Antibiotics Found to Have Helped Limit Anthrax Infections: “The widespread use of antibiotics in response to the October bioterrorist attacks spared at least nine people from being infected with inhalation anthrax, the deadliest form of the disease, according to a study released today.” New York Times

Beige Cosmos Produces Red Faces New York Times

The Anatomically Correct Oscar:

‘Two women’s groups, the Guerilla Girls and Alice Locas, have mounted a giant billboard in the heart of Hollywood depicting the “anatomically correct oscar” in the ungainly shape of a pudgy, middle-aged man.

“We decided it was time for a little realism in Hollywood,” they said in an statement yesterday.

“So we redesigned the old boy so he more closely resembles the white males who take him home each year.” ‘ Sydney Morning Herald

“John Rockwell, editor of The New York Times’ Sunday Arts & Leisure section for the past four years, steps down from the influential post today. He will move into the newly created position of senior cultural correspondent, writing cultural news stories and criticism.

Since it became public last December, the impending shift has caused widespread concern in the arts community, particularly because of the Times ‘ stated wish to further emphasize pop culture in the Arts & Leisure section. Under Rockwell’s guidance, it has developed into perhaps the country’s most prominent source of performing arts commentary, with coverage of everything from movies to music, from the mainstream to the fringe.” Andante

NPR Cultural Programming Put to Triage:

‘National Public Radio has begun an extensive review of its musical programming, and is considering overhauling or eliminating some of its venerable jazz and classical offerings.

A strategy paper written by NPR’s top programming executive says some of the network’s live performance and recorded music shows “may disappear,” although officials stress that nothing is final.’ Washington Post

The curse of coffee-table cinema

Movies are all about illusion, and the greatest illusion of them all is the illusion of quality. This is Miramax’s stock-in-trade. It takes stories that seem a bit classy – Captain Corelli’s Mandolin, Shakespeare in Love, Chocolat – and turns them into cultureless mush, affected little movies which are grand in their own way, and which win Oscars, but which are actually meritless escapades fine-tuned to dupe the public.

Miramax has given the world a host of cliches about European culture – naughty French priests, macho Greeks, hoity-toity Englishmen, zany Italians – and has reduced human complexity to a bunch of hopeless stereotypes bursting with sentiment. Yuck. I hate Miramax. It is the cinematic equivalent of coffee-table books and slim cuisine: full of big type and hidden sugars, but popular with those who want a taste of culture with a minimum of effort. Telegraph UK

The Last Days of Bamian’s Buddhas: “It took decades to build the magnificent stone Buddhas of Bamian. It took the Taliban nearly a month to obliterate them.

The destruction required an extraordinary effort, so complex that foreign explosives experts had to be brought in and local residents were forced to dangle on ropes over a cliff face to chip out holes for explosives. According to witnesses and participants, the Taliban struggled with ropes and pulleys, rockets, iron rods, jackhammers, artillery and tanks before a series of massive explosions finally toppled the statues.” LA Times

Bush Zigzags After Choice Loses in California Primary Making it much more likely that the governorship of the state, with one of eight American voters, will remain Democratic, this not only compromises Bush’s chances to take the state in 2004, but damages him for having “picked the wrong candidate.” Grey Davis, in a sense, engineered it:

In a highly unusual move, Mr. Davis essentially picked his own opponent by spending as much as $10 million on television commercials — about as much as Mr. Simon and Mr. Riordan combined spent — that depicted Mr. Riordan as a flake who shifted his positions on abortion and the death penalty. Some strategists said it was as if Mr. Davis won both primaries, his own, with token opposition, and the Republican contest.

Although the advertising barrage deeply wounded Mr. Riordan, he did not help himself by being impetuous on the stump and by focusing just on Mr. Davis and neglecting conservatives who are crucial to winning Republican primaries here. NY Times.

Michael Moore’s Rockstar Moment: The kerfluffle over HarperCollins’ threat not to publish Michael Moore’s Stupid White Men after the “political climate change” caused by 9-11 has given legs to the book it otherwise might not have had, making HarperCollins a bundle in the process. Moore, perhaps guilty about being in bed with Rupert Murdoch in the first place, isn’t going to go easy on his publisher, whom he accuses of lackluster promotion of the book. AlterNet

Fortune Telling: Democratic Presidential primary candidates will be the major losers in campaign finance reform “soft money” restrictions; the winner will exit the primary campaign, expected to be hotly contested, underfunded and set to take a beating from Dubya, who is not expected to have any serious challengers in the primaries to drain his coffers. The New Republic

Archaeologists believe they have uncovered the origins of monotheism at the ruins of a 3,600-year-old temple in a remote corner of Jordan. The Daily Star

Gifted few make order out of chaos: Chaotic patterns are nonrandom but disordered, yet some people appear to have a gift for predicting the next elements in a chaotic series, a new study by an Australian psychologist demonstrates. No one has any idea how they do it… [Did William Gibson write this story? –FmH] New Scientist

“Maybe the only lesson that is applicable is: whenever you use local forces, they have local agendas…” How Osama bin Laden got away: “In retrospect, it becomes clear that the battle’s underlying story is of how scant intelligence, poorly chosen allies, and dubious military tactics fumbled a golden opportunity to capture bin Laden as well as many senior Al Qaeda commanders.” CS Monitor

“Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer said the software giant would have to withdraw the Windows operating system from the market if a federal court approves sanctions being sought by nine of the states in the antitrust case, according to depositions released Monday.” ZDNet News

From Lloyd Grove’s Reliable Source column in the Washington Post yesterday: ‘Here’s a vignette we’re dying to see on the ABC broadcast of Sunday’s Ford’s Theatre Presidential Gala: When Stevie Wonder sat down at the keyboard center stage, President Bush in the front row got very excited. He smiled and started waving at Wonder, who understandably did not respond. After a moment Bush realized his mistake and slowly dropped the errant hand back to his lap. “I know I shouldn’t have,” a witness told us yesterday, “but I started laughing.” ‘ [thanks again, Adam!]