Sitenet Info News - newsxyrm.blogspot.com: June 2012

Walker Win May Signal Bumpy Ride for Obama

â€œRemember me? I'm the only guy that gave you four surplus budgets out of the eight I sent.â€

-- Former President Bill Clinton at a Monday fundraiser with President Obama.

WAUKESHA, Wisc. -- Tuesday's oversized victory by Gov. Scott Walker, R-Wisc., in the recall election launched by labor groups and Democrats here comes at an unhappy moment for Obama Democrats.

The election showed, most dangerously for Obama, that the same silent-majority voters who had been racking up wins for the GOP since 2009 are out in force. Why did the final result in the election â€" a 9-point trouncing â€" differ so much from what exit polls showed at the outset? Power Play suspects that the voters least likely to answer questions from inquisitive strangers with clipboards outside their precinct â€" working, white males â€"were out in force.

We are now about a third of the way through the general election season, and if the first act was a prelude to what's to come, President Obama will be in for a very bumpy ride.

Obama said this week that his challenge in this election was â€œfear and frustrationâ€ among voters, but those adjectives might better suit the Democratic Party at this milestone moment in the 2012 election.

The failed recall in Wisconsin proved a microcosm of the troubles plaguing Obama and his party right now: internal divisions, an implacable base and muddled messaging.

Government worker unions, now the most important constituency of the Democratic Party, demanded the risky recall and Democrats in the state and nationally had little choice but to go along for the ride.

And while the Democratic nominee to replace Walker, Milwaukee Mayor Tom Barrett, was out trying to talk to moderate voters about jobs and the economy, the Democratic base was fixated on an intense hatred of Walker and his law curbing the power of government worker unions.

The national narrative further intruded when the ongoing fracas between the Clinton and Obama wings of the party came to town. While Obama rankled Democratic activists by not campaigning for Barrett, former President Bill Clinton, still engaged in a two-week rampage through Obama's election messaging, dropped in to campaign with their man.

Obama flew over the state as part of a six-fundraiser day and offered a Tweet of support , reinforcing his reputation as a solitary man, not a team player for his party. Clinton, meanwhile, ate it up like a fresh-grilled Sheboygan bratwurst.

The message for the small sliver of undecided voters in the state was that Democrats were a mess. The party's talking points in the election sounded like scanning through the radio too fast.

The election also showed, most dangerously for Obama, that the same silent-majority voters who had been racking up wins for the GOP since 2009 are out in force. Why did the final result in the election â€" a 9-point trouncing â€" differ so much from what exit polls showed at the outset? Power Play suspects that the voters least likely to answer questions from inquisitive strangers with clipboards outside their precinct â€" working, white males â€"were out in force.

While an SEIU member from Madison might have been eager to talk about their vote, the forklift operator from Waukesha might prefer to not tarry and talk politics with someone they don't know. We didn't hear his voice in the exit poll, but sure did when the votes were counted.

Those guys have been keeping Republicans on a winning run since the Virginia and New Jersey gubernatorial elections in November 2009 and the hole in Tuesday's polling data shows they are still voting, and not for Democrats.

It was 10 weeks ago that Republican Mitt Romney began to don the cloak of presumptive GOP nominee. Since then, Obama and his team have committed many unforced errors: the hot mic â€œflexibilityâ€ message for Russian strongman Vladimir Putin; jousting in public with the Supreme Court; the insult of Ann Romney; failing to get his party lined up behind the opening assault on Romney's reputation; etc.

The president has also had plenty beyond his control go wrong. As the recovery stalls again there is an increasing sense that the president could be running on empty.

To have this all lead up to a blowout win for Walker in this recall has got to make Team Obama feel like they've been run over by the Packers' defensive line.

There are now about 21 weeks until the election. If Obama has another 10 weeks like the ones he's just completed, no amount of money, technology or organization will be able to save this election for him.

And Now, A Word From Charles

â€œLoose cannon? Â He is a double agent. What is the message? Â Bill Clinton says elect Obama because at the end of a second term you might begin to be getting out of recession? Â I wouldn't run on that.â€

-- Charles Krauthammer on â€œSpecial Report with Bret Baierâ€ Â
Â

Chris Stirewalt is digital politics editor for Fox News, and his POWER PLAY column appears Monday-Friday on FoxNews.com.

Article from FOXNEWS

\'100 Midget March\' Film Flap

Snubbed dwarfs are raging at the makers of Hollywood film "Snow White and the Huntsman" for casting average-sized people as the film's seven dwarfs.

The dwarf actors are threatening to protest against the film -- which stars Oscar-winner Charlize Theron -- with a "100-midget march," according to a report in TMZ.

Los Angeles dwarf theater group Beacher's Madhouse is fuming -- arguing that filmmakers would never use white actors and then digitally turn them black.

Matt McCarthy -- a 4ft, 1in dwarf who heads the group -- fired off a letter to Universal Chairman Adam Fogelson, saying, "In response to and in protest of this incredible injustice and prejudice, the Beacher's Madhouse midgets and I are coordinating a 100-midget march to Universal's offices."

McCarthy adds that casting average-sized actors as Snow White's dwarfs "is the equivalent of Universal casting a white actor to play a role written for an African-American person and digitally changing the color of their skin".

Another dwarf group, The Little People of America, said the entertainment industry should be actively casting little people.

A spokesman said, "This means both casting people with dwarfism as characters that were specifically written to be played by little people ... and other roles that would be open to people of short stature."

In the film, the dwarfs are played by actors Ian McShane, Bob Hoskins, Toby Jones, Eddie Marsan, Brian Gleeson, Ray Winstone, Nick Frost and Johnny Harris.

Director Rupert Sanders used camera angles and special effects to make them appear like dwarfs, including digitally inserting their faces on to the bodies of shorter people.

Go to The Sun for more.

Article from FOXNEWS

Police confirm newly-found body part is \'fake\' foot

This image provided by Interpol shows an undated photo of Luka Rocco Magnotta, 29 years-old, who is accused of videotaping a gruesome murder before posting it to the internet will be charged with threatening Canada's prime minister after mailing a severed foot to his Conservative party headquarters, police said.AP/Interpol
This surveillance image provided by Interpol shows who authorities believe is Luka Rocco Magnotta at a security checkpoint area. A state prosecutor says police are investigating two claimed French capital sightings of the Canadian porn actor wanted in connection with a gruesome murder in Montreal.AP
June 4, 2012: People enter the internet cafe where Luka Rocco Magnottahe was recognize in the district of Neukoelln in Berlin, Germany.AP

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Police who responded early Wednesday to frantic reports that a human foot had turned up in Montreal later confirmed the body part was a "fake."

Montreal police said on its Twitter account that the foot was "not a human foot," following news early Wednesday that the item had been recovered from the city's Notre-Dame-de-Grace neighborhood.

"The foot found in N-D-G is a fake. It's not a human foot," police said on Twitter.

The incident follows the now-infamous "cannibal murder" in the city and just one day after a human foot and a hand were found in the mail by two schools in Vancouver.

Staff at False Creek Elementary School received a parcel containing a hand, and St George's School received a package containing a human foot, Vancouver Police Deputy Chief Constable Warren Lemcke confirmed Tuesday.

The suspect in the killing of Jun Lin, 29-year-old Luka Rocco Magnotta, was arrested in Berlin on Monday and is expected to be extradited. If he doesn't fight extradition, it's possible he could be back in Canada by the end of the week

The case began last week when body parts were mailed to the headquarters of Canada's Liberal and Conservative parties. A torso was found in a suitcase on a garbage dump in Montreal, outside Magnotta's apartment building.

Magnotta, 29, was caught at an internet cafe in Berlin after evading police for days while he partied in Paris. He has told German authorities he would not fight extradition.

German authorities are waiting on Canada's formal extradition request, Martin Steltner, a spokesman for Berlin prosecutors, said Wednesday. The Canadian Embassy in Berlin declined to comment on when Ottawa may file the official papers seeking extradition.

After the request arrives, Magnotta will officially have to tell the court whether he objects to the request. If he does, it could drag out the process, Steltner said.

In Vancouver, Deputy Police Chief Warren Lemcke said a package containing what appeared to be a human hand was opened by staff at False Creek Elementary School on Tuesday. Another package containing what appeared to be a human foot was found by staff at St. George's private school for boys later in the day.

"There is no indication any student or staff has been targeted at any school," Lemcke said Tuesday.

Zheng Xu, a press spokesman at the Chinese consulate in Montreal, said four of Lin's family members, including his parents, arrived in Montreal on Tuesday night and will meet with Montreal police.

Video footage of what authorities believe to be the killing seems to show the suspect eating the body, police said Tuesday in Montreal, where the death occurred.

Lafreniere said that although police have not been able to conclusively confirm it, they suspect Magnotta ate parts of the victim's body.

"As gross and as graphic as it could be, yes, it was seen on the video," Lafreniere said.

Authorities allege Magnotta filmed the killing in his apartment and posted it online.

A copy of what police believe is the video of the killing, viewed online by The Associated Press, shows a man with an ice pick stabbing another naked, bound male. He also dismembers the corpse and performs sexual acts with it.

It did not show anyone eating the body but did show a man using a fork and knife on it. Police suggested Tuesday that they have access to more extensive video of the killing, possibly an unedited version.

"We're keeping some details for ourselves," Lafreniere said.

Cmdr. Denis Mainville, the head investigator of the Montreal police major crimes unit, said investigators will review hundreds of homicide cases over the last 30 years in Montreal and throughout Quebec for any possible links to Magnotta. Mainville said such a review is routine in such cases.

Montreal police on Tuesday said DNA tests have confirmed that the body parts mailed to the political parties were Lin's remains, and that they have footage of Magnotta mailing the two parcels that were sent to Ottawa.

Related Stories 'Canadian Psycho' Magnotta arrested in Berlin, report says

Article from FOXNEWS

Ray Bradbury Dies, Was Icon of SciFi Literature

FILE - This Dec. 8, 1966 file photo shows science fiction writer Ray Bradbury looks at a picture that was part of a school project to illustrate characters in one of his dramas in Los Angeles. Bradbury, who wrote everything from science-fiction and mystery to humor, died Tuesday, June 5, 2012 in Southern California. He was 91.AP

Ray Bradbury, the science fiction-fantasy master who transformed his childhood dreams and Cold War fears into telepathic Martians, lovesick sea monsters, and, in uncanny detail, the high-tech, book-burning future of "Fahrenheit 451," has died. He was 91.

He died Tuesday night, his daughter said Wednesday. Alexandra Bradbury did not have additional details.

Although slowed in recent years by a stroke that meant he had to use a wheelchair, Bradbury remained active into his 90s, turning out new novels, plays, screenplays and a volume of poetry. He wrote every day in the basement office of his Cheviot Hills home and appeared from time to time at bookstores, public library fundraisers and other literary events around Los Angeles.

His writings ranged from horror and mystery to humor and sympathetic stories about the Irish, blacks and Mexican-Americans. Bradbury also scripted John Huston's 1956 film version of "Moby Dick" and wrote for "The Twilight Zone" and other television programs, including "The Ray Bradbury Theater," for which he adapted dozens of his works.

"What I have always been is a hybrid author," Bradbury said in 2009. "I am completely in love with movies, and I am completely in love with theater, and I am completely in love with libraries."

Bradbury broke through in 1950 with "The Martian Chronicles," a series of intertwined stories that satirized capitalism, racism and superpower tensions as it portrayed Earth colonizers destroying an idyllic Martian civilization.

Like Arthur C. Clarke's "Childhood's End" and the Robert Wise film "The Day the Earth Stood Still," Bradbury's book was a Cold War morality tale in which imagined lives on other planets serve as commentary on human behavior on Earth. "The Martian Chronicles" has been published in more than 30 languages, was made into a TV miniseries and inspired a computer game.

"The Martian Chronicles" prophesized the banning of books, especially works of fantasy, a theme Bradbury would take on fully in the 1953 release, "Fahrenheit 451." Inspired by the Cold War, the rise of television and the author's passion for libraries, it was an apocalyptic narrative of nuclear war abroad and empty pleasure at home, with firefighters assigned to burn books instead of putting blazes out (451 degrees Fahrenheit, Bradbury had been told, was the temperature at which texts went up in flames).

It was Bradbury's only true science-fiction work, according to the author, who said all his other works should have been classified as fantasy. "It was a book based on real facts and also on my hatred for people who burn books," he told The Associated Press in 2002.

A futuristic classic often taught alongside George Orwell's "1984" and Aldous Huxley's "Brave New World," Bradbury's novel anticipated iPods, interactive television, electronic surveillance and live, sensational media events, including televised police pursuits. Francois Truffaut directed a 1966 movie version and the book's title was referenced -- without Bradbury's permission, the author complained -- for Michael Moore's documentary "Fahrenheit 9-11."

Although involved in many futuristic projects, including the New York World's Fair of 1964 and the Spaceship Earth display at Walt Disney World in Florida, Bradbury was deeply attached to the past. He refused to drive a car or fly, telling the AP that witnessing a fatal traffic accident as a child left behind a permanent fear of automobiles. In his younger years, he got around by bicycle or roller-skates.

"I'm not afraid of machines," he told Writer's Digest in 1976. "I don't think the robots are taking over. I think the men who play with toys have taken over. And if we don't take the toys out of their hands, we're fools."

Bradbury's literary style was honed in pulp magazines and influenced by Ernest Hemingway and Thomas Wolfe, and he became the rare science fiction writer treated seriously by the literary world. In 2007, he received a special Pulitzer Prize citation "for his distinguished, prolific and deeply influential career as an unmatched author of science fiction and fantasy." Seven years earlier, he received an honorary National Book Award medal for lifetime achievement, an honor given to Philip Roth and Arthur Miller among others.

"Everything I've done is a surprise, a wonderful surprise," Bradbury said during his acceptance speech in 2000. "I sometimes get up at night when I can't sleep and walk down into my library and open one of my books and read a paragraph and say, `My God, did I write that? Did I write that?', because it's still a surprise."

Other honors included an Academy Award nomination for an animated film, "Icarus Montgolfier Wright," and an Emmy for his teleplay of "The Halloween Tree." His fame even extended to the moon, where Apollo astronauts named a crater "Dandelion Crater," in honor of "Dandelion Wine," his beloved coming-of-age novel, and an asteroid was named 9766 Bradbury.

Born Ray Douglas Bradbury on Aug. 22, 1920, in Waukegan, Ill., the author once described himself as "that special freak, the man with the child inside who remembers all." He claimed to have total recall of his life, dating even to his final weeks in his mother's womb.

His father, Leonard, a power company lineman, was a descendant of Mary Bradbury, who was tried for witchcraft at Salem, Mass. The author's mother, Esther, read him the "Wizard of Oz." His Aunt Neva introduced him to Edgar Allan Poe and gave him a love of autumn, with its pumpkin picking and Halloween costumes.

"If I could have chosen my birthday, Halloween would be it," he said over the years.

Nightmares that plagued him as a boy also stocked his imagination, as did his youthful delight with the Buck Rogers and Tarzan comic strips, early horror films, Tom Swift adventure books and the works of Jules Verne and H.G. Wells.

"The great thing about my life is that everything I've done is a result of what I was when I was 12 or 13," he said in 1982.

Bradbury's family moved to Los Angeles in 1934. He became a movie buff and a voracious reader. "I never went to college, so I went to the library," he explained.

He tried to write at least 1,000 words a day, and sold his first story in 1941. He submitted work to pulp magazines until he was finally accepted by such upscale publications as The New Yorker. Bradbury's first book, a short story collection called "Dark Carnival," was published in 1947.

He was so poor during those years that he didn't have an office or even a telephone. "When the phone rang in the gas station right across the alley from our house, I'd run to answer it," he said.

He wrote "Fahrenheit 451" at the UCLA library, on typewriters that rented for 10 cents a half hour. He said he carried a sack full of dimes to the library and completed the book in nine days, at a cost of $9.80.

Few writers could match the inventiveness of his plots: A boy outwits a vampire by stuffing him with silver coins; a dinosaur mistakes a fog horn for a mating call (filmed as "The Beast From 20,000 Fathoms"); Ernest Hemingway is flown back to life on a time machine. In "The Illustrated Man," one of his most famous stories, a man's tattoo foretells a horrifying deed -- he will murder his wife.

A dynamic speaker with a booming, distinctive voice, he could be blunt and gruff. But Bradbury was also a gregarious and friendly man, approachable in public and often generous with his time to readers as well as fellow writers.

In 2009, at a lecture celebrating the first anniversary of a small library in Southern California's San Gabriel Valley, Bradbury exhorted his listeners to live their lives as he said he had lived his: "Do what you love and love what you do."

"If someone tells you to do something for money, tell them to go to hell," he shouted to raucous applause.

Until near the end of his life, Bradbury resisted one of the innovations he helped anticipate: electronic books, likening them to burnt metal and urging readers to stick to the old-fashioned pleasures of ink and paper. But in late 2011, as the rights to "Fahrenheit 451" were up for renewal, he gave in and allowed his most famous novel to come out in digital form. In return, he received a great deal of money and a special promise from Simon & Schuster: The publisher agreed to make the e-book available to libraries, the only Simon & Schuster e-book at the time that library patrons were allowed to download.

Bradbury is survived by his four daughters. Marguerite Bradbury, his wife of 56 years, died in 2003.

Article from FOXNEWS

Miss PA: Pageant Was Rigged!

May 30: Miss Pennsylvania Sheena Monnin resigned Monday after claiming the show was rigged.AP

The Miss USA pageant representative from Pennsylvania resigned her crown claiming the contest is rigged, but according to organizers the beauty queen was upset over the decision to allow transgender contestants to enter.

A posting on Miss Pennsylvania Sheena Monnin's Facebook page claims another contestant learned the names of the top 5 finishers on Sunday morning -- hours before the show was broadcast. Â

Monnin claims the other contestant told her the names of the top 5 she spotted on a planning sheet for the telecast -- and she decided to step down as soon as those same contestants were named during the show. Â

"In my heart I believe in honesty, fair play, a fair opportunity, and high moral integrity, none of which in my opinion are part of this pageant system any longer," Monnin wrote in one of her Facebook posts. Â

Monnin, of Cranberry, Butler County, did not immediately respond to a Facebook message from The Associated Press. Â

Donald Trump, who runs the Miss Universe Organization, called Monnin's claims that the pageant was fixed "totally ridiculous" in a live interview Wednesday on ABC's "Good Morning America" and said the pageant organization plans to sue Monnin for making the "false charge." Â

"We're going to be suing her now. She made a very false charge and she knows it's a false charge," Trump said. Â

Pageant organizers confirmed Monnin resigned, but said it wasn't for the reason she claimed. Â

According to a statement from the Miss Universe Organization, the contestant who Monnin claimed saw the sheet vehemently refuted Monnin's account. Â

The statement includes text from an email organizers said Monnin sent citing the decision to allow natural born males into the competition as the reason she's resigning. Â

A transgender contestant was initially denied entry to the Miss Universe Canada pageant because she wasn't born female, but Trump subsequently overruled that decision. Â

Trump downplayed the role transgender contestants had on that Monnin's decision, even though pageant claim that was her motivation. Â

"I don't think that she had an issue with that," Trump said. "I think her primary issue is that she lost and she's angry about losing. And frankly, in my opinion, I saw her barely a second and she didn't deserve to be in the top 15."