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Sheldon Adelson’s Terrible Horrible No Good Very Bad Day

July 16, 2012 /1 Comment/in /by

Pro Publica and PBS’s Frontline are out today with a joint blockbuster report on suspected corrupt dealings that casino magnate Sheldon Adelson–the largest donor to pro-Republican and pro-Mitt Romney Super Pacs–may have engaged in to get his largest gambling parlor built, in the Chinese territory of Macau. An executive and a senior attorney in Adelson’s company warned against trying to unduly influence the decisions of a Chinese government official with large payments, but according to the story, more than $700,000 was paid to the official anyway. Now, Adelson and his company are under investigation by the Justice Dept. and the SEC for possible violations of the Federal Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA). I heard reports about the Pro Publica/Frontline scoop on “All Things Considered,” with Lowell Bergman, one of three reporters on the piece, the others being Matt Isaacs, and Stephen Engelberg. On The Rachel Maddow Show, Engelberg was a guest.

But that strong dose of traditional investigative reporting is the least of what is about to hit Mr. Adelson, not by a longshot: The irrepressible Sarah Silverman has prepared some new comedic and political mischief for her co-religionist Sheldon Adelson. According to TechPresident’s Nick Judd, in a piece headlined, “Sarah Silverman Uses YouTube, Bikini Bottoms to Kickstart an Online Anti-Adelson Campaign“

“Sometime in the next two or three days, an ankles-in-the-air Sarah Silverman will probably appear in your Facebook news feed with a political stunt video designed to hijack the 21st-century media cycle as we now understand it. If casino mogul Sheldon Adelson would just stop giving money to super PACs supporting Mitt Romney’s candidacy, she says in a new video, she will put on bikini underwear and perform a sex act with him that is so far out of its normal context—the video hypes it up with the tagline “traditional lesbian sex”—as to make it almost-but-not-quite acceptable to describe to a family audience.”

For those who recall Silverman’s 2008 campaign video, “The Great Schlep,” this latest effort promises to inject a welcome hit of serious humor in to the presidential campaign. I can’t imagine that Pro Publica/Frontline and Sarah Silverman coordinated their efforts, but I bet they couldn’t be happier with the coincidence of their two efforts coming out within days of each other. Regarding Adelson’s free-spending efforts to elect Mitt Romney, it must be said that a Romney victory in November would probably spell be the end of the investigations and possible prosecution of wrongdoing at Adelson’s company. That’s quite a way to potentially buy yourself a stay-out-of-jail card–by yourself a new president and a new justice department. For all her bawdy humor, Silverman is clearly trying to influence the public discussion over this, as the website for her effort, http://scissorsheldon.com/, also includes a page headlined, Who is the $100 Million Man?

Library Voices, Kicking it up in Quebec City

July 16, 2012 /0 Comments/in , /by

I love the music of Canadian power pop septet Library Voices, and in the past year have twice had the pleasure of hearing them play live. The first time was last November when they played the Knitting Factory in Brooklyn with the six-piece outfit Ohbijou*, a show I wrote about in the early weeks of this blog. The second time was this past April when they played Pianos on the Lower East Side with Yukon Blonde, when the photos accompanying this post were shot.

Library Voices play their power pop with an exuberant intensity that I’ve found a great joy to take in. In my post last fall, I wrote they have “a brash, fun sound with vibrant catchy hooks, bookish song titles and literary-minded lyrics by synth player Mike Dawson (‘Reluctant Readers Make Reluctant Lovers,’ ‘If Raymond Carver Were Born in the 90s,’ ‘Prime Minister’s Daughter’), and a very athletic performing style.” Among the foremost of the athletes on stage is bassist Eoin Hickey-Cameron, a big man with a great personality who in a photo shown here utterly dwarfs me! Eoin jumps in place while playing his instrument, which he does with great abandon. It is for good reason that Library Voices got a lot of votes in last year’s CBC Radio 3 Bucky Awards in the “Best Live Band” category, including mine.

I was delighted to read today that over the past weekend Library Voices played a festival in Quebec City, far from their prairie base in Regina, Saskatchewan. And, according to Mark Teo of Exclaim magazine, the show they played at the Festival d’été was one for the ages. Teo writes their “eager energy — more befitting of a hardcore act — translated into scintillating pop, converting ‘If Raymond Carver Were Born in the ’90s’ and ‘Generation Handclap’ into insta-memorable shout-alongs. And when they closed with the Misfits’ ‘Where Eagles Dare,’ it became official: Library Voices owned the funnest set of the Festival d’été.” About Eoin, he adds, “Bassist Eoin Hickey-Cameron pogoed as if he were in Youth of Today.” Teo’s terrific review is only a few paragraphs, and really worth reading at this link.

* Ohbijou is a great band too. In my post last November, I described them as playing a kind of “space jam with soaring notes and lyrical interludes with great vocals by sisters Casey and Jenny Mecija, who also play guitar and violin respectively.” In the last photo in the gallery along with this post, I’m pictured with Jenny, who happens to be Eoin Hickey-Cameron’s girlfriend.

Alamo Drafthouse Cinema Coming to NYC!

July 15, 2012 /3 Comments/in , , /by

July 17 Update–A Note to Great Gray Bridge Readers: A reader of my blog saw the post below and thought it’s possible that Alamo Drafthouse Cinema may not come to the Metro Theater in NY after all, that it may not happen. I agree there’s certainly been no improvement to the site yet and I concede the news was reported in Huff Post more than 4 months ago. There’s a possibility something could go wrong, but I doubt it. I’ve found the Huff Post story was triggered by a blog post on the Alamo site. I just don’t think they’d have announced the Metro renovation without a proper deal. We shall see soon, if they really are planning to open in 2013.

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I was excited to discover that Austin, TX–based Alamo Drafthouse Cinema–an innovative chain of movie houses that combines film and food–are going to renovate and reclaim the handsome Metro Theater on Broadway at 100th Street in Manhattan, which has been neglected and empty for nearly a decade. This is great news for the Upper West Side! Coincidentally, the Metro Theater marquee is featured in the series of urban marquees that my wife Kyle Gallup has recently been painting, as seen here. Following Kyle’s piece is shot of the Metro’s Art Deco facade, in a photo borrowed from the Alamo Drafthouse Cinema Facebook page, which you may ‘like.’

Alamo Drafthouse Cinema is also opening a location in Yonkers, just north of New York City, so they’re clearly aiming for a major presence here in the metropolitan area. On the web page for the Yonkers location, they are already soliciting local applicants for positions with the company.

Brave Woman Fends off Grizzly Bear

July 15, 2012 /1 Comment/in /by

Over at the Great Gray Bridge tumblr, I’ve posted an article and a photo of an Alaskan woman who, brandishing only with a walking stick and a spray bottle of insect repellent, prevented an aggressive grizzly bear from attacking her, her nieces, and her husky dog. H/t journalist @BrendanKoerner who first tweeted about this story. From the amazing story by reporter Tim Mowry:

“If somebody had told me I would hold off one or possibly two bears with a walking stick and a can of natural insect repellent I would have told them they were crazy, but you do what you gotta do,” she said. “I wasn’t going to let that bear eat my dog and I definitely wasn’t going to let it eat my nieces.”

 

Mitt’s Friday the 13th TV Adventure–Weak Talk & Condescension

July 14, 2012 /0 Comments/in /by

In the round of network interviews Mitt Romney sat for yesterday, which he and his campaign doubtless hoped would quell the growing demands that he reveal more about his Bain years and his opaque finances, he uttered some really weak stuff that remind me of the moment in the primaries when he suggested people should talk only in “quiet rooms” about his business dealings. This is what he said to Wolf Blitzer yesterday.

“I know there will always be calls for more. People always want to get more,” Mr. Romney said on CNN. “And, you know, we’re putting out what is required plus more that is not required. And those are the two years that people are going to have. And that’s–that’s all that’s necessary for people to understand something about my finances.”

“People always want to get more.” Such blazing condescension! “Understand something about my finances” Is that all the media and the people are entitled to learn, something?

Do Mitt and his advisors really believe this weak talk is going to quiet the demands for more information? They may wish it were so, but it ain’t gonna happen. Surely, over the next four months, other issues will take center stage but I predict that between now and Election Day this is going to be a continuing feature of the campaign. It will hover over Mitt’s campaign like a dark cloud continually threatening a downpour, and the people underneath it will never know when they’re going to get drenched.

Best TV Ad of the Campaign Season

July 14, 2012 /1 Comment/in /by

The most damaging thing a candidate can to his political opponent is make him seem ridiculous, teasing him in such a way as to reduce his gravitas. We’ve seen that Mitt Romney always tries to maintain his gravitas, and this new ad by the Obama campaign utterly punctures that veneer of seriousness, using Mitt’s singing voice, not to mention making a fair point about Mitt’s business dealings.

#FridayReads, July 13–“The Double Game” by Dan Fesperman

July 13, 2012 /1 Comment/in /by

#FridayReads, July 13–Finished The Double Game, a brilliant and compelling espionage novel by Dan Fesperman. I loved the end as much as the first half. The mark of quality here is defined by the appendix of 218 books at the back of Fesperman’s book that he read and drew from in writing his latest work. As I posted in my #FridayReads last week, “Terrific dialogue, characters, and use of dozens of classic espionage books as clues and plot points. Sonny Mehta’s letter on the back of the galley is right: ‘For anyone who loves a good spy thriller–and who has loved them for years–this will be a treat.’”

This Week at The Great Gray Bridge

July 13, 2012 /0 Comments/in , , , /by

In the past week I’ve blogged about an urban skunk I encountered in Riverside Park;  a great new espionage novel called The Double Game by Dan Fesperman; the shameful lack of recognition for women in tech, as revealed by Change the Ratio’s Rachel Sklar; a well-deserved honor for Jim Tully: American Writer, Hollywood Brawler, Irish Rover, my fave biography of 2011; the lack of public transportation for wage-earners which means they often can’t get to jobs they would otherwise be able to fill; a new genetics study that may shed light on how the Americas were peopled in prehistoric times; a personal essay I’m contributing to a new book called Rust Belt Chic: The Cleveland Anthology; Mitt Romney’s most secret offshore investment, Mitt and Ann’s Jet-Ski vacation, and a NY Times Editorial that hit Mitt. I also put up a guest post by my son Ewan Turner, a blended short story that fuses an actual incident from Bob Dylan’s career with an imagined episode involving the singer.

Over at The Great Gray Bridge tumblr, my site for quick hits and diverting photography, I put up a photo of Donald Trump that the Scots must find hilarious (h/t TPM and Zuma Press/Newscom and a post about the personal effects of lawman Eliot Ness, which have been put for auction.