Free Republic

If we should be learning anything from the Susan Boyle meltdown phenomenon, in the wake of her inpatient treatment for “exhaustion” a mere weeks after coming to prominence, it’s that the average person isn’t cut out for fame. The same holds true for political leaders. What precisely makes one person succeed while another cracks? Susan Boyle lived a quiet, simple country life alongside companions of the mainly feline persuasion, until she was thrust into the spotlight on Britain’s Got Talent and instantly became the focus of fantasy projections by every single fat slob splayed out on the couch with a...

True art vs. fame for fame's sake by The Stranger On 6/1/08, in the Sunday Times was a book review of a new bio: POSTHUMOUS KEATS, the life and work of poet John Keats who died at the age of 25, far from home, poor, in Rome. Family members were either dead, or estranged from him. The woman he loved was convinced they had no future together. He had no reputation, or success. What must it be like to die at that age, in those circumstances? The review mentions that today Keats “ranks with Shakespeare now, in talent if not...

Bo (woof) In Commentary: Monkey see, monkey do. That’s the explanation I come up with as to why a damn, dirty ape won’t keep his mitts off the honor of being on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. Clearly driven by the sight of Lassie’s and Rin Tin Tin’s names between his toes as he peruses the shops on Hollywood Blvd, Cheeta the monkey actor is pushing to get his name put there as well. (LOS ANGELES - Three stars on the Hollywood Walk of Fame have gone to the dogs, so why can’t Cheeta the chimp get some love? The...

SAN DIEGO, March 19, 2008 – In the months since her last flight in the No. 3 jet for the Air Force’s Thunderbirds, Maj. Nicole Malachowski has had a hard time attaching perspective to being the first woman to fly on a service-level U.S. military flight demonstration team. Air Force Maj. Nicole Malachowski holds her plaque after being inducted into the Women in Aviation International's Pioneer Hall of Fame on March 15, 2008, in San Diego. The major, who piloted the Thunderbirds No. 3 jet, was recognized for being the first woman pilot to be part of a service-level...

The seedy Joe Francis’ empire, Girls Gone Wild, has made an offer to the most famous prostitute in America, 22-year-old Ashley Alexandra Dupre. The hooker caught in the middle of the prostitution ring busted by the government that brought down New York Governor Eliot Spitzer has become an Internet sensation - and received a $1 million offer from Girls Gone Wild.

Is dying really a shrewd career move? Cynics, art dealers and humorists seem to think so. The French painter Jean-François Millet fakes his own death in Mark Twain's play "Is He Dead?" in order to push up his prices: "A painter has so much more talent when he's dead. Indeed the deader he is, the better he is." Dawn Powell used a similar plot device in her comic novel "The Wicked Pavilion," in which an unsuccessful artist touches up the half-finished canvases of a deceased colleague and passes them off as authentic. Both of these examples are, of course, fictional...

NEW YORK -- Rich 'Goose' Gossage became only the fifth relief pitcher elected to the Hall of Fame, earning baseball's highest honor Tuesday on his ninth try on the ballot. Gossage appeared on 86 percent of the ballots. Former Boston Red Sox outfielder Jim Rice had 72.2 percent of the vote, just short of the 75 percent needed for enshrinement.

On Dec. 7, 2001, nearly three months after the terrorist attack that had made him a national hero and a little over three weeks before he would leave office, New York Mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani took the first official step toward making himself rich. The letter he dispatched to the city Conflicts of Interest Board that day asked permission to begin forming a consulting firm with three members of his outgoing administration. The company, Giuliani said, would provide "management consulting service to governments and business" and would seek out partners for a "wide-range of possible business, management and financial services"...

Initially I thought Indian Americans are mobilizing as armies of Fanjayas, voting in large numbers to keep the 17-year-old on the show. After all, most other barriers had been broken by the community. They were on Wall Street and on main street, in political parties and Silicon Valley, in government and in management, in hotels and motels, in medicine and in space. They were writers, analysts, advisers and policy makers. Perhaps the one last hurdle was for an Indian American to become a pop icon. When they saw Sanjaya, they felt he had a shot. But as weeks went by...

Gump Worsley, the Hall of Fame goalie who played for the Minnesota North Stars, died on Friday, five days after suffering a heart attack. He was 77. Worsley is remembered by local hockey icons as a jovial anachronism, a throwback to an era when a goalie could carry a potbelly but no facemask.

LOS ANGELES — The California Highway Patrol recommended Monday that actress-singer Brandy be charged with misdemeanor vehicular manslaughter in a freeway crash that killed a woman motorist last month, a city attorney's spokesman said. The CHP referred the matter to the city attorney's office for review, said spokesman Nick Velasquez. "The office is currently reviewing the case and determining whether the evidence warrants the filing of a misdemeanor charge of vehicular manslaughter," Velasquez said. A message seeking comment from Brandy's publicist, Courtney Barnes, was not immediately returned. Brandy, whose real name is Brandy Norwood, has publicly expressed condolences to the...

What is it about the various human spheres of activity, Fame and Faith, which makes the achievement of one so detrimental to the progress of the other? What is it about the obtainment and grasping of money, wealth, power, and notoriety that makes it so difficult for those who have achieved some measure of each to maintain some ensuing sense of decorum, dignity and respect? I would like to make pronouncement of some simplistic, and usually misquoted platitude to explain this phenomenon, such as; “money is the root of all evil,” or “absolute power corrupts absolutely.” But that would not...

/16/2006 - U.S. AIR FORCE ACADEMY, Colo. (AFPN) -- Former Air Force great Chad Hennings received one of the highest honors a college football player can earn May 16. He was elected into the College Football Hall of Fame. Hennings is one of 13 players and two coaches to be selected to the hall of fame from a ballot of 77 candidates and a pool of hundreds of eligible nominees, according to Ron Johnson, chairman of the National Football Foundation and College Football Hall of Fame. Hennings, a 1988 graduate of the Academy, is considered one of college football’s great...

LOS ANGELES - Actor Samuel L. Jackson left his mark on Hollywood Boulevard on Monday, sinking his hands and feet into wet cement in front of Grauman's Chinese Theatre, where many other stars have been honored. "It's an awesome sort of experience, the kind of thing you don't really think about as a young actor," Jackson said at the ceremony. "You sort of stop to pause and say to yourself, 'Wow, you're in a very elite club.'" Jackson began his film career in 1972 with "Together for Days," and has appeared in more than 100 movies, including "Do the Right...

Star search: Why so few Cowboys in Hall? By Brad Townsend Many Cowboys fans are among the suspicious. They believe that only bias and conspiracy can explain the relatively paltry number of Cowboys in the Hall of Fame. No franchise has won more playoff games (32) or played in more Super Bowls (eight), and only one other team has won as many championships (five). But only five Cowboys players are in the Hall. No Cowboy has been elected since Mel Renfro in 1996, but that could change Saturday. Troy Aikman, Michael Irvin and Rayfield Wright are among the 15 finalists....

SIERRA VISTA — The names of two more Sierra Vistans have been added to the Arizona Veterans Hall of Fame. Duane R. Brofer and Gerd S. Grombacher were honored at an event last weekend in Phoenix, which saw the fifth annual induction ceremony. They were joined by Henry F. Hauser, who was inducted in 2003 but was too ill to attend at the time. The Hall of Fame is sponsored by Unified Arizona Veterans, Arizona Department of Veterans’ Services and the Office of the Governor. “It recognizes state veterans who have honorably served their country through military service and who...

ATLANTA (AP) - Ted Turner, Henry Aaron and the later former Mayor Maynard Jackson Jr. were among 11 people inducted to the International Civil Rights Walk of Fame on Friday. Members of the diverse group stood at the Martin Luther King Jr. National Historic Site with a plaque containing their footprints and had their shoes preserved in display cases. "This is the celebration of a few brave and courageous souls, men and women, whose personal sacrifice and commitment to justice was free of malice, greed and self-promotion," Atlanta Mayor Shirley Franklin said. Xernona Clayton, who created the Walk of Fame,...

Ladies and Gentlemen, we have ZERO days until the preseason. The NFL season officially kicked off on Saturday with the American Bowl game in Japan between the Atlanta Falcons and the Indianapolis Colts. Despite Peyton Manning leading a touchdown drive on the first series of the game, the Colts didn't have what it took and Matt Schaub led the Falcons to a victory.(Note: Manning, Vick, and other stars didn't play much of the game. If you are a Falcons fan, don't get too excited, if you are a Colts fan, don't get upset)Today the Bears play the Dolphins in the...

Michael Jackson is surely not sleeping well these nights. In lieu of having him take the stand at his child-molestation trial in Santa Maria, his attorneys played nearly three hours of outtakes from the infamous Martin Bashir TV documentary, in which a tipsy Jackson revealed that the way he really loves to sleep is onstage under seven spotlights, all on him. Presumably, when the spotlights dim, what's next best is getting an endless string of little boys to share his bed. The sad truth is that were Jackson any other 46-year-old man with a history of alcohol use and prescription...

Countless conservatives fear the quickening onset of judicial activism. Challenges that never would have passed the laugh test in days of yore are passing the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals to find sympathy from our Supreme Court. We all remember Michael Newdow, aptly named “America’s least favorite atheist” by Time Magazine. The man had the hubris to charge that our Pledge of Allegiance was an unconstitutional government endorsement of religion, due to the inclusion of the phrase, “under God.” While it is unremarkable that a wannabe Perry Mason would allege anything to argue before our nation’s highest court, the...