The very deserving Chicago Bears Head Coach Lovie Smith got a new 4-year, 22-million contract. More details below:
By The Associated Press
Mar 1, 2007 (AP)— The Chicago Bears decided Lovie Smith was the right coach to lead the team into the next decade with hopefully a few more Super Bowl appearances.
A week after Smith's agent said negotiations were so stalled the coach would probably leave after the 2007 season, the Bears signed Smith to a four-year contract extension through 2011 on Wednesday.
The lowest-paid coach in the NFL last season at $1.35 million when he led the Bears to the Super Bowl, Smith's deal will average about $4.7 million per season over five years. He'll make $22 million in new money and the total value of the five years is $23.45 million, the Chicago Tribune reported. Smith was scheduled to make $1.45 million this season in the final year of his initial four-year contract.
The deal was announced by the team Wednesday night, as was an extension through 2013 for general manager Jerry Angelo.
Smith, the 2005 NFL coach of the year, led the Bears to a 15-4 record and their first NFC championship in more than two decades last season before they lost 29-17 to Indianapolis in the Super Bowl.
Thursday, March 01, 2007
Antonetta Barba - American Idol Star-In-Waiting Has An Exhibitionist Side
It's the hot topic on Technorati and yet another example of how sex and sexual images rule the Internet. Antonetta Barba, an American Idol contestant and favorite, is the subject and image of scores of sexy photos all over the Internet, from blogs to main reporting agencies, to Google itself, she's the Topic De Jour.
But will these photos hurt her chances on American Idol. Nope. I'll bet just the oppostite. The Paris Hilton Rules lives on!
Pacman Faces Obstruction Charges
Pacman' Faces Obstruction Charges
By Associated Press
NASHVILLE, Tenn. -- Tennessee cornerback Adam "Pacman" Jones is scheduled to appear in court in Georgia later this month on obstruction charges from an incident with police last year, The Tennessean reported Wednesday night.
Jones, who has been staying with family and friends near his hometown of Atlanta, was recently accused of being involved in a fight at a Las Vegas strip club that ended in the shootings of two bouncers and a customer. Police have not named any suspects in the case and no one has been charged.
Now Jones is scheduled to appear in Superior Court in Fayetteville, Ga., on subpoenas for felony and misdemeanor obstruction of justice charges for an incident outside a home in February 2006, The Tennessean reported on its Web site Wednesday night. Jones owns a home in Fayetteville.
"One of our officers was involved in a traffic stop with him, and after Pacman and others ran into a home, there was a physical altercation between him and the officer, and he was involved in that. He was arrested for that," Police Chief Steve Heaton told the newspaper.
It wasn't immediately known why the charges weren't filed earlier.
The Tennessean also reported that Jones was arrested and charged with marijuana possession in the same county a month later, but the charges were later dismissed.
Worrick Robinson, one of Jones' attorneys, declined comment to the newspaper Wednesday night. Phone messages left late Wednesday night at the offices of Robinson and Atlanta attorney Manny Arora weren't immediately returned.
Mike Pruitt of the Georgia county's Drug Task Force said marijuana was found in two rooms of a home belonging to Jones by officers executing a search warrant. When Jones drove up to the home, Pruitt said he smelled marijuana coming from Jones' car.
"I asked him why his (Corvette) smelled so bad and he said, `We were smoking it on the way down here from Nashville,'" Pruitt told the newspaper. "Personally, I think the NFL needs to change its drug policy because (players) basically know they are going to get drug tested.
"I asked him, `Why do you want to throw your career away for a bunch of marijuana junk?' He said, `I know when I am going to get drug tested, so I quit doing it.' It's just crazy."
Pruitt said he did not know the marijuana charges were dismissed.
The alleged obstruction occurred one night in February when Jones and friends were sitting in a car outside a house around 1 a.m., Heaton said. Police had been monitoring the area for burglaries and when they approached the car there was a verbal confrontation. Jones wasn't suspected of being involved in any burglaries.
"The verbal altercation led to a physical confrontation and they ran into a home they were sitting outside of. We had to run in and get them and there was a physical confrontation with Pacman and he was charged with the felony obstruction," Heaton said. "We had to get physical with him and he got physical with us."
Including the most recently reported Georgia incidents, there have been 10 times Jones has been in trouble and the police have been involved. He has been arrested four times. Charges from a Nashville nightclub incident in July 2005 were dismissed in March 2006. A judge dismissed a simple assault charge for spitting on a woman on Feb. 1.
The Titans have said they are monitoring Jones' legal troubles, but have refused to comment on any of the allegations.
By Associated Press
NASHVILLE, Tenn. -- Tennessee cornerback Adam "Pacman" Jones is scheduled to appear in court in Georgia later this month on obstruction charges from an incident with police last year, The Tennessean reported Wednesday night.
Jones, who has been staying with family and friends near his hometown of Atlanta, was recently accused of being involved in a fight at a Las Vegas strip club that ended in the shootings of two bouncers and a customer. Police have not named any suspects in the case and no one has been charged.
Now Jones is scheduled to appear in Superior Court in Fayetteville, Ga., on subpoenas for felony and misdemeanor obstruction of justice charges for an incident outside a home in February 2006, The Tennessean reported on its Web site Wednesday night. Jones owns a home in Fayetteville.
"One of our officers was involved in a traffic stop with him, and after Pacman and others ran into a home, there was a physical altercation between him and the officer, and he was involved in that. He was arrested for that," Police Chief Steve Heaton told the newspaper.
It wasn't immediately known why the charges weren't filed earlier.
The Tennessean also reported that Jones was arrested and charged with marijuana possession in the same county a month later, but the charges were later dismissed.
Worrick Robinson, one of Jones' attorneys, declined comment to the newspaper Wednesday night. Phone messages left late Wednesday night at the offices of Robinson and Atlanta attorney Manny Arora weren't immediately returned.
Mike Pruitt of the Georgia county's Drug Task Force said marijuana was found in two rooms of a home belonging to Jones by officers executing a search warrant. When Jones drove up to the home, Pruitt said he smelled marijuana coming from Jones' car.
"I asked him why his (Corvette) smelled so bad and he said, `We were smoking it on the way down here from Nashville,'" Pruitt told the newspaper. "Personally, I think the NFL needs to change its drug policy because (players) basically know they are going to get drug tested.
"I asked him, `Why do you want to throw your career away for a bunch of marijuana junk?' He said, `I know when I am going to get drug tested, so I quit doing it.' It's just crazy."
Pruitt said he did not know the marijuana charges were dismissed.
The alleged obstruction occurred one night in February when Jones and friends were sitting in a car outside a house around 1 a.m., Heaton said. Police had been monitoring the area for burglaries and when they approached the car there was a verbal confrontation. Jones wasn't suspected of being involved in any burglaries.
"The verbal altercation led to a physical confrontation and they ran into a home they were sitting outside of. We had to run in and get them and there was a physical confrontation with Pacman and he was charged with the felony obstruction," Heaton said. "We had to get physical with him and he got physical with us."
Including the most recently reported Georgia incidents, there have been 10 times Jones has been in trouble and the police have been involved. He has been arrested four times. Charges from a Nashville nightclub incident in July 2005 were dismissed in March 2006. A judge dismissed a simple assault charge for spitting on a woman on Feb. 1.
The Titans have said they are monitoring Jones' legal troubles, but have refused to comment on any of the allegations.
CNN's Paul La Monica Says YouTube Not The Ememy
CNN's Paul La Monica , he's got the right idea, but the "controllers" -- i.e. the big media companies -- will not get it until it's too late. We're in an era where media content can't be controlled. People will get what they want and if they can't, then they will make it themselves.
Kennedy Insider Arthur Schlesinger Dies at 89 - AP
John Kenneth Galbraith, Arthur Schlesinger, representatives of a grand era when Government worked.
Kennedy Insider Arthur Schlesinger Dies at 89
HILLEL ITALIE | AP | March 1, 2007 10:31 AM EST
Schlesinger was dining with family members in Manhattan on Wednesday when he suffered a heart attack, his son Stephen said. He died at New York Downtown Hospital.
Schlesinger was among the most prominent historians of his time, widely respected as learned and readable, with a panoramic vision of American culture and politics. He received a National Book Award for "Robert Kennedy and His Times" and a National Book Award and a Pulitzer for "A Thousand Days," his memoir/chronicle of President Kennedy's administration. He also won a Pulitzer, in 1946, for "The Age of Jackson," his landmark chronicle of Andrew Jackson's administration.
"(He had) enormous stamina and a kind of energy and drive which most people don't have, and it kept him going, all the way through his final hours," Stephen Schlesinger said early Thursday. "He never stopped writing, he never stopped participating in public affairs, he never stopped having his views about politics and his love of this nation."
With his bow ties and horn-rimmed glasses, Schlesinger seemed the very image of a reserved, tweedy scholar. But he was an assured member of the so-called Eastern elite, friendly with everyone from Mary McCarthy to Katharine Graham and enough of a sport to swim fully clothed in the pool of then-Attorney General Robert Kennedy.
He was a longtime confidant of the Kennedys, a fellow Harvard man who served in President Kennedy's administration and was often criticized for idealizing the family, especially for not mentioning the president's extramarital affairs.
"At no point in my experience did his preoccupation with women _ apart from Caroline crawling around the Oval Office _ interfere with his conduct of the public business," Schlesinger later wrote.
Liberalism declined in his lifetime to the point where politicians feared using the word, but Schlesinger's opinions remained liberal, and influential, whether old ones on the "imperial presidency," or newer ones on the Iraq war. For both historians and Democratic officials, he was a kind of professor emeritus, valued for his professional knowledge and for his personal past.
"Arthur was a trusted friend and loyal advisor to President Kennedy, and a wonderful friend to me and to all of us in the Kennedy family," Sen. Edward M. Kennedy, D-Mass., said in a statement. "I will miss him terribly, but his contributions to this country will live on."
A native of Columbus, Ohio, and the son of a prominent historian, he was born Arthur Bancroft Schlesinger Jr., but later gave himself his father's middle name, Meier. Family friends included James Thurber, historian Charles A. Beard and future Supreme Court justice Felix Frankfurter.
Schlesinger attended Phillips Exeter Academy and in 1938 graduated summa cum laude from Harvard University. During World War II, Schlesinger drafted some statements for President Roosevelt and served as an intelligence analyst for the Office of Strategic Services, forerunner to the CIA.
Schlesinger emerged as a historian with "The Age of Jackson." Published in 1945, when he was just 27, the book offered a new, class-based interpretation of the Jackson administration, destroying the old myth that the country was once an egalitarian paradise. The book remained influential despite eventual criticism _ even by Schlesinger _ for overlooking Jackson's appeasement of slavery and his harsh treatment of Indians.
Schlesinger was deeply involved with the Democratic Party, and even when writing about the past he minded the present. "The Age of Jackson," for instance, was completed during the presidency of Franklin Roosevelt and its characterization of President Jackson as a great 19th century populist was an acknowledged defense of Roosevelt and the New Deal.
Like many liberals of the 1940s, Schlesinger was also trying to reconcile support of the New Deal to the start of the Cold War. He responded by condemning both the far right and the far left, any system that denied the "perpetual tension" of a dynamic democracy. "World without conflict is the world of fantasy," he wrote in "The Age of Jackson."
In 1946, Schlesinger helped found Americans for Democratic Action, a leading organization of anti-communist liberals. Three years later, he published the influential "The Vital Center," which advocated a liberal domestic policy and anti-communist foreign policy. The book's title became a common political phrase, still in use decades later, and Schlesinger's call for defending American ideals abroad was endlessly revived as Democrats debated U.S. involvement in countries from Bosnia to Iraq.
In the 1950s, Schlesinger became increasingly involved in electoral politics, supporting Adlai Stevenson, the erudite Illinois governor and two-time loser to Dwight Eisenhower for the presidency. In 1960, the historian switched his loyalty to Kennedy, even as he acknowledged that Stevenson was a "much richer, more thoughtful, more creative person."
Liberals were wary of Kennedy, but Schlesinger, tired of Stevenson's dreamy detachment, was drawn to Kennedy's "cool, measured, intelligent concern." Over time, he came to embody Schlesinger's ideal for a head of state: charismatic but not dogmatic; progressive yet practical; a realist, he once observed, brilliantly disguised as a romantic.
Kennedy appointed the Schlesinger a special assistant, an unofficial "court philosopher" of symbolic, if not practical power. The high-minded historian was soon trapped in the tangle of superpower politics: the Bay of Pigs invasion in 1961, the disastrous attempt to overthrow Cuban leader Fidel Castro.
Schlesinger was opposed to the plan, he later wrote, but acknowledged helping the administration suppress a pre-invasion story by The New Republic that correctly reported the U.S. was training Cuban mercenaries. Had the press not cooperated, it might "have spared the country a disaster," a regretful Schlesinger recalled.
His time in government was brief. Kennedy was assassinated in 1963, and the historian soon left the administration of his successor, Lyndon Johnson. ("With Kennedy gone, it was no longer exhilarating," Schlesinger explained). Schlesinger then supported Robert Kennedy's brief, tragic 1968 campaign.
Being a liberal, Schlesinger once observed, means regarding man as "neither brute nor angel." Whether discussing the Kennedys, Vietnam or the power of the presidency, Schlesinger sought moderation, the middle course. He blamed the Vietnam War on the moral extremism of the right and left and worried that the executive branch had become "imperial," calling for a "strong presidency within the Constitution." He saw American history itself as a continuing "cycle" between liberal and conservative power.
In 1998, Schlesinger opposed Republican-led attempts to have President Clinton removed from office, and he later criticized President George W. Bush for his doctrine of "preventive war," saying "I think the whole notion of America as the world's judge, jury and executioner is a tragically mistaken notion."
His works included "The Age of Roosevelt," an acclaimed series about FDR that he abandoned after joining the Kennedy administration but attempted to revive late in life; and "The Disuniting of America," a controversial text which warned a "cult of ethnicity" could reduce the country to isolated factions. To the amusement of President Kennedy, Schlesinger also wrote film criticism for Vogue and other publications.
Schlesinger had six children _ four from his first marriage, to the author Marian Cannon, and two from his second, to Alexandra Emmet.
Texas Chippendales Eight Free From Court - What's The Fuss?
I can't figure out what the fuss is over this matter. Who made the call to report them? The sports bar hired them to begin with.
Weird.
From the Smoking Gun...
FEBRUARY 26--Free the Chippendales Eight! A Texas prosecutor has decided not to press charges against a cadre of male adult dancers who were busted earlier this month at a Lubbock sports bar for dancing suggestively in front of 1100 female fans. The dancers, wearing tight leather pants and boxer shorts, were popped after they began gyrating and thrusting pelvises in a manner meant to cause "sexual gratification," according to police, whose Special Operations Unit shut down the performance at Jake's Sports Café.
But while cops booked the dancers on a misdemeanor charge of violating the state's adult cabaret law, the Lubbock County District Attorney's office declined to prosecute the eight perfomers. Three other men--a Chippendales manager, a show promoter, and the bar manager--were also arrested after the abbreviated February 16 performance. They, too, will not be prosecuted. On the following pages you'll find Lubbock Police Department mug shots of the unjustly accused beefcake and the management trio. The dancers are reportedly considering whether to sue Lubbock authorities over the dirty dancing arrests.
Paris Hilton Smoking Crack? - ParisExposed Website Is Shut Down?
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