So, Lady Gaga did not approve of a song by Weird Al. It’s called “Perform This Way” and is a pretty pointed satire of the Queen of Pop’s “Born This Way.” Its proceeds would have benefited the Human Rights Campaign. Well, citing “Fair Use,” Weird Al decided to release it anyway to YouTube and Gaga’s people later relented. They gave official permission for the song to go forward. Take a listen, it’s pretty good.
A plane carrying First Lady Michelle Obama and Joe Biden’s wife Jill Biden was forced to abort a landing and circle Andrews Air Force Base after an air traffic controller allowed the VIP plane to get too close to a large cargo plane.
The trouble started as the plane carrying Obama and Biden arrived from New York. Controllers knew the plane was high priority, but ordered the plane to do a series of maneuvers to create more space between it and the cargo plane. As the First Lady’s plane approached the runway, though, the large cargo plane remained on the runway.
FAA rules require planes to remain 5 miles apart to ensure safety. Due to an error at a regional airport, the two planes in today’s incident got within 3 miles of each other. That’s too close. That said, members of the First Lady’s staff were not even aware that anything out of the ordinary was occurring.
The incident comes at an especially bad time for the FAA. Over the past couple of weeks, numerous reports have emerged of air traffic controllers falling asleep while on duty. Just yesterday, a controller was fired after he accidentally streamed audio from a movie to all aircraft in the surrounding area.
This past couple of days has given some great clips from TV. Here are four of my favorite. You should take some time and watch them.
1) Fault Lines: Fast Food, Fat Profits (Al Jazeera): You probably don’t think of Al Jazeera first when you think of great news documentaries, but maybe you should. This short 20-minute documentary talks to all players in the food wars, and does a great job of explaining the problem briefly.
2) Paul Allen on Gates, Microsoft (60 Minutes): The co-founder of Microsoft has a new book out called Idea Man that offers an inside look into the founding of the world’s most important tech company. Allen seems to have an ax to grind, but you can make up your own mind. He rarely does interviews so this is a rare look.
3) China’s Ghost Cities (Dateline Australia): This short clip looks at the property bubble that’s forming in China and how many of their cities lie unoccupied. It raises bigger questions, like how long can China sustain its current rate of growth? Fascinating perspective from all sorts of people.
4) Three Cups of Tea Controversy (60 Minutes): One of the more inspiring tales of charity work in the past couple of decades may be a hoax. Greg Mortenson says that when he descended from K2 (the second highest mountain in the world), people in a small town nursed him back to health. In response, he promised to build them a school. A successful book and charity followed. It may all be false though. Incredible report and brilliant reporting.
Hope it has a good view. An anonymous Ukrainian man purchased “Flat A” at One Hyde Park for $221 million in 2007 in cash. The man will likely spent 60 million additional pounds (or $98 million) to make renovations to the apartment. It came with bare walls and no furniture. Most of the properties in the complex have already been bought, with over one billion pounds spent on purchasing the 45 properties.
What does the shocking amount of money buy? Lots. The apartment covers the top three floors of the complex. All residents have a staff of 60 Mandarin Oriental hotel trained staff on site 24/7. Flat A comes with bulletproof glass and a panic room. All residents have access to an exclusive private cinema and lots of swimming facilities. Oh, and a 999 year lease.
Unfortunately, discrimination remains a fact of life for many people whose only crime is showing the world who they are truly are. Thankfully, there are lots of other people out there who remind victims of discrimination that they are far from alone.
1) London, UK: Jonathan Williams and James Bull were finishing up a very happy first date with a drink at the John Snow pub in London’s SoHo neighborhood. After a while, they began to kiss. This disturbed some patrons. After a while, somebody claiming to be the landlady asked them to leave because their kissing was bothering some of the patrons. A plainclothes officer said she had the right to ask them to leave. I have to say that two people kissing is probably one of the more innocuous things to happen at a bar during a busy evening.
So yesterday, hundreds of people attended a kiss-in outside the pub in question to protest the treatment Williams and Bull endured. The pub decided to close down and forfeit an evening of profits rather than open in the middle of the protest. Human rights campaigners from all over London attended the festivities. Word is that the happy couple at the center of the story will go on a second date sometime after Easter. Hopefully, it will be a little more low-key.
2) Brazil: At a semifinal match last week in a prominent Brazilian volleyball league, the fans erupted in cheers of “bicha” (which means “f****t”) in Portugese. Those cheers were directed toward a member of Vôlei Futuro named Michael. He was forced to come out to the press saying, “I’m gay. Everyone knows who I am. My team fully respects my sexuality.”
So at a second semifinal, the team showed Michael how much they were behind him. During warmups, the entire team wore pink jerseys as a sign of solidarity and the team’s libero, a player who wears a different color jersey than everyone else, wore a rainbow-colored tee shirt. The crowd displayed a large banner that read, “Vôlei Futuro Against Prejudice” and had thundersticks with the word “Michael” on them to drown out any potential homophobia that erupted during the match.
They won too.
Not Intent on Arriving 