hiphopmusic.com:

Normally if I see those names together, I expect the topic is "three names least likely to appear next to the word 'truth'" ..But in this case I'd be mistaken:

Wendy Williams, Dave Mays and Benzino Starting "The Truth" Magazine

You can't keep a thuggish, bankruptcy-prone, Harvard-educated hip-hop mogul down. Six months after being forced out of The Source, Dave Mays is set to return to magazine publishing with a new title that's being described as an urban version of In Touch. Joining him in the effort are failed 38-year-old MC Ray "Benzino" Scott, his partner at The Source; surgically-enhanced radio yapper Wendy Williams; and Mimi Valdes, the former Vibe editor in chief who was canned, along with most of her staff, after BlackBook owner Ari Horowitz bought that title in July.
Valdes will edit the mag, which is tentatively called The Truth.

I guess we'll be nice and not ask how his daughter fits in with that last comment..

Lionel Richie "Coming Home"

In recent years his once blazing hot career has cooled, but now Mr. Richie is hoping to regain relevance with a new album, “Coming Home,” which will be released today by Island/Def Jam. In an effort to ensure that his latest effort doesn’t end up being largely ignored like several of his recent albums, he has teamed up with young hit-making producers like Jermaine Dupri, Dallas Austin and Raphael Saadiq. “I asked them, ‘What does Lionel Richie sound like in 2006?’ ” Mr. Richie said, “And they said, ‘The same way he sounded like in 1976 — we’ll just bring you new beats.’ ”...

...Mr. Richie couldn’t help taking a swipe at the crop of new artists. “Today we’ve learned to celebrate mediocrity,” he said. “Back in the day we had creative artists; today we have created artists.”

In case anybody was surprised by Arnold's race weirdness the other day, here's the classic cringe-inducer from 1983, the governator in Rio De Janiero waxing poetic about the wonders of the "mulatto":

Honor yesterday by paying attention today.

I don't got it. Lynne's got it.

Meanwhile, unkut shows us that sometimes it's better not to explain..

And below via shakespeare's sister, Matt Lauer gets in Bush's grill on the torture issue. Uhh, I mean the alternative techniques issue. The lesson here: nothing is illegal when you can just "agree to disagree" with the law!

Forget all that military stuff, the real question is: How long until you can control Serato Scratch with your mind??

Double amputee uses thought-controlled arm
msnbc

Jesse Sullivan has two prosthetic arms, but he can climb a ladder at his house and roll on a fresh coat of paint. He’s also good with a weed-whacker, bending his elbow and rotating his forearm to guide the machine. He’s even mastered a more sensitive maneuver — hugging his grandchildren.

The motions are coordinated and smooth because his left arm is a bionic device controlled by his brain. He thinks, “Close hand,” and electrical signals sent through surgically re-routed nerves make it happen.

Doctors describe Sullivan as the first amputee with a thought-controlled artificial arm....

Not a good look. But I guess it's educational in an Ice Cube here's what they think about you sort of way, to watch the liberal blogosphere lecture colored folks on letting go of "identity politics" so they can focus on the "big picture."

This would have been much bigger about 17 years ago, but I'm still curious. Anybody remember the buzz back in the day that Ra had a new song named "Cut the Kane in Half"? That was right up there with the classic "Big Daddy Kane Has AIDS" rumor.

Freddie Foxxx Making Rakim Dis Record
mtv

Someone is getting ready to do the absolutely unthinkable: call Rakim out on a record by name. It's not going to be anything like the subliminal sparring that was rumored to be going on between Rakim and Big Daddy Kane in the '80s. This person is going to dis the God, one of the greatest MCs ever. Who has enough courage to do so? None other than Mr. Fearless himself, Freddie Foxxx a.k.a. Bumpy Knuckles. The song is called "The King Is Down" and appears on his new LP, Amerikkkan Black Man.

"I will eat Rakim's ass alive on any record, any stage," Bumpy Knuckles asserted recently. "When I finish with him, every bit of legendary status he had is gonna go out the window. I swear on everything I stand on, I will eat that n---a alive, bar by bar. I'll tell him to his mutha----in' face..."

(via Eskay)