culture

In the opening scene of Touchstone Pictures Confessions of a Shopaholic, financial journalist Rebecca Bloomwood has a flashback to an event in her childhood in which she is shopping for shoes with her mother. Her extremely frugal mom buys her what could only be described as a horrific-looking pair of shoes because they were on…

WP: Geithner Asks Congress for More Power to Seize Firms, They Say “When Your Jacket Fits” WSJ: Obama Dials Down Wall St. Criticism, Leaves It to the ‘Internet Stans’ NYT: With No Foreign Aid Workers Left, Sudanese Take to Shooting Domestic Aid Workers USNWR: Study IDs Variation in Black, White Genomes; Maybe Race Isn’t a…

After four days of close, intense games and some memorable last-second shots, the NCAA Men’s College Basketball Championship Tournament, aka March Madness, has narrowed the field from 64 to 16 teams, and the results are surprisingly predictable. In each of the four regions, the top-three seeds are still playing; two fourth seeds, Xavier University and…

MSNBC: Tips for Making College Affordable—Step One: Have Money AJE: Deadly Attack on Iraq Funeral (Yeah, It’s Reaaallly Time for Us to Go) CNN: Tyra Gets Her Robin Givens On, Talks to Oprah of Abuse WH: Obama Talks Green Jobs *Live* IS: Indiana Near Top of Black Homicide Rate; Buzz Didn’t Know Hoosiers Were That…

MONDAY WP: AIG Discloses Use of Bailout Funds; You Didn’t Get Any, But an Incompetent Did Times of London: Thousands of Girls Mutilated in Britain WSJ: Having Little Interest in Being Opposed, Chavez Sends Navy to Venezuela’s Seaport to Make This Clear AP: Imus Has Prostate Cancer; Rev. Al Sharpton to Protest This in Some…

BB: Lehman Stress Balls Coughed Up By Barclays; Bloomberg Headline, Not Ours IHT: More Comes Out about Gaza killings; Israel Would Deny, But Knows How Much That Stinks in Reverse Fox: Iranian Leaders Reject Prez’s Gesture; Obama Says “Rahm, Fetch My Shinebox” SR: 50 Cent Replaces Forrest Whitaker in Film; Apparently, Every Black Actor Ever…

The NCAA Women’s Basketball Tournament starts Saturday, and I have a problem with that. The women’s tournament is easily the third-best collegiate sporting event, surpassed only by football and men’s hoops. While pundits love to debate the viability of the WNBA (and those who wish it would go away try to ignore that attendance was…

Point me t’ward tomorrow We did what we had to do. Won’t forget, can’t regret What I did for love. —“What I Did For Love,” from A Chorus Line A dancer’s life is famously short, brutal and riddled with potential pitfalls: ripped Achilles tendons, torn hamstrings, stress fractures, cruel choreographers. There is drama and angst…

 BBC: Israeli Soldiers Admit Gaza Abuses; Israel Claims, ‘But They’re Not Really People, Ya Know’? CNN: Bin Laden May or May Not Have Come Out with New Mixtape; SoundScan Has Been Weak of Late SJMN: Richard Aoki, Charter Member of Black Panthers, Dies in Berkeley NYT: Heart Failure Strikes Black More Often and at Younger…