news as she's getting undressed. And then, on the other hand, you could have two boring people behind a desk. Our newscast has to be somewhere in between." Mr. Moonves has been wooing Katie Couric to succeed Dan Rather - she seems itchy to move on from making eggnog with Martha Stewart. Like Barbara Walters, she'd get withering scrutiny for earning a record-breaking paycheck (even though a man probably wouldn't). But even if Katie breaks this barrier, presumably with her clothes on, will it be an important milestone for women? She is already the most important breadwinner for her news division, with morning chat shows outearning nightly newscasts. By the time women get to take over something - like Hollywood or Bush administration diplomacy - the thing is already devalued beyond recognition. TV evening news is so feminized and soft-focus now - brimming with features on animals, diets and new "age defying" skin treatments - that Katie may forget she's not still working the sunrise crowd.

To David ... ...and many, many more!. with thanks for the Night Lights.

Roxio's Toast is what I use--excellent (on a Mac, at least)

I still have an old percolator. This one once belonged to the Malcolm Forbes household, and it works!

I have tried many different coffee machines, from Cory to Krups--drip, pump, percolate, whatever. I love gadgets, little blinking lights, knobs, buttons, beeps and whistles, but the best coffee I have ever had was made the old-fashiond way. In Denmark, we call it "Madame Blue," although it isn't always that color. It uses a "coffee bag" (that sometimes is suspended with the help of a pair of knitting needles) and is, of course, of the "drip" variety. Perhaps it's the coffee blend, or it may be the water, but this primitive enameled pitcher really produces a superior cup of coffee.

I took these pictures from my window an hour ago...