News in Brief

Published April 8, 2008

By Max C. Bookman

“It’s none of your business.”

-Former First Daughter Chelsea Clinton, responding to a question posed by a student during a visit to North Carolina State. The student, a Hillary supporter, asked if the Monica Lewinsky scandal poorly reflects on Chelsea’s mother. A similar question was posed days later, followed by the same response.

“If Hollywood had a Mt. Rushmore, Heston’s face would be on it.”

-Publicist Michael Levine, paying tribute to the late Charlton Heston, who died over the weekend at the age of 84. Heston was an iconic figure throughout the ‘50s and ‘60s, playing epic characters in classics such as The Ten Commandments, El Cid, Antony and Cleopatra, and Planet of the Apes. He was also president of the National Rifle Association from 1998 to 2003, when he coined the phrase “from my cold dead hands.”

“I think boycotting the opening ceremony…is something that should be kept on the table.”

-Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, suggesting that President Bush should boycott the opening of the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing, a ceremony traditionally used to pay respect to the government of the host country. The Chinese government, which has fallen under serious international scrutiny regarding its human and civil rights abuses, not to mention the upheaval in occupied Tibet, has already learned that Germany’s Angela Merkel and Britain’s Prince Charles will be boycotting the opening ceremony.

“Bad news.”

-Advisor to Iraq’s Prime Minister, Sami al-Askari, reacting to reports that the State Department has renewed Blackwater’s contract. Blackwater, whose name just sounds sinister, is a private security contractor, which is just a nice way to say paramilitary, or even better, mercenary. They hit headlines earlier in the year when Blackwater employees opened fire on and killed innocent civilians in a crowded market. Subsequent investigations revealed an alarming number of similar incidents.

“You have a need in an evolutionary sense for both money and women.”

-Professor Camelia Kuhnen, of Northwestern University, claiming that from the results of a recent study she conducted, sex and money are linked in the male brain. The study, which surveyed 15 young heterosexual men, concluded that the same sections of the brain that are activated when a man sees an erotic image or attractive woman are also active when making financial decisions, including gambling.

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