The Jane Hotel's Death at the Hands of City Officials Begins Apace
Just as we predicted now that the neighbors have taken up the cause against downtown hotspot the Jane Hotel, it's going to die the death of a thousand licensing violations. Now they've closed the ballroom to meet compliance. The Hotel's representatives say that it is not closed, but they are making some changes based on the violations that the Fire Department and the Department of Buildings found on Friday night when they raided the joint. It's all petty things—like broken emergency lights, where the fire extinguishers are hung, operating with the current licenses—but these are the minuscule infractions that add up over time leading to a nightclub's demise. Check out the documents below. After the city's first volley has lead the club's management to "voluntarily choosing to make a few minor physical adjustments to the ballroom space to insure that the entire venue is in 100% compliance with all codes and ordinances," according to their spokesperson. While that happens, the ballroom will be closed for the next several weeks and only the front bar will be open to the public. So, there you have it folks, start picking out your funeral attire. MORE >>
The Gruesome L Train Incident: Solved
What exactly happened on the L train—NYC's most cool subway line—today? Earlier we heard rumors of a suicide. We got a bunch of tips. And just before we went to put up this post, we saw this. 1010 Wins says a dead body was found on the tracks. No word on whether or not it was the result of a suicide. But we'll go ahead and post all these tips, just to illustrate how messed up a city can get by one single incident... These videos are not the most enthralling things ever. Watch them if you will. But we got this report from a person on the train in the video: The L train stopped underground between the Bedford and the 1st Avenue station around 10:44a.m.- give a few minutes here or there. Being just prior to 1st avenue, we waited underground for 15 minutes if that, and moved a couple of inches every few minutes. The announcement was then stated that we were to be evacuated onto a train in front of our own... I'm assuming that it was backed up into the tunnel to provide a link for us to arrive at 1st avenue by foot. The train operator having come out from the conductors closet told another passenger that "no, someone isn't sick... it's an injury". This was my first understanding of what had caused us to halt the transit. When we all had quietly and patiently (I felt quite in awe by the patience of the crowd) onto the 1st avenue platform we came upon a grouping of New York's finest, all guarding the first train car. There were stretchers and such. I couldn't say for sure if someone was laid out on the seat in the first train car, nor if they were alive, though that was the glimpse of things, and based on assumption that someone was injured, it seemed that car was providing the medical and emergency assistance either he or she required. We stepped above ground just after 11am. And, we heard from another L train rider who told a similar story about going to work this morning—probably on that very same train: I was riding on it, toward the back of the train. Train slows down, then just stops. The front cars reached the First Avenue platform, the back cars—where I was—were still in the tunnel. After a couple of minutes of delay, they said there had been an "injury" to a passenger and we would have to all evacuate. Anyway, since the back of the train wasn't even at the platform, we all had to walk toward the middle of the train and get off there. We were at the far end of the platform and had to walk down. We got off, and then it was all crazy. Dozens and dozens of firemen (carrying axes, which was particularly odd) and lots of police officers. They had a gurney laid out near the front of the train, but again, had no idea what happened from there How bad was it? Another L train passenger tells us that much later, everything was still totally fucked: "I was actually one of the hundreds of people waiting for the L to arrive at 1st Ave, around 12:30. The station was open, and there hadn't been any announcement over the... MORE >>
Gawker Exclusive: Letterman Blackmailer Lunched With Cop Days Before Launching Plot
Joe Halderman, who is accused of attempting to extort $2 million out of David Letterman, ate lunch with a veteran Nashville homicide detective just days before he left a note demanding $2 million in Letterman's car. Sgt. Pat Postiglione, who heads the Nashville police department's cold case unit, told Gawker that he had lunch with Halderman in Nashville in the last week of August, when Halderman was traveling there to speak to a meeting of the National Information Officers Association. "He seemed OK," said Postiglione, who worked for years with Halderman on a 48 Hours story Halderman produced about the 1996 murder of Nashville socialite Janet March. Postiglione's cold case unit solved the case in 2004, and he featured prominently in Halderman's piece. "He seemed like he had lost quite a bit of weight, but other than that he was normal. We talked about different cases, and he said he wanted to come back and do a story on a cold case." Little did Postiglione know that on September 9, a little over one week after that lunch, Halderman would hatch his alleged extortion plot by handing a blackmail note to Letterman's limousine driver outside his Manhattan home. Postiglione said Halderman's work on the March story, which took him to Nashville several times over several years, made him a lot of friends in the Nashville police department. "We knew him fairly well," he said. "We were stunned. He's much smarter than that, and he was clearly pro-police to the max." Halderman's true-crime stories for 48 Hours put him in close touch with a lot of law enforcement officers, and made it his job to tell stories of how the bad guys got caught by the cops—which makes his apparently ham-fisted attempt in Letterman's case all the more mystifying. "If he was going to do something like this," Postiglione said, "you'd figure he would have come up with something more sophisticated. He tried to cash a $2 million check and didn't think anyone would notice?" MORE >>
Layoffs at Forbes?
A source close to Forbes tells us another layoff round is imminent, the third this year. Ouch. Some Forbesers darkly note that, barring a summer recess, company layoffs have come near the end of this year's financial quarters, with 19 let go from the magazine and website in early January followed by a reported 50 or so at the very end of March. Another round now, just after the close of the Sept. 30 quarter, would fit the pattern. CEO Steve Forbes assured staff in May that layoffs were done for the moment and "Forbes continues to outperform its competitors." But in such a severe an ad recession that's not much reassurance. We've put in an inquiry with Forbes PR and will update with what we hear back. MORE >>
In Australia, Blackface Is Still Only Slightly Offensive
Last night an Australian variety show aired a skit with five white men in blackface performing as the Jackson 5. And the audience cheered! Thank goodness Harry Connick Jr was there to be the voice of reason. The show was a live reunion special for Hey Hey, It's Saturday, a popular and long-running program down under that was cancelled a decade ago. During their Red Faces segment, which is similar to the American version of The Gong Show, six doctors performed a choreographed number in blackface and afro wigs pretending to be the Jackson 5. Thankfully, one of the judges hit the gong shortly into the number. But what did the crowd do when they stopped the music. They booed! Harry Connick Jr, one of the guest judges gave the team a zero score and the judge who gonged gave them a one, even though the crowd was roaring to give them a 10! One female judge gave them a 7 out of 10 because she is apparently ignorant or, beause she's a sweet female sitting between two men judging a singing competition she thought she was Paula Abdul and took a handful of pill before the broadcast, so she didn't know better. The amazing thing is that, as the show tells us, in 1989, the same group doing a very similar act won the competition! So, in 20 years, we've gone from this offensive form of comedy being wildly popular to being still popular with the masses, even though some people know better. In America, blackface is one of those things that you can only show if you're talking about how awful it is because, well, it is pretty awful. Sure, there are culture differences, but it's not like they don't have black folks in Australia who would get pissed off by this. Luckily, they gave Connick some time at the end of the show to say that he wouldn't have done the show if he knew there was going to be such an act. "[Americans] have spent so much time trying to not make black people not look like buffoons, that when we see something like that we really take it to heart." Wow, and American is being the voice of cultural sensitivity? Australia must be really messed up. MORE >>
The Hills and The City Kiss Princes to Make Frogs
There was a lot of ticking last night. Heidi's biological clock was making noise and so was the time bomb of Roxy working at People's Revolution. Oh, and Audrina was ticked off, but no one seems to care. The trouble with Heidi and Spencer began with a visit from Stephanie to their glass coffin when Heidi confessed that she had eaten the poisoned apple and wanted to fall into the deep, deep sleep of motherhood. Spencer only cares about himself and hates kids. We find him to be deplorable but his decision not to spawn with Heidi means to be one of his smarter decisions, like every time he takes off one of his ridiculous hats. But Snow Heidi has enlisted Seven Dwarves of the Apocalypse, and their names are Giuseppe, Luigi, Antonioni, Malfi, Anthony, Vincente, and Enzo, and they are brought over to the house by their parents Caroline and Seth, who are Speidi's new neighbors. This is all just a plan to get Spender (as Enzo calls him) to get hip to giving her some babies, because she is tired of shopping for clothes for herself and has been banned from just about every clothing store in the greater Los Angeles area, so for her to continue shopping, she must have a baby and enter into the untapped maternity/baby wear retail market. Hey Big Spender (duh da duh nah) is not down with this plan and when Heidi volunteers to babysit for the Seven Dwarves, Spender says "Hey, ho, it's off to work you go," and tells Seth and Caroline to go back to the queen with a deer's heart in a box. Later, little Enzo escapes the witch's clutches and runs to the embrace of another harpy, Heidi, who puts him under the spell of some video games. The wee thing wails on the Wii and when Spender comes home, he refuses to babysit for free. This is what happily ever after looks like, ladies and gentleman, and we wish that Heidi would just slip back into her coma and leave the rest of us alone. Once upon a time, Kristin was across town having a conversation with the producers that went something like this: "Hey Mary from MTV, with your little clip board and denim miniskirt, why am I sitting at this restaurant to have lunch with Audrina and she's not here. Is she coming?" "No, she's not. How do you feel about that? Are you angry? Show us angry." "Yeah, I'm angry. At you for wasting my time! Did you know she wasn't coming?" "Did you know she wasn't coming?" "I thought she was coming because you set up this lunch and told me to be here. So, is she coming?" "Well, no. We told her to, but then she went shopping and decided that she didn't want to." "Why didn't you tell me?" "We were hoping you would throw a scene and make some angry phone calls when she didn't show up. And your cell phone is right here, why don't you pick it up and..." "I don't want to talk on the phone, I want to have lunch. I'm starving, and I got my hair done all nice and now I have no one to eat with. Don't make me waste good hair on footage we can't even use. Who can you get here?" "We can probably get Lo. She... MORE >>
Letterman Scandal Shock: Fling Caused Love Letters, Anger
The Sexy Middle-Aged Man Interoffice Romance Scandal continues apace! Today in salacious pieces of information relating to David Letterman and the woman he smooched and her crazy boyfriend: A blackmail motive! Lusty letters! And a good guess at who's leaking! That Dude Mostly Blackmailed Letterman Just to Make Him Feel Pain, Allegedly: The New York Post's daily Letterman angle is that Joe Halderman, the guy who tried to extort Dave for $2 mil, didn't even care about the money that much—he wanted to see suffering! "He wants to hurt Letterman as much as he can — and he wanted to hurt the girl, too," said a snitch. Probably because Dave was still boning Stephanie Birkitt, Halderman's girlfriend. Grandma Speaks: Stephanie Birkitt's 90 year-old grandmother told the Post, "She said she never had sex with him." Christ. Leave that old lady alone, sex-talking reporters. Sexy Letters Exist Maybe: Hello, the Daily News still has some fight in it! New York's slightly less skeevy tabloid gets back in the Letterman Scandal Game with today's story: Stephanie Birkitt wrote (but never mailed) "'trashy' love letters [to Letterman] that will embarrass them both when they become public, sources said Tuesday." One might argue that we cum-hungry tabloid news outlets should be more embarrassed about reading and publicizing the contents of a lady's unsent private love letters. It's a debatable matter! Who's Leaking All This?: Yesterday we mused over who might be the source for all this inside info about the case. Letterman's camp? Halderman's lawyer? Birkitt's friends? Judging by what's come out today, we can safely assume: It's the fucking cops. This David Letterman scandals marks the first time in American history a secret office romance has resulted in hurt feelings, love letters, and embarrassing things said by grandma. [Pic: Getty] MORE >>
Obama's Gay Night Out Brings Sullivan, Phelps Together
Once in a great while, ideological opponents find themselves on the same side of a debate. And, though both parties find one another repulsive, that's what's happening, however tenuously, with Andrew Sullivan and those "God Hates Fags" crazies. The issue at hand: President Obama's plans to address elitist gay group Human Rights Campaign's annual dinner in DC. Now, some of you may not be hip to Obama's same-sex politics, but that's okay: they don't amount to much. Despite all those campaign promises, the Big O's dragging his feet on, well, basically every important LGBT policy. And that lackadaisical approach has many, like Sullivan, arguing that Obama's simply in it for that sweet, sweet gay dough: In some ways, Obama's fealty to the big gay lobby rather than to the real gay community is testimony to why Democratic party politics remain repulsive to me. HRC has achieved nothing substantive for gay equality on a federal level in the twenty years I've been observing them. ... If Obama wants to support gay equality, he knows what to do.... So spare us the schmoozing and the sweet-talking and do it. Until then, Mr president, why don't you have a nice steaming cup of shut-the-fuck-up? Sullivan's not alone in wagging a finger at this weekend's event. The rag tag Westboro Baptist Church, which was founded by the scary Fred Phelps and has a knack for getting press, announced that it will also wag a finger, and some questionable placards. That's no surprise. Nor is their hateful press release, which comes awfully close to Sullivan's criticism: You stupid fags think Obama gives a darn about you? No, he hates you. He is going to use your money and your resources and then when he shows himself for what he is, he will merely destroy you along with the rest of this nation of self-loathing hypocrites. Their release, however, does top Sullivan in one respect (other than the national damnation bit): it delves into the event's dinner menu: "What, you're going to have an all the feces you can eat bufet [sic]? YUCK!" Yuck is right! What self-respecting gay eats feces from a buffet? How pedestrian! MORE >>
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