The production of a Hollywood film on the romance between Jawaharlal Nehru, India’s first prime minister, and Lady Edwina Mountbatten, wife of the last British viceroy of India, has been temporarily halted. The Indian government wants an assurance that the movie, Indian Summer, starring Cate Blanchett and Hugh Grant, would not contain physically intimate scenes. (Nehru’s name was also romantically...

“[I] went and tried to talk to Sarah Palin, and instead she talked to Greta. … But maybe she’ll talk to me now that she has a book deal,” Oprah Winfrey, last December. That was an Andrew Sullivan quote of the day. I’m guessing Palin on Oprah is old news to TMV readers by now. A tit-for-tat; Palin’s book is out the day after her eagerly awaited Nov 16 appearance on the show....

Mike Keefe, The Denver Post This cartoon is copyrighted and licensed to run on TMV. Unauthorized reproduction prohibited. All rights reserved.

Um, NOT.  The strategy is to “marginalize [the administration's] most powerful critics.”

Mural to the dead: Revolutionary Guard members look at pictures of commanders and colleagues killed in Sunday’s suicide bombing. Who is responsible for Monday’s devastating attack on members of Iran’s elite Revolutionary Guard? According to Iran and others, the U.S. and Britain are responsible, since they back the Sunni group that has claimed responsibility and is fighting for an independent...

As some of you may know there is a story circulating around the internet about an election in a 3rd grade class in Nashville, Tennessee. Because of the way things end up on the net, I am not going to swear to the veracity of the story itself but I am pretty sure something like this happened and it is certainly a great analogy for what is wrong with society. The story takes place in fall 2008 and involves a class...

Consolation prize?: Vice President Joe Biden and Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk in Warsaw, Oct. 21. Has America agreed to station U.S. forces in Poland to ease the pain of canceling the construction of elements of an anti-missile shield in that country? In addition to discussing the new version of the U.S. anti-missile shield with its East European allies, according to this article by Andrzej Talaga of...

I’m pretty sick and tired of seeing and hearing President Obama every day. His words become more meaningless with each passing week. I already agree with half of his policies and the other half I’m willing to judge later after they are tested in the real world. I am even willing to give him an another award certifying that he is the most inspiring speaker of the 21st Century despite having 90 years left...

Could it be that the United States is somehow behind or involved with the suicide attack on a meeting that included senior members of Iran’s Revolutionary Guard? According to this editorial from Pakistan’s Frontier Post, which is published right along the Afghan-Pakistan border, there is every reason to believe that the attack, claimed by the Sunni group Jundallah which is fighting for an independent...

The White House has stirred up a hornets’ nest of controversy in its “war” against Fox News (see our many posts here on TMV by scrolling down). Some call it a major political mistake. But the Washington Post’s Eugene Robinson, who was also critical of the White House, has begun to think that the White House may be “crazy like a fox…”

The White House’s Curious War Against Fox News by Jon Wells Over the last week, members of the White House staff have gone out of their way to single out Fox News as an unworthy news organization. It began with White House communications chief Anita Dunn’s rant on CNN last Sunday saying Fox wasn’t a real news network and was more a wing of the Republican Party. Press Secretary Robert Gibbs...

Mike Keefe, The Denver Post This cartoon is copyrighted and licensed to appear on TMV. Unauthorized reproduction prohibited. All rights reserved.

Excellent piece from Steve Benen on what’s wrong with the way the mainstream media is framing the current war of words between Fox News and the White House:

In regard to Afghanistan, should Russians indulge in a little schadenfreude - a German word meaning taking pleasure in the pain of others – or should it help the United States out of its predicament. For Russia’s Kommersant newspaper, columnist Sergey Markedonov asks his readers: “Should we be happy over the misfortune of our ’sworn friend’ the U.S. – particularly against...

Continuing with our look at Obama’s Nobel Prize through a global prism, this article from Syria’s state-controlled Thawra Al Wada shares the rest of the world’s surprise with the award – but with a distinctly anti-Israel Syrian twist. For Thawra Al Wada, Khalaf Ali Al Moftah argues that Obama has time to earn the award, as long as he does a few things no American chief executive is ever...

by Walter and Rosemary Brasch One of the joys of Halloween is to dress in scary costumes and pretend to frighten others, who pretend to be frightened. But with less than two weeks until an evening of trick-or-treating, it’s possible there won’t be anything scarier than what’s already happened in the country. We are being told to fear the swine flu virus, and then learn that the vaccine, which...

I ran across an interesting article about AT&T and Google Voice. I received an invitation to use Google Voice, and I find it very useful. It rings several phones when my Google Voice phone number is called, allowing me to give that number to a select few whom I want to be able to contact me anywhere. The article covers a dispute between AT&T and Google, and in involves the FCC. Regulation of the phone...

Nate Beeler, The Washington Examiner This cartoon is copyrighted and authorized to appear on TMV. Unauthorized reproduction prohibited. All rights reserved.

David Fitzsimmons, The Arizona Star This cartoon is copyrighted and licensed to appear on TMV. Unauthorized reproduction prohibited. All rights reserved.

The White House must end its fight with Fox News now. Enough already. David Gergen, White House advisor to three former presidents, said it is “risky strategy.” I agree and add it’s stupid and unproductive. While Fox commentators may have succeeded in tweaking President Obama’s massive ego, retaliation from the Oval Office violates a very simple rule: You can’t win a fight when...

The knock on Barack Obama from the start was his unwillingness to go head to head–”mix it up a little,” as Maureen Dowd urged during the campaign. Now, after a Nobel Peace prize, he suddenly seems to be brawling with everybody, from the health insurance industry down to Fox News. “They’re filling the airwaves with deceptive and dishonest ads,” he said this weekend in counterattacking...

Some of Iran’s top military commanders were killed in a terrorist attack on Sunday, and according to this article from Iran’s state-controlled Kayhan newspaper, the regime holds the U.S. and Britain responsible. The Kayhan news item says in part: “A terrorist blew himself up at a meeting of tribal elders in southeastern Iran Sunday, martyring at least 31 people, including top commanders. The...

If you thought the “balloon boy” story would float away, think again. With the latest news that a key law enforcement official has now branded the nationally covered incident a hoax, it will be more in the news than ever. Scroll below to read our blog posts, but here’s a cross section videos showing of how some of the news organizations are covering the latest news. Sheriff Jim Alderden of...

The sheriff of Larimer County Colorado has just held a press conference in which he has confirmed that this was a hoax and a publicity stunt. The father did stage this, it turns out he was an actor in California before he moved to Colorado and this is part of a plot to promote a new TV show. There have been two former 911 calls to this location. The first was determined to be an accident when a child called...

It came as no surprise to me when I read a recent article “Saudi jailed for ‘bragging’ about sex”. You see, like an average man (or MCP) I, too, never lose an opportunity to brag…well, about everything!!! So, when I landed in Jeddah in the late-1970s to take up my journalistic assignment, my friends warned me to be very, very careful about two subjects — drinks and women...