Los Angeles Times Obituary Claims Gore Vidal 'Demolished Intellectual Rivals' Like William F. Buckley, Jr

From Elaine Woo's obituary, "Gore Vidal, iconoclastic author, dies at 86" (via Memeorandum):

In other spare moments, [Vidal] demolished intellectual rivals like Norman Mailer and William F. Buckley Jr. with acidic one-liners, establishing himself as a peerless master of talk-show punditry.

Actually, attacking your opponents with ad hominem invective isn't exactly "demolishing" your rivals, as this famous video from 1968 shows:

During a discussion of the Vietnam War, Buckley -- in his aristocratic drawl -- compares opponents of the war (including Vidal) to Nazi appeasers. Vidal, in his own aristocratic drawl, fires back.

Vidal: The only pro- or crypto-Nazi I can think of is yourself...
Buckley: Now listen you queer, quit calling me a crypto-Nazi or I'll sock you in the goddamn face and you'll stay plastered.

Yeah, a queer alright.

Lots of folks are talking about Vidal's flaming homosexuality. See IBT, "Gore Vidal: Gay Icon Who Put Homosexuality On the Page."

'The Jeffersons' Star Sherman Hemsley Dies at 74

A very interesting obituary at the New York Times, "Sherman Hemsley, ‘Jeffersons’ Star, Is Dead at 74":

Sherman Alexander Hemsley was born in Philadelphia on Feb. 1, 1938. He dropped out of Edward W. Bok Technical High School in the 10th grade to join the Air Force and was stationed in Asia after the Korean War. He returned to Philadelphia after his discharge and, while working at the post office, attended Philadelphia’s Academy of Dramatic Arts in the evening.

Stock Market Nears Bear Territory

At Wall Street Journal yesterday (and at Google):

After turning in the worst quarter since the financial crisis, U.S. stocks started the new one by approaching the level considered a bear market.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average tumbled 2.4% Monday, leaving the index down 16.8% from its April high, 3.2 percentage points away from the 20% decline that many analysts believe signals that a bear market is under way. The broader Standard & Poor's 500-stock index also fell sharply and is even closer to bear-market territory, down 19.4% since April. The indexes are at their lowest closing levels in more than a year...

Check those links at top to continue.

Jack LaLanne, 1914-2011

A man whom I admired from a very young age. When he was on television, as a child, it was a simpler age. Not necessarily better, just simpler.

At Sippican Cottage, "Muscles Didn't Make Jack LaLanne Mighty."

And at Los Angeles Times, "Jack LaLanne dies at 96; spiritual father of U.S. fitness movement":

Jack LaLanne, the seemingly eternal master of health and fitness who first popularized the idea that Americans should work out and eat right to retain youthfulness and vigor, died Sunday. He was 96.

LaLanne died of respiratory failure due to pneumonia at his home in Morro Bay, Calif., his agent Rick Hersh said. He had undergone heart valve surgery in December 2009.

Though LaLanne was for many years dismissed as merely a "muscle man" — a notion fueled to some extent by his amazing feats of strength — he was the spiritual father of the health movement that blossomed into a national craze of weight rooms, exercise classes and fancy sports clubs.

LaLanne opened what is commonly believed to be the nation's first health club, in Oakland in 1936. In the 1950s, he launched an early-morning televised exercise program keyed to housewives. He designed many now-familiar exercise machines, including leg extension machines and cable-pulley weights. And he proposed the then-radical idea that women, the elderly and even the disabled should work out to retain strength.

Full of exuberance and good cheer, LaLanne saw himself as a combination cheerleader, rescuer and savior. And if his enthusiasm had a religious fervor to it, well, so be it.

"Well it is. It is a religion with me," he told What Is Enlightenment, a magazine dedicated to awareness, in 1999. "It's a way of life. A religion is a way of life, isn't it?"

"Billy Graham was for the hereafter. I'm for the here and now," he told The Times when he was almost 92, employing his usual rapid-fire patter.

Another time, he explained, "The crusade is never off my mind — the exercise I do, the food I eat, the thought I think — all this and how I can help make my profession better-respected. To me, this one thing — physical culture and nutrition — is the salvation of America."

Gerry Rafferty, 1947-2011

At NYT, "Gerry Rafferty, Songwriter, Dies at 63."

And Proof Positive has more (via Memeorandum).