Thoughts of a Chilled Out Entertainer
January 20th, 2005 — Music
Coldplay are set to release their third album on March 29. There’s all sorts of rumors regarding a coinciding tour, my favorite of which is the one which has them co-headlining this May’s Coachella Festival in California with none other than U2.
Speaking of U2, we could be hearing an official annoucement regarding their tour dates as soon as tomorrow.
January 19th, 2005 — Film
January 18th, 2005 — Hockey
NHLPA president (and Vancouver Canucks center) Trevor Linden has invited representives of the NHL owners’ association to a secret meeting in an undisclosed location in a last ditch effort to save the hockey season, and by extension the NHL itself.
The players and owners have been locked in a labor dispute for months now, a dispute which to this point has seen the cancellation of every NHL game so far this season.
In a statement released by the NHLPA, the players made it clear that they are not changing their anti-salary cap stance, nor are they offering any new ideas. However, the invitation was not extended to the two main combatants in this dispute, union-chief Bob Goodenow, and NHL president Gary Bettman.
Let’s hope that with the abscence of those two immense egos, the season can be salvaged, and hockey be saved here in the United States.
January 17th, 2005 — Adventure
Yesterday, in a beautiful ceremony, surrounded by family and friends, my grandparents renewed their wedding vows exactly fifty years to the day they first exchanged them.
It’s quite a moving testament to the existance of true love, and I couldn’t be happier for them.
Salut!
To see photos from yesterday’s festivities, click on the image above, or here.
January 15th, 2005 — Arsenal FC
My week of misery continues as Arsenal lay a stinking turd in a 1-0 away loss to Bolton. Chelski won today, which means that at ten points behind, the title chase is effectively over for the Gunners.
January 12th, 2005 — Television
Don King files $2.5 billion defamation lawsuit against ESPN
from the Associated Press
Instead of pontificating, the boxing promoter stood stiffly in the background as his lawyer discussed a defamation suit King filed Wednesday against ESPN. The attorney said King is entitled to damages of more than $2.5 billion.
The lawsuit says a “SportsCentury” segment aired last May accused King of being “a snake oil salesman, a shameless huckster and worse,” claimed the flamboyant promoter underpaid Muhammad Ali by $1.2 million and claimed King - convicted in a 1967 beating death and acquitted in a 1954 killing - “killed not once, but twice.”
Most of the material in the program had been printed or broadcast earlier about King, who has spent much of his career in court, but the wild-haired promoter said he had just had enough.
“I just felt that this was the straw that broke the camel’s back and I can’t take it anymore, and I’m going to fight back,” King said at a news conference. “I seek justice.”
King, wearing a garish American flag tie and two flag lapel pins, then quietly stepped back and let lawyer Willie Gary answer questions.
Gary called the SportsCentury segment “a story designed to orchestrate and create an impression that is not there,” and said the network had refused to retract parts of the program that offended King.
The suit, filed in state court in Broward County, Fla., names ESPN and its parent company, Walt Disney Co., among the defendants. Also named are Disney-owned ABC Cable Networks and Advocate Communications, a Florida-based cable and satellite system.
“We have not seen a copy of the lawsuit, so we are not in a position to comment on it,” said Mike Soltys, ESPN’s vice president of communications. “However, SportsCentury is a Peabody- and Emmy-award winning series of more than 250 biographies that is widely respected for its journalistic quality and integrity.”
The suit also says SportsCentury accused King of threatening to break the legs of heavyweight Larry Holmes and of cheating boxer Meldrick Taylor out of $1 million from a fight and then threatening to have Taylor killed.
“It was slanted to show Don in the worst way. It was one-sided from day one,” Gary said. “Don is a strong man, but he has been hurt by this.”
King has represented fighters from Ali to Mike Tyson, and has been sued by several of them - including a $100 million lawsuit filed against him by Tyson. King paid $7.5 million to former middleweight champion Terry Norris in late 2003 to settle a suit. King sued former heavyweight champion Lennox Lewis for libel.
King also has beaten federal charges, including tax evasion and fraud. He served nearly four years in prison for the 1967 beating death of a man who owed him money. In 1954, he killed a man who was robbing a numbers house he operated in Cleveland, but it was ruled self-defense.
