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He's the "eight" wonder of the world! Here is the iconic first photo of a bare-chested, medal-clad Michael Phelps doing his best Mark Spitz impression - sporting an Olympic-sized grin as his eight golds dangle from his neck. The photo - taken inside an ancient temple in Beijing on Sunday night - will grace the cover of Sports Illustrated, which hits newsstands tomorrow.

The NFL implemented a new code of fan conduct Tuesday, warning that spectators who misbehave will be ejected from stadiums and barred from coming back. The policy, first recommended by commissioner Roger Goodell at league meetings in April, is aimed at conduct that the league said "detracts from the gameday experience." It includes bans on: -- Behavior that is unruly, disruptive, or illegal. -- Drunkenness and signs of alcohol impairment that result in irresponsible behavior. -- Foul or abusive language or obscene gestures. -- Interference with the progress of the game, including throwing objects onto the field. -- Failing to...

Wow! Amazing! http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/multimedia/photo_gallery/0808/oly.phelps.sequence/content.1.html

SI.com has learned that for the first time in history, a major presidential candidate may sponsor a race car in NASCAR's premier series. According to sources, Barack Obama's campaign is in talks to become the primary sponsor of BAM Racing's No. 49 Sprint Cup car for the Pocono race on August 3. **** Obama will also be present for a second private fundraiser on July 30 in Miami, in which team owners Beth Ann and Tony Morgenthau -- staunch Republicans -- will give the Democrat an opportunity to spread his message of change. Randy Moss and Fergie are among the...

Model Marisa Miller has been chosen as this year's Sports Illustrated swimsuit issue cover girl. (David Letterman had the honor of revealing the news on the Late Show last night.) Our first thought upon seeing the California blonde? Where's the treadmill? Our second (and third and fourth) thought? Her arms are way too skinny. Those boobs look fake. And that tan is straight from the bottle. Hey, we gotta find some way to make ourselves feel better...

Brett's wife, Deanna, was there, looking glamorous in a long coat and high-heeled boots. Even before her memoir about beating breast cancer hit The New York Times's best-seller list, she was the second-biggest celebrity in Green Bay. Favre's mother, Bonita, was holding court at one of the half-dozen tables, her throaty laugh audible over the din. Brett's sister, Brandi, was cooing over her newborn daughter, Myah, while his brothers, Scott and Jeff, were busy refereeing their young sons, who were creating a ruckus by playing tackle football with an empty water bottle. Also enjoying the spread of steak and crawfish...

The Hillary Curse continues. No New York team has won a major championship since Hillary was elected Senator from New York. Last night, the Curse continued, as the New York Yankees, $200 million payroll and all, were eliminated once again from the baseball playoffs. As an explanation point, the Buffalo Bills lost on Monday Night Football in the most bizarre fashion, giving up a late touchdown, stuffing the 2 point conversion, losing a onside kick, and giving up a 53-yard field goal to lose by 1 point. Yes, Hillary and her master are smiling from that hot place down below....

BOSTON (AP) -- Presidential contender Mitt Romney has tapped a prominent Cuban- American Republican in Florida for his first radio ad targeting Spanish-speaking voters.

(AP) Another high note for Beyonce _ the coveted cover shot of this year's Sports Illustrated swimsuit issue. The singer and now movie star ("Dreamgirls") posed on a Florida beach in a yellow-and-pink bikini by House of Dereon, the fashion label she started with her mother, Tina Knowles. There's also a photo spread inside. "The Dreamgirl As You've Never Seen Her," a cover headline teases. The 2007 swimsuit edition continues with a music them inside, featuring scantily-clad models posing with Kanye West, Aerosmith, Kenny Chesney, Gnarls Barkley and Panic! At the Disco for the camera of lensman Steve Erle.

One day, God willing, Russell Baer was going to tell his son this story. One day, after the boy's heart and brain had healed, he was going to point to that picture on the kid's bedroom shelf of the man doing a handstand on the roof of a house, take a deep breath and say, Mav, that's a man who lived a life as pure and died a death as muddy as any man ever to walk this rock, and I was there for both. That's the man, when your heart stopped for an hour and they slit you open...

Ever since its disastrous 2000 merger with America Online, Time Warner has been playing defense. Outside agitators like Carl Icahn have called on the media behemoth to sell or spin off units that generate cash reliably but don't offer much in the way of growth, notably AOL and the company's vast cable holdings. CEO Richard Parsons, refusing to budge from the company's conglomeration strategy, has politely demurred. But recent events suggest that Icahn and the professional noodges have focused on the wrong corporate assets. What if Time Warner sold off Time Inc., the company's mammoth magazine business? Home to such...

USA Citizens Day - July 1st Immigration Control Rally Nationwide Rally on Saturday, July 1st, at noon, at your City HallMay 1st - Million of Illegal Aliens Marched in our StreetsTwelve million illegal aliens demonstrated their political power, and declared May 1st to be A Day Without Undocumented Workers ( illegal aliens ). They boycotted the USA, all US businesses and institutions. Millions of them marched in our streets, carried Mexican flags, shouted "Si se puede!", and demanded new laws from our Congress. July 1st - U.S. Citizens Nationwide Rally for Immigration ControlRally to stop our continuous invasion by...

MIAMI - Former Sports Illustrated swimsuit model May Andersen was arrested after allegedly becoming unruly and striking a flight attendant on a plane from Amsterdam to Miami, police said. Andersen, 23, from Denmark continued being loud and violent after officers met Martinair Flight 643 on the ground Thursday, Miami-Dade Airport Police said. She was examined for alcohol and substance abuse at Jackson Memorial Hospital and later transported to the Miami-Dade County Jail. She has a hold for immigration, which means no bail has been set. She cannot be released until immigration lifts it, said Janelle Hall, a corrections spokeswoman.

Maria Sharapova is featured in the 2006 Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Issue, which hit the newstands on Tuesday. Sharapova is making her first appearance in what is billed to be the most widely read issue of any magazine in the world. The former world No.1 and current No.4 graces the cover of the swimsuit edition, on the lower right hand corner with the headline "Tennis Ace Maria Sharapova, As You've Never Seen Her." She is the only athlete pictured in the magazine, along with 26 supermodels, including Rebecca Romijn, Petra Nemcova, Rachel Hunter, Elle Macpherson and Heidi Klum. The photo shoots...

This year, fans of Sports Illustrated's annual swimsuit issue will have an abundance of choice when it comes to formats for viewing the bikini-clad supermodels.In addition to the magazine, which appears on newsstands tomorrow, and on the Web site at Sportsillustrated.com, fans will also be able to purchase any of eight specially produced videos from iTunes.com, Apple Computer's online store, for $1.99 each, or download content to a cell phone or to a handheld device, through a partnership Sports Illustrated has made with American Greetings Interactive. Mark Ford, the president and publisher of Sports Illustrated, estimates that newsstand sales of...

I love sports, and I read my subscription to sports illustrated to get a reprieve from the normal liberal drivel that is pervasive in television and newspapers... Then I got my last Sports Illustrated. A sniveling little twerp named Steve Rushin had an article about the dangers of guns and all of the gun violence related to sports stars.

ABC TV's Monday Night Football promotion is like a restaurant that tries to attract customers by telling you how entertaining its waiters are. Then when one of them keeps dropping dishes, management will bring in a new one, and then another, all the time keeping the pitch going about how this is a promotion not to be missed. The food? Naah, nobody cares about that. It's our waiters they're interested in, our stars.The sick thing is that journalists buy into this nonsense ... TV columnists, molders of public opinion. I've already begun to read the hand-wringing about the departure of ABC...

In 1986, the rock band Boston released its third album, Third Stage, which was the musical equivalent to Colorado's effort in the Big 12 Championship game a few weeks back. The '70s air-guitar heroes had released one of the greatest all-time debut albums in 1976 (Boston) and then followed it up two years later with a sophomore effort (Don't Look Back) that hadn't been equaled until Dwayne Jarrett's 4th-down catch in South Bend. But then the self-proclaimed "just another band out of Boston" took eight years off. And look what happened. Bowl teams can be like that. After taking as...

It's not working for me this year. The Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Issue just isn't working. We're told this issue will generate $50 million in ad sales, calendars, television shows and other spin-offs, but I think more people are thinking and feeling precisely what I am: The concept is tired and played out. Surely you've heard about the history of this issue. In 1964, the editors wanted to do something to draw readers during February. With football over and baseball not yet begun, readership usually plunged. So on Jan. 20, 1964, they launched the first swimsuit issue -- a cover shot...

When we look at the constant assault on all that made America great -- a common language, personal liberty, the right to assemble with whom we wish, conventional marriage, the Boy Scouts, religion, etc. -- we need only look inward to those working among us. We can call them Democrats, liberals, the left, or progressives. The label is not important. By their acts, we know them as socialists and they have a plan to disassemble society as we know it. We have written about the infamous House Progressive Caucus[1] many times before. The Progressive Caucus is the Congressional arm of...

Honor Pat Tillman with your vote!

I'd appreciate it if you took some time to go here to vote, select Pat Tillman on the sliding window on the left of the site (he's second from the bottom and wearing a red football jersey), click on his picture, then hit the vote button. Currently, he is in third place behind Lance Armstrong and Michael Phelps.

NEW YORK - A month after winning their first World Series title since 1918, the Boston Red Sox were honored as Sports Illustrated’s Sportsmen of the Year — the first major pro sports team to receive the award. “Every Sox fan everywhere shares in this with the team,” SI managing editor Terry McDonell said. The issue hits newsstands Wednesday. The Red Sox made an unprecedented rally from a 3-0 deficit to beat the New York Yankees in the AL championship series. They then swept the St. Louis Cardinals in the World Series to put an end to the supposed “Curse...

Issue will hit newsstands tomorrow--sneak peek pix:

Last Thursday, House Democrats elected Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) as House Minority Leader. Pelosi won the minority leader position on a 177-29 vote. That is, only 29 House Democrats voted against her. Clearly, 177 agree with her positions. This is a very important point. Because, now we can define, specifically, what the House Democrats are and what they stand for. Money is the life-blood of politics. Like Hillary in the Senate, Pelosi capitalized on that. In so doing, Pelosi bought her position within the Democratic Party. According to Opensecrets.org(1), Pelosi set up her own PAC and quickly became a major...

Everyone seems to have their favorite conspiracies nowadays and we must get "alerted" to four or five new ones a week. So, herein, we shall not be starting yet another. Still, there is a rather significant point that must be made before the general election next month. Because, there really is a well entrenched organization afoot that is unabashedly reorganizing life in the United States as we know it. This group is not secret. In fact, they hold semipublic meetings in our nation's Capitol and everyone in the Washington press corps know about them. Fifty years ago, most members of...