The internet (or internets, if you're George Bush) has helped change the way news gets reported. Take for example, R. Scott Moxley's story on Los Angeles County Sheriff's Commander and candidate for Orange County Sheriff Ralph Martin's call for Mike Carona's immediate resignation. On Thursday at a press conference on the steps of the old county courthouse in Santa Ana, Martin denounced Sheriff Carona for his relationship with a Vegas mob associate and other wise guy-friendly types. "This is unacceptable behavior," Martin said. "We can't allow our law enforcement personnel to be associated with known criminals or criminal associates." And since pictures are worth a thousand words, Martin had pictures. Carona enjoying a moment with a relaxed looking mob associate. Carona posing with two of the wise guy-friendly and a big cake. And Carona swearing in those two cake-and-wise-guy friendlies as reserve OC sheriff deputies. All photos from the Weekly– unearthed by R. Scott Moxley and first published on the Weekly's website the day before the press conference as part of Scott's story, "'Dirty, Stupid or Both', Never mind the photo: Sheriff Carona denies Mafia ties".

Without the online version of the Weekly, readers would have had to wait a week, instead of a few hours, to read about one of the leading candidates for sheriff taking on the incumbent over his fraternizing with people who resemble minor characters from a Martin Scorsese movie. Or they would have had to rely on the Orange County Register– which might not be the best idea, since the Reg seems to be pursuing a different internet strategy.

Friday's online version of the Reg did have a story on the press conference, if you could find it. The intrepid hunter had to click through three screens before getting to it. On the way there, you could check out the stories the Reg gave a higher priority. A holocaust survivor to speak in Fullerton. Anniversary celebration in Cerritos. Something about green buildings in Mission Viejo. An In and Out Burger related story. And a warning of a likely traffic slowdown this weekend because of freeway construction. All received more prominent placement than the "Dirty, Stupid or Both" issue erupting into the sheriff's race.

Now, some might question why this story was dumped somewhere behind Burger news and the never-ending story of delays due to freeway work, but I think the answer is obvious. The Reg has clearly adopted an online strategy of trying to make itself exciting, in the way that the late I.F. Stone used to find the Washington Post exciting. Stone, a legendary muckracking journalist, said the Post was an exciting paper to read, "because you never know on what page you would find a page-one story."

cold war kids have been blowing up on the internet as of late, first on new york hipstress karen plus one's blog, and then, today, on the insanely huge stereogum.com.

but let's not forget who wrote about them first. and who obsessed about hospital beds one for an entire day not too long ago (search "hospitalbeds" and you'll find the post). and did you ever get your FREE oc weekly comp CD featuring cold war kids, matt costa AND richard swift? no? then, please, by all means, drop by our office and pick one up! we've got lots!

Dear Peoples Republic of Blotter Types:

It makes us chortle that so many folks have their Fruit of the Looms in a bunch over the National Anthem being sung in Spanish. Heck, the only thing we remember from 1 1/2 years of California public high school Spanish nearly 30 years ago was the Pledge of Allegiance en espanol. The may-yammo-es: gone. The lame salutations: gone. The curse words: gone. But being able to say the Pledge -- the bajo dios version even -- are permanently burned into the memory banks.

And yet, we've never been prompted to send 3/4's of our paycheck to a Mexican village. Go figure.

It was only 1 1/2 years of Spanish because we were kicked out the final semester after a confrontation with our Spanish teacher, who'd complained a bunch of non-English speakers in Chicago had just perished in a fire because when firemen broke into their burning building and yelled, "Fire!" no one knew what that meant so they stayed and died. The teacher blamed the firemen for not knowing Spanish. We blamed the residents for not having learned at least one English word, obviously the most critical English word as this case showed. The clash over who should know Spanish vs. who should know English led to a nasty argument in front of everyone. "Who told you to say that?" the teacher kept yelling, like a 17-year-old could not possibly think up such a position on his own. We were removed from class for not apologizing to the teacher, but it was the teacher who got the last laugh: without that final semester of the same foreign language, we could not enroll in state universities after graduation and wound up going the far more expensive private college route.

Our place at university was taken by a Peruvian fireman, we understand.

Please forgive the over-generalization, but to over-generalize the Democrats are the party of expensive mass transit boondoggles, the Republicans are the party of lung cancer, freeways to nowhere and terror-enabling dependence on foreign oil, and in Orange County members of both parties are against commercial airports unless the flight paths shadow the opposition's neighborhoods. But, believe it or not, there are other political parties operating in Orange County, birthplace of the Libertarians (who are for private roads carrying mass-marketed, tax-free vehicles fueled by medical marijuana), and playground for the Green Party of Orange County.

Our cuddly little Greenies are fixing to discuss their big-view transportation solution: Personal Rapid Transit. PRT is a proposed public transportation mode that would offer on-demand, non-stop transportation between any two points on specially built guideways. The PRT concept, which was born in the 1960s, has influenced the design of existing people movers and proposed mass-transit systems, although no project has yet progressed beyond the project stage. The knocks against PRT are the same ones against just about any transportation mode: cost, safety and public acceptance. And like any transportation mode, no decision-maker is going to get behind PRT until someone can prove ridership will exceed the costs, meaning -- as with any transportation mode -- it's going to take leadership, a resource this county, state and country sorely lacks.

So, like with many other transportation modes, for that kind of top-down support we must travel beyond America's borders, to Heathrow Airport in London, where a PRT system is scheduled to come into operation in 2007, and another at Dubai International Financial Center in 2008.

Dubai!

The next time you're sitting in traffic at the Y, the Orange Crush or the 22, think about this: since the Democrats and Republicans have let us down when it comes to planning our transportation future -- toll roads: what's THAT about? -- don't we at least owe it to ourselves to hear what the Greenies have to say about the PRT SKYTRAN proposal? The featured speaker is Aliso Viejo City Councilman Karl Warkomski. Measure M and your favorite toll-road extension, the Foothill South, will also be discussed. The fun begins at 2 p.m. Sunday, May 7, in the Board Room of the Irvine Ranch Water District, 15600 Sand Canyon Ave., Irvine. (http://www.ocgreens.org)

If you're outraged by the idea of people singing the Star Spangled Banner in something other than English (a bit awkward having to make a nationalistic argument regarding language when your language is named for a different nation, but you have to work with what you've got), like, say, the new Spanish language version of the national anthem, I've got some bad news-- you're going to have to spend a lot of time being outraged. As Steve points out over at No More Mister Nice Blog, translating the anthem into another language is a widely accepted American practice-- except, to judge by news reports, when Latinos do it. German, French, Polish, even Tagalog, not a peep of protest, but reach for the Spanish/English dictionary and the howling starts on talk radio and cable news channels. Of course all the outraged types doing the howling in the media claim that race has nothing to do with this, it's the principle of the matter-- the Star Spangled Banner should only be sung in English. If you are one of those types, best of luck to you-- protesting all those non-Spanish translations is going to be a lot of work. Your anti-German language protests at Oktoberfest alone will be grueling. But it'll be worth it, right? Because it's all about the principle, and has nothing to do with race.

Me, I'll be in the beer tent, trying not to look surprised when the picket lines don't appear.

The good news? the Journal of Pharmaceutical Sciences is to publish a report on how marijuana smoked from a vaporizer (they cite the Volcano by name, which is really nifty) is a "safe and effective" delivery system. I.e. not dangerous. I.e. a major political argument for medipot, that smoked marijuana does harm and thus is unsafe, is burnt to nothing like a cashed bowl.

The Volcano

The better news? The report comes from Leiden University - in the Netherlands! Can't get enough of those wonderful Dutch. Amsterdamn good research, guys!
Still, the National Organization for the Remanding of Marijuana Laws has known about this since 2004.

I need to clarify one point in Will Swaim's previous post about Matt Cunningham finally coming out of the Jubal closet, and Cunningham's disingenuous defense of the uses he was making of his secret identity. It's easy to confuse which version of Cunningham is which sometimes (it could have been even more confusing if I had included in the story the other pseudonyms Cunningham publishes under on the internet– one of which, it probably won't surprise you to learn, has also been singled out for praise by Jubal in the past), and that confusion combined with the way Cunningham is trying to frame the issue may obscure part of the story.

Cunningham claims not disclosing the fact that Diane Harkey's state senate campaign paid his blog consulting firm, BlogAtomic, $1050 isn't worth the ink the Weekly gave it, because the money was used to buy an ad on OC Blog. Leaving aside the fact that OC Blog readers had no way of knowing that the ad money wasn't just going to the blog, but also to one of Cunningham's outside businesses, this response doesn't address the other half of the problem. When I wrote "He [Cunningham] hasn't disclosed that payment in any of his subsequent posts on the senate race" I was referring to his posts on the FlashReport, something I thought was clear since the sentence goes on to say, "and he certainly hasn't disclosed the payment on OC Blog". Cunningham never disclosed the payment on the FlashReport, where he blogs under his own name and where the other bloggers disclose their business ties to the subjects of their posts. Even Cunningham occasionally discloses a business relationship on the FlashReport, but he chose not to do so when it came to the Harkey campaign.

For reasons of space, a rather charming detail about Cunningham's non-disclosure was dropped from the final version of the story. Records show the Harkey campaign paid BlogAtomic the $1050 on January 17. In a January 17 FlashReport post time stamped 3:10 pm, Cunningham manages to shoehorn a pro-Harkey line into a post about 67th Assembly district race. Now, potential clients of Cunningham's are free to admire that as prompt customer service or good value for money, but FlashReport readers who visit the site in hopes of finding trustworthy commentary are likely to take a dimmer view. Just as they would no doubt take a dimmer view of two of Cunningham's subsequent touching on the state senate race, which directed them the OC Blog's special section devoted to the race, featuring more than 120 posts, all pro-Harkey, all but four of which were written by Cunningham as Jubal.

A final note about that January 17 FlashReport post: it opens, "I just saw on OC Blog..." Five words into the post, and Cunningham is already linking to one of his Jubal posts, in order to let his readers know what he just saw on OC Blog. In other words, he's claiming to have just seen something he wrote himself. Normally when people make such a claim, it's a sign of untreated mental illness– in Cunningham's case, it's just business as usual.

Also cut from the story for reasons of space was a line pointing out that hiding behind the Jubal pseudonym spared Cunningham from having to disclose his business dealing with the subjects of his posts. I have to admit now, I underestimated Cunningham. He doesn't need a secret identity to keep his readers in the dark. Consider this OC Blog post he put up as Jubal, four days after the Weekly story appeared: "Word Is Getting Around About Freedom-Friendly Anaheim". What Jubal doesn't tell the reader is Matt Cunningham does consulting work for "Freedom-Friendly Anaheim".

I knew blogs were supposed to increase in the interactivity between reader and writer, but I had no idea that as part of that interactivity it was now up to the reader to figure out on his own if the writer is taking money from the subject of his posts.

Your favorite Co-ed Dorm Wall Clock was shocked--SHOCKED!!!--to read our fresh-pressed copy of the Monday edition of the Chapman University Panther student newspaper (where, little known factoid, we twice toiled as a fill-in faculty advisor, until a certain former LA "By God" Times slacker slid in and put a spell under head honchoess Sue Paterno. Damn you, Jerry Hicks, damn your shapely thighs!) It was this headline that had our just-chewed Special K flying across the breakfast nook:

"Racy Student Film Draws CU Officials' Attention."

And well it should, because diligent Panther reporter (and former Weekly intern) Heather Reger draws out a jaw-dropping tale of woe--and woo--about a risque Chapman student film whose mere existence prompted a "disgruntled" university trustee to press CU Prez Jim Doti for answers. And what was it, according to Reger, that put Ryan Witherspoon's shortie Barely Legal on the prominent (though unnamed) board member's radar? Why it was a film piece in a certain Weekly by the handsomest writer in the land! Writes Reger ...

The March 30 column poked fun at the conservative reputation held by many at Chapman and the irony that the university produced the
student film Barely Legal that suggested pornography and featured the dramatized rape of an intoxicated woman at a college party.
Upon the request of President Jim Doti, Witherspoon--the writer, director and producer--provided a director's statement to Film School Dean Bob Bassett.

Dean Bassett--DEAD! Sorry, slipped into Animal House mode there. For his part, Witherspoon tells Reger what an ordeal this high-level pressure has put on him...

"The publicity has been great. I think this is a film that should be widely seen."

Is this kid a film major or a marketing major?

As for Doti, he essentially locks his office door, hides under his desk and puts his fingers in his ears while humming "La-la-la" until the probing Reger goes away, although she more diplomatically encapsulates the incident with a brief, "Doti declined to comment." Now, what this Sexed-Up Seiko found most interesting of all was the Weekly passage the Panther chose to pass on. See, with that earlier reference to the institution's "conservative reputation," we figured they'd go with the opener, especially since it's filled with so many colorful Chapman characters ...

Oh, to be a fruit fly on the wall at the Dodge School of Film and Media Studies 2006 "Let the Good Times Roll 'Em" Awards Banquet. Picture Chapman University's largest--in every sense of the word--benefactor George Argyros, every splatter of banquet chicken and gravy falling off his grapefruit-sized chin immediately swabbed by wee Chapman prez James Doti. Alum and former Orange County GOP chairman Tom Fuentes would hold court in the middle of the room, regaling his bored tablemates with his tales of destroying California public education one community college district at a time. And stuck at the far back table, the one they ran out of tablecloths for, the one that's so close to the swinging kitchen doors that one door actually smacks liberal poli-sci prof Fred Smoller's chair, would be alum and U.S. Representative Loretta Sanchez (D-Garden Grove), regaling her tablemates with her tales of students being squelched in their quest to make her their commencement speaker immediately after she made history by becoming the first Latina member of Congress. Giving a full belly laugh to that one would be the commencement speaker administrators unilaterally substituted for Sanchez, Republican former congressman from Newport Beach, Chris Cox, eavesdropping from the Fuentes table and in town to help three-quarters of the room escape the probing efforts of the federal Securities and Exchange Commission Cox now chairs. No wonder they call the school Dodge.

But, alas, the article goes with the more titillating ...

The shocked crowd would be subjected to pill-popping, lesbianism, anal sex (desired, not shown), lost virginity, cumming on tits (suggested, not shown) and a guy going all Haidl on a passed-out girl (without the Snapple bottle, lit cigarette, juice can, pool cue, etc.).

My oh my, that's the first time I can recall reading "cumming on tits" on the front page of a student newspaper. This sure ain't the La-La Times, eh Jerry?

And now the ironiest of ironies of all: Witherspoon says he will indeed enter Barely Legal for a Chapman U film award, and ya'll can call us Kreskin.

Your favorite TV Time Tracker figured one of those knuckleheads at The Blotter would have already, uh, blottered this, but in case you missed it: Orange County's very own right-wing whackmaster Hugh Hewitt was on The Colbert Report the other night--and he wasn't even being punked like some other recent OC politicos were by a different Comedy Central faux news program. And damn if Baby Hughie wasn't reserved as host Stephen Colbert, who does the second best right-wing whackmaster impression on television (no one can top Papa Bear, Bill O'Reilly), filled most all of the air by taking Hewitt to task for his new book Painting the Map Red not going far enough. (Colbert wants all 50 states red, despite Hewitt's protestations that Cali and the Big Apple are lost causes.) When we discovered many key Weeklings missed Hughcifer, one mused that he's such a shameless self-promoter he surely has a video link to the broadcast on his site. Sure enough, here'tis.

However, even funnier than the funny Colbert-Hewitt repartee is Hughie's explaining away his silence on Colbert farther up on his site. See, HH learned long ago from interviewing comedians (Harry Shearer, Tracy Ullman, Dick Cheney) that his questions are just set-ups for their comedy bits. So he seamlessly slipped into "reverse mode" with Colbert, the host's comedic questions allowing Hugh to assume the quiet "Dick Smothers" character. (For you coveted center-of-Weekly demographic readers who do not know who Dick Smothers is, ask your grandparents).
To paraphrase a much better straight man, "Say goodnight, Hugh ..."

Amazingly, there are those who think Anaheim isn't glamorous enough already. Unwilling to let the city only bask in the reflected glory of the largest concentration of sweaty, underpaid wannabee actors dressed like popular cartoon characters this side of any place named Six Flags, the city is ready to pursue even more glamor in a very Orange County way: by combining a franchising opportunity with a paving program.

This morning's L.A. Times has a report on Anaheim's attempt to acquire some non-Disney related glitz, the Anaheim/Orange County Walk of Stars. The stars won't actually be walking in Anaheim, of course, it'll just be their names stamped into shiny new sidewalk slabs-- assuming the star in question is willing to pony up $15,000 for the sort of immortality that small dogs can easily shit on. The fifteen grand may also be paid by a fervent admirer of the famous person, since some of these immortals/small dog attractions being considered for the honor are dead. Prime example: local boy made good, then gone horribly bad, R.M. Nixon. (His star, if he gets one, would no doubt give Walk-of-Fame scientists an opportunity to test out the latest in urine- and graffiti-resistant star coatings.)

This will not be just any old walk, this sidewalk replacement program will be overseen by the Motion Picture Hall of Fame Foundation, the same folks who are in charge of the Hollywood Walk of Fame– an attraction considered exciting and glamorous by those who have never seen it in person.

Anaheim Mayor Curt Pringle is excited about the coming walk, telling the Times: "Orange County has had a very long history, and oftentimes it was seen as just a suburb of Los Angeles. Today, it's a lot different, and Orange County's identity is something we're very proud of." That's right, Orange County is going to assert its own unique identity by setting up a minor-league version of something Los Angeles already has. Very clever, no?