Free Republic

The one-time owners of Penthouse magazine cooked the books and defrauded investors by falsely booking up to $1 million in phantom revenue in 2003, according to charges leveled yesterday by federal regulators. The Securities and Exchange Commission also charged that executives at the company illegally used an electronic signature of Bob Guccione Sr., the magazine's legendary founder, on government filings that he never saw. "The inclusion of the $1 million payment under the agreement increased Penthouse's reported revenue by approximately 9 percent from $11,072,000 to $12,072,000 and changed a quarterly net loss of $167,000 to a purported net profit of...

The Justice Department yesterday lost the first major test of obscenity laws in at least a decade when a federal judge in Pittsburgh threw out an indictment of Extreme Associates, which sells films of women being gang-raped, defecated on and having their throats slit. U.S. District Judge Gary Lancaster dismissed charges of distribution of obscene materials brought here last year against the California company and its owners, Robert Zicari, 31, and his wife, Janet Romano, 27. In a 45-page opinion, the judge said the federal obscenity statutes as applied in the case violate constitutional protections of liberty and privacy.

New York Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-NY) has long been rumored as desperately seeking the democratic nomination for president in 2008. And while many political observers fully expect the power hungry former First Lady to hit the campaign trail within only a few months of being re-elected as a US Senator in 2006, US News & World report claims to have a confirmation of sorts. From USNews.Com's Washington Whispers: Hillary's in… You don't have to take it from us about Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton 's desire to run for president. Her brothers, Hugh and Tony Rodham, say it's true. Friends...

A radio station indefinitely suspended a talk-show host after he used an obscenity on the air while criticizing state lawmakers. Michael McGee's "Word Warriors" show was canceled because the expletive may have violated federal broadcast law, Jerrel Jones, owner of WNOV-AM, said Friday. McGee uttered the word Thursday as he criticized state lawmakers' handling of a social service agency that has come under fire over how it has used money from the state's welfare-to-work program. A recent state audit showed the Opportunities Industrialization Center of Greater Milwaukee paid McGee $176,000 from the program to sponsor his show from 1997 to...

The BBC is to screen the most expletive-strewn programme in TV history. More than 8,000 obscenities will be broadcast when BBC2 shows a screen version of the musical Jerry Springer The Opera in January. The figure dwarfs the previous swearing record of 246 when Channel 4 aired the film Reservoir Dogs last year. Even foul-mouthed chef Gordon Ramsay pales in comparison — with 111 swear words in a single episode of his Channel 4 show Ramsay's Kitchen Nightmares. Jerry Springer The Opera also risks offending religious groups because it contains blasphemous scenes. The show has caused controversy since it opened...

The state Legislature has sent to the governor an Internet pornography bill.... The anti-pornography bill sponsored by former Rep. Allan Egolf, R-86, would withhold a portion of state funding from public schools or libraries that do not adopt policies to prevent students and employees from sending, receiving, viewing or downloading visual depictions of obscenity, child pornography or material harmful to minors, Egolf says in a written statement. Under the proposed law, library boards would be responsible for implementing and enforcing their policies with the use of access-blocking software, Egolf says. The bill passed the House in June by a vote...

Obscenity is not encompassed within the phrases "freedom of speech" or "freedom of the press." There is no constitutional protection for obscenity, federal or state. Since this is so, Congress and the state legislative bodies may adopt laws to proscribe and punish those who manufacture, distribute, exhibit, or advertise obscene materials. Since no inroads are made by such legislation on protected speech, it is not necessary to look for a "clear and present danger"; nor even is it required to find a "compelling" or "substantial" federal or state interest to justify such laws. Unless the one challenging such laws can...

LOS ANGELES, Aug. 23 - A member of the California Assembly has warned the pornographic-film industry, already buffeted by an H.I.V. outbreak earlier this year, that unless actors wear condoms while they work he will write a law requiring it. The warning, from Paul Koretz, a Democrat who represents West Hollywood and parts of Los Angeles and Beverly Hills, came in a letter last week to 185 producers and publishers of pornographic material, advising sex performers to adopt "harm-reduction procedures" like using condoms or face the chance that the Legislature will "exercise its authority to mandate more stringent actions." While...

ATHENS, Greece - Women's road cycling silver medalist Judith Arndt won't be suspended for making an obscene gesture as she crossed the finish line, the leader of the German Olympic delegation said Monday. Arndt directed the gesture at German cycling officials on Sunday, upset because they didn't put her close friend Petra Rossner on the Olympic team. Australia's Sara Carrigan won the gold in Sunday's race, passing Arndt in the final 200 meters for the win. Arndt was fined $162 by the International Cycling Union — the only sanction she'll face, German delegation leader Klaus Steinbach said. "We cannot accept...

http://www.thetowntalk.com/html/CF1C7CFE-CB7C-4475-99A1-55DBA91020C7.shtml

MIAMI — A couple returning home from a Costa Rican vacation was ejected from an American Airlines flight because the man was wearing a T-shirt depicting a bare breast. Oscar Arela and his girlfriend, Tala Tow, were removed from Flight 952 on Saturday after he refused to change the shirt or turn it inside out at Miami International Airport. The flight left 90 minutes late without them. The couple, making a connecting flight from Costa Rica, said nobody on the earlier flight objected to the shirt and claimed the airline violated their constitutional right to free speech. "It's a picture...

DALLAS (Reuters) - A Texas woman charged with violating obscenity laws for selling a sexual toy and explaining to her customer how to use it has had the case against her dismissed, court officials said on Monday. Joanne Webb, a mother of three and a former schoolteacher in the town of Burleson near Forth Worth, was facing up to a year in jail after she sold a vibrator at a private party to two undercover police officers posing as a married couple. The case received national attention because it touched off a debate on whether a person should be jailed...

Slim-Fast Sheds Whoopi Goldberg After Bush Riff NEW YORK (Reuters) - Comedian Whoopi Goldberg will no longer appear in ads for diet aid maker Slim-Fast following her lewd riff on President Bush's name at a fund-raiser last week, the company said on Wednesday. Florida-based Slim-Fast said it was "disappointed" in Goldberg's remarks at last Thursday's $7.5 million star-studded fund-raiser at Radio City Music Hall in New York. "Ads featuring Ms. Goldberg will no longer be on the air," Slim-Fast General Manager Terry Olson said in a statement, adding that the company regrets that Goldberg's remarks offended some customers. Republicans have...

slim-fast.com as of Monday July 12, 2004 slim-fast.com as of Wednesday morning July 14, 2004

Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., urged the Kerry-Edwards campaign on Sunday to release a controversial videotape of their Thursday night fund-raiser at Radio City Music Hall, where foul-mouthed comedienne Whoopi Goldberg compared President Bush to female genitalia. "I want the tape from New York," Graham told ABC's "This Week" host George Stephanopoulos. "I want to see the standing ovation they got in New York." Stephanopoulos, who hadn't planned to discuss the subject, asked the South Carolina Republican to explain. "There was this hatefest in New York, where people who don't mind being called liberal got up and ran President Bush into...

Something to Yak About – Obscenity Laced Celebrity Hate Fest Reflects Kerry-Edwards Values A lot of papers carried an item Friday about the star-studded fundraiser in New York City, fawning over the Hollywood Big Shots who helped John Kerry raise $7.5 million. What many of those reports glossed over was the “X-rated rant,” of Whoopi Goldberg while Kerry could be seen, “laughing uproariously during part of Goldberg's tirade.” John Kerry’s response to the invective laden hate mongering? "Every performer tonight ... conveyed to you the heart and soul of our country.” John-John Shows Less Sense Than Dean We’ve already seen...

Some CBS Affils Could Drop Newscasts By John Eggerton -- Broadcasting & Cable, 5/5/2004 11:55:00 AM CBS affiliates are telling the Federal Communications Commission that unless it changes its ruling about profanities on-air, many will have to stop doing news outside of the 10 p.m.-6 a.m. safe harbor for indecent speech. Noncommercial stations, meanwhile, argued that the decision has caused them to significantly self-censor for the first time. The CBS stations move would mean an end to many morning, afternoon and newscasts, which are ironically just the sort of local service the FCC otherwise encourages. "Live newsgathering outside of the...

Ohio Couple Indicted On Obscenity Charges The indictment alleges that since 1990, the defendants have operated a catalog business that offers for sale hundreds of videotapes and DVDs depicting obscene matter, including sexually explicit conduct involving sado-masochism, defecation, urination and bestiality. The defendants are also alleged to have distributed these obscene matters using the United States mail. WASHINGTON, D.C. - Assistant Attorney General Christopher A. Wray of the Criminal Division, U.S. Attorney Gregory A. White of the Northern District of Ohio, and Robin Dalgleish, Inspector in Charge, Pittsburgh Division, U.S. Postal Inspection Service, announced today that a federal grand...

Only a quarter of the radio stations contacted by the New York Post say they're willing to go to the mat to continue broadcasting Howard Stern's radio show. Seventeen stations, representing just under half of Stern's 35 national affiliates, were surveyed by the Post's John Mainelli late last week, after steep FCC fines prompted Stern's syndicator, Clear Channel, to drop him from the roster of six of their outlets. "Only four station managers expressed unabashed support [for Stern]," reports Mainelli. "Another is on the fence, and 12 more avoided all comment." He calls the result of his thumbnail survey a...

National Coalition Comments on Justice Department's Crackdown on Obscenity 4/7/2004 6:29:00 PM -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- To: National Desk Contact: Maryam Kubasek of the National Coalition for the Protection of Children & Families, 513-521-6227, ext. 111 or 513-515-7700 (cell) CINCINNATI, Ohio., April 7 /U.S. Newswire/ -- The following is a statement by Dan Panetti, vice president for legal and public policy of the National Coalition for the Protection of Children & Families: "The news is abuzz with the continual crackdown from the Department of Justice on the issue of obscenity. Not only has the DOJ brought in Bruce Taylor, formerly with the...

WASHINGTON - Broadcasters meeting Wednesday to discuss indecency said they would consider an industry code of conduct, an idea the nation's chief telecommunications regulator suggested they should pursue. Federal Communications Commission (news - web sites) Chairman Michael Powell (news) said if the industry leaves it to the government to set strict standards for broadcast decency, they won't like the result. "You do not want to ask the government to write a `Red Book' of dos and don'ts," Powell told the gathering organized by the National Association of Broadcasters. "I understand the complaint about knowing where the line is, but heavier...

WASHINGTON -- Lam Nguyen's job is to sit for hours in a chilly, quiet room devoid of any color but gray and look at pornography. This job, which Nguyen does earnestly from 9 to 5, surrounded by a half-dozen other "computer forensic specialists" like him, has become the focal point of the Justice Department's operation to rid the world of porn. In this field office in Washington, 32 prosecutors, investigators and a handful of FBI agents are spending millions of dollars to bring anti-obscenity cases to courthouses across the country for the first time in 10 years. Nothing is off...

"You've got to vote Bush out to send a message as a Howard Stern fan," he tells his listeners. Republicans have dismissed Mr. Stern's recent political tirades, deeming his Bush bashing as inconsequential as the flatulence jokes that precede it. But media experts caution against underestimating the self-proclaimed "King of All Media." Talk radio heavyweights Rush Limbaugh and Sean Hannity are preaching to the converted, they said. Mr. Stern has 8.5 million potential swing voters tuned in, and his loyal listeners have shown a willingness to do stunts far more outlandish than going to the polls at the shock jock's...

LOS ANGELES - George Carlin (news) famously dissected "The Seven Words You Can't Say on Television" as a way to explore what everyone was so uptight about. Thirty-two years later the same debate is still raging, now fueled by Janet Jackson (news)'s Super Bowl flash, the suspension of Howard Stern's raunchy radio show from six stations and new House legislation that would raise a performer's indecency fine from $11,000 to $500,000. So what does the 66-year-old Carlin think of the current handwringing over what is indecent, profane, obscene, immoral, lewd or insulting? "More of the same, more of the same....

Life (and TV) after Janet. The good news is that there is public pressure to maintain standards of some sort in public scenes and over the airwaves. On Thursday, the House even passed the Broadcast Decency Enforcement Act, which would fine offenders impressive sums of money. The trouble has to do with the difficulty in defining objectionable, though you feel this in your groin. The Janet Jackson display at the Super Bowl crossed the threshold and awakened some latent sense of decorum. The public sense of it was that to bare a breast as part of the half-time entertainment at...

US radio star fired for obscenity The segment was broadcast twice on California radio station KCRW A US radio commentator has lost her job after using a four-letter word on Los Angeles station KCRW-FM. Author and actress Sandra Tsing Loh said the obscenity was the result of an editing error in a recorded segment - but the station said it was deliberate. The profanity occurred during a report on a Bette Midler concert, in which Loh's musician husband played guitar. KCRW-FM general manager Ruth Seymour likened the incident to Janet Jackson's breast-baring Super Bowl performance. "It is the equivalent of...

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------- For Monday, February 16, 2004 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Archives: Mon.2.16.2004 Fri.2.13.2004 Wed.2.11.2004 Mon.2.9.2004 Fri.2.6.2004 Wed.2.4.2004 Mon.2.2.2004 Fri.1.30.2004 Wed.1.28.2004 Mon.1.26.2004 Fri.1.23.2004 Wed.1.21.2004 Mon.1.19.2004 Bad Courts Years ago, when the U.S. Supreme Court in effect legalized pornography, I predicted that the decision would result in the corruption of the whole culture. And so it has. The reasoning is obvious. If pornography is legal, then everything short of pornography is also legal. As I wrote at the time, the problem would not be the porno shop in a sleazy part of town. The problem would be the profanity and vulgarity that would find its...

DALLAS (Reuters) - Joanne Webb is a mother of three, a Baptist, a booster of the town of Burleson, Texas, and a former schoolteacher. She also faces trial for being a smut merchant. Webb, 43, was arrested in November by two undercover police officers for selling sexual toys and charged with violating Texas obscenity laws. She could face up to a year in jail and a fine of $4,000 if convicted. Webb is a representative for Passion Parties, a California company marketing potions, lotions and sexual toys sold at gatherings that mimic Tupperware parties. Women over 18 meet in a...

Keeping Abreast of the Culture Wars Yes, the Super Bowl half-time show was unfit for children to watch and just plain insulting to the rest of us. Most of the commercials made the humor from the movie Wayne’s World seem positively high-brow--old people being tripped, women being burned from torched horse flatulence, a monkey hitting on a woman. But network television didn’t just fall into the sink hole overnight. This cultural slide has been happening for decades and for decades those who were trying to raise public awareness about it were branded a bunch of unhip philistines, throwbacks to the...

Not all equal This is obscenity in its most vomitive form. In Tennessee, school districts in Nashville have stopped releasing their honor rolls. Some are looking at ending the practice of hanging the best of student work in hallways. Spelling bees? Doomed, most likely. This is how the All Children Left Behind initiative begins. Parents of students at some Nashville schools complained that their children might be ridiculed for not making the honors list. School attorneys extrapolated the rest -- some students' work in the halls, but not others, might create downtrodden students. This gets worse. Unbelievably, it gets worse....

Terrorism Notebook Brazil fines U.S. pilot after gestureSAO PAULO, Brazil; An American Airlines pilot was fined nearly $13,000 yesterday for making an obscene gesture when being photographed at the airport as part of entry requirements for U.S. citizens, officials said. Brazil imposed the new rules that Americans be fingerprinted and photographed at entry points in response to similar rules in the United States for citizens of Brazil and other countries who need visas to enter. The pilot, Dale Robin Hersh, lifted his middle finger while undergoing the new security process at Sao Paulo's Guarulhos International Airport, said Federal Prosecutor Matheus...

DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. -- A part-time priest was charged with making obscene phone calls to a 70-year-old Ormond Beach woman. Stanley Staniszewski, 60, who worked as a "helper" priest at several Catholic churches in the Diocese of Orlando, said he was unaware of any charges and that the calls were made as "a joke" and that he was "under the influence of medication." The woman, who requested her name not be released, said the Nov. 1 and 2 calls were enough to "scare the heck" out of her. Staniszewski said he still considered himself able to function as a priest....

Scores of elected officials in Congress are, in effect, calling the FCC on the carpet for its recent decision that use of the "f-word" over the public airwaves does not constitute indecency or obscenity. Representatives of the Federal Communication Commission met on Thursday with members of the House Committee on Energy and Commerce, which oversees the federal agency, to discuss that issue. By its own order, FCC commissioners concluded on October 3 that use of the expletive during the Golden Globe Awards on January 19, 2003, by U2 lead singer Bono did "not violate obscenity or indecency law." The agency...

Gutter-lyric rap star Ludacris has fired back at his cable news nemesis, Bill O'Reilly, for getting Pepsi to stop using him in their commercials last year - by apparently insulting the top talker in his latest musical endeavor, "Hoes in My Room." We say "apparently" because the song in question is so vulgarity-laden it's hard to tell what the gangsta rapper is trying to say. In a verse sung with that other poet of the streets, Snoop-Doggy-Dog, Ludacris waxes indelicately about several "hoes" who evidently appeared in his dressing room one day. "Now, these chicks wouldn't leave, they was...

NASHVILLE, Tenn. (BP)--A privately funded 40-foot-high bronze sculpture of five naked women and four naked men has been unveiled on public ground in Nashville, Tenn., and some are questioning why such "artwork" is acceptable while a display of the Ten Commandments is not. The $1.1 million sculpture, called "Musica" and placed in the center of a roundabout on Music Row in downtown Nashville, is meant by the sponsors to provide tourists with a sense of the different types of music that have emerged from Music City. But some observers note there is no obvious connection between naked sculptures and music,...

Passage of House Concurrent Resolution 298 Will Help Dispel False Notions about Obscenity, Obscenity Law Enforcement, Says Morality in Media 10/9/03 12:21:00 PM -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- To: National Desk Contact: Patrick McGrath of Morality in Media, 212-870-3217, mim@moralityinmedia.org, http://www.moralityinmedia.org NEW YORK, Oct. 9 /U.S. Newswire/ -- Robert W. Peters, president of Morality in Media, made the following statement in support of House Concurrent Resolution 298, introduced yesterday by Rep. John Sullivan (R-Okla.) and 36 co-sponsors, which "expresses the sense of Congress that Federal obscenity laws should be vigorously enforced throughout the United States": "Americans concerned about the proliferation of obscenity, especially...

President Bush was denounced as an 'evil f---' at a fundraiser this week for Democratic presidential candidate Sen. John Kerry. The event, held at Manhattan's Intrepid's Sea-Air-Space Museum Thursday night, featured a vulgarity laced performance by techno-rocker Moby, who invited Kerry onstage for a sing-along tribute to punk rock godfather Lou Reed. As the duo perfomed Reed's classic "Walk on the Wild Side," Kerry "froze," according to the New York Daily News, when Moby reached one particularly obscene portion of the song. Then, after the song ended, Moby denounced Bush to the crowd of Kerry-backers as "an evil f---," the...

(CNSNews.com) - Cultural conservatives are cheering the federal obscenity prosecution of a Los Angeles pornography distributor and two of its executives while pointing out that it is the first such indictment of an L.A.-based pornography firm in a decade. Most of the adult film industry is based in Los Angeles' San Fernando Valley. The 10-count indictment originates from a federal grand jury in Western Pennsylvania and names Extreme Associates, Inc., of North Hollywood, as well as the husband-and-wife team of Robert Zickari and Janet Romano of Northridge, Calif. Extreme Associates' website touts its content as the "Hardest Hardcore on the...

Keith Colvin, a good friend of mine, owns a local chain of comics shops. Not long ago, the City prosecutor here in Dallas convicted Keith's employee, Mr. Jesus Castillo, for selling a copy of the Japanese Demon Beast Invasion manga to an adult vice cop posing as a customer. [ Details of original arrest and subsequent legal process.] Yes, you read that right. Mr. Castillo was busted for selling an adults-only comic book to an adult. The City's rationale was that Keith's shop is located across the street from a public elementary school, and was therefore by its very presence...

A crude culture makes a coarse people, and private refinement cannot long survive public excess. There is a Gresham's law of culture as well as of money: the bad drives out the good, unless the good is defended. In no country has the process of vulgarization gone further than in Britain: in this , at least, we lead the world. A nation famed not so long ago for the restraint of its manners is now notorious for the coarseness of its appetites and its unbridled and antisocial attempts to satisfy them. The mass drunkenness seen on weekends in the center...

County Board members said Saturday they have neither the power nor the intention to stop a troupe called Puppetry of the Penis from performing at the county-operated Rosslyn Spectrum Theatre, despite complaints that the show’s content makes it inappropriate for a municipal venue. Practicing what troupe members call the “ancient art of genital origami,” Puppetry of the Penis is slated to perform at the Spectrum from July 22 to Aug. 17. Performers manipulate their private parts into everything from a hamburger to their signature effort, the Eiffel Tower. A few Arlingtonians are not amused. “We should not be pandering to...

COLUMBUS, Ohio July 17 — A state appeals court on Thursday dismissed the guilty plea of a man imprisoned for writing fictitious stories of child torture and molestation. Lawyers specializing in the First Amendment believe Brian Dalton was the first person in the United States successfully prosecuted for child pornography that involved fictional writings, not images. The 10th Ohio District Court of Appeals in Columbus ruled that Dalton received ineffective legal assistance. Dalton had argued that his former lawyer didn't inform him of the legal implications of a guilty plea or ask for an immediate dismissal on First Amendment grounds....

Nudity, Crassness, Perversion on Display as San Francisco Celebrates Legal Sodomy 7/2/2003 By Allyson Smith Anti-Catholic 'Sisters' group takes shot at Vice President Cheney SAN FRANCISCO—Homosexuals were jubilant—and some naked—Sunday, June 29, as they celebrated last week’s Supreme Court ruling overturning Texas’ sodomy law during this city’s 33rd annual “gay pride” parade. This writer witnessed no attempt by city police to arrest those who were publicly nude, and no attempts to urge revelers to cover their private parts. The San Francisco "gay" celebration occurred just two days after President George W. Bush visited the city on a campaign stop to...

American Rapper DMX Arrested for Using Profanity During St. Kitts ConcertBy Clive Baccus Associated Press WriterPublished: Jun 28, 2003 BASSETERRE, St. Kitts (AP) - Authorities arrested American rapper DMX on Saturday for using profanity during a concert the night before on the Caribbean island of St. Kitts and Nevis, police said. DMX, whose real name is Earl Simmons, was released on bail of $376 until Monday, when he is due in Basseterre Magistrate's Court. The 32-year-old rapper left the Caribbean island on Saturday afternoon, but he pledged to return for his court date. "I'll go to court on Monday,"...

CLINTON SEX ROMP CAUGHT ON VIDEO! CLINTON Bill Clinton has been caught on videotape cheating on Hillary -- and the steamy sex romp could torpedo her political career! Now foes of Hillary are in an all-out race to obtain the tape and publicize it, an exclusive ENQUIRER investigation has discovered. The issue that goes on sale Friday reveals how Clinton was taped having sex in a pickup truck with a department store clerk, how Hillary's opponents plan to use the video to sabotage her political plans … and more. Published on: May 30, 2003

New York Pressed to Pardon Lenny Bruce By LARRY McSHANE Associated Press Writer Here's a six-letter word rarely associated with the late comedian Lenny Bruce: Pardon. Supporters of Bruce, the foul-mouthed comic convicted of obscenity charges in 1964, have launched a campaign to win him a legal reprieve - 37 years after his tragic death. The goal is to "correct a grave injustice - the prosecution and persecution of comedian Lenny Bruce for nothing more than speaking his mind," said Ron Collins, co-author of "The Trials of Lenny Bruce: The Fall and Rise of an American Icon." The movement to...

.... Neither does the Rev. Grant Storms, a rock-ribbed Christian conservative known in certain sections of the Quarter for moral crusades, most notably for videotaping what he brands "orgies" in the streets during the 2002 Southern Decadence festival. In the past year, copies of his tape have made their way into the hands of local politicos and evangelical church leaders throughout the metro area. The tape struck a chord with state Rep. Danny Martiny, R-Kenner, who filed House Bill 1981, which would increase the penalty for public sex to a mandatory 10 days in jail. "I cannot conceive that anyone...

Down at the protest today, many lefties came by to try to shout us down. I noticed an abundance oif signs making reference to Sen. Wellstone. ("I'm Marching for Wellstone" was fairly typical.) Some even claimed that he was murdered. Less than 24 hours after the man's death, his "friends" were eagerly politicizing it. I find this extremely offensive. While Sen. Wellstone stood for everything we oppose, he was by all accounts an honorable man who does not deserve to have his name besmirched by this cheap, tasteless politicization. And did anyone notice the press conference after the DC sniper...

Come Back to the Five and Dime, Snoop Doggy Dogg: The Perils of Postmodernismby William Grim I was recently in the J.C. Penney's store at the Tuttle Creek Mall in Columbus, Ohio shopping for some trousers. Now, clothes shopping is one of those activities -- like root canals and remarriage -- that I try to avoid if at all possible. The "shopping experience" has become more miserable of late because American retailers seem to believe that no one will buy clothes except to the accompaniment of Eurotechno or rap music screeching out of speakers at something approaching the threshold of...