TRUMP FINDS PR OPPORTUNITY IN HUDSON TRAGEDY • "In the wake of her family tragedy, Jennifer Hudson has received a helping hand from a very unlikely source — Donald Trump. Hudson and some of her family members have been staying at the Trump International Hotel & Tower in Chicago, and Trump has been picking up the tab. 'They are safe,' Trump told People on Monday night. 'She’s a great girl and we’re protecting them well.'"
As gruesome counterpoint to Law and Order, where the stories are ripped from the headlines, a Canadian man was arrested trying to plagiarize a a page out of Michael C. Hall's book when he allegedly lured a man into his garage and killed him in a style similar to Showtime's anti-hero serial killer, Dexter.
The story came out around Halloween and it was weird enough to warrant a post, but there was all that election fervor and it got lost in the wayside. So here's the deal: Canadian "filmmaker" Peter Twitchell convinced Johnny Altinger that he was meeting a woman he met on an Internet dating site. But Twitchell was actually making his own movie, that was a sequel to the Star Wars franchise, included a member of the original cast, and apparently necessitated a snuff scene.
GOOD THINGS HAPPENING TO BAD PEOPLE "Monday morning could be absolutely huge in the Hudson family murder case — the cops' only suspect, William Balfour, could walk out of jail a free man. Law enforcement sources tell TMZ Balfour, who's only being held on a parole violation in a case unrelated to the murders, could "conceivably" skate if there's not enough evidence to prove he did violate his parole."
HUDSON MURDER SUSPECT CONTINUES TO LOOK GUILTY "The convicted felon suspected in the slayings of actress-singer Jennifer Hudson's mother, brother and nephew told police he is innocent but balked at taking a lie-detector test, a police official said."
HUDSON FAMILY SLAYER SHOULD HAVE BEEN IN PRISON "The convicted felon suspected in the slayings of Oscar-winner Jennifer Hudson's mother, brother and nephew was arrested after police allegedly found crack cocaine in his car in June, but authorities declined to return him to prison on a parole violation, according to documents obtained by The Associated Press. A judge dismissed the charge for lack of probable cause in July, but under the strict rules of the state's parole program, William Balfour could have gone back to prison just for the arrest."
Two skinheads from Tennessee plan to go on a massive killing spree — during with they shoot 88 blacks and decapitate 14 others — culminating in the assassination of Barack Obama? It sounds too scary to be true. But according to the ATF, it was a real plan that Tennessee residents Daniel Cowat, 20, and Paul Schlesselman, 18, intended to carry out. Luckily, the plan had not reached advanced stages, sources said, although the duo had cased a gun store to rob and were plotting to target black children at a local, predominately-black school.
BREAKING - "ATF says it has disrupted skinhead plot to assassinate Obama, kill 102 black people."
HUDSON OFFERING $100K REWARD FOR NEPHEW Oscar-winning actress Jennifer Hudson is offering a $100,000 reward for the safe return of her nephew, Julian, who police believe has been kidnapped across state lines. Hudson's mother and brother were killed on Friday and her estranged brother-in-law has been apprehended as a "person of interest," but Julian remains missing.
THE AMERICAN DREAM? "An unemployed financial adviser apparently despondent over his troubles shot and killed his wife, his mother-in-law and three children before taking his own life in a gated community, Los Angeles police said Monday. Officers responding to a call from concerned friends found the bodies about 8:30 a.m. in a two-story house in the upscale Porter Ranch neighborhood about 30 miles northwest of downtown, said Los Angeles Police Dept. Deputy Chief Michel Moore. … 'This is a perfect American family behind me that has absolutely been destroyed,' [Moore] said."
Welp, things have gotten reprehensible much faster than we ever could have imagined.
McCain supporters are now screaming out "terrorist" when their candidate asks the rhetorical question "Who is the real Barack Obama?" And this happened at a McCain-Palin rally in Florida yesterday:
"Now it turns out, one of his earliest supporters is a man named Bill Ayers," Palin said.
"Boooo!" said the crowd.
"And, according to the New York Times, he was a domestic terrorist and part of a group that, quote, 'launched a campaign of bombings that would target the Pentagon and our U.S. Capitol,'" she continued.
"Boooo!" the crowd repeated.
"Kill him!" proposed one man in the audience.
(emphasis ours)
This is what politics is now: literally and figuratively yelling fire (and calls to murder people) in a crowded theater. God bless America and mavericking and deceit and blind hate.
Update: More vile hate speech from the McCain-Palin rally in Clearwater, Florida yesterday:
Palin then went on to blame Katie Couric's questions for her "less-than-successful interview with kinda mainstream media." At that, Palin supporters turned on reporters in the press area, waving thunder sticks and shouting abuse. Others hurled obscenities at a camera crew. One Palin supporter shouted a racial epithet at an African American sound man for a network and told him, "Sit down, boy."
Video after the jump.
CONTINUED »
THIS TIME, OJ'S GUILTY "O.J. Simpson has been found guilty on all charges in the gunpoint robbery of two sports memorabilia dealers in a Las Vegas casino hotel room more than a year ago. The 61-year-old former football faces up to life in prison. A somber Simpson released a heavy sigh as the charges were read Friday in Clark County District Court. He was immediately taken into custody. The verdict comes 13 years to the day after Simpson was acquitted of killing his ex-wife, Nicole Brown Simpson, and her friend, Ronald Goldman, in Los Angeles."
Thomas Jefferson's possible replacement is a winking, stammering anti-intellectual saying "doggonnit" when discussing policies that affect the lives of millions, and you need more proof we're in our last days? Fine, you asked for it.
Under here, the most horrifying story we've read in weeks.
CONTINUED »
Actor Lillo Brancato Jr, whose most recent work of note was as mobster Matt Bevilacqua in The Sopranos, will go on trial next month for the 2005 murder of an off-duty police officer.
Brancato and another man were allegedly stealing prescription drugs from a private residence when the officer came upon them and a chase ensued. Brancato's co-defendant, Steven Armento, is accused of firing the fatal shot. Brancato claims he didn't know Armento was armed.
This story is about 500 percent less sexy than it would have been on HBO.
WE ABHOR VIOLENCE, BUT… "In our hyperreal media multiverse, it's getting harder to stick with metaphor while communicating the desire to kick someone's ass. So indie-hoppers East Coast Avengers have foregone pretense entirely and released a single called 'Kill Bill O'Reilly.'"
FRIENDS IN LOW PLACES Phil Spector, the hugely influential music producer now on trial for the death of a woman found shot in the head in his mansion (he maintains it was an "accidental suicide"), came to court today sporting a "Barack Obama Rocks" button. Every little bit, I suppose.
Oui! Oui! Oui! Whereas we deep-fried Americans are inclined to lounge behind computers and blog angrily ("I'ma break this fuckin' MacBook, y'all!!!1!) when news about Angelina Jolie and her ubiquitous brood overtakes all the other headlines, those fabulous Frenchman take to the fucking rues and let the world know they're pissed:
Protestors began picketing outside of the Fondation Lenval hospital this week, where the [Jolie-Pitt] twins were born on Saturday.
… Nice residents are upset the mayor has failed to address the case of a local murder victim in lieu of celebrating the American movie stars and their new additions.
Following the birth, Mayor Christian Estrosi showed off the children's birth certificates on the steps of the hospital, describing the birth of Knox Leon and Vivienne Marcheline as "a pride to Nice and all its citizens."
Vive la France!
By now everyone's heard about this nut in California who beat a toddler to death on the side of a road because he believed the one-year-old boy was filled with demons, right? Yes, OK: sad, shocking, disgusting—all of it. But did anyone else read that three or four cars of people pulled over to survey the incident before NOT DOING A FUCKING THING TO STOP THIS ASSHOLE FROM KICKING A BABY TO DEATH!!!!!!! This according to a police officer who arrived after the boy was dead:
What we got from witnesses is he was punching, slapping, kicking, stomping, shaking … They tried to intervene and get involved, but their efforts really didn't have an effect. The suspect was engaged in what he was doing. He just pushed them off and went back to it.
Um, really? They tried but the suspect was "too engaged" to be stopped? Wow. Allow me to quote the immortal Yoda here: "Do, or do not. There is no 'try.'" Got that, people? If you and two or three carloads of others see an unarmed man smashing a toddler into the pavement, everyone needs to get out of the fucking Hyundais and pile on the guy. If he's strong enough to push all of you off, then someone should hit him in the head with a tire iron until he stops moving. Then call the cops.
What the fuck is wrong with people? Is everyone really this scared?
A Plano, Texas steroids dealer has learned the hard way that it's a bad idea to fuck with the lives of undereducated, strong millionaires amped up on mood-altering drugs.
David Jacobs and girlfriend Amanda Jo Earhart-Savell were found shot to death in Jacobs' Plano home yesterday, just 15 days after Jacobs met with NFL security officials and gave them the names of players he said bought steroids from him.
At the time of the couple's murder, Jacobs was on probation and cleaning up his life after pleading guilty last year to conspiring to possess with intent to distribute anabolic steroids.
Editor
