On this day, March 5th
1922–Annie Oakley broke all existing records for women’s trap shooting.
1936–MGM’s Mutiny On The Bounty was voted “Outstanding Production” (Best Picture) as they used to say.
Clark Gable
1946–Winston Churchill delivered his famous Iron-Curtain Speech.
1960–Elvis Presley returned to civilian life after a 2-year hitch in the Army.
1963–Patsy Cline, Cowboy Copas, and Hankshaw Hawkins were killed in a plane crash near Nashville after returning from a benefit concert.
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From The Courier-Mail
A TOURIST who refused to take his clothes off at a swinger sex party has been blamed for “a mini-riot” at a north Queensland nudist colony.
Police were called amid threats of violence and lewd behaviour and ordered the Brisbane man and his wife from the adults-only “anything goes” sex party.
The White Cockatoo resort at Mossman, near Port Douglas, is promoting swingers and sex parties in a month of hedonism for March in a bid to boost sagging tourism figures.
Once billed as the nation’s top group-sex hotspot for swingers, the resort made international headlines last year when The Courier-Mail first reported plans to lift a self-imposed swinger ban.
Owner Tony Fox said the “mini-riot” erupted when four naked female guests protested when confronted by the fully-clothed man.
“They felt uncomfortable with him eyeing them off and I asked him to show some respect and take his clothes off,” said the nudist colony manager.
“He then threatened to bash me, there was some argy-bargy and I ordered him off the premises and police were called.”
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Virtual Reality Headset Will Let Users Experience All Five Senses
A headset that harnesses all five senses will create such a convincing virtual reality that it will be indistinguishable from real life, designers promised.
The Virtual Cocoon, unveiled today, will enable users to go on safari from the comfort of their own front rooms.
The headsest will enable users to experience the smells, heat, sounds and sights of places such as Kenya’s Masai Mara.
Stand-by for virtual fun and games...it may be all we can afford.
A team of scientists from universities across the UK are working on the project. It is hoped that the device will be available in three to five years time.
The technology, funded by the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (ESPRC), is described as a ‘step change’ in virtual reality.
Professor Alan Chalmers from Warwick University is working on how smells will be generated electronically in the device.
He explained: ‘The idea is to produce a portable virtual reality device that you can use in the comfort of your own home
‘This will be a huge step forward in comparison to today’s virtual reality devices. Combining the use of all five senses will make the experience feel totally real – it will be unlike anything previously available.’
The device will be used for leisure and also for education and training. (Read more.)
B.S. Report–This device reminds me of the Arnold Schwarzenegger movie, “Total Recall.” In the movie, which I vaguely remember, he used some kind of machine to simulate reality.
One thing all the people associated with the device carefully avoid saying is possibly the biggest selling point: the sexual potential for a virtual reality machine. You can experience your vacation, go on a safari, play amazing video games, use it to train the military…blah, blah, blah.
But they know if they can make this thing “hook you up” like it did Arnold in the movie, then it will be a “virtual money” printing press. They know it–and they also know it’s best leaving that unsaid. But when it does become available it will probably be used mostly by people to go on a hot date with the man or woman of their dreams.
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“The greatest [calamity] which could befall [us would be] submission to a government of unlimited powers.”
–Thomas Jefferson, Declaration and Protests of Virginia, 1825.
B.S. Report–Welcome, everyone; to the greatest calamity…
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Thanks For Stopping By…Have A Nice Trip Home
LONDON (Reuters) – A Mexican national who told airport immigration he was visiting Britain to see a friend was swiftly deported after a search unearthed a good-luck card in his luggage wishing him well for his “new life in the UK.”
B.S. Report–What? Where is this man’s lawyers? Where is the UKCLU?
UK Border Agency officers at Manchester Airport routinely stopped the 40-year-old chef after he arrived on a flight from Los Angeles last Friday.
B.S. Report–Well, it’s back to Los Angeles where a Mexican need not worry whether he’s illegal or not.
The man told them he was on a short trip to see a friend who was opening a restaurant in the area.
"No way Jose, it's back to L.A."
“However, a search of the passenger’s baggage revealed a huge collection of Mexican food recipes and a good-luck card from his church wishing him well for his ‘new life in the UK,'” the agency said in a statement.
The man later admitted he had intended to work at the restaurant illegally and had planned to bring his family over from America if he liked it.
B.S. Report–He just assumed that it would be just as easy to sneak into the U.K. as it was the U.S. and that no one would care. He must have been absolutely shocked that he was not allowed to live in the U.K.
He was deported the next day.
B.S. Report–What? No six-month delay like in the U.S. where you’re released on your own recognizance and then you just simply ignore your court appearance and nobody really cares enough to track you down.
“We will not tolerate people coming here to work illegally,” the agency said. “People wanting to visit the UK must play by the rules. Those who do not are sent back.”
B.S. Report–Sent back to the United States where all are welcome whether you are a peaceful Mexican sneaking over for a better life– or a hostile Muslim terrorist from Iran sneaking over to bomb a building. Come one, come all.
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“Octomom” Has Been A Lunatic For Awhile
WHITTIER, Calif. (AP) — Octuplet mother Nadya Suleman became unhinged with fear last year when she thought she had lost one of her children, repeatedly telling an emergency dispatcher, “Oh God, I’m going to kill myself,” according to a recording of her 911 call released Wednesday by police.
Photo of "Octomom," oh wait, that's a fruitcake--no difference.
Suleman made the call Oct. 27 after her 5-year-old son went missing from the front yard, only to find him a few minutes later after he returned from a walk.
Suleman’s repeated threats of suicide prompted a chiding from the dispatcher, who could hear children’s voices in the background.
B.S. Report–It takes a lot to get yelled at by a 911 operator…that tells you “Octomom” is a special kind of lunatic.
“Don’t say that in front of your other child, OK?” the dispatcher tells Suleman. “Keep yourself under control for your other child; he doesn’t need to hear that.”
Suleman, an unemployed single mother, has come under scrutiny since giving birth to octuplets Jan. 26 when she already had six other children, ages 2 to 7. Talk show hosts, celebrities and others have weighed in on the topic, with some questioning her ability to look after 14 children.
B.S. Report–She obviously isn’t even very good at looking after herself…so adding 14 kids to the mix surely won’t be a problem.
The dramatic call Suleman made three months before the octuplets’ birth resulted in a police visit to her home in Whittier, about 15 miles east of Los Angeles. It was among a number of visits authorities have made to the house in the last 14 months.
The 911 tape begins with Suleman repeatedly asking the operator, “Where’s my son?” before she provides an address or any information. She eventually tells the operator she hadn’t seen Joshua Jacob for an hour and he had been playing in the front yard, and she feared he was kidnapped.
The call ended with Suleman sobbing hysterically upon finding the child, saying, “He went on a walk and came back by himself.”
Police and the Los Angeles County Department of Child and Family Services visited Suleman’s home in July in response to a complaint that the children appeared poorly cared for, but both agencies determined the complaint was unfounded.
Suleman, in an interview with RadarOnline.com, said the neighbor who alerted police was unhappy because her family was loud and she allowed her children to play in the mud.
Police also once visited the home to let a child out of a locked bedroom.
B.S. Report–Who has all these dealings with “authorities” and police officers? Here is an interview with “Octomom.”
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I hope Mick can afford to upgrade his TV to digital.
These are just a few of the never before seen private snaps of the world’s two biggest bands coping with growing fame as they toured America in the 1960s.
The behind-the-scenes, intimate and unguarded shots, have been unearthed after spending 45 years in a duffel bag of The Beatles and Rolling Stone’s former tour manager.
The collection of more than 50 pictures, which are being revealed to the public for the first time are part of 3,500 taken by Bob Bonis, the US tour manager who helped organize the so-called British invasion of America in the Swinging Sixties.
When The Beatles and The Rolling Stones arrived in the US for the first time in 1964, The Beatles were known for just one hit song, “I Want to Hold Your Hand,” and The Rolling Stones were billed beneath Bo Diddley and The Everly Brothers.
But Bonis sensed something special was afoot and photographed many of their first tours. By the time the tours has ended the two bands were the biggest in the world.
The photographs, which also include poolside shots of the two bands drinking and relaxing, as well as “goofing” around in hotel rooms, were found by Bonis’s son Alex stored in an old Duffel bag.
They are to be exhibited Not Fade Away Gallery will premiere the exhibition ‘The British Are Coming: The Beatles and The Rolling Stones 1964 – 66.’ in New York.
Larry Marion, Gallery director, said the frames captured a pivotal time in the two bands’ careers; their first tours of America from 1964 to 1966.
“In more than 20 years as a rock archaeologist I’ve never come upon a discovery of this magnitude,” he said.
(B.S.-Imagine a grown man with the job title, “Rock Archaeologist”)
“I’ve shown the photos to Ringo, who loved them. Keith [Richards] is going to come see the show.”
The pictures were never meant for the public eye and Bonis, who died in 1991, kept the negatives and slides private until his son decided to show the world.
Bonis was a small-time talent agent who got lucky and landed the job managing the American tours of the two bands from 1964 to 1966. The trust and confidence he earned from the bands is immediately evident from the snapshots.
Bonis also private photos of other big stars including Simon and Garfunkel, Cream and Frank Sinatra.
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Tough Texan Catches Her Thief
Val Renfro didn’t think twice when she chased down the man who snatched her purse.
"Super Granny"
The 65-year-old Arlington woman was getting into her car Sunday afternoon outside an Office Depot on Eastchase Parkway in Fort Worth. That’s when a man later identified as Ricky Lee Sample, 47, came up from behind, pushed her down and ran away with her purse, according to a police report.
Renfro immediately grabbed her phone, which she keeps in her bra for such situations, and dialed 911.
“Somebody just grabbed my purse out of my car,” she told the operator.
“I’m going to chase him down.”
Renfro careened her silver Buick Park Avenue out of the parking lot toward the nearby UA Eastchase Market 9 movie theater. There, she spotted the thief, a 5-foot-9-inch man in jeans and a hooded shirt.
She rolled down her window, just enough so he could hear her, and shouted, “Where’s my purse? You put it on the hood, now. Give me my purse before I run you over.”
The man didn’t put her purse on the hood. Renfro accelerated. She hit him. But he kept running east toward Ederville Road.
Horns were blaring around Renfro. She saw people from the theater join in the chase. Six or seven men finally circled the purse snatcher.
Renfro parked and walked up to him. The 911 tapes caught this:
Man: “I don’t have nothing.”
Renfro: “Like hell you don’t.” (Read more…see Val Renfro video re-enactment and listen to 911 audio here.)
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Doctors Fight Back Against Patient Criticism
The anonymous comment on the Web site RateMDs.com was unsparing: “Very unhelpful, arrogant,” it said of a doctor. “Did not listen and cut me off, seemed much too happy to have power (and abuse it!) over suffering people.”
Such reviews are becoming more common as consumer ratings services like Zagat’s and Angie’s List expand beyond restaurants and plumbers to medical care, and some doctors are fighting back.
They’re asking patients to agree to what amounts to a gag order that bars them from posting negative comments online.
“Consumers and patients are hungry for good information” about doctors, but Internet reviews provide just the opposite, contends Dr. Jeffrey Segal, a North Carolina neurosurgeon who has made a business of helping doctors monitor and prevent online criticism.
Some sites “are little more than tabloid journalism without much interest in constructively improving practices,” and their sniping comments can unfairly ruin a doctor’s reputation, Segal said.
Segal said such postings say nothing about what should really matter to patients — a doctor’s medical skills — and privacy laws and medical ethics prevent leave doctors powerless to do anything it.
His company, Medical Justice, is based in Greensboro, N.C. For a fee, it provides doctors with a standardized waiver agreement. Patients who sign agree not to post online comments about the doctor, “his expertise and/or treatment.”
“Published comments on Web pages, blogs and/or mass correspondence, however well intended, could severely damage physician’s practice,” according to suggested wording the company provides.
Segal’s company advises doctors to have all patients sign the agreements. If a new patient refuses, the doctor might suggest finding another doctor. Segal said he knows of no cases where longtime patients have been turned away for not signing the waivers.
"Now you promise you'll say something nice about me online?"
Doctors are notified when a negative rating appears on a Web site, and, if the author’s name is known, physicians can use the signed waivers to get the sites to remove offending opinion.
RateMd’s postings are anonymous, and the site’s operators say they do not know their users’ identities. The operators also won’t remove negative comments.
B.S. Report–Choosing a doctor can be a difficult task. Feedback from prior patients is one of the best ways to assess his or her competence. We use that system when we buy books or other merchandise online at, for instance, Amazon.com, and although it’s hardly foolproof, it does give the consumer an idea of what to expect.
It’s up to the doctors to protect their reputations, just as it’s up to store clerks or restaurant owners to protect theirs. Understandably, ranking a doctor’s performance is subjective and should be broken down into separate criteria.
Doctors bedside manners and communication skills are often the reason for low ratings. Sometimes the complaint or issue is something as basic as actually listening to a patient before recommending the course of treatment.
Other times, it’s whether the patient feels satisfied with his recovery. If you feel the doctor made you well…he was good and competent. If you didn’t recover satisfactorily, then there is a natural inclination to blame the doctor, rightly or not.
There will always be differences…but making patients sign a form limiting their speech is not the answer.
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Murder Suspect Killed After Attacking The Judge
FRESNO, Calif. (AP) — A man accused of killing his girlfriend was shot to death in a Stockton courtroom Wednesday after he attacked the judge presiding over his murder trial, officials said.
David Paradiso, 28, was shot by a police detective after he left the witness stand and began attacking San Joaquin County Superior Court Judge Cinda Fox during a break in proceedings, said Dave Konecny, a spokesman for the sheriff’s department.
Lucky Judge...Cinda Fox
Paradiso had been testifying around 2 p.m. when his mother, in the audience, left the courtroom upset. Fox called a recess, and as jurors filed out, Paradiso left the stand and approached the judge from behind “with an unknown cutting instrument,” Konecny said.
Karen McConnell, a county spokeswoman, said witnesses reported seeing Paradiso lift the judge and begin punching and possibly stabbing her when bailiffs ran to her aid and shots rang out. Lodi Police Det. Eric Bradley has been placed on administrative leave while the shooting is being investigated, city spokesman Jeff Hood said.
Fox, who had a bandage on her left arm as she was carried out of the courthouse on a stretcher, told reporters, “I’m OK,” before being taken to a hospital. Calls to her home were not immediately returned.
The courthouse immediately went on lockdown, although people were allowed to leave after the building was secured, McConnell said.
Konecny said he did not know how Paradiso obtained a weapon. He said at least two bailiffs were on duty in the courtroom at the time of the attack.
Paradiso was on trial for allegedly stabbing his girlfriend, Eileen Pelt, in the neck as his mother drove them in her car. Debra Paradiso told police her son forced her to drive to Amador County, where he dumped the body. (Read more.)
B.S. Report–Now that’s swift justice! I think some bailiff’s head is going to roll as they find out how a defendent can obtain a weapon in the courtroom, right under their noses and stab the judge. I wouldn’t list this incident on my resume if I were in a Security profession. Unless, of course, I was the police detective who took out the attacker.
Perhaps the judge herself needs to run a better courtroom…like this judge.
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THE B.S. REPORT 