There is a cringe-worthy cute-meet romance movie in this story, as well as some valid points about our celebrity-focused culture, and how it subsumes the the news cycle, pushing out important socio-political issues.

Political journalist Laura Penny is rather pragmatic about being saved from an oncoming New York taxi by a double-denim wearing guy who turned out to be actor/heartthrob Ryan Gosling. The Drive star reached out and grabbed her in the nick of time.

Penny–the author of Meat Market: Female Flesh Under Capitalism and Penny Red: Notes from the New Age of Dissent who has covered Occupy and writes for the Independent–is a contributing editor to The New Inquiry, and has contributed to The New Statesman, The Guardian, The Nation, Salon.com and Jezebel. She described the incident on Twitter:

I  literally LITERALLY got saved from a car by Ryan Gosling….I was crossing 6th avenue in a new pink wig. Not looking the right way because I am from London. Ryan Gosling grabbed me away from a taxi…Identity of no-idea-if-actually-a-manarchist-but-definitely-a-decent-sort Ryan Gosling confirmed by girl next to me, who said ‘you lucky bitch’

Penny has received numerous media requests which she has turned down because

it’s getting silly now…I really think it’s a bit of a fuss over not very much

and writes in her piece for Gawker on the incident

I am grateful to every other kind New Yorker who has saved me from oncoming traffic in recent weeks, good citizens making the streets of this fine city that much safer for random British writers who can’t remember to look both ways….People do lovely, considerate things for other people all the time. I don’t believe that the fact that A-list celebrities occasionally act like human beings is in itself news — it might have been slightly newsworthy had Mr. Gosling simply floated by on a cloud of his own cultural significance whilst a young woman got smeared into the tarmac, but lucky for me, even the most chiseled-jawed of us are usually boringly dependable in times of minor peril.

Gosling may not be a manarchist, he is socially active. He volunteered in Biloxi, Mississippi as part of clean up efforts after the 2005 Hurricane Katrina, has campaigned with PETA to encourage KFC and McDonalds to use more humane methods of slaughtering chickens.  The actor is also involved with African aid causes, and has traveled to Darfur, Uganda and Congo, as well as supporting  the Invisible Children charity.

And pulling Penny out of the way of a taxi isn’t Gosling’s first peripheral brush with Occupy. His upcoming film, Gangster Squad, about the Los Angeles Police Department in the 1950s, displaced Occupy LA for several days last year when they shot scenes at Los Angeles City Hall.

To Penny–who explained via Twitter she couldn’t do any TV appearances to discuss her five-second encounter with Gosling because the Manic Panic hair dye she used had turned not only her hair but her hands and face fuschia–the real heroes in America

are risking everything to make sure that the United States doesn’t slide further into bigotry, inequality and violence whilst everyone is distracted by the everyday doings of celebrities.

Exactly. But it would have been a fabulous opportunity for her to open celebrity-crazed minds to

war on Iran and war on women’s bodies and [why] Rick Santorum is considered a serious presidential candidate.

And in case you were wondering, Gosling didn’t say

Hey girl

when he moved Penny out of the way of the cab. He said

Hey, watch out!

At least Obama has a sense of humor plus some timing and delivery, which is more than can be said about Rmoney, Frothy Santorum, the Gin Grinch, or Grandpa Ron Paul. Or for that matter, Sarah Palin who wooden delivery on the Today Show, coupled with her grating voice, and robotic repetition of

socialist policies

was tragic.  Fred Karger is funny and as a former actor  can deliver witty remarks, but MSM forgets he’s running.  Here’s what Obama said today:

REMARKS BY THE PRESIDENT

AT THE ASSOCIATED PRESS LUNCHEON

Marriott Wardman Park

Washington, D.C.

THE PRESIDENT:  Thank you very much.  (Applause.)  Please have a seat.  Well, good afternoon, and thank you to Dean Singleton and the board of the Associated Press for inviting me here today.  It is a pleasure to speak to all of you — and to have a microphone that I can see.  (Laughter.)  Feel free to transmit any of this to Vladimir if you see him.  (Laughter.)

Clearly, we’re already in the beginning months of another long, lively election year.  There will be gaffes and minor controversies, be hot mics and Etch-a-Sketch moments.  You will cover every word that we say, and we will complain vociferously about the unflattering words that you write — unless, of course, you’re writing about the other guy — in which case, good job.  (Laughter.)

First the National Organization for Marriage  gets all sandy-panties, and now  the vegans are going nuts over a natural food coloring, passing the scarlet panic onwards to omnivores. Starbucks just can’t stay out of hot water.

After supporting LGBT rights and marriage equality, the super-venti global coffee corp was put on notice by those shrill, conservative, divisive  equality haters, National Organization for Marriage, who issued a fatwa  and called for a boycott of the multinational chain. Oooh, we’re all shaking like a Frappuccino® over that huge scare. Not. Hardly made a dent in Starby’s business, and may have increased it actually, since people who don’t normally buy coffee there (like me) did so to show their support of  their local boite des Buxes.

Now vegans and the slightly more food-flexible vegetarians are upset because Starbucks uses a natural red dye in their strawberry Frappuccinos®: Dye made from crushed cochineal bugs, as the company states they have a

goal to minimize artificial ingredients in our products. While the strawberry base isn’t a vegan product, it helps us move away from artificial dyes.

Starbucks uses the natural dye–FDA approved, made from the innards of a New World insect which has been sourced as a colorant since before the time of the Conquistadors and whose origins were once one the world’s most closely guarded secrets–in their red velvet whoopie pies birthday cake pops and mini donuts with pink icing.

This is why we can’t have nice things. So let’s make it easy–how about no artificial color at all. No pink drinks. No pink icing. No luridly insect blood-stained red velvet whoopie pies. There’s no real need for a strawberry Frappuccino® to be a colored with a dye because it’s made with real red strawberries, right? Oh…never mind.

Of course, objections to the use of the natural cochineal coloring, as opposed to some nasty man-made chemical dye, in Starbuck’s food–and in other products–could negatively impact the 40,00 people in Peru who labor in cactus fields, scraping cochineal bugs off prickly pear cactus paddles, then mushing the insects into paste and selling them to support their families as they have since before the arrival of the colonial Spaniards.

On April 4, Starbucks’ CEO Howard Schultz will be on Fox Business with Liz Claman at 3 pm Eastern to discuss NOM’s epic fail boycott, their company’s expansion into China, and U.S. job creation (Starbuck’s has teamed up with the Opportunity Finance Network® (OFN) for the Create Jobs for USA program designed to create and sustain jobs, and seeding $5 million to provide financing to underserved community businesses which include small business loans, community center financing, housing project financing and microfinance).

And yes, Schultz will probably have to address the bug guts issue.

The Eurovision Song Competition semi-finals begin May 22 in Baku, Azerbaijan, climaxing with finals May 26th. And the world should be watching, because Azerbaijan, which shares an open border with Iran, is believed to have opened access to airbases in the secular Moslem nation to Israel, with whom they have a relationship, according to Foreign Policy:

Four senior diplomats and military intelligence officers say that the United States has concluded that Israel has recently been granted access to airbases on Iran’s northern border. To do what, exactly, is not clear. “The Israelis have bought an airfield,” a senior administration official told me in early February, “and the airfield is called Azerbaijan.”

The report of Israel using airbases in Azerbaijan for war planes is discounted by Israel’s Haaretz, citing a number of logistical issues that make the use of the Azeri airfields impractical as launching grounds for F-15 fighter planes:

[T]hey fail to address the problem of where the Israeli warplanes can fly to once they have refueled in Azerbaijan. There is no friendly route to fly back to Israel, except over Iranian or Turkish territory, hardly appealing alternatives once an attack has already been carried out and both countries will be on highest alert…

Since landing in Azerbaijan after a strike on Iran would almost certainly mean that returning these valuable aircraft to Israel would be a lengthy and complicated process, especially at a time when the IAF [Israeli Air Force] would certainly need them for additional missions, this doesn’t seem to make sense. Other uses proposed in the FP feature, using Azeri fields just in the case of emergency landings or using them to base search-and-rescue helicopters or reconnaissance drones, makes more sense.

As part of the European Broadcasting Union, Israel is a participant in Eurovision, despite the contest’s May 26 final falling on Shavuot, an Israeli holiday, which commemorates God giving the Torah to the Jews. (Shavuot is celebrated seven weeks after the second day of Passover). Israel’s entry Izabo will perform on the May 22 semi-final.

Now in its 57th year, Eurovision is held among the active member countries of the European Broadcasting Union (EBU) or members of the Council of Europe. Each member country submits a song which is voted on by other countries, and the winner hosts the next year’s contest, providing a chance to promote their nation. Eurovision is such a huge deal that in 2005, host country the Ukraine waived their visa requirements for the summer. This year, 75-year old Englebert Humperdink will be representing for the UK, and Russia has a team of grannies from Urals performing their entry. Sadly this year Armenia withdrew from the competition over tension with Azerbiajan stemming from the 1990s war over the disputed region of Nagorno-Karabakh which killed over 25,000.

Regarding the mounting Israeli/Iranian tension, Haaretz adds:

Meanwhile, it may turn out that the only Israeli attack through Azerbaijan this year will be psychedelic punk-rock band Izabo since according to Haaretz’s senior columnist, Amir Oren, Tuesday night’s announcement that the U.S. Defense Department would be seeking funding for further development of Israel’s Iron Dome anti-missile defense system, was a signal that there would be no Israeli strike on Iran this year.

But if for some reason Izabo cancels, duck and cover.

Last week I questioned the appropriateness of running the trailers of Ben Stiller and Vince Vaughn’s upcoming movie “Neighborhood Watch” in light of 17-year old Trayvon Martin’s shooting death at the hands of gun-toting Neighbor Watch captain and cop-wannabe George Zimmerman.

The summer comedy’s distributor, Twentieth Century Fox, has now pulled trailers and posters from Florida theaters

out of respect.

Protests over the shooting death have spread across the country, and director Spike Lee in a bonehead move tweeted the address of the wrong George Zimmerman to half a million people who follow him on Twitter. Dude, if you’re gonna dox somebody, get it right, and don’t make a nice old couple have to hide out in a motel. On the other hand, if the Zimmermans get a good lawyer, Spike may end up funding their retirement account and a nice college fund for their grandkids.  Reacting to Lee’s clumsy use of teh Googles, journalist Mark Ebner tweeted Spike Lee’s address.

Rick Santorum is seeking to strike Wisconsin voters the right way by incorporating bowling terms into speeches, showing up at bowling lanes three times in five days and telling reporters:

Well, I always try to make campaigning fun and do things that are, you know, along the way, and get a chance to meet people in sort of normal settings instead of in rallies or structured events.

But when Frothy Santorum stopped to perform in an alley in La Crosse, he suddenly got controlling. According to Reuters reporter Sam Youngman, Santorum said to a young man bowling with him:

You’re not gonna use that pink ball. We’re not gonna let you do that. Not on camera.

Wait, what exactly is wrong with a pink bowling ball? And what if that bowling ball was the one closest in weight for the guy’s playing needs? Is this what we have to look forward to if Frothy Santorum is elected–the government telling us what color balls we can play with? That men can’t stick their fingers into something pink?

Santorum then added:

Friend don’t let friends use pink balls.

Oh Rick, I beg to differ. My friend lets me use his.

Oh can’t you hear the screams from the Excessive Machine now that it’s been announced that Jane Fonda is in talks to play Nancy Reagan in “The Butler,”  directed by Lee Daniels (the Oscar winning “Precious”). The film centers around White House butler Eugene Allen, who worked for eight United States presidents over more than thirty years.

I hope they show Mr. Allen admitting astrologers into Mrs. Reagan’s sitting room!

A Sacramento law firm is suing to prevent Democratic congressional candidate Jose Hernandez from describing himself as an “astronaut/scientist/engineer” on the June ballot. The firm Bell, McAndrews & Hiltachk has ties to Republican politicians:

Attorney Charles Bell Jr., one of two lawyers named on the lawsuit, is general counsel to the California Republican Party. The other attorney listed on the lawsuit, Brian Hildreth, has worked for former Republican Gov. Pete Wilson.

The lawsuit points out that Jose Hernandez did not receive any pay from NASA in 2011 and that

Hernandez’s attempted use of ‘astronaut’ violates the Election Code’s unambiguous requirement that a candidate’s ballot designation reflect one’s current profession, vocation, or one held during the previous calendar year.

Hernandez left NASA in January of 2011. He was

born into a farmworker family, trained as an engineer at the University of the Pacific and was selected as an astronaut candidate in May 2004. He flew aboard the shuttle Discovery in 2009.

Artist Shepard Fairey has been instrumental in bringing George Orwell’s influential and classic work of  dystopian fiction Nineteen Eighty-Four to Imagine Entertainment and production company LBI. If greenlit, the artist could receive producer credit.

Last month,  Fairey  plead guilty to charges of criminal contempt of court for destroying documents and manufacturing evidence related to AP’s lawsuit against him.  That suit dealt with the unlicensed appropriation of Mannie Garcia’s photograph of Barak Obama for the iconic “Hope” poster. Fairey now faces fines and jail time.

As part of the lawsuit settlement, which included an undisclosed sum, Fairey agreed to license any AP photos he may wish to use in future art work. Additionally, both the AP and Fairey will share the rights to create merchandise based on the image–and that means the profits from those items. Fairey recently voiced a parody of himself on an episode  of The Simpson’s, “Exit Through the Kwik_E-Mart” playing a street artist who is actually a police informant.

First published in 1949, Orwell’s book has twice been given cinematic treatment, first in 1956 and then, appropriately enough, in 1984.  In Nineteen Eighty-Four, Orwell coined terms like Big Brother, thought crime, New Speak, thought police and doublethink, now in common usage. And “Orwellian” has come to mean a totalitarian, secretive,  manipulative, overbearing and controlling regime.

In America,  Nineteen Eighty-Four is often invoked as a cautionary tale in order to cast the politicians of either or both parties in unfavorable light. The book however, makes the point that there is only one party.

Madonna declared on her Facebook page that she will speak up against a new stringent anti-LGBT law in St. Petersburg, Russian which calls for fining anyone who promotes

the false perception that traditional and non-traditional relationships are socially equal.

moral content

I’m a freedom fighter.
My show
My songs
My work
My art
Is all about freedom of expression
Freedom to choose to speak to act
Always with humanity and compassion
I will come to St. Petersburg to speak up for the gay community, to support the gay community and to give strength and inspiration to anyone who is or feels opressed.
I don’t run away from adversity.
I will speak during my show about this ridiculous atrocity.

Why it is not illegal to be gay in Russia, LGBT events have been violently disrupted by police, who claim the events upset the populace, and the Russian Orthodox church urges punishment or hospitalization for gays.

Madonna’s concert appearance in August is causing friction in the LGBT community. Yury Gavrikov, head of the St. Petersburg branch of Gay Russia movement told AFP:

We intend to protest against the hypocrisy of pop stars. In Russia, they have fantastic earnings, and this allows them to forget about the problems of human rights. If people like Madonna boycott their concerts particularly in Saint Petersburg that could have economic consequences, and that is important, while declarations of support for gay rights at concerts mean nothing.

Meanwhile, in Moscow, Igor Kochetkov, chairman of the Russian LGBT Network spoke to the Daily Mail, saying:

We consider that Madonna’s visit and her address to millions of her Russian fans with words in support of freedom of expression for everyone will bring more good than a boycott would.

(Icon caption from “Crimes of Passion,”  by Madonna and Kevin Bray)