Olympic pride: Thank you, Kobe, and Michael

Crossposted at http://faustasblog.com, where this blog is now

With the exception of the men's swimming relay (for which I stayed up last night in spite of not getting much sleep the night before), I haven't been watching the Olympics, so I missed this:

Kobe Bryant Schools Liberal NBC Announcer On Patriotism (my bold print)

Chris Collinsworth: Tell the story when you first got your USA uniform.

Kobe Bryant: Well I had goosebumps and I actually just looked at it for awhile. I just held it there and I laid it across my bed and I just stared at it for a few minutes; just because as a kid growing up this is the ultimate, ultimate in basketball.

Collinsworth: Where does the patriotism come from inside of you? Historically, what is it?

Kobe: Well, you know it’s just our country, it’s... we believe is the greatest country in the world. It has given us so many great opportunities, and it’s just a sense of pride that you have; that you say "You know what? Our country is the best!"

Collinsworth: Is that a ‘cool’ thing to say, in this day and age? That you love your country, and that you’re fighting for the red, white and blue? It seems sort of like a day gone by(?)

Kobe: No, it’s a cool thing for me to say. I feel great about it, and I’m not ashamed to say it. I mean, this is a tremendous honor.

Video at Ms Underestimated has the video, which is also on YouTube, editorial bubbles and all:



However, Q&O sees Collingworth's differently,

To me it seemed like Collinsworth was simply trying to set Kobe up to say how awesome patriotism is, and how much he loves America. If you've watched any Olympics coverage ever, then this is exactly the kind of saccharine backstory pablum fed to the viewers, regardless of who the interviewer is, or which network is providing the coverage. It's a part of the basic formula: controversy, hard luck, sick/dead relative, USA! USA! USA! So I don't think the question was Collinsworth's opinion, but instead a softball for Kobe to tee off on.

Either way, thank you Kobe.

And Chris.
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The WSJ has a terrific slideshow of Michael Phelps winning his 8th gold medal.

All of us middle aged and older remember being excited when Mark Spitz won his seven golds.
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This week's WSJ's Five Best books on historical conquest, selected by David Day:

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This week's shoes:
Merrell Encore

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Tony Snow

Former newsman and White House press secretary Tony Snow died this morning of complications from colon cancer. He was 53 years old. Fox News is breaking the story right now.

UPDATE
Huge roundup at Memeorandum

Welcome, Instapundit readers.
Please note that this is my backup blog since my Fausta's blog, http://faustasblog.com is moving to a bigger new location. Please visit often.

Cancer's unexpected blessing, by Tony Snow, via Juliette.

Crossposted



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One side benefit of the Colombian hostage rescue: No Alo Presidente!

Noticias 24 reports that Hugo's weekly 4-hours long TV program is "suspended until further notice", due to

Chavez's heavily-booked schedule this upcoming week.

Following the Colombian hostage rescue he probably doesn't have much to brag about.

As far as Hugo's schedule goes, the Venezuelan Minister of Communications mentioned that Colombian President Alvaro Uribe is scheduled to visit Venezuela on July 11 and the Petrocaribe summit's scheduled for July 12-13.

Chavez's situation in either visit will be vastly different from what anyone pictured four months ago. Now he's in a sweat, being the big loser in the hostage liberation.


Unless he can come up with a really good powerpoint presentation, he can kiss the Nobel Peace price good-bye. But don't count him out yet. At the current oil prices, he's still got the bucks to carry him through.

Crossposted


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Venezuela: RCTV's anchorman stabbed to death in his Caracas apartment

UPDATE
This is the second Venezuelan journalist killed in a week. Scroll down
Asesinado Javier García, ancla de El Observador de RCTV

Javier García, periodista y ancla de El Observador de RCTV, ha sido asesinado, este fin de semana, de varias puñaladas, en el interior de su apartamento de Caracas.

El hallazgo ocurrió en el departamento del comunicador, ubicado en Colinas de Bello Monte, en Caracas. Se desconoce el móvil del crimen.
(my translation:)
Javier Garcia, journalist and anchorman of RCTV's Observer newscast, was stabbed to death this weekend in his Caracas apartment.

He was found in his residence at Colinas de Bello Monte, Caracas. The motive for the crime is unknown.

Noticias 24 says that the building's doorman stopped a man who tried to leave the building with a suitcase. When the doorman asked where was he coming from, the man said the suitcase belonged to Garcia. The doorman didn't allow the man to leave with the suitcase.

Here is a video report in Spanish:

Asesinado Javier Garcia de RCTV
by noticias24

Readers of this blog will remember that Chavez closed RCTV last year, amidst a great deal of outrage. For more information on the RCTV closing please listen to my May 26, 2007 podcast.

UPDATE
Pierre Gerges, vice president of Reporte Diario de la Economia, was driving his brother's car Monday evening a week ago when two unidentified gunmen on a motorcycle shot him at least 12 times: The IHT has the article, Venezuelan newspaper says executive's killing due to reporting



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Tim Russert dies of a heart attack

The NYPost first had the news. Tom Brokaw made the announcement.

The Washington Post:

Russert's clout was such that when he declared Barack Obama to have wrapped up the Democratic nomination last month, that was treated as a news event in itself.

My condolences to his family, friends, coworkers and associates.
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The Bear hunters are back

It's that time of year: dozens of Bear Grylls fans come to my blog looking for "Bear Grylls naked."

Unfortunately I don't have any still photos of the very delectable Mr. Grylls in the buff.

However, here's a nice YouTube of behind the scenes in Patagonia:


And let's not forget the naked scene of the same episode:


Unfortunately they blurred the naughty bits.

He also sings "I love a-rach-nids" in the Discovery Channel ad:


For more Bear treats, here's the official Discovery Channel website and his blog. Don't miss the slideshow.

I wonder where he goes on vacation.



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Saturday night House

The USA channel's playing the seven deadly sins of House marathon, so here's lust for you (probably not really suitable for work):

Venezuela: The Simpsons are back

Simpsons Back to Bueno in Venezuela

A little more than a week after a Venezuelan TV station pulled a daily broadcast of The Simpsons amid viewer complaints of failing to be socially responsible programming - replacing it, ironically enough, with the jiggly bastion of family-friendly viewing that is Baywatch Hawaii - the cartoon series has made it back on the air.

Televen returned Matt Groening's brainchild to the airwaves Wednesday night, this time running the series at 7 p.m. as opposed to its previous scheduling of 11 a.m., when it was apparently consumed by an impressionable and much younger demographic.

The Beeb has more:

The National Telecommunications Commission also said the channel would be taken off air if it failed to move the show from its 1100 slot.

It claimed the saga of Homer Simpson, wife Marge and their three children flouted regulations that prohibit "messages that go against the whole education of boys, girls and adolescents".

It looks like the Venezuelan censors never caught on to the idea that The Simpsons are "quite an anarchic and liberal-left assault on that idea of the family".

Let's get this straight: The Simpsons got pulled off the 11AM time slot because they weren't "socially responsible", and Babewatch Hawaii is. But now the Simpsons are back at 7PM instead. You must admit, you can't say that Babewatch Hawaii (or any of the Babewatches) doesn't go against the whole of anyone's education; to the contrary.

I'm blinded by the brilliance of their logic. Mr. Spock would have been proud.

In other Venezuelan news, Venezuela is now the biggest importer of foreign weapons in South America, and ninth world-wide, and A First Nations chief from southern Manitoba is asking Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez for $1 million to fight for pipeline royalties. With bills like that, no wonder Hugo needs his money, pronto.



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Very Good, Jeeves!

Russians are going wild for P G Wodehouse

Outlawed by Stalin in 1929, P G Wodehouse - or Pyelem G Vudhaus as he is known - has undergone a remarkable revival since the ban on his books was lifted in 1990.

There can be few fans as dedicated, however, as Mr Kuzmenko.

As president and founder of the Russian Wodehouse Society he has attracted over 3,000 members, some from as far away as Cheliabinsk and Omsk, thousands of miles to the east. His monthly Wodehouse dinners at the Cleopatra and elsewhere are always sold out.

The actors Stephen Fry and Hugh Laurie have played their part. Ever since their acclaimed television portrayal of Jeeves and Wooster was dubbed into Russian, young fans have started flocking to the club.

Wodehouse translations have mushroomed and even a souring of Anglo-Russian relations has done little to dim the enthusiasm for this quintessentially English author.

Is it because Kristol Talks, Ivan Listens?

Or is it due to a secret streak of Anglophilia?

"The reader is lifted into an English paradise, which many Russians believe is the best paradise of all."

I ask, you decide.

John O'Sullivan says there's a Drones Club in New York. I wonder if they accept women?

You, too, can do as the Russians and enjoy the whole Fry/Laurie Jeeves & Wooster series on DVD:


And of course, there are the books,


But if you become a Hugh Laurie fan (who, moi?)


I don't know about you, but I find it comforting to think that Bertie Wooster grew up to be Dr. House...

More blogging later.


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This week's terrorist field trip at the Beeb: Paintball

BBC 'took terrorist trainers paintballing'and paid them to go on the field trip, too. as part of their reality-TV program Don’t Panic, I'm Islamic,:

The BBC paid for Mr Hamid and fellow defendants Muhammad al-Figari and Mousa Brown to go on a paintballing trip at the Delta Force centre in Tonbridge, Kent, in February 2005. The men, accused of terrorism training, were filmed for a BBC programme called Don’t Panic, I'm Islamic, screened in June 2005.

The BBC paid Mr Hamid, an Islamic preacher who denies recruiting and grooming the men behind the failed July 2005 attack, a £300 fee to take part in the programme, Woolwich Crown Court was told.

Bad enough, you would think. But it doesn't end there:

Nasreen Suleaman, a researcher on the programme, told the court that Mr Hamid, 50, contacted her after the July 2005 attack and told her of his association with the bombers. But she said that she felt no obligation to contact the police with this information. Ms Suleaman said that she informed senior BBC managers but was not told to contact the police.

Brought to you by the taxpayer-supported corporation that refers to Muhammed as <the Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him).

John Noonan notices that the activities at the terrorists' camp read like something you'd find at a gymnastics day camp.

Meanwhile, I wonder if they coudln't bother find law-abiding British Muslims that have completely integrated into society, and have them discuss the issues of the day while having a meal in a nice restaurant instead.

No word if the Beeb is planning further terrorist field trips to the laserpark.



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Early Sesame Street's not suitable for minors; this post may also not be

The NY Times reports that

According to an earnest warning on Volumes 1 and 2, "Sesame Street: Old School" is adults-only: "These early 'Sesame Street' episodes are intended for grown-ups, and may not suit the needs of today’s preschool child."
...
I asked Carol-Lynn Parente, the executive producer of "Sesame Street," how exactly the first episodes were unsuitable for toddlers in 2007. She told me about Alistair Cookie and the parody "Monsterpiece Theater." Alistair Cookie, played by Cookie Monster, used to appear with a pipe, which he later gobbled. According to Parente, "That modeled the wrong behavior" — smoking, eating pipes — "so we reshot those scenes without the pipe, and then we dropped the parody altogether."

Here's what the fuss is all about:

As Ed Driscoll said,

Forty years from now, when the current season of Sesame Street is being assembled for release on whatever the successor format to the successor format of DVD is, how much of it will have to be reshot to comply with how much further the nanny state is sure to have expanded further?

And how much more crap are we willing to put up with?



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Technorati tag: Sesame Street

Weekend Geekness: When did Star Trek jump the shark?

Jay Garmon asks, When did Star Trek jump the shark?

Answer: When they brought in the Borg Queen.

I know a guy who thinks the Borg Queen's sexy.

Excuse me as I lapse into total geekness, but the best Star Trek episode/movie ever was The Best of Both Worlds.

Here's the cliffhanger:


Update, Monday 19 November
Via Instapundit, the ultimate geek digs



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Bear's back! And he's got yomps.

I should be catching up on homework but why do homework when instead one can post about Bear Grylls?


I knew it was time for a new season of Bear Grylls on the Discovery Channel when a lot of people suddenly started coming to my blog this past week.

Mr. Grylls has a blog, where he looks gorgeous while grimy:

I routinely train for three to four hours a day to keep my physical fitness at the level needed to sustain the pace of each shoot; this routine includes weights, running, yoga, rucksack runs, yomps, and circuit training.

What are yomps, I wonder?

Unfortunately he hasn't updated it for a while. Fans will be more satisfied with the Discovery Channel website.

Here's an interview on his latest Everest romp:


Here's Bear talking to Conan:

"Naked, with a pair of boots and a trenchcoat" will certainly bring more viewers to any blog or website that shows him in that. There's a persistent couple of people who keep coming to my blog looking for "Bear Grylls naked".


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Jack's back, season vii

Via Jay:

Tony's back, but what about Edgar?

Don't tell Janet, and today's items

Janet-my-personal-trainer will have me doing 100 push-ups if I ever bring this up: Demi Moore spent $300,000+ on personal trainers (h/t Maria).

The article doesn't say how much Demi spent on acting lessons.
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John Edwards's botox seems to be working only on one side of his forehead.

Is his hairline receeding?
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Hsu-Zeno: "Norman Hsu had other programmers."
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Working for the BBC
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Weather stumps forecasters. Again.

Pandering tonight: Dems "debate" on Univision

The Democrat party is now deep into full-pandering mode: they can't be bothered to hold a real debate on Fox News but they're willing to have someone do the translating for them on Univision tonight for their round-robin press conference, which they continue to call a "debate".

By doing so, they continue to foment the delusional Hispanic mirage, which perpetuates the exploitation of poor Spanish speakers by denying them the means to participate in all of our country's opportunities - of which learning English is only the first step.

Make no mistake: not learning English is the surest way to keep the underprivileged dependent on big government and the welfare state.

The Courant: A Big Night For Latinos
In Debate Sunday, Connection Is Key

"A lot of people are free today because they believe in the American dream," he said.

And that dream means debates like Sunday's, where the nation's Hispanic voters can not only watch eight White House hopefuls respond to issues of special concern to their communities but also have their answers translated into Spanish.

"We'll have a unique opportunity to hear a discussion in a format we've really never heard before," said Janet Murguia, the president and chief executive officer of the National Council of La Raza, a Hispanic activist group.

The debate at the University of Miami will be broadcast live at 7 p.m. on the Univision television network, Radio Cadena Univision and online at Univision.com. Univision, a Spanish-language network, claims it reaches 99 percent of all U.S. Hispanic television households.

The forum will be conducted in English - since only New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson and Connecticut Sen. Christopher J. Dodd speak fluent Spanish - and will be simultaneously translated into Spanish.

But the meaning is clear.

Think of all the Hispanics who fled their native countries for political reasons, said Jorge Mursuli, national executive director of Democracia U.S.A., a nonpartisan group that encourages political involvement.

"We tell people in this country it's easy to become civically engaged," he said, "and these debates are an incredible example of how to bring democracy right into the living rooms of Hispanic Americans."

Spare me the pandering, please. If the La Raza people were really interested in effective political involment by Spanish-speakers, they would be sponsoring English as a Second Language classes.

The Miami Herald: Democrats to participate in first Spanish-language debate

Democratic presidential candidates were meeting Sunday night for the first debate broadcast entirely in Spanish, the clearest sign yet of the growing influence of Hispanic voters.

How influential do those voters really want to become that they can't bother to learn the language used in Congressional bills, the tax code, and the Senate record?

Or are the Dems proposing to translate those, too?

At least the Republicans aren't heading in that direction,

Univision invited the Republican candidates for a similar forum, but only Arizona Sen. John McCain has accepted.

Sen. McCain sponsored the disastrous Kennedy-Bush amnesty bill which mercifully didn't pass.

Coming up next? America con Hillary.

Update: A colombo-americana's perspective

Come to the US, retain your language, learn a new one, have more opportunities open up for you. Not a difficult concept; many have done the same before, and have done well for themselves. Stop playing the race/ethnicity/minority card, and get over yourselves.

Read her entire post.



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Two media items:

The first item has to do with CNN's shameful exercise in moral equivalence and disregard for historical facts, God's Warriors. I watched part of the Christian Warriors episode and fully expected Amanpour to compare the Veggie Tales with the Hamas Mickey Mouse.

Phyllis Chesler in her article, CNN'S Master Plan: Part One, unveils Amanpour's prejudices:

In my no doubt alarmist and paranoid view, she is trying to position American and world Jewish support for Israel as essentially equivalent to American and world Muslim support for Hamas and for other Muslim terrorist organizations who also engage in humanitarian aid and social service projects. Just as the leaders of the Holy Land foundation are being tried as supporters of terrorist organizations in America today, Amanpour's portrayal of Jewish support for an allegedly "illegal," "racist," or "apartheid" Jewish "settler state" with a "handful of Jewish terrorists" may now lead to similar attempts to shut down American-based fundraising for Israel and to dampen Congressional support for military foreign aid to Israel.

Perhaps Amanpour does not envision this at all but merely wishes to show that there is terrorism on both sides of the divide. But this is not true. While there is indeed a "handful" of "Jewish terrorists" or ideologue of Jewish reprisal, (Meir Kahane, Baruch Goldstein, Yigal Amir, and the Jewish Underground are named), such figures are just that--a handful, and their attempts at indiscriminate violence have either been prevented or immediately and seriously punished by the Israeli government.

Further, Amanpour fails to draw the right conclusions from what she does show on camera. In every instance, Israeli government officials, including former Shin Bet and IDF spokesmen are the ones who prevent Jewish terrorists from striking, who arrest and imprison them when they commit violence, who sentence them to between 7-15 years in jail or to life sentences. There are no posters all over Israel glorifying their violent deeds as there are on the West Bank for their shahids and shahidas and in the no-longer occupied Gaza strip. Israeli textbooks and television videos do not sing their praises in Israel as is the case among the Palestinians.

Hip-Hop Republican posts about "Mother Amanpour" and her Magical Kingdom.

The point of CNN's religious fundamentalism series

Atlas Shrugs has more.

Update
I simply never thought of drunkblogging it.

UPDATE 2
Phyllis continues, Christian Crusaders Also Want a Caliphate. The Gospel According to Christiane

Amanpour completely fails to make the distinction between Islamists who teach hatred of infidels and women and who blow infidel and Muslim civilians up (as well as honor-murder their own women); Israelis who are under perpetual terrorist siege and who are trying to defend themselves against Islamist attacks; and conservative Christians who are trying to mobilize votes, change laws, or win hearts and minds with words, not bombs (although she certainly has lots of footage of the bloody bombings at abortion clinics--bombings I personally abhor and mourn--as do many Christians).

Amanpour wants us to like Muslims--even the most extremist among them. They are human, prick them will they not bleed? But she does not want us to like Christians or Jews, especially those who are Zionists.

Read it all.
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The second item has to do with these two photos:



The FBI has asked the public to be on the lookout for these two characters. The Seattle Post Intelligencer has refused to publish the pictures.

(Warning: disturbing photos at the link) Gerard Van der leun rips the SPI to shreds up one side and down the other.

So easy a caveman can do it, and today's items

Siggy has the poster, and the link to the Caveman's Crib.

Any rumors that Siggy's own International Crib of Mystery resembles the Caveman's are simply that, rumors.

Not that I would know.
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Neolithic gum: So easy, a caveman can chew it!
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Vladimir Putin's attempt to achieve fame as a sex symbol got stymied by his severe blood-iron deficiency and total lack of chest hair.

That Tilley hat didn't help, either.

Update
Via Glenn, turns out Vlad was aiming for a different market demographic from mine. But is he butch enough?

And more:
LOLPutin

Meanwhile,

Kremlin watchers have been busy trying to guess what kind of political message the pictures might send, given that Putin has insisted he plans to step down at the end of his second presidential term next year, as required by the constitution.

"I shake my little toush on the catwalk, on the catwalk..."
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More cartoon censorship
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TigerHawk continues his report on the pitiful conditions at the McCaffrey's parking lot.
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You Are 39% Bitchy

You're a pretty sweet person, and you're definitely not prone to bitchy outbursts. Sometimes, though, you can't help thinking mean thoughts about people. But at least you don't act on them!

How Bitchy Are You?

And now for a Mr. Monk moment:

Now dirty chopsticks picked up in China scare

A Beijing factory recycled used chopsticks and sold up to 100,000 pairs a day without any form of disinfection, a newspaper said on Wednesday, the latest is a string of food and product safety scares.
...
Officials raided the factory and seized about half a million pairs of recycled disposable bamboo chopsticks and a packaging machine, the Beijing News said.

At times like this, one has to ask, "WWMMD?"

What would Mr. Monk do?

He'd carry his own carefully sterilized chopsticks, made of non-porous stainless steel, that's what:


How about a Mr. Monk bobblehead, while you're at it?

Count me on O'Reilly's side, and other items

Via Allison,
Is there a lawyer in the house? Take a look at what the kossers have been up to: I just returned from Falafel Bill's house

I've got video of O'Reilly in his sleepwear (red shorts and a white t-shirt). I delivered the Andrea Mackris Court filings to all of his neighors - every home in his development got a copy. And I put a bunch of signs up along his street - "Bill O'Reilly: Andrea Mackris has your cash" directly across from his house; "Bill O'Reilly: PERVERT" in front of his home; "Bill O'Reilly: CHEATER" on the road he must take to exit his development and "Bill O'Reilly: Can't be trusted with your daughters" at the landmark boulder marking the entrance to his development.

After this, whatever the merits of the argument are on either side, I'm on O'Reilly's side. Behavior like this should be prosecuted.
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Shame on them: Senate GOP Caucus Caving On Earmarks?
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Garbage In, Garbage Out: Arab "Intellectuals" Opine, Strikingly unburdened by reality.
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Also via Allison,
Academics oppose Israel boycott

Thousands of academics from around the world have condemned plans for a UK boycott of Israeli institutions over its treatment of the Palestinians.

More than 10,000 academics have signed a declaration saying they would not join any project which barred Israelis.

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Via Larwyn,
The Rise of Chaos, the Rise of Counter-chaos
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Also via Larwyn,
People's Karaoke: Che Dude (don't make it bad)
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Growth Rebounds To Perky 3.4% With Tame Inflation; Consumer Confidence Highest In Six Years