Greepeace leader Gerd Leipold admitted in an interview with BBC reporter Stephen Sackur (full interview here) that the environmental activist group included an unsupported (and indeed false) claim in an announcement made last month that sounded an alarm over the need for immediate action against global warming under the headline “Urgent Action Needed As Arctic Ice Melts”.

The July 15th press release stated that all of the Arctic ice would disappear by 2030, however when pressed in the interview, Leipold did not hesitate to call that claim “a mistake”. However, despite the alarming but false information, Leipold defended the organization’s practice of “emotionalizing issues” to persuade public opinion.

Later in the interview, a more expansive agenda that went beyond environmentalism was given to Greenpeace’s motives. “We will definitely have to move to a different concept of growth. … The lifestyle of the rich in the world is not a sustainable model,” Leipold said. “If you take the lifestyle, its cost on the environment, and you multiply it with the billions of people and an increasing world population, you come up with numbers which are truly scary.”

Leipold said later in the BBC interview that there is an urgent need for the suppression of economic growth in the United States and around the world. He said annual growth rates of 3 percent to 8 percent cannot continue without serious consequences for the climate.

What do you think? Hopefully we can all agree that accurate information should be used to persuade the public, but what about the practice of intentionally adding emotion to what is allegedly otherwise just a scientific argument?

Tucked away, but hardly hidden (according to the ratings) at 3AM eastern (midnight on the west coast) is a news analysis and commentary show unlike any other you’ll find. The show, Red Eye, featuring guests from the entertainment industry and political scene who chat with the host and an always rotating cast of guest commentators with day jobs as comedians, magazine editors, columnists and bloggers airs on an unlikely source: not E! or Comedy Central, but on Fox News.

While Fox News opinion personalities are frequent guest commentators,  one of the most endearing and unique features of the show is the inclusion of the hard-newscasters invited to appear, giving us rare glimpses into the casual and quirky sides of the anchors who we would normally only see as straight-men and women during the day delivering news on world leaders, natural disasters and economic developments at the top of every hour.

One of these anchors is Patti Ann Browne, a Red Eye favorite who uses her news reading skills and charmed delivery by day to inform the world, but uses those talents for “evil” by night when invited on the late night shows panel. Here she is doing a newsbreak on 7/23/07:

When appearing on Red Eye however, the viewer is treated to Patti Ann’s humorous side as she delivers absurd intro’s, announcements and corrections for the late night comedy show. Watch the mashup below and just try not to bust a guy laughing…

Mad Men is an American television drama series broadcast on the cable network AMC. Set in New York City, Mad Men begins in 1960 at the fictional Sterling Cooper advertising agency on New York City’s Madison Avenue. The show centers on Don Draper (Jon Hamm), the agency’s creative director, and the people in his life in and out of the office. It also depicts the changing social mores of 1960s America.

“Mad Men is more than Don Draper, which is a good thing since for most of last season he behaved despicably” notes a commenter on an article by John Boot where he wonders out loud why exactly females enjoy the character.

While he recognizes that at least in part, the show is fantasy and escape, he acknowledges that the men and women are uniformly despicable.

They cheat on their spouses and stab each other in the back. Don’s wife Betty (January Jones) drives drunk, horrifically mismanages her children, and has an affair of her own with a stranger. Don’s colleague at the ad firm Sterling Cooper, Peggy Olson (Elisabeth Moss), denied even to herself that she was pregnant until she was about to give birth, then managed to mysteriously separate herself from the baby without an apparent second thought and return to work. Everyone drinks, smokes, schemes, and keeps secrets.

Mr John guesses that style has a large part to do with the shows appeal to women, pointing out that not only does “everyone look great” but that “style-conscious women can’t stop talking about the sleek craftsmanship of every ashtray and tie clip” and that “At glossy magazines, designers are gushing Mad Men-inspired layouts”.

So is Mad Men just Melrose Place with skinny ties? asks Boot. Not quite.

The deftness and subtlety of the show’s writing and directing, the way characters’ shadings emerge only in scenes of whispery quiet, carries a strong rebuke to today’s confessional culture. Imagine the wordless disgust on Don’s face if you told him you were Tweeting your wedding planning, or your training for the marathon, or your search for your birth parents.

Boot mentions women’s fondness for “fictitious sexy rascals” that has always existed and will never go away but argues that Don’s misbehavior comes as “part of a package that women find hard to resist”.

Women aren’t likely to rise to the top in the working world of Mad Men but “they assume total command of the household” notes Boot. “They may not know where their men are in the evenings when they say they’re at ‘business dinners’ (and frequently are, with young models or foxy department-store heiresses) but that leaves them plenty of time to conduct discreet little flirtations of their own.”

Mr Boot concludes that “the women who watch the show aren’t just sighing with lust for Don. They’re sighing with relief in contemplation of a world that, though unfair and imperfect, is carefully ordered and stable, at least on the surface. Yet Mad Men is a testament to how important surfaces can be when there is a consensus that the unpleasant parts of the past ought to be enthusiastically buried. There’s no monster of the deep so fearsome that it can’t be chased away for a moment or two with a pitcher of martinis.”

What do you think? Do you watch Mad Men? Why do you like it?

They say that opposites attract, but any long time observer knows that while that cliche is often true, it doesn’t mean they “stick”. The anecdote is also largely to be a reference to personality differences, but new research is suggesting when it comes to physical appearance at least, women are more likely to be attracted to their masculine mirror image and not their polar opposite.

Researchers at the University of St Andrews not only found that women are more attracted to men who look like them, but that women are more trusting of men sharing similar features to themselves.

David and Victoria Beckham, Kelly Osbourne and Luke Worrellor  Johnny Depp and Vanessa Paradis? The UK Daily Mail wonders out loud: Were these celebrity couples drawn to each other because of their similar looks?

Perhaps this is the reason it didnt work out between Tom Cruise, a shorter than average brunette and Nicole Kidman, herself a tall and leggy blonde. After that relationship, Tom paired with Penelope Cruz, a girl sharing some of Kidmans features, but with the dimmer switch turned down and who even shared a homophone last name. Cruise then of course settled with the physical match Katie Holmes.

In the study, scientists used computer graphics to manipulate men’s faces before women rated their attractiveness. Faces were made to look more or less masculine, and more or less like the woman looking at the picture. The women rated the faces for attractiveness.

The results were that women like two things when rating a man hot or not: masculinity, and themselves.

Heidi Montag, 22, who married costar Spencer Pratt, 25, in April, has been heavily promoting her Playboy spread, going as far as to bring the upcoming September issue where she graces the cover with her on the red carpet for G.I. Joe.

Now the star of The Hills, says she used the magazine as a guide when she got her 2007 plastic surgery. “When I was shopping for my boobs, I wanted the best, so I sat down and flipped through a bunch of Playboys,” Montag, who also had a nose job, gushed to the magazine in an interview conducted by her husband, Spencer.

She’s not done going under the knife in pursuit of her looks either, saying “I plan to get a few more upgrades … I’m sure as I get older I’ll need some touch-ups” adding “I think I want to go bigger on my boobs for [Spencer].”

U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton snapped at a Congolese student over a question mistranslated about her husband’s views on foreign policy. You want me to tell you what my husband thinks?’ she snapped back at her questioner.

‘My husband is not Secretary of State. I am,’ she raged after a translator made a mistake and asked what her partner felt about an international matter.

Mrs Clinton, who was speaking at a meeting in the Congolese capital Kinshasa during her first official tour of Africa, looked clearly rattled.

‘You want me to tell you what my husband thinks?’ she replied incredulously when the male student asked her what ‘Mr Clinton’ thought of World Bank concerns about a multibillion-dollar Chinese loan offer to the Democratic Republic of Congo.

‘If you want my opinion, I will tell you my opinion. I am not going to be channelling my husband.’

Notes the DailyMail:  The question was left unanswered as the moderator of the event quickly moved on.

The translator should have asked what ‘Mr Obama’  thought as the student’s question was actually about Barack Obama, not Bill Clinton.

Sidelined for weeks after she was injured during a fall this spring, Mrs Clinton returned to a flurry of speculation that she had been shoved to the side as a diplomatic force.

Commentators said she had been overshadowed by globe-trotting President Barack Obama, Vice President Joe Biden and a bevy of heavyweight special envoys assigned to the world’s critical hotspots.

According to the latest polling, former president Bill enjoys a 5% higher favorability rating than current secretary Hillary:

58% Have Favorable opinion of Bill
53% Have Favorable opinion of Hill

See Cartoons by Cartoon by Theo Moudakis – Courtesy of Politicalcartoons.com – Email this Cartoon

Dane Cook shocked, amused and offended many in the audience of the 2009 Teen Choice Awards when he prefaced his category announcement with an off-the-cuff joke embarrassing High School Musical star Vanessa Hudgens, who was in the audience. Cook specifically called directly out to Hudgens in the audience before delivering the slam referencing a new set of private self-taken nude photographs of the 20 year old actress allegedly from 2007 when others were originally leaked on the internet.

Hudgens innocently took the bait and raised her hand so the cameras could find her and accepted the attempt to shift attention toward her with a curious but welcoming smile, wondering what the gag was going to be.

Once the “punchline” was delivered however, Hudgens reacted gracefully to the cruel trick as Dane exclaimed “Girl, you gots to keep your clothes on! Phones are for phone calls, girl.”

Cook, who hosted the show in 2006, added that he decided to address “the elephant in the room” only minutes before he presented Robert Pattinson and Megan Fox with Choice Hotties awards.

“I planned it about 20 minutes before I went out there,” Cook added. “Because I like to be on the cusp of fear.”

The comedian brushed off the attack with the expected “hey, it was just a joke” defense, telling Access Hollywood “Mostly I just wanted it to be funny,” leaving us to wonder what the rest of his intent was after one takes away that “mostly” aspect.  “That’s the best part about being a comic, when you go, ‘Maybe I can say the thing that everybody is kind of feeling and nobody [is saying].’ The elephant-in-the-room moment. So, I’ll take it, I’ll take the hit. It’s OK.”

The problem of course being that the “hit” Cook refers to is non-existent other than perhaps some disgust by his and Hudgens fans, but disgust at a comics attempt at humor can hardly be called a “hit” as it is standard fare for the profession.

Here at OliveSpin, we support controversial humor and performances that have a questionable or mean spirited bent, however we categorically condemn public humiliation on any level, and making the gag in such a venue as the Teen Choice Awards with the target of his attack present in the audience, unable to respond and going out of his way to spotlight Hudgens beforehand makes Cook an asshole here.

He should have apologized, if only for singling Hudgens out before taunting her from stage over such an issue.

While an involved mother can also help stave off a teen’s sexual activity, dads have twice the influence.

It’s something predatory men and teenage boys have known for hundreds of years; maybe forever: girls without fathers are easier to have sex with. The less prominent the fathers role in the girls life, the higher your chances of getting her to have sex with you with little coaxing or commitment. Perhaps in the past this was due much more to protectionism and the family structure of older times where father knows best and curfews were at 9 o’clock, but despite the cultural shift, the reality and reliability of the father-daughter rule remains.

Teenage boys know the rule all the more. You have a massively higher shot at getting laid by a girl raised by a whose parents are divorced, single mom, or who just hates daddy. This is frequently pointed out by male shock entertainers like Howard Stern and the now in exile Tom Leykis.

Now research by Boston College social psychologist Rebekah Levine Coley confirms it all with scientific observation in a study that surveyd 3,206 teens, ages 13 to 18, who all came from two-parent homes. The teens were asked about both their sexual behaviors and their relationships with their parents, including how much each parent knows about how they spend their time when they’re not home, and how much time they spent with each parent on activities like eating or playing games.

The impact of family time overall was especially notable. One additional family activity per week predicted a 9 percent drop in sexual activity.

Linda Carroll, an MSNBC contributor, writes in response to the study that when it comes to preventing risky teen sex, “there may be no better deterrent than a doting dad”.

Patrick Tolan, a professor of psychiatry and director of the Institute for Juvenile Research at the University of Illinois in Chicago explained, “if you’re spending time talking to them, they’re going to get your values and they’re more likely to think things through rather than acting impulsively.”

Disney has gone so far to pick out these people to be their new “Stars” but do they ever pick any truly DECENT people? They choose all these kids that crack under the pressure. The women and young girls though, they go further. They just are complete idiots who exploit themselves inappropriately on the web and to other people they have cast with. Hudgens, Cyrus, and Bailon. All Disney stars that have taken inappropriate pictures. Cyrus wasn’t as bad. but when you look at other things she’s done (such as dating an underwear model that was about four years older than her).

Does Disney even TRY to cover these things up? What if a little kid searches Hudgens to print out a picture for say, school? Then they see the nude pictures. Would you want a young child exposed to those images? Not to mention the three celebs I’ve mentioned were just more recent ones. Even stars from Disney’s older generation can’t handle themselves. Just look at the way spears broke down from everything. Especially since she’s been in the spotlight since such a young age. It seems like Disney doesn’t want to help their stars.

Another thing is their so called “original movies” most of them are just spin offs of other movies or wanna-be’s of classics. Alot of people have pointed out the similarities between High School Musical and Grease. If it isn’t a spin off of another movie, it’s just one to follow the same plots just different names and in another place. What happened to their originality? Why can’t they come up with good movies or shows anymore? Even Stevens used to be a good show, so was Lizzie McGuire. OF course both were canceled to make room for what? Hannah Montana? Sonny with a Chance? Jonas? Even then they don’t appeal to the generations which loved Disney. Everyone loves good old Mickey and Minnie. The only place to find them is on the Disney XD channel. Those aren’t even the classic episodes. Those in which are now in vaults with many of the other Disney Character’s shows. Kids can see them at a young age, but once they move up to regular Disney they don’t watch them anymore. Instead they watch shows on what idealistically can only happen to one in a million people.I’m not saying kids can’t dream, but there aren’t so many contests to get on shows, and not too many actors that lead a double life.

Sometimes though, it makes the children too confident, which can hurt them as they mature into high school levels when not everyone is as pleasant as Troy or Kelsey. They can be a lot worse then Sharpay too. There is a lot more than one bully at a school. Not every single person gets along with everyone.

If you support an action on another body remaining legal, should you be obligated to undergo that action yourself? Thus was the question comedian and co-host of The View, Joy Behar asked best selling author and conservative pundit Ann Coulter on CNN’s Larry King show while Behar was filling in as host.

Joy challenged Ann on her support for the practice known as “waterboarding” which is a harsh interrogation technique used by US forces on captured terrorists and Al Queda suspects which gives the target the sensation of drowning as water is poured onto their covered face at an angle. Ann fired back on Joys support for abortion, bringing Joy’s waterboarding question into a new light on the obligation a pro-choice advocate has in choosing the action for themselves.

The exchange went something like this:

Behar To Coulter: “You Support Waterboarding… Get Waterboarded!”
Coulter: “You Support Abortion… Abort yourself”