Me makes new banner

Suspend This Guy, Bob Kraft!

MANSFIELD, Mass. -- New England Patriots defensive back Willie Andrews is being held without bail after allegedly pointing a handgun at his girl friend's head.

A spokesman for the Bristol County district attorney said Andrews was arrested Monday morning after the alleged incident, which occurred when Andrews returned home at about 1 a.m. and an argument began between him and his girl friend.

Gregg Miliote said Andrews, a backup since being drafted by the Patriots in 2006, was charged with illegal possession of a large capacity firearm and assault with a dangerous weapon. He said Andrews is being held without bail pending the results of a dangerousness hearing Thursday.- WHDH

Andrews isn't very good anyway.

Half-Year in Review: January-June, 2008

2008 hasn't even ended yet, but it'll go down as a year full of news. Perhaps, years from now, people will look to our website as a time capsule of the year of the Patriots and The Love Guru. Or not.

The lack of incumbents made this year's presidential race the most unusual in recent history. John McCain won his party's nomination easily compared to the Clinton-Obama duel. Can you believe that, only months ago, the competition included people like John Edwards, Rudy Giuliani, Mike Huckabee, Mitt Romney, and Fred Thompson? The guy from Law and Order? My friend Glen has never been shy about his opinions, and I decided to take a stab at punditry as well with Picking the President. As both of us learned, sometimes, your favorite candidates don't make it to the final round. Gravel and Paul, we hardly knew ye. The much-hyped launch of U.N.A.M.I.D. proved disappointing for those hoping for progress in Darfur. Catherine Wagner summed it up nicely: "The guys changed their helmets from green to blue." Not much of an increase in manpower, money, supplies, or aid, and the violence continues.

April Fool's Day was quite a day for us. For 24 hours, we changed all our colors to pink, and covered the latest in celebrity gossip. We had lots of fun pissing on everything this blog stands for for a day. A little later, the death of one of the finest comedians there ever was, George Carlin, sparked many tributes from this site and beyond. Meanwhile, our own Chris DeCarlo filled the site with tributes to the object of his obsession, another great comic named Bill Hicks. These two greats continue to remind us Étudiants that, no matter how hard we try, we will never truly write anything humorous, so we should just stop trying. J.K. L.O.L.

Isn't it sad that this website has more music-related content than MTV? Who needs TV or the radio when you can stop by the Étudiant for a CD or concert review, recommended bands and songs, or even a Top Tan List? Whether it's the Smiths, Billy Joel, or Glen butchering "Bittersweet Symphony", we've got it all.
Our site's going stronger than ever, and we're looking to make the next-half year even better than the last! Keep checking us out for more politics, Darfur, Beatles worship, and dead comedians! Mahalo.

Troop deaths in Afghanistan surpass those in Iraq

(CNN) -- For the second month in a row, U.S. and allied troop deaths in the Afghan war have surpassed those in Iraq, according to official figures tallied by CNN.

As Jon Pebley said a few months ago, the situation in Afghanistan is even worse than the one in Iraq...

Étudiant...I mean WHDH...Weather

A three day stretch of scorching hot weather.

Mugabe spokesman disses West

A spokesman for Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe has rejected Western criticism of the country's disputed presidential run-off election.

At an African Union summit in Egypt, George Charamba said the West had no basis to speak about the situation - and can "go hang a thousand times".

Continuing the rhyming theme of my comments today, Charamba rhymes with Zaramba, the most evil generous teacher in the whole math department...

Obama Reaches Out To Faith

CHICAGO -- Reaching out to evangelical voters, Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama is announcing plans to expand President Bush's program steering federal social service dollars to religious groups and -- in a move sure to cause controversy -- support some ability to hire and fire based on faith.

Obama was unveiling his approach to getting religious charities more involved in government anti-poverty programs during a tour and remarks Tuesday in Zanesville, Ohio, at Eastside Community Ministry, which provides food, clothes, youth ministry and other services.

"The challenges we face today ... are simply too big for government to solve alone," Obama was to say, according to a prepared text of his remarks obtained by The Associated Press. "We need all hands on deck." - WHDH

Now, just denounce your support of abortion!

Darfur update

The United Nations and the African Union (AU) have appointed the Burkina Faso Foreign Minister, Djibril Bassole, as their new Darfur peace envoy.

I can think of at least one funny word that rhymes with "Bassole".

Chrysler To Lay Off 1,500 Workers

DETROIT -- The worsening U.S. auto sales slump hit Chrysler LLC again Monday as it announced plans to close one St. Louis-area factory and cut a shift from another because of declining demand for minivans and pickups.

Officials with the Auburn Hills-based automaker said in a conference call that it will shutter the St. Louis South plant, which makes minivans, effective Oct. 31. The St. Louis North plant, which makes full-size pickups, will be cut from two shifts to one effective Sept. 2.

The minivan plant's closure will cut 1,500 jobs, and it wasn't clear if the company would ever recall the 900 workers who will be laid off at the pickup truck plant. Both factories are in Fenton, a St. Louis suburb. - WHDH

Well, those workers can find new jobs...right? On a related note, how come nobody is blunt anymore? Instead of saying "Lay Off" they say "Close Down Plant"...what the heck!

Hey Ben, January-June 2008 Half-Year Review?

You did one last year...doing one again this year?

Election update

As Sen. Barack Obama pushes ahead with his weeklong patriotism tour of middle America, Republican rival John McCain is leveraging his patriot credentials to tackle the more contentious topic of free trade.

Sen. Obama is using the Fourth of July week to try to silence rumors questioning his loyalty to the nation. His tour kicked off with a speech in Independence, Missouri, home of Harry S. Truman, where he told supporters: "I will never question the patriotism of others in this campaign. … And I will not stand idly by when I hear others question mine," the New York Times reports.

O.M.G. NO FLAG PIN VOTE MCCAIN

Revere Beach could use some work

On a recent afternoon, Ursula Giroux and her parents stretched out between clumps of seaweed, discarded plastic cups, rusted bottle caps, abandoned cutlery, and other refuse left on Revere Beach.

Enough said. Clean up, clean up, everybody everywhere...

CD Review: The Best of Sugarhill Gang

1) Rapper's Delight
2) Hot Hot Summer Day
3) 8th Wonder
4) Showdown
5) Apache
6) The Lover In You
7) The Word Is Out
8) Kick It Live From 9 to 5
9) Livin' in the Fast Lane
10) Girls
11) Work, Work, The Body
Give your Smiths CD a rest and listen to a group that'll make you feel...good! Before rap became the music of jewelry, scantily clad girls, and bragging about your not-necessarily true childhood in the streets, it was 70s R&B with more talking than singing. The Sugarhill Gang didn't invent the genre, but they made it known to the mainstream...you know, white people.
Sure, their songs are dated and cheesy. But they're still much better than anything you'll hear on 94.5. "Rapper's Delight" sets the tone for the rest of this collection...skilled rhyming over textured and soulful, if a bit unoriginal, beats.
The harmonies and horns of "Hot Hot Summer Day" will make you wonder why, instead of hanging with friends outside, you're in your basement blogging. The beat takes a Latin turn with "8th Wonder". The Furious Five guest on "Showdown", the cheesiest rap battle of all time.
Then, we get perhaps the corniest song of all, "Apache", or, as you may know it, "Jump On It!". Big Bank Hank brags of being a chief, sandwiched by borderline racist chants and wails. But the song is just so dance-able that we forgive it.
Thus is the rest of this disc. Decades later, it's still great dance party music. Today's rappers should pay their dues to...and take some tips from...the group that paved the way for 'em.
****1/2 out of five

Unintelligent Design

Lost amid all the recent discussions of intelligent design -- including Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal's decision this past Friday to sign a bill that allows teachers in his state to "supplement" classes on evolution with talk of creationism -- is one simple basic fact. The human species isn't intelligently designed.

When you get right down to it, from an engineering perspective, the design of the human mind (and for the matter the human body) is a bit of mess.

Take, for instance, human memory, and the trouble we often have in remembering even the most basic facts -- where did we put our keys? Where did we park our car? Because our brains so often blur our memories together. Human eyewitness testimony is often no match for even a low-rent survelllance camera, and memory can fail even in life-or-death circumstances. (6% of all skydiving fatalities, for instance, are from divers that forgot to pull their ripcords) - The Huffington Post

...Not that I agree with the author of this post...

Tyson Homosexual Sets Record

It's going to be an embarrassing day at the office for people who get their news from the Christian web site One News Now. The water cooler conversation about sports is going to get awkward when they say, "Did you see the record set by Tyson Homosexual?"

Yes, One News Now, which describes itself as providing "your latest news from a Christian perspective," calls the Olympic sprinter Tyson Gay "Tyson Homosexual."

Jim Buzinski of Outsports explains that the site has set a filter to change the word "gay" to "homosexual," and they don't bother to look at the context of the story before applying the filter. And that's how Gay became Homosexual. - Michael David Smith of AOL Sports

As one commenter, UkraineNotWeak wrote, "He ran like he was on fire. I guess that would make him a "Flaming Homosexual" in the Christian Right's eyes."