THE TIMES FINALLY SETS THE JFK ASSASSINATION RECORD STRAIGHT

After years of obfuscation about the Kennedy assassination, the New York Times has finally set the record straight. In today's obituary of Paul Bentley, the Dallas police detective who arrested Lee Harvery Oswald at the Texas Theatre, and whose masonic ring allegedly caused the shiner Oswald sported after that arrest, the paper makes an important correction. When Jim Leavelle was escorting Oswald through the basement of the Dallas jail, and Jack Ruby killed Oswald, the hat Leavelle was wearing was NOT a Stetson, it was a Resistol. Resistols were impermeable, just like the Times.

OH THE SHARK BITES....GREG NORMAN, CHRIS EVERT, ANDY MILL PLAY MIXED TRIPLES

Best quote of the British Open golf so far, from skier Andy Mill, re the curiously rejuvenated Greg Norman (first day leader and second day second place) and Mill's ex-wife and Norman's fellow 80s celeb Chris Evert: “Greg Norman at one time was my best friend and a year-and-a-half ago I would have taken a bullet for this guy,” he said. “But I didn't realise he was the one who was going to pull the trigger.”

When Evert filed for divorce from Mill, she cited 'irreconcible differences', which would make a great new nickname for the Great White Shark. Although Mill might find Shark appropriate too.
And I've got to ask: are his teeth REAL or was he taking the nickname too seriously?

Apparently Mill is a shoo-in for the US Ski Federation's Spider Sabich Unlucky In Love award.

And exactly how many husbands do you have to go through before you stop being America's sweetheart?

Meanwhile, let's discuss in an adult fashion the Evert-Norman relationship: fuzzy balls v dimpled balls, balls in holes, balls in cups, flagpoles in cups, two-handed backhands, second service, foot fault, putter, mashie niblick, fast greens, in the rough, love-forty, ad-in, backswingers, serve and volley, chip shot, mixed doubles, dogleg.....

Have I missed anything?

REVERSING THE RED SOX CURSE (or THOSE WHOM THE GODS WOULD DESTROY, THEY FIRST LET PICK UP STRIPPERS)

The revelation that stipper Candice Houlihan distracted A-Rod with the second of their two nights of brief sex and extended talking during the 2004 ALCS loss to the Red Sox doesn't really explain the Yanquis' monumental foldo, but it helps. It doesn't help explain why 32 year old A-Rod would be buzzing round the 133 year old Ayesha-clone Madonna either. Vanity Fair ran a picture of Madonna a couple of months ago, in their ecology issue, bizarre as that seems, with the caption 'Timeless Beauty'. I suppose in the sense that plastic and silicone never decay they were right! This isn't like Nuke LaLoosh desperately seeking Susan Sarandon (oh wait, she married Tim Robbins, so it IS!)

Meanwhile C-Rod, who saw rod and reeled in Lenny Kravitz in Paris (nous sommes seulement bonnes amies, he said), is back and filing for the big D. Michael Strahan is probably laughing all the way to the TV studio as he wonders what Cynthia Rodriquez is going to get out of this one.

It may not explain the Red Sox winning their first World Series since 1918, though with a name like Houlihan she's got the credentials to be a Sox fan. But it does reinforce Rodriquez's quest to become the highest salaried wuss in history. It's not so much that his wife was pregnant with their first child (she got pregnant with number two while they were repairing their marriage after ARod got caught with a different stripper). It's that they talked about the fact that this stripper was a former basketball player, and he found that 'weird'. That the conversation got THAT deep may be considered a surprise if this is any indication of the depths of the distaff side, explaining why she slept with the Yanqui even though she knew he was married:

“It was killing me and I felt bad after,” Houlihan said. “I’m not a bad person. I know how it feels to be cheated on, it sucks. But a couple of drinks later, I didn’t notice all that much, to tell you the truth.”

If they ever want to bury Rodriquez wrapped in a Big Papi jersey underneath the new Yanqui stadium, he can have an honour guard of stippers lining the way. Bring back Derek Jeter and Mariah Carey Yanqui fans probably regret Rodriquez's wife wasn't using him to order human growth hormone, like Debbie Clemens. But put it this way: if Madonna shows up outside Fenway looking for Manny Ramirez this September, someone tell Manny: just say no!

OLD CLICHES NEVER DIE, THEY JUST KEEP ON DANCIN'

I was almost pleased to see the headline in yesterday's Sunday Times over an article about Brazilian players in English, Scottish, and Faroe Islands football. Yes, the Faroes; it's worth a read. But the headline was classic, restoring my faith that none of the old prejudices and stereotypes that made Fleet Street great have really died. You can see a picture of two of Chelsea's latest recruits alongside this column.

'SAMBA STARS ON THE WAY', bringing back the image of a conga line of dancin' Stepin Fetchits juggling footballs with their toes while jiggling to a beat that's far beyond Land Of Hope And Glory. I mean this is nothing as bad as the back page headline from the Daily Mail back in 1983, when Scotland's Alan Welles placed fourth in the World Athletics Championships' 100m to three Americans. WHITE LIGHTNING! screamed the Mail, informing us that Welles had just become the 'world's fastest white man'. I am not making this up, by the way.

Of course the Times means it innocently enough, they know that we all know Brazilians are naturally talented, great dancers, laugh a lot, are some of Rupert Murdoch's best friends and so on and so on and scooby dooby dooby. Different strokes for different folks, as it were. We can only guess what their reaction might be were the Brazilian press to label English players Cloggy Morris Dancers, plodding round their soggy pitches.

But headline aside, I recommend the article, by Jonathan Northcroft. In its sidebar it also includes an interesting 'League Of Nations' table, which points out that there are 14 Brazilians in the English Premier League. But what is interesting is first, that of the 525 players who appeared in the EPL last season, only 184 were English, or roughly 35%. That's not promising for English football, though it is for English spectators.

But what was even more interesting to me was that America was represented by only one fewer player than Brazil. 13 Americans played in the EPL, more than the 12 Dutchmen or 11 Portugese, and just behind Scotland (14) Spain (14) and Wales (16). That's pretty good for a nation which can't understand soccer. Believe me, that whole 'the sport the Americans call soccer' chiche is a topic for another post.

But remember, in the 2002 World Cup, the Americans got to the quarter-finals where a Scottish referee handed Germany a bitterly-fought match, while no one in particular at home watched or cared. Meanwhile, in England, our heroes were the subject of months of 24/7 media hype and attention, and they got to the quarter-finals and rolled over like whipped dogs before the, uh, samba skills of the Brazilians! As a supporter, which situation would YOU rather be in?

And don't forget, the US national team did every bit as well as the English in the recent European championships, didn't they?

IRRESISTIBLE TARGETS

I started this blog as an experiment and exercise, and the first thing I learned was that it would probably be more useful for me, trying to reach an audience, if the format were more specific...so I'm trying a second blog, for crime fiction reviews and maybe some other things.
It's called Irresistible Targets, from the John Stewart song, and it's available at

http://irresistibletargets.blogspot.com

I've opened with the Pelecanos piece as blogged here, and links to a couple of Crime Time reviews.

My imaginary dialogue with Robert B Parker and my rant about the Guardian's review of Fred Vargas last year will be posted soon....

SIX DEGREES OF EXECUTION

The French army shootout in Carcasonne was an easy way to play the Kevin Bacon game, as anyone who remembers Animal House will appreciate. According to the reports I read, the one soldier with live ammo may have been the one chosen not to have blanks, for reasons no one could explain. Perhaps they were trying for the inverse of a firing squad, where one member is traditionally given a blank so that all of them can pretend they might not have been the executioner. I'm not sure that held true in Germany between 1939-45.

As it happens, on the day of the shooting we were driving from Ceret, close by the Spanish border, to Cuq Toulza, between Toulouse and Castres, and as we headed up from Castlenaudary, a convoy of about 10 APCs passed us going the other way (direction Carcasonne, as the French road signs say, invariably only after you're on the right road). Kirsten asked what they were up to and I guessed there had been a sighting of a New Zealand Greenpeacer in Carcasonne. Little did I know.

I remember as a kid watching parades of military stuff with great delight, so I suppose I shouldnt be that surprised that the French were staging a show of 'anti-terrorist' tactics as a pre -Bastille Day diversion. Since all of us are potentially terrorists in the brave new Bush/Blair/Sarkosy world, it's probably useful to see. It's also fun to watch the new French right-wing Prime Miniature going head to head with the military because he didn't show them the proper respect after they'd shot up one of the country's prime tourist towns. Luckily no one was killed, including a child shot in the heart, but don't mention that either, because then you're just Michael Moore entranced by the French health system. Their tax system, as we heard from the hoteliers in Coq Toulza, is something else indeed!

happy Fourth of July! Le 14eme s'approach!