By The Weekend Desk B Team
Weekend Desk Editor Natasha Julius is on assignment in Copenhagen, Oslo, and Kabul. The B Team is reporting from Wicker Park.
International Affairs Desk Report
Whatever You Do, Don’t Take the Al-Qaeda No. 3 Gig.
Tiger Woods Affairs Desk Report
“A spokesman for the Windermere Police Department told reporters Thursday that investigators have gathered enough weird-ass evidence to officially classify Tiger Woods’ recent car accident as pretty fucking strange,” the Onion reports.
“‘The only thing we know for sure is that at 2:25 a.m. Friday morning Mr. Woods crashed his Cadillac Escalade into a fire hydrant and tree at the end of his own driveway,’ Police Chief Daniel Saylor said during a press briefing. ‘After that, the account becomes confused. We are unsure if Woods was leaving the driveway or arriving at it, which is rather unusual. At some point Woods’ wife, Elin [Nordegren], seems to have struck the car with a golf club, which is pretty bizarre. And she states that she did this to break the rear window and extract Mr. Woods from the vehicle, which, the longer you think about it, is some freaking weird shit’.”
Health Care Reform Affairs Desk Report
“Insurance Industry Insider: ‘We Win’.”
Music Affairs Desk Report
“Cheap Trick wants you to want them, and they’re still mighty desirable. Thursday night at the Allstate Arena, the band blasted through a 75-minute set that featured four powerful songs from their 2009 studio album, The Latest, alongside timeless gems like ‘Surrender,’ ‘Dream Police’ and ‘I Want You to Want Me’,” Bobb Reed writes.
“Thirty years after their commercial peak, the ageless wonders from Rockford are making some of the best music of their career. While most of their peers are either fat, dead, disbanded or no longer composing great songs, Cheap Trick has discovered a fountain of youth in the form of Beatlesque power pop, which is the same elixir that allowed them to sell millions of albums in the ’70s and ’80s.”
Facebook Friends Affairs Desk Report
“[S]omehow, this circumstance in which I have 658 [Facebook] ‘friends’ while having only 30ish actual friends causes me no cognitive dissonance, much less despair for the future of human interaction,” Kate Harding writes in a piece that appears in edited form in the Sun-Times.
“Newsflash: People only end up with hundreds or thousands of ‘friends’ on social networking sites because nobody really thinks they mean the same thing.”
Health Care Reform Affairs Desk Report
“A new report from government economic analysts at the Health and Human Services Department found that the nation’s $2.5 trillion annual health care tab won’t shrink under the Democratic blueprint that senators are debating. Instead, it would grow somewhat more rapidly than if Congress does nothing,” AP reports.
“More troubling was the report’s assessment that the Democrats’ plan to squeeze Medicare for $493 billion over 10 years in savings relies on specific policy changes that ‘may be unrealistic’ and could lead to cuts in services. The Medicare savings are expected to cover about half the nearly $1 trillion, 10-year cost of expanding coverage to the uninsured.”
The Blue & Orange Kool-Aid Report Affairs Desk Report
“Olin Kreutz said B.J. Raji is getting far too much attention for a rookie with 10 games of experience after the Green Bay Packers nose tackle made it clear Thursday in comments to the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel that he is stronger than the Bears’ center,” the Tribune reports.
“[T]hat’s the way young players are nowadays, they are all pretty much clowns,” Kreutz said.
Noted non-clowns Brian Urlacher and Lance Briggs could not be reached for comment.
Health Care Reform Affairs Desk Report
“Former Secretary of Labor Robert Reich is pulling no punches in his criticism of the health-care reform ‘deal’ that has reportedly been reached by Senate Democratic negotiators,” John Nichols reports.
“‘I’m here to tell you that this is no deal: it’s a gift to Big Insurance, plain and simple,’ says Reich, one of his party’s and the nation’s most noted economic analysts and social reformers.
The Cub Factor Affairs Desk Report
Jim Hendry finally killed him.
Health Care Reform Affairs Desk Report
“A loophole in the Senate health care bill would let insurance companies place annual dollar limits on medical care for people struggling with costly illnesses such as cancer,” AP reports.
“Adding to the confusion, the language is tucked away in a clause of the bill captioned ‘No lifetime or annual limits.’ Advocates for patients say it fails to deliver on that promise.”
Reading With Scissors Affairs Desk Report
Marilyn Monroe Christmas Ornaments.
For Entertainment Purposes Only (Including Gambling) Affairs Desk Report
Over/Under: Del Negro firing: Jan 1
Tiger (-$200M) @ Elin
Tiger @ T Woods Legal Team (+$50M)
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Posted on December 12, 2009