This American Life’s great episode from 5/9/08, “The Giant Pool of Money,” is one of the best, clearest explanations of the current housing crisis you’re likely to find. Basically, short-term greed overcame any consideration of long-term consequences. Funny how that works. (But glibertarians and fat cats will still tell you all regulations, even those that would have prevented this conduct a decade or so ago, are bad.)

Rick Perlstein discusses his new book Nixonland on Fresh Air, with some great anecdotes. (Plus, Mark Evanier discusses his new book about comic book icon Jack “King” Kirby, true believers!)

Reverend Carroll Pickett’s interview on Fresh Air is thought-provoking stuff:

Reverend Carroll Pickett was the death-house chaplain at the Walls prison unit in Huntsville, Texas for 13 years. During his tenure, he ministered to 95 inmates executed by lethal injection. He is the subject of a new documentary, At the Death House Door.

“Rape in the Military” is PBS show Now’s look at a very troubling trend that QuestionGirl covered not long ago (and BH has covered for some time).

Democracy Now! recaps everything known to date about Pat Tillman’s death, and for Memorial Day, ran another piece on Winter Soldier.

Robert Scheer discusses his new book The Pornography of Power on The Politics of Culture, from L.A.-based NPR station KCRW (my regular listening destination). Plenty of dissection of the neocons and the military-industrial complex.

(Cross-posted at Vagabond Scholar)

from various sources

Celebrities paid to heat up Vegas clubs

LAS VEGAS - Three years ago, as Paris Hilton was about to turn 24, the celebutante got a sense of her worth to the nightclub industry in Las Vegas. She had celebrated her previous three birthdays at Light, the Bellagio hotel-casino nightclub run by the Light Group. But for her 24th, another company swooped in with an offer that trumped the standard private jet to and from L.A., a free stay at a luxury suite, a sumptuous dinner and, of course, free booze.

The hotel heiress would get a big paycheck - Light was told $200,000 - just to party, but it had to be at PURE, a rival nightclub at Caesars Palace run by the PURE Management Group.

Her people let the Light Group know that their former deal was off.

Film academy sues to stop sale of Oscars

LOS ANGELES - The Motion Picture Academy of Arts & Sciences is suing to stop the public sale of two Academy Awards given to silent film star Mary Pickford.

In the lawsuit filed Wednesday, the academy claims it has the right to buy the historic statuettes and one owned by her late husband for $10 each.

The academy contends an heir to the Oscars demanded $500,000 for one statuette alone in July - an offer the academy refused.

Pickford won the Academy Award for best actress in 1930 and was given an honorary Oscar in 1975.

Houston, Brown battle over child custody

SANTA ANA, Calif. - Bobby Brown went to court Friday to seek custody of his and Whitney Houston’s teenage daughter.

Brown and his attorney asked Orange County Superior Court to dismiss a default judgment issued in December that granted Houston sole custody of 14-year-old Bobbi Kristina.

Brown wasn’t given enough time to respond to Houston’s divorce filings, his attorney Stacy D. Phillips said: “He didn’t have his day in court.”

Judge Claudia Silbar ordered Brown and Houston to argue their case at an Oct. 22 hearing before she decides who will get custody.

‘Family Ties’ star gets probation

BOULDER, Colo., Aug. 31 (UPI) — Brian Bonsall, a one-time “Family Ties” star, was sentenced to probation in a Colorado Court after pleading guilty to assaulting his girlfriend while drunk.

Before being sentenced, Bonsall told Boulder County District Judge Lael Montgomery he has gone to rehab, is sober and “happy as ever,” The Boulder Daily Camera reported Friday.

Bonsall, 25, played the younger son, Andy Keaton, on the series from 1986-89.

compiled from various sources
by Jim Swanson

Reports: Owen Wilson drops out of movie

LOS ANGELES - Owen Wilson, hospitalized after an apparent suicide attempt, has dropped out of the upcoming ensemble comedy “Tropic Thunder,” film industry trade papers reported Wednesday.

Wilson will not appear in the DreamWorks movie, already six weeks into production in Hawaii, Daily Variety and The Hollywood Reporter said, citing sources they didn’t identify.

The decision was characterized as a mutual agreement between director Ben Stiller and the 38-year-old actor, who was taken to the hospital Sunday after police responded to the report of a suicide attempt at his Santa Monica home.

The Hollywood Reporter said Wilson had a minor part in the movie, which stars Jack Black and Robert Downey Jr. and revolves around a group of actors who find themselves in the middle of a war.

No-Contest Plea in Director’s Death

A driver involved in a head-on crash that killed “A Christmas Story” director Bob Clark and his son pleaded no contest Wednesday to two counts of gross vehicular manslaughter while intoxicated.

Hector Velazquez-Nava, a 24-year-old Mexican national, entered his plea before Superior Court Judge Keith Schwartz and faces up to six years in state prison when he is sentenced Sept. 27.

Prosecutors said Velazquez-Nava was drunk when he steered his sport utility vehicle into the wrong lane of Pacific Coast Highway in April, striking Clark’s sedan. The filmmaker and his son, Ariel Hanrath-Clark, 22, died at the scene.

Letterman to Appear on `Oprah’

David Letterman will make his first appearance on “The Oprah Winfrey Show” next month, another sign the talk’show titans have buried the hatchet after a rift that lasted more than a decade.

Letterman will tape the interview, a rare appearance on someone else’s show, on Sept. 10 at Madison Square Garden in New York, Winfrey’s production company announced Wednesday.

Their reconciliation began in 2005 when Winfrey appeared on CBS’ “Late Show with David Letterman.” It was Winfrey’s first guest appearance with Letterman, though she twice appeared on his NBC show before the comic jumped networks in 1993.

Faith Hill New `Sunday’ Football Voice

Faith Hill will sing the opening theme to NBC’s “Sunday Night Football” this season, the network announced Wednesday.

The country star will perform “Waiting All Day for Sunday Night” before each game. The song, which pop singer Pink sang last season, is set to the tune of Joan Jett’s ’80s hit, “I Hate Myself for Loving You.”

“I’m honored to have been asked,” Hill told The Associated Press in a phone interview from her home near Nashville. “I truly am a football fan. Particularly, men find it hard to believe that women can be big fans of football, but I love it. I loved it in junior high and high school, but being married to a man who schedules his life around football games, it makes it a lot easier.”

Mark Cuban, Wayne Newton Try `Dancing’

Is it possible Mark Cuban, Floyd Mayweather Jr. or Wayne Newton can dance? Viewers will find out on the new season of “Dancing With the Stars,” which has assembled another eclectic field of contestants.

Cuban, the billionaire Dallas Mavericks owner, welterweight boxing champ Mayweather and Las Vegas headliner Newton are among the 12 celebrities who will compete when the show returns Sept. 24, ABC announced Wednesday.

The rest of the field:

_ Melanie Brown, aka “Scary Spice” and Mel B.

_ Sabrina Bryan of Disney Channel’s “Cheetah Girls.”

_ Indianapolis 500 champion Helio Castroneves.

_ Actress Jennie Garth (”Beverly Hills, 90210″).

_ Model-actress Josie Maran.

_ Soap star Cameron Mathison (”All My Children”).

_ Singer Marie Osmond.

_ Model Albert Reed.

_ Actress Jane Seymour (”Dr. Quinn, Medicine Woman”).

Xbox 360 repairs will cost Microsoft $1B

SEATTLE - In another setback for Microsoft Corp.’s unprofitable entertainment and devices division, the company says it is planning to spend at least $1 billion to repair serious problems with its Xbox 360 video game console.

Microsoft declined to detail the problems that have caused an onslaught of “general hardware failures” in recent months but said Thursday it will extend the warranty on the consoles to three years.

Gore arrest highlights Rx drug abuse

CHICAGO - Drug abuse experts say the arrest of Al Gore’s son underscores the growing problem of prescription drug abuse among America’s youth. College students use the stimulant Adderall, an attention deficit drug, to get a speedy high or pull all-nighters.

The other drugs police say they found in Al Gore III’s possession - marijuana, Xanax, Valium and Vicodin - also are campus favorites, experts say.

Tony Parker and Eva Longoria get married

PARIS - Professional basketball star Tony Parker married “Desperate Housewives” star Eva Longoria at a civil ceremony in Paris on Friday - a prelude to their expected star’studded weekend wedding bash at a lavish and storied chateau.

Paris Mayor Bertrand Delanoe officiated and gave a speech saying how happy he was that they were married in the City of Light, said the mayor of Paris’ 4th District, Dominique Bertinotti.

UCLA student has old Hilton cell number

LOS ANGELES - For months, Shira Barlow’s cell phone was flooded with wrong-number calls and text messages, mostly between 2 and 4 a.m. on weekends. Told they had reached a college student, callers refused to believe it.

“Baby girl, how are you?” one man purred in a foreign accent. “Why are you doing this?” a woman asked. “This is so rude.” And there were several seemingly random references to “Paris.”

As in Paris Hilton.

Feds search Michael Vick’s property

SURRY, Va. - Federal agents investigating possible dogfighting searched property owned by Michael Vick on Friday.

Portsmouth’s WAVY-TV broadcast video of investigators working under a blue tarp on a portion of Vick’s wooded property in southeastern Virginia. They were sifting dirt collected in white buckets and clearing brush. Some wore T’shirts with the wording “POLICE.”

The U.S. attorney’s office, contacted Friday by The Associated Press, would neither confirm or deny the search or an investigation. Surry County officials could not immediately be reached for comment.

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