this modern world leads us to this very interesting nytimes piece.

Investigators at the Corporation for Public Broadcasting are examining $15,000 in payments to two Republican lobbyists last year that were not disclosed to the corporation's board, people involved in the inquiry said on Wednesday.

One of the lobbyists was retained at the direction of the corporation's Republican chairman, Kenneth Y. Tomlinson, they said, and the other at the suggestion of his Republican predecessor, who remains on the board.

The investigators, in the corporation's inspector general's office, are also examining $14,170 in payments made under contracts - which Mr. Tomlinson took the unusual step of signing personally, also without the knowledge of board members - with a man in Indiana who provided him with reports about the political leanings of guests on the "Now" program when its host was Bill Moyers.

secrets are coming out tomlinson's mission to conservatize public broadcasting. secret off-the-books lobbyists?

Corporation officials said the two lobbyists did not approach lawmakers but provided strategic advice on handling a bill last year that would have given public radio and television stations more representation on the corporation's board. The measure, which died, was opposed by the White House and Mr. Tomlinson but was supported by stations.

One of the lobbyists, Brian Darling, was paid $10,000 for his insights into Senator Conrad Burns, a Montana Republican who sponsored the provision. This year, he briefly served as a top aide to Senator Mel Martinez, Republican of Florida, but resigned after the disclosure that he had written a memorandum describing how to exploit politically the life-support case of Terri Schiavo.

yes, this darling guy wrote the infamous terri schiavo "great opportunity for the GOP" memo. real stand-up guy. and if tomlinson hired the guy, and tomlinson opposed the bill he was hired to consult on, then clearly they were working to defeat a bill that the member stations all wanted, using CPB's money, and not reporting it to the board.

but on to the hoosier connection:

The inspector general is looking at contracts signed by Mr. Tomlinson with a man named Fred Mann to monitor the political leanings of "Now." The inquiry was requested by two Democrats, Representatives John D. Dingell of Michigan and David R. Obey of Wisconsin, after they learned about the monitoring.

Officials said the inspector general was examining whether Mr. Tomlinson, as chairman of the corporation, had the authority to approve the contract or the payments.

Mr. Mann, who was listed in the contracts as living in Indianapolis, could not be located, and officials at the corporation said they knew nothing about him.

googling "fred mann" indianapolis turns up 98 hits or so, but the only ones that really seem to refer to a hoosier mention a fred mann who lives in cloverdale and is on the indiana commission on agricultural and rural development (link to google cache because the actual link didn't work). i suppose that could be the guy, but i don't know why he'd be qualified to monitor tv content if his expertise is agriculture. it's probably not him. and i need to go to bed: no time for more googling right now.

still, if there's a naptown connection to a scandal at CPB, will our local media start picking up on the story soon? i suspect i know the answer, but wouldn't it be cool if the indy star or something tracked down fred mann & broke open that aspect of the story?  ¶ 12:54 AM

my show tomorrow night is, among other things, a cd release for the funeral party.

they got a brief write-up in today's INTake. it has a bit about the band as well as the show.  ¶ 2:32 PM

sign the petition to protest the propsed cuts to NPR & PBS funding.

http://www.moveon.org/publicbroadcasting/  ¶ 1:47 PM

the terri schiavo autopsy is out, and it essentially reaffirms everything michael schiavo ever said while debunking everything his detractors ever said.

In a victory for Michael Schiavo, a coroner who performed an autopsy on Terri Schiavo reported Wednesday that she suffered from an irreversible brain injury and would not have recovered as her parents insisted was possible. It also found no evidence that she was strangled or otherwise abused.

"Her brain was profoundly atrophied," Jon Thogmartin, medical examiner for Florida's Pinellas-Pasco County, told a press conference. "There was massive neuronal loss, or death. This was irreversible and no amount of therapy or treatment would have regenerated the massive loss of neurons."

"The brain weighed 615 grams, roughly half of the expected weight of a human brain," he added.

Thogmartin was joined by Dr. Stephen Nelson, who described her condition as "very consistent with a persistent vegetative state," which is what Michael Schiavo and most doctors had contended was the case.

half of her brain had turned to goo. but thinkprogress remembers back to when senate majority leader bill frist (who used to be a doctor, don't forget) tried to diagnose terri by videotape. frist claimed that "[s]he certainly seems to respond to visual stimuli". however, the autopsy shows that terri's vision centers were long gone, meaning that she was blind.

the only remaining question: is frist worse at being a doctor or at being a senator? or does he suck equally at both?  ¶ 12:03 PM

when john aravosis of americablog picks up on a story, he really clenches it in his teeth and bites down hard. today he has lots about mary carey's visit to the white house fundraiser. (he also has a lot about the recent senate "anti-lynching", which was secretly passed during a late night voice vote, apparently because there are around 15 republican senators who are seemingly pro-lynching, but that's a different story.)

john even wrote an article about it for radar, which closes with this fantastic quote:

"Politicians see the people who make porn movies as sleazy and the girls as dumb, but Mark's not sleazy and I’m not dumb." She pauses for a minute then asks, "Do you think I should shave my vagina tonight or tomorrow?"

though still no answer on whether she went "brazilian" or shaved down to a "landing strip"... it appears i need to do more "research" on on the issue of carey's bush ("carey" sounds like "kerry"? "bush" vs "bush"? coincidence?)

and as much as certain media outlets might want to ignore the porn-star angle to the fundraiser story (*cough*washingtonpost*cough*), people are starting to take notice. and some of those people don't share my unabashed love of porn stars. some of them tried to get comments from white house spokesliar scott mclellan but scotty refused, redirecting the question to the NRCC, which hosted the fundraiser.

anyway, i hope the radar article gets picked up, because the only thing i like more than seeing the word "vagina" in the news is seeing the word "vagina" appear in an article about bush.  ¶ 11:02 AM

tomlinson's crusade against PBS continues:

A House subcommittee voted yesterday to sharply reduce the federal government's financial support for public broadcasting, including eliminating taxpayer funds that help underwrite such popular children's educational programs as "Sesame Street," "Reading Rainbow," "Arthur" and "Postcards From Buster."

In addition, the subcommittee acted to eliminate within two years all federal money for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting -- which passes federal funds to public broadcasters -- starting with a 25 percent reduction in CPB's budget for next year, from $400 million to $300 million.

In all, the cuts would represent the most drastic cutback of public broadcasting since Congress created the nonprofit CPB in 1967. The CPB funds are particularly important for small TV and radio stations and account for about 15 percent of the public broadcasting industry's total revenue.

way to go tomlinson! while you're smashing that awful "liberal bias" at PBS, go ahead and smash the funding for popular kids' shows like sesame street. PBS-kids is the only channel my 32-month-old nephew watches. but if those shows were to go away, he could just watch Kids' WB and get the same educational value from yu-gi-oh that he currently gets from sesame street or between the lions or my favorite boohbah, right?

The subcommittee's action, which came on a voice vote, doesn't necessarily put Big Bird on the Endangered Species List. House members could restore funding as the appropriations bill moves along or, more likely, when the House and Senate meet to reconcile budget legislation later this year. The Senate has traditionally been a stronger ally of public broadcasting than the House, whose former speaker, Newt Gingrich (R-Ga.), waged a high-profile but ultimately unsuccessful campaign to "zero out" funding for the CPB a decade ago.

The cuts nevertheless surprised people in public broadcasting. In his budget sent to Congress in February, President Bush had recommended reducing CPB's budget only slightly.

Several denounced the decision by the panel, which has 10 Republicans and seven Democrats, as payback by a Republican-dominated House after years of complaints from conservatives who see liberal bias in programs carried by the Public Broadcasting Service and National Public Radio. Broadcasters noted, for example, that the 25 percent cutback in next year's CPB budget was a rollback of money that Congress had promised in 2004.

of course, even though this attempt to gut PBS and NPR is as transparent as susan storm's love handles, republicans are still trying to deny it.

Rep. Ralph Regula (R-Ohio), the subcommittee's chairman, said the cuts had nothing to do with dissatisfaction over public radio or TV programs. "It's pretty simple," he said in an interview. "The thinking was, there's not enough money for everything. There are 'must-do,' 'need-to-do' and 'nice-to-do' programs that we have to pay for. [Public broadcasting] is somewhere between a 'need-to-do' and a 'nice-to-do.' "

um... someone should call rep regula and point out to him that "must-do" and "need-to-do" are synonyms and mean the same damn thing. but anyway...

Regula suggested public stations could "make do" without federal money by getting more funding from private sources, such as contributions from corporations, foundations, and listeners and viewers.

yes, the two things that PBS needs to do is sell out to more advertisers (oops, i mean underwriters) and interrupt more programming by having more & longer pledge drives. the audience would love both those things, i'm sure.

But the loss of $23.4 million in federal funds for children's educational shows -- which PBS calls its "Ready to Learn" programs -- could mean the elimination of these programs, said an official at Alexandria-based PBS who asked not to be named because the network still hopes to regain the funding. PBS's revenue totaled $333 million in fiscal year 2004.

The Ready to Learn group includes "Sesame Street," "Dragontales," "Clifford" and "Arthur," among others.

  ¶ 12:48 PM

today, bush will meet bush in the battle of the bushes! or not so much a battle as a conference of the bushes.

yes, president george "dubya" bush will today confer with another world-famous bush, or at least the owner of a world-famous bush: pr0n star and former california gubernatorial candidate mary carey, who will be at the white house today for a republican fundraiser.

sure, republicans talk a lot about immorality, and how much they hate pr0n, prostitution (which they equate with pr0n), and homosexuality (while carey is probably not gay, i can guarantee that she's had "lesbian" sex live on videotape)... but what warm-blooded male doesn't (at least secretly) love pornography? looking at naked people is fun. watching people have sex is fun. and watching a former gubernatorial candidate run around nude and fucking people... what fun!

it's not just fun, either. there's a lot of money in them there panties. courtesy of americablog:

Event: Mary Carey Pre-Presidential Dinner Fashion Show/Press Conference

Who: Porn star and former California gubernatorial candidate Mary Carey will be joining her boss, Kick Ass Pictures president Mark Kulkis, in attending a dinner with President Bush on Tuesday evening, June 14. Kulkis was invited to attend the event by the National Republican Congressional Committee (NRCC), which is organizing the event. Kulkis serves as an Honorary Chairman on the NRCC’s Business Advisory Council. His company produces hardcore adult videos with a guarantee of “No Fake Boobs & No Condoms.”

What: This press conference will cover several topics.

* First and foremost, Carey will put on a mini-fashion show on Coyote Ugly’s bar, displaying the outfit she will be wearing to the President’s Dinner later that evening.

* Kulkis & Carey will reveal what happened at their luncheon with Karl Rove a few hours earlier.

* Kulkis & Carey will discuss how the president of a porn company and his contract superstar were invited to attend a Republican fundraiser, and why they accepted. (Kulkis has said: “Republicans bill themselves as the pro-business party. Well, you won’t find a group of people more pro-business than pornographers. We contributed over $10 billion to the national economy last year.”)

* Carey is expected to officially announce her candidacy for Lieutenant Governor of California in 2006.

no fake boobs and no condoms. that could almost be a slogan for the bush administration!

president bush is pretty unpopular these days. his approval ratings are the lowest ever, and have been well under 50% for some time now. his approval ratings on the issues are even lower. in contrast, president clinton big approval ratings in his second term, and i believe they were at their highest when he was being impeached for having sex with an intern (or not having sex, depending on your definitions).

so just imagine how high bush's numbers would climb if he one-upped clinton by bedding a porn star during a fundraiser! no need to do it privately in the oval office... take her to the lincoln bedroom to properly seduce her. or just do her right there on the banquet table in front of the other guests! that would really emphasize the president's manhood. (or maybe it wouldn't, depending on how small his manhood is.)  ¶ 12:15 PM

click to enlarge

this mixer is a bit taller than my old mixer, maybe one or even two rack spaces taller. my rack still had room for it, but just barely; i had to move the cd remotes in order to squeeze the mixer into its spot.

this also means that the back of the mixer (where all the ins and outs are) is much closer to the back of the rig. the gap is narrow enough that some of my rca cables won't fit, and the smaller cables will fit but inserting them requires some tricky finger work.

worse, the mixer comes with a detachable power cable (identical to the power cables used on PCs), which would be a cool design idea if space were unlimited. but it's not, and there simply was not space to plug the cable in. i had to have barry take it to the basement and carve a hole in the rack with his dremel tool in order to plug the cable in. but that's done now, and my studio is hooked back up with the exception of turntable 1, because i just didn't have enough rca cables with small plugs. i'll have to pick up a couple more cables, maybe tomorrow.

it will take time to get used to not having eq or gain on each channel; i'm used to cranking up the gain on quiet channels, which is bad mixing practice, but otherwise i didn't really use them. and now my whole setup, except for the kaoss pad, is numark. maybe they will sponsor me.  ¶ 11:46 PM

so drbmd & i went to sam ash at lunchtime and bought my new mixer. i guess drbmd was bored and looking for a distraction, which was fine with me.

numark dm1295, with built-in sampler. that sampler is going to be awesome.



i don't know if i'll get a lot of time to play with it tonight, as drbmd & i are also getting together to watch a little movie called ninja of the magnificence, which is guaranteed to be magnificently bad. but i definitely want to play around with my new mixer for a bit before i perform with it for the first time this friday.  ¶ 1:29 PM

i went mixer shopping today, but haven't bought anything yet.

first i went to guitar center, and was a bit taken aback at how awful their selection was. i mean, just terrible. they had a bunch of turntables and cd decks, but at most four 19" dj mixers. four poorly displayed mixers. one, which was too expensive & out of my price range, was on display near the floor; the others were stuffed in boxes on shelves, and were all crappy cheaper mixers. the only one i would be willing to accept was the $699 one, so i left.

on to sam ash, which probably had double the selection. but the mixers they had on display were not necessarily the ones they had in boxes on the shelves, and you can't always tell what features a mixer has by looking at its controls. of course, in both places, there was really no help to speak of. so i wrote down a few model numbers and left.

i drove back to guitar center, just in case they had some of the same models for cheaper, but i was only reminded of just how bad their selection was, and left.

so i drove all the way over to ipa pro audio, where they have exactly two 19" dj mixers, but of course i got help immediately. still, they had no good mixers, so i moved on, wandering around the lafayette square area thinking there had to be somewhere else in the neighborhood that sells such things. but i couldn't find one, and eventually came home empty handed.

so i guess i'll be going back to sam ash to buy something (no time to order online), probably tomorrow at lunch. here are the mixers i was looking at there:

• numark 1295: $299. this has a kickass built-in mixer, with up to 110sec total nonvolatile memory (that means the samples stay there if you turn it off and back on). and the sampler is polyphonic, too. it has send but no return (useless to me), and it does not have 3-band eq on each channel... but i rarely use that anyway, except to crank up my midrange when i'm struggling to hear myself over my fellow animals.
• denon dx-400: $399. this has send/return and 3-band eq on each channel, but it seems like the send/return only has two settings: mic and main (as opposed to a mixing board, which would have an fx control for each channel). that seems somewhat standard for send/return on the dj mixers i've seen, and is kind of lame, because it really doesn't increase the flexibility of my kaoss pad very much.
• denon dx-800: $499. this is fancier than the dx-400 and includes built-in fx, send/return, and sample triggers. but it doesn't actually have a sampler, it just interacts with denon cd players (which i don't have), so fuck it.

out of those, i have to go for the numark 1295 because that built-in sampler looks pretty cool, and the denons don't really add much that would help me. so unless i come up with a better plan, i'll probably be going out to sam ash tomorrow to pick that up.  ¶ 4:16 PM