Lady GaGa meets THE Queen.

I love this picture.

All About Broadway

One of my best friends is taking questions through Sunday, Feb. 22 at The New York Times regarding his book, Broadway Musicals. Please go leave a question or buy the book at Amazon.com.

Here is the question that I left, but somehow I don't think the moderators will post it:

Long time reader, first-time writer. I am a big fan of both of you. With the economics of putting on a show so high now, will it be possible to actually hire real talent instead of former TV stars with no theater experience trying to restart their career? As a corollary, do you have any great anecdotes about back stage drama with such stars as Liza Minnelli that you can share? Thank you.

UPDATE: It was posted.

It's a firesale

don't miss this.

Big News Day

It's about time. Who knew it was this bad. The recorded conversations of the first lady of Illinois are the best

This is so inappropriate....

but, Rosie O'Donnell made a movie (Rosie can act?) a few years ago, Riding the Bus with My Sister, for TV. In the movie, Rosie played a developmentally challenged person, and I can't say that she "acted" the part well.

I came across a site this morning that actually has a soundboard of Rosie from the movie. It provides one with hours of entertainment.

You know...

things are really bad when there is gun fire in the Waldorf-Astoria Hotel in New York City. There was a robbery in the jewelry store next door, but this really is shocking. Crime always increases during a recession and if the type and location of the crime is any indication, this is going to be a rough recession.

Alaska

Senator Ted Stevens was re-elected yesterday to the Senate. An 84-year-old man who was just convicted of lying about gifts (government corruption).

I need to get this in writing. Senator Stevens will resign over the next two months and Governor Palin will appoint herself to the seat.

UPDATE
Alaska law does not allow an appointment by the Governor to fill this seat because Frank Murkowski (Governor prior to Sarah Palin, upon being elected Governor resigned his own Senate seat and appointed his Daughter to his fill his vacancy). If Ted Stevens were to resign, there would be a special election. But, Sarah Palin could resign as Governor and ask the Lt. Governor to appoint her to the vacant Senate.

Newspapers are too Liberal

The Ombudsman for the Washington Post, Deborah Howell, wrote her weekly article yesterday about why newspapers are losing money. The reason: they are too liberal. Glenn Greenwald wrote a great post about this yesterday.

The entire thesis of this article is wrong. Newspapers may be losing readers for all of the reasons that she mentioned, but the most influential reason they are losing readers (in print) is the internet. Very few people under the age of 30 read any newspapers in print. Nor, do they have a land-line phone (only cell phones). And, as these people age, this is going to continuing growing. Newspapers as is are a dinosaur and are dying. If News organizations use ad revenue from print as their main business model, they will not make enough money to turn a profit. In fact, the trajectory is downward on revenue, so they may not even make any revenue let alone profit.

And, how did Deborah Howell determine that the Washington Post is too liberal? She came to this sound scientific reasoning on the number of emails she gets complaining about the liberal bais the Washington Post has. You would think she would alread know that there are very well organized PR campaigns to flood the inbox of the likes of Deborah Howell with emails where the sender writes how liberal the WP is. Just using the number of emails that one gets on a certain topic is not scientific at all. That is the same as using all of my friends or coworkers as a scientific survey. It is not reality.

And, this idea that for a newspaper to be objective and correct, it should offend people on the left and right doesn't make any sense. What about the Iraq war coverage? And, not the lead up to war, but the actual coverage, especially in 2004. The right basically was highly critical of "objective" coverage and publishing pictures of the dead or their names. People on the right (or a very vocal small percentage of people) seem to be upset when the truth is printed about the right and it's not favorable. People on the left (or a very vocal small percentage of people) get upset when stories are printed about the right and they aren't truthful.

Progressives are willing to hold all sides accountable and publish the truth. Think about it.