Fungiphobia is the fear of eating poisonous mushrooms. Five out of one hundred people suffer from this phobia and many need
counseling or hospitalization to deal with the fear.


Out of the 263 kinds of poisonous mushrooms, one variety is only poisonous to the cells in the brain that control fear and phobia's. Therefore if ingested this mushroom will cure the paranoia and the phobia. Unfortunately the cure is rarely used since the Fungiphobic are too afraid to try.
Believe it? Why Not?

Over and Done

This country is fighting two wars, unemployment is at 10% the economy is in the toilet, and soldiers don't seem to be safe at home on their own Army base. And to top it off the Fort Hood shooter in yesterday's killings was a mental health doctor named Malik Nadal Hassan.

According to his cousin Maj. Hassan is a native born Muslim American, who enlisted in the Army because he loved the army and wanted to make a difference. However, after 9/11 he became the target of slander, bullying and hurtful remarks because of his Arabic name. He was born in America but was treated like an outsider and mistrusted, because of his name and religion.

Now I'm not sure if the ethnic bullying and slander is what drove him to commit a horrific act of multiple murder, maybe it was the fluoride in the water or perhaps Texas just drove him crazy. One thing for sure by the evening "news spin", Fox News was declaring his act a terrorist attack because, after all, he is a Muslim and you know how they are.

The Los Angeles Police has put around the clock patrols on the Islamic Center here in Southern California to protect Muslims from the death threats that have resulted from the Fort Hood tragedy.

So...in light of yesterday's tragedy and today's aftermath, what is wrong in exploiting a dead terrorist puppet with a Muslim name who's catch phrase is "I Kill you".... It's funny, right? According to the character's creator, "Muslims don't have a problem with that puppet". Well, there you go, it was probably Major Malik Nadal Hassan favorite character.

Selma Diamond once said in reference to an ethnic joke on the set of "Night Court", "Just because you can get a laugh with that joke... doesn't mean you should."
Over and Out,
Jay

Sleepy and Grumpy
(Snow's Favorites)

Well it seems all you need to do to start a fight is mention the "ventriloquist" in yesterday's blog and I don't mean Edgar Bergen. People have some really strong feelings about him on both sides. It seems his popularity gets defended more than his talent but intensely none the less. So... I will refrain from broaching the subject or the person in this forum.

I couldn't sleep again last night. It wasn't the clowns this time. I don't know what it is. I'm not particularly concerned about it, just tired. However, long about 4:00 in the morning you can find some unusual television. I guess the world is full of night creatures that only come out after dark, why should television be any different.

Mostly it is "paid advertisement shows" at that hour. They are designed to look like talk shows or news shows with desks and couches, covering a single "story" with great detail. 90% of them involve health in some way. There are diets, hair restorers, things to make you bigger, pills to make you longer, younger, blonder... Apparently no one likes who they are at 4:00 in the morning and are looking for ways to change.

I got bored with all of that, CNN was on it's second repeat of Anderson Cooper so that was out.
Then I found Jerry Springer. Good old Jerry. Thanks to Jerry and his skills as an investigative journalist, I realized not only do people not like who they are at that time of morning, according to the Springer world, they hate everyone else as well. Who are these people that would come on television and admit to having an affair with a zoo animals? Is there enough money in the world for Jerry Springer to wake up in the morning and say to himself, "Today I am going to the studio again and talk to a man who has sex with his twin sisters in the back of a bass boat while his 700 pound wife catches the fish with her teeth."

Why in my day... television used to be more than just an exposé of trailer trash infidelities and patent medicine treatments. Not that long ago television just quit broadcasting after Johnny Carson was over. Early television execs knew that nothing good can be programed at 4:00 in the morning. Not now... video muzak... the never blinking eye...over dose on info. So my suggestion is, if you have insomnia the television won't help, even though every third commercial is for sleeping pills.
As you were,
Jay

The Plot Thickens

This is an up date on a story I was talking about some blogs ago. It concerned a friend of a friend who was caught up in the real life plot of "Double Indemnity". His ex-wife and a brother-in-law were trying to have him declared incapacitated so they could take his money. In league with a brain surgeon they told him he had only months to live because of a brain "tumor-like" disease. They almost had him locked away in a care facility in charge of his money when a real friend took him to get a second opinion. The second MRI revealed that the original diagnosis was a fraud.

Now, the only funny thing to come out of this scam was what the guy said when he discovered the foiled plot. After the positive results of the second opinion he phoned a friend very excited at the news. His words were.... "They did another scan of my brain and found nothing."


There is only four weeks until "Jay Johnson: The Two and Only" opens at the Colony Theatre in Burbank. Dates are December 3 through Dec 13th. If you live close enough to come, please do. This is a very special theatre, perfect to see my show. I don't know when we will perform it in the LA area again. We seem to be walking backwards getting the DVD of the show done... so seeing it live may be the only way for some time to come.

Here is the link to the Colony Theatre Site. It has all the information that you will need to find the theatre and book some tickets. They have a large subscription base and we sold out the last time we were here. I know we are getting close to selling out again. There are some great tickets left but you have to act soon.

I am always being scolded for not letting people know when and where I am performing. I am so glad to be back at this the Colony, performing close to home, I am really trying to spread the word. Please tell anyone one you know about it and send them to the Colony. It makes a really great Christmas gift.

As you were,
Jay

Goodbye to a Friend

I was very sad to hear the news that my friend John Kenley died on Oct. 23. You can click here for the official obit and here for the Akron, Ohio obit. However, there really aren't enough words in the English language to talk about John. I would say that living an active, healthy life until you are 103 is accomplishment enough, but he was much more complicated than that.

On his birthday this year I wrote about him (I have reprinted the piece below), and recently his name came up when I published the pictures of Whoopee. I describe my feelings as sadness because I don't really know how else to quantify them. He had a full life and accomplished much so, sad may not be the best word. I guess I am feeling a little sorry for myself. Although I had not seen him or talked to him in some time, just knowing he was still around was a good feeling. The sadness is the realization that this source of show business history no longer exists with his departure. No one spanned the generations of theatre and knew as many different people as John. He was a personal witness to so many changes in the way Theatre is crafted, now we just have to read about it in books. I know there are others who will make an impact in their own field as great as John did in Show Business. I suspect they are an endangered species.

Thanks again, and again, John.
Jay

The Real Two and Only......
John Kenley

John Kenley turned 103 years old on Feb 20th. If you don't know that name you don't know one of the most interesting people in the history of musical theatre. There are millions of stories and rumors about John Kenley, most are true and most were started by John himself.

Since John has by now out lived anyone who can separate veracity from rumor, all stories about him must now exist as the truth. It is hard to know how to start talking about John Kenley, but here is what I know. I have gathered it from rumor, recollection and personal experience.

From roughly the late sixties through the mid-eighties John Kenley produced summer musical theatre in the Ohio area. The shows toured Akron, Flint, Daton and Columbus in what was called the Kenely Circuit. It was very successful and attracted big name celebrities at big time salaries. The season provided work for hundreds of repertory cast members during the summer. A lot of young performers got their Equity card working a Kenley show.

John has worked in theater all his life. On stage as a young chorus boy in the Ziegfeld Follies, he danced his way up the show business ladder, eventually working with and ultimately out living many of the biggest names in show business. His memory of events and actors is sharp, precise and wickedly retold with the skill of a master thespian.

However, his career was always overshadowed by the fact that he is a registered hermaphrodite. He is one of the few people in the United States registered with legal identification as both a male and a female. Rumor has it that he lived the summer in Ohio producing shows as John, and spent the winters in Florida living as a woman named Joan. The two identities rarely intersected with mutual friends.

A director I know claims John recounted in detail a conversation between the director and a lady sitting next to him at a bar in Las Vegas the winter before. He did not realize at the time that the lady he had briefly befriended was the female identity of John Kenley. The director remembered the encounter well because the lady seemed to be very knowledgeable about the theatre .

I don't know anything about Joan, but I did work a couple of summers for John. My first Kenley show was one the afore mentioned David Sinkler co-wrote. It was the early 1980's when Kenley was a mere 78 years old. The picture above with his dog is probably him eight years earlier. Although, for some reason he always looked the same no matter what his age.

I took an immediate liking to John Kenley. I thought he was charming, funny, smart, gentlemanly and elegantly flamboyant. He was royalty but certainly not a queen. John Kenley is just one of those rare people you can never forget. I love great story tellers and he is one of the best, with a century of personal material to draw on. I was always trying to coax another story out of him.

The first time I met John was in the rehearsal hall at the theatre in Akron. On the first day of rehearsal I was the only one who had not worked with John Kenley before. The director said we were to start with our table reading and John would join us shortly. I believe we were several scenes into the show when the double rehearsal doors flew open. In walked a frail man in a cranberry vest, white shirt and black pants. A navy blue tie was folded around his neck like an ascot rather than tied in a traditional knot. He was not young but it was difficult to guess his age. His skin was almost iridescently pale without a trace of a wrinkle like the face of a porcelain doll, smooth and almost translucent. He wore makeup, but he was not "over done". His thinning hair slicked back on his head with the color of silver fading through the reddish-orange tint. He certainly was not macho in his ways, but comfortable and confident with his own sexuality, whatever direction it went.

The rehearsal stopped as every eye was on John Kenley. Silently he walked the long side of the table opposite where I was sitting. As he rounded the far end I stood up to shake his hand since it seemed he was coming around the table to greet me. He did not look at me nor even stop. He glided passed my outstretched hand without saying a word, then exited the double doors.

In a dramatic move he grabbed the frame with his hands pulling himself backwards through the doorway. Posing in an Erte´-esque back bend with his head arched toward the table he said,

" Once I was meeting a man in the lobby of the Waldorf-Astoria hotel. On the phone before the meeting he said, 'I don't know what you look like, how will I know it's you...' " John paused then quickly added, "I said to him.. you must be kidding ", and with that he disappeared through the door.

That was my official introduction to Mr. Kenley. From that moment on we were friends. He made everyone laugh and would without provocation occasionally kick his leg high above his head with balletic precision.

Being around when John would tell stories about his career was the best treat. We all told him 25 years ago to write it down in a book. He said he would think about it, but he would want to tell the "really juicy" stories if he wrote a book. We thought the ones he casually recounted were fantastic.

I haven't seen or talked to John in a long time. I can't believe he is 103. In the article about his birthday he credited his longevity to a couple of stiff Vodkas every night. I don't know how to get in touch with John to tell him happy belated birthday. If the Internet works like it should, somehow this will get to him.. but here is what I would tell him if I could.

Thanks for being my friend, John. And thanks for all the stories. I am still waiting for the call to do another season. It was always fun, which is what the theatre should be.

As you were,

Jay

Halloween Week

I host the countless memories of haunted houses, Halloween parties, Bubonic Players Theatrics and all that goes with Halloween. I remember the first show I ever did in Richardson, Texas after we moved from Abernathy was a Halloween party at the Canyon Creek Country Club. I was 14 or 15 years old. That part of the memory is not clear. What is clear is that Halloween evokes some very strong emotions in me.

So last night I couldn't sleep. Excitement of the season or traumatic insomnia, who knows. But it is almost Halloween so even dark moods should be celebrated. I dressed in black. Turned the lights down and decided to draw. I was hoping that the muse would deliver a really Gothic pen and ink Edgar Allan Poe would covet.

Unfortunately, it turned out to be a Jack O' Lantern. Not as scary or grotesque as I wanted. Perhaps a little to Hallmark for my darkness, but there it is. This morning it dawned on me. Why was I drawing a Jack O' Lantern when I could actually carve one. Three pumpkins were currently sitting on the porch. Sandi does not like to carve them too early since they wither. She likes to have them around for Thanksgiving. But I decided to make my move and carve early.

Several years ago Andrew, my adopted child from Bulgavia, gave me an electric pumpkin carving device. Actually it is a battery drive drimmel cased with orange plastic. Although I have used it for other projects when a rotary tool would work, I had never actually attempted to "create" a Jack O' Lantern with it.

I'm sorry to report to Andrew that the tool was a high tech hoax probably the Trick of the season. I had to rely on my well worn and over used pumpkin knife that has served me for seasons. It is just a very dull serrated knife. It seems to cut pumpkin very well but nothing else like your finger.

Unfortunately the actual Jack O' Lantern turned out no more grotesque, and nothing like my sketch.

As you were,
Jay

Gettysburg Victory

I am coming back on a high from the Gettysburg Majestic Theatre. Beautiful theatre, great audience and the historic town of Gettysburg is vibrant. Wish I could have stayed a lot longer and entertained more audiences, they were smart and responsive. Thank you Jeffery Gable for the chance to come and experience your theatre.

The stress of doing a hit and run "one nighter" is well... stressful. You get there, set up, focus lights, work the sound, rehearse it a couple of times, take a break, do the show, and then break it all down and pack it up. I even found myself sewing some clips onto a microphone cord so I could hide it in my hair. The capsule and cord I had with me that I usually use was not a match for the Majestic system. I didn't even have time to share a drink with my fellow vent Tom who came to the show. (Again, thanks for coming Tom, it was great to touch base with you for even a brief moment.) I guess that is the deal when you are a "one man show".

I think the show was sold out. If I'm not working the door, I usually don't look at the count. It wasn't a Jeff Dunham arena show, but I am happy to draw the kind of audience that seems to come to see me.

I guess there are ways to attract huge crowds at the sacrifice of your own internal artistic compass. That has never been a very satisfying compromise for my personal esteem. The lowest common denominator has never been appealing. I want to try and raise the level of this oft misunderstood art form, not suppress it even more. So I guess I will continue to feed my own artistic soul and hope that a select few come to the feast as well. Bon Appetit
As you were,
Jay

The original Cray computer at NASA which calculated the Apollo Astronauts trip to the moon had a computing capacity of 80 megs. At the time it was the fastest, largest and most expensive computer made. Today an 8 gig flash drive about the size of a half stick of gum contains 8000 megs or one hundred times larger than the Cray and costs about $30 dollars.
Believe it? Why not?

On the Road

Thumb typing a quick blog this morning. It is a beautiful day in LA and I am off to Gettysburg. What fun to get to go to the airport to hang with my friends from the TSA. Speaking of Gettysburg, a shout out to "the other one". When I mentioned I was playing the Majestic in Gettysburg, I got the comment, "what's the address?". I didn't get it until several days later. Very funny.

As you were,
Jay
www.monkeyjoke.com

Chuck and Bob

Susan Harris wrote Chuck and Bob into the bible of SOAP in 1977 after reading William Goldman's novel on ventriloquism called, Magic. Originally the producers thought they would just get an actor to play Chuck and dub in Bob's voice. It would only be for 7 episodes and the character would be written out. Jay Sandrich (who will correct my facts if I am wrong) said Chuck needed to be a real ventriloquist for the role to work. The actors, he said, had to react in real time to a real character. I happened to be at the right place, the right time, the right age and happen to actually be a ventriloquist who had done some acting. They hired me, Chuck and Bob weren't written out after seven but stayed for the entire run of the show.

I have often wondered what would have happened if a non-ventriloquist actor had done the part instead of me. I wonder how that would have worked. Well, now I know... and Mr. Sandrich, you sir were absolutely right on that call.

For three days this week I have been working as a consultant/coach on a new cable sitcom. I was asked to do this because one of the characters on this show is a ventriloquist. At least he is playing a ventriloquist in the script, but they are looping the "puppet" voice. I'm not going to say the name of the show or the cable network. It won't air until March and it doesn't matter anyway. Besides I don't want to write gossip just observations, observations on how, but for a decision of casting, my life and the characters of Chuck and Bob would have been radically different. I am getting to see what it is like for an actor to play a sit com ventriloquist.

First of all, the kid that I am working with is a good actor, from New York. He has some really good chops, acting wise. But he has never even held a puppet can't even spell ventriloquism and doesn't have a clue. Yet, he is a regular character and they have written Chuck and Bob scenes for him and the puppet. The producer who brought me in to "help" said, "I guess we didn't realize how difficult ventriloquism was..." Duh... I feel like an acrobat from Cirque du Sole being brought in to help someone do a triple flip on the trapeze when they can't even do a cartwheel.

The puppet looks okay but is mechanically dreadful. It was made by a prop man who adapted a doll. When the kid showed me the puppet, I tried to operate it and it was like trying to play piano with mittens on. He told me it was better than the first on they gave him to work on the pilot. I got a look at the original which had a mouth that was perpetually open and the control closed it. I have never heard of a vent puppet being constructed in that manner. That is the equivalent to playing a piano with mittens on hanging upside down. The puppet needs to be replaced.

As we go to the office of the executive producer to plead our case for a new puppet, it turns out that the Executive Producer is a huge fan of mine. He is so excited I would agree to help them out. He knows every episode of SOAP by heart. It was life support to my ego at that point. But the kid is 18 and really has no idea who I am, or what SOAP is. To him, I'm just a puppeteer hired to coach. As we leave the office the executive producer said, "You haven't aged a bit since Soap." My standard line at such a complement is, "Well, I am hiding Bob in the attic and he is aging quickly." To a room full of writers the Dorian Gray reference got a big laugh.

As I worked with the kid I couldn't even get him to hold the puppet up straight when he was working him. The puppet was lifelessly limp in his hands. I kept giving the note but he just didn't get it. Finally I got an idea. We found a computer and I "YouTubed" some old Chuck and Bob scenes. I said, "See hold your puppet like that...". He replied, "But you are sitting down in those scenes, I have to stand up in three of the scenes in my script. How do you hold him when you are standing up?"

Well, on YouTube I found a Today show shot of me and Bob promoting "The Two and Only" in New York. It happens that the interview took place outside in Rockefeller Center and I am standing with Matt, Meredith, Al and the bunch holding Bob. This I thought would give him an example of how to at least hold the puppet. I played him that scene and he said, "You know... that puppet Bob hasn't aged all that much...."

I have to go to Gettysburg to do my show and won't be there for the actual taping, but I have seen enough. I have given all the notes I can, suggested business to keep the puppet alive, told secrets I never thought I would reveal and none of it seems to happen when the director yells action. Basically the actor is limp when the puppet is supposed to talk and the puppet is limp when the actor is talking, this puppet is dead as the furniture. But like all sit coms the writers on the floor laugh at every muffed line like they just swallowed a laugh track, so everyone thinks the character is a hit.

I don't think this will put the nail in the coffin for "sit coms ventriloquist characters" because this show will air and never be seen. But it is frustrating to see such a wasted opportunity.

Did I just hear a voice in my head say, "Why these young kids today they don't know jack about......" Maybe I better go up in the attic with Bob and talk about the "good ole" days.
As you were,
Jay

Fact Check Revisited

So, on Monday I was writing about checking facts. It was an experiment to see if anyone truly does question things they are told, even when they are easy to check. Not every fact is important enough to check, but you would think that some one reading this blog would have been curious enough, or movie-phile enough to challenge the only "fact" in the piece. To date only two people, my "photographic memory" friend David Sinkler and my most favorite director, Jay Sandrich caught the error and responded with the correction. This means one of two things. They are the only fact checkers left in the world... or perhaps the only two people reading this blog.

Nonetheless, this is how things become mis-informed. The first publication of a fact is not checked and it sits in "etherland" for a while. The next global search for that subject calls up the error. That error is used as the fact check for the current mis-statement and suddenly there is research to support something that is absolutely wrong.

In the CIA they refer to it as the "assimilation of mis-information." They take one fact that is true and combine it with another fact that is absolutely false. Instead of assuming the entire missive is wrong, people usually think the entire missive is truthful.

Example: "Stephen Grover Cleveland (March 18, 1837 – June 24, 1908) was both the 22nd and 24th President of the United States. Cleveland is the only President to serve two non-consecutive terms (1885–1889 and 1893–1897) and therefore is the only individual to be counted twice in the numbering of the presidents. Cleveland was born in New Jersey with a small deformed extra finger on the back side of his left hand. This is seldom mentioned in his biography. He was teased about about his six fingered hand as a child, and always tried to hide it. In his official Presidential portrait he is posed with his left hand closed so as not to accidentally expose the deformity. "

So all of that is true, except the finger. But because the rest can be verified and it is mentioned that the "finger fact" is lessor known, unless challenged, the entire statement seems true. Some day a researcher will search every reference to Stephen Grover Cleveland that was ever published on the Internet and come across the statement above. Unless they publish more than just that paragraph, the fact that Cleveland had six fingers would be a referenced fact of research.

So Howard Hawks was a famous noir director and he did direct Bogart but he did not direct him in Casablanca. That credit belongs to Michael Curtiz. Even the poster included in Monday's blog credits Michael Curtiz not Howard Hawks. The research to correct the error was contained on the same page.

Okay, now that I know that the truth will never stand in my way of telling a good story..... this blog may improve greatly. But don't go thinking you can ever pull one over on Jay Sandrich or David Sinkler.
As you were,
Jay...the other

Memory Lane

My friend Mike Sartor, who was also in this production of "Whoopee" twenty some odd years ago, sent me these photo's recently. I am the Indian with the eye glasses on the far right.

This was a Kenley Players Production in Akron, Ohio. (I wrote about John Kenely in a blog some time ago Go to Kenley Blog.) After the run in Akron we took it to Flint, Mi and Dayton, Ohio, which was at the time the Kenley circut.

"Whoopee" was an old Eddie Cantor vehicle in the 1920's and was revived on Broadway in the early 80's. It was the mid 80's by the time Kenley got the rights.

The show is about a hypochondriac named Henry Williams who goes to a Dude Ranch for his health. He takes his nurse Mary along who is secretly in love with him, and hopes they will end up alone in some romantic situation. Mean while back at the ranch, Western sheriff Bob Wells is preparing to marry Sally Morgan; she loves part-Indian Wanenis, the half-naked Indian in the middle, whose race is an obstacle. Sally flees the wedding with hypochondriac Henry Williams, who thinks he's just giving her a ride; but she leaves a note behind saying they've eloped! Chasing them are jilted Bob, Henry's nurse Mary (who's is trying to get her man back) and others. Of course, humor ensues. The big numbers are "Makin' Whoopee" and "My Baby Just Cares for Me", which I got to sing. The show was conducted by a very young, 19 years old to be exact, Phil Reno who is now the conductor of choice for the legitimate stage musical . I'm not sure why John thought of me for the role back then, but I will be forever in his debt for giving me a chance to be an actor on stage and not just the guy with a puppet. It is so easy to get "pigeon holed" in show business. Ventriloquists seem to have a permanent hole in the pigeon roost. John saw me as an actor who was also a ventriloquist.

The picture above is me as Henry trying to fit in with the Indians while hiding from the Sheriff.

Standing to my left during the bows is Karen Morrow who played Mary the nurse. She was even then a seasoned Broadway veteran who is not only one of the most talented performers I have ever known, but also the sweetest. We had such fun. We tried not to let the show get in the way of a really good time every night. I think the audience felt the energy. I remember the reactions were almost electric. It was my first Equity show and you never forget your first time.

I did a curtain speech every night. Since I was known, at the time, for always being with Bob on SOAP, I made a "ventriloqual" phone call to him to see where he was. We did a quick routine and Bob ended the conversation by asking,
"Did you and Karen get your usual standing ovation tonight?" Flustered a little by the question I said, "Sure... just like always." It never failed to cause the audience to jump to their feet cheering as the curtain went down the final time.

Occasionally you can look back and see where you have been, but you really never know where you're going. Of all the people on the stage at that time, the least likely one to ever win a Tony was me. The secret is to enjoy every second of the ride right now, knowing you are on your way to something wonderful.
As you were,
Jay

Fact Check

Not long ago in a social situation I and several of my friends were trying to remember the name of a director. We all knew his work, we could describe him and even knew some of the actors he had worked with, but no one could not think of his name. Some say this is a sign of old age. I say "horse apples". At some point in your life your brain learns that a lot of "facts" you have collected over the years are of absolutely no value. Like the name of a director, I mean it is not the name of one of your children. Einstein said, "Why remember what you can look up". He was smart and old, so there.

Instantly three blackberry's and two Iphones are drawn like six shooters in a bad western and the contest begins. Who can answer the query of the director in question quickest? There are many directions to go which will lead to the correct answer. Some people Google, some IMDB, some Wikipedia while others try to find credit lists for the movies the director has done. Soon the director's name is not important anymore. The only reward for this game is who can come up with it first. Later we realized that everyone was working at the same G3 speed, on different devices and models of communication units. It was really a matter of technique as to who got the name first. Someone, not me, finally found the directors name and there was a general "Oh Yeah, of course. Who could forget?" reaction. The entire process probably took no more than two minutes to go from ignorance to intelligence on this matter. We realized there was no need to remember his name at all since in less than two minutes we could, as Einstein said, "look it up".

So here's the point. In the old days checking facts used to take days. It involved libraries and the dreaded use of "card catalogues" and the Dewey decimal system. It was the realm of nerds and book worms. It would sometimes delay the reporter's news story for days searching for the relevant facts before it was published. Generations ago we assumed information from the learned was true. It was so difficult to check a fact we generally took their word for it. No more, most of us carry the library of congress in our pockets all day long with a G3 response time. So why is there so much crap and misinformation still out there.

So called "news stories" are claiming facts that can be so quickly challenged they don't stand up even as editorial license. Yet most of the country is still accepting these "truths" like the Dewey decimal system was still standing in their way of checking. The Daily Show derives a lot of humor from simply taking politicians remarks and "fact checking" them. Some times the politicians are impeached by their own earlier recorded contradictory statements.

The "fact" is, just because it is so easy to check a fact, we should never assume that a writer/newscaster/pundit/Limbaugh or Beck has done it. We no longer have to take anyone's word for it... we can find out for ourselves and should.

So... the director of Humphrey Bogart's classic movie "Casablanca" was the legendary film noir director Howard Hawks.

As you were,
Jay

Titanic Thompson, a noted proposition gambler, once bet he could hit a golf ball more than 700 yards in a single drive. The only stipulation was he got to determine the time and place. Eventually a group of guys got enough money up to challenge his claim.
The bet was on. Thompson chose the dead of winter on a frozen lake. He hit the drive onto the frozen lake and the ball didn't come to rest for over 1000 yards.
Believe it? Why Not?