johnrpierce.info blog

"Representing approximately 50 students at the Law School, the plaintiffs -- the Student/Faculty Alliance for Military Equality and OutLaws, the association of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender students -- are challenging the 1995 Solomon Amendment, which threatens law schools such as Yale's with withdrawal of all federal funds if they deny military recruiters access to the law schools' career offices."

"Bravo's 'Queer Eye for the Straight Guy' returns with new episodes Nov. 18. Later this season, the Fab Five will check in on previous makeover men to see if they've reverted to their slobbery."--Hotline in the Boston Herald.

In Colorado, Howard Dean "declared himself a 'metrosexual' but later admitted, 'I don't know what it means,'" reports NewsMax.com.

October 29, 2003

Camille Paglia said in an interview for salon.com: "As a writer, I'm inspired not just by other writing but by music and art and lines from movies. I think that's what's missing from a lot of blogs. Most bloggers aren't culture critics but political or media junkies preoccupied with pedestrian minutiae and a sophomoric 'gotcha' mentality. I find it depressing and claustrophobic. The Web is a wide open space -- voices on it should have energy and vision. "

October 28, 2003

"U.S. Rep. Jesse Jackson Jr., D-Ill., plans to endorse Democratic presidential candidate Howard Dean," reports nbc5.com.

October 27, 2003

The Harvard Crimson reports that last night a Harvard undergraduate crashed a car into Claverly Hall, a dormitory on Mount Auburn Street in Cambridge. There was damage to the car, but not to the building. The driver was hospitalized with a gash to the head.

Almost all of the reviews of the show The Boy from Oz have loved the star Hugh Jackman but have hated the show, wrote Robin Pogrebin in the New York Times.

At Yale University, dancer Mikhail Baryshnikov recently announced the opening of a new arts center in New York, reports an article in the Yale Daily News.

"The arts center, which will be completed next May, will be a six-story building with a 400-seat theater located on 37th St. and 11th Ave. Baryshnikov said the center will feature programs that focus on the interdisciplinary aspects of art; for example, he said, lighting designers may work with costume designers to learn how lighting design is affected by fabrics.

* * *

"Baryshnikov said he has decided not to be a teacher at the center.

"'I believe education means creating a human bond with the teacher,' Baryshnikov said. '[My former teacher] knew me better than I knew myself. Here, there's no way to create the same personal relationship.'

"The center will begin hosting programs next summer."

--from article by Neil Katsuyama in the Yale Daily News.

I watched most of the movie What Women Want with Mel Gibson and Helen Hunt on television last night. I'll watch the last half hour tonight. I decided to tape the last hour and go to bed at eleven. The movie was better than I had expected from having read the reviews when it first came out in the theatres. Mel Gibson plays an advertising exec who as a result of an accident can hear women's thoughts. Helen Hunt, whom I usually don't like, was actually very good in her role as Gibson's boss.

October 24, 2003

Dennis Kucinich has declined the opportunity to appear on a television broadcast of Chris Matthews' Hardball from Harvard College this fall, the Harvard Crimson reports. The show, on MSNBC, reaches millions of viewers. Since Kucinich has never, so far as I know, had more than one percent support in polls relating to the presidential campaign, it seems like a very stupid move, no matter what biases Chris Matthews may be perceived by Kucinich as having.

Today Amazon.com begins a new feature, "Search Inside the Book," which allows searching the complete text of more than 120,000 books. However, Amazon requires a credit card on file for you to be able to view the pages of the books. There is nothing wrong with the card of mine that they have on file, but I repeatedly got a message that the card could not be "verified."

"A poll released [today] gave Howard Dean a 23-point lead over John Kerry among likely voters in the New Hampshire primary.
"Dean, the former Vermont governor, was at 40 percent in the Zogby poll, while Kerry, the Massachusetts senator, was at 17 percent. Dean led Kerry 30-20 percent in the last Zogby poll in the state, taken in late September."

--from an article at thebostonchannel.com.

October 13, 2003

"Democrat Dennis Kucinich, the liberal four-term congressman who has been steadfast in his opposition to the Iraq war, formally launched his long-shot bid for the White House Monday.

* * *

"Kucinich, who has been campaigning for months, made the announcement in his hometown of Cleveland, the first stop of a 12-state tour that will include Michigan, New Hampshire, Wisconsin and Iowa."

--from an Associated Press article in the Seattle Post-Intelligencer.

October 12, 2003

Part of Columbus Day parade on State Street, Boston.

October 11, 2003

"Flush with cash after a record-breaking fund-raising effort, the presidential campaign of Howard Dean is raising the stakes in Iowa and New Hampshire, where Dean victories could cripple a pair of major rivals.

"Dean's team is increasing the number of field operatives in those states by 50 percent after reaping about $14.8 million for the quarter ending Sept. 30. In Iowa alone, the campaign is nearly doubling its staff.

"The money that Dean raised during the quarter could be at least $10 million more than that raised by his closest Democratic rivals."

--from an article by Brian C. Mooney in the Boston Globe.

"Rush Limbaugh, the nation's most popular radio talk-show host with an audience of 20 million people a week, announced yesterday that he was addicted to prescription painkillers and would check into a rehabilitation center.

* * *

"Mr. Limbaugh, who has regularly told his listeners that drug users should be jailed, said he began taking painkillers after spinal surgery in the 1990's."

--from an article by James Barron in the New York Times of October 11, 2003.

"You could hire Rush Limbaugh's housekeeper, or you can elect me president of the United States."-- Senator John Kerry, on how to get lower prescription drug costs, as quoted in the Boston Globe.

"New accusations have surfaced in the past year against current and former Catholic priests who served as chaplains in the military.

"The new allegations bring to more than two dozen the number of Catholic military chaplains accused of sexual abuse, according to a review of church, military, and court records."--from an Associated Press article in the Boston Globe.

I imagine that their motto was, "Don't ask, don't tell!"

"Authorities believe that the Roman Catholic priest who was abruptly removed from his parish this week had a sexual relationship with Robert R. Nolin Jr., the convicted child rapist accused of murdering 20-yer-old Jonathan D. Wessner on a Falmouth[, Massachusetts,] beach late last month, according to a source with knowledge of the homicide investigation.

"The Rev. Bernard R. Kelly was pastor of St. Joseph's Parish in Woods Hole until Tuesday, when Bishop George W. Coleman of the Catholic Diocese of Fall River suspended the 70-year-old Kelly 'due to the seriousness' of his role in the murder investigation and Kelly's apparent refusal to cooperate with authorities.

"Kelly, according to the source, has admitted to investigators that he was having a sexual relationship with the 39-year-old Nolin, who worked as a handyman at St. Joseph's and served an 18-year prison term for the 1982 rape of a child in Lowell."

--from an article by Anne Barnard and John Ellement in the Boston Globe.

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