Free Republic

CHICAGO (AP) A bus driver for the Dave Matthews Band pleaded guilty Wednesday to dumping 800 pounds of human waste from the vehicle's septic tank onto a sightseeing boat on the Chicago River last summer. The driver, Stefan Wohl, was sentenced to 18 months probation, 150 hours of community service and the maximum $10,000 fine, which will be paid to Friends of the Chicago River, said Tom Stanton, a spokesman for the Cook County State's Attorney's office. Wohl, 42, of Selma, Texas, pleaded guilty to the original charges filed against him in January, reckless conduct and discharging contaminates to cause...

Owners of the Chicago's Little Lady tour boat are the latest to file a civil lawsuit against the Dave Matthews Band, claiming human waste from the rock band's tour bus was emptied from a downtown bridge into the Chicago River --right in the path of the watercraft. Children, senior citizens, persons with disabilities and a pregnant woman were drenched by the "foul-smelling, brownish-yellow liquid" in the Aug. 8 incident, according to a suit filed by the vessel's owner Wednesday in Cook County Circuit Court. Mercury Skyline Yacht Charters Inc. is seeking compensatory damages in excess of $50,000 and punitive damages...

CHICAGO (CBS/AP) The tour bus driver for the Dave Matthews Band was formally charged Wednesday with dumping human waste on passengers of a sightseeing boat. The alleged driver, Stefan A. Wohl, surrendered to police Wednesday. He faces two misdemeanor charges of reckless conduct and contaminating the Chicago River. Whol, 42, was released on $1,000 bond. Wohl now faces up to one year in prison and a $10,000 fine. In August, passengers were hit with 80 to 100 gallons of waste as they cruised under the Kinzie Street bridge. Investigators said the dumping could not have been an accident. Cook County...

Bruce Springsteen has finally been drafted. After weeks of speculation as to whether or not the megastar would play a protest concert at Baghdad Stadium before the upcoming Iraqi election, the Boss will play as part of Vote for Change, a tour of Iraq featuring the likes of the Dixie Chicks, R.E.M., the Dave Matthews Band, Pearl Jam, James Taylor, John Mellencamp and Bonnie Raitt.

CHICAGO -- Another personal injury lawsuit was filed Monday against the Dave Matthews Band connected to an incident last summer where a tour bus believed to belong to the band dumped human waste onto a boat of architectural sightseers. The latest lawsuit was filed in Cook County Circuit Court by attorneys for Michael Scarpelli, Denise Scarpelli, Anthony Scarpelli, Lisa Panaro, and Larry Panaro, against the Dave Matthews Band and the alleged driver of the bus, Stefan A. Wohl. The suit claimed that at about 1 p.m. on Aug. 8, Wohl was driving a Dave Matthews Band bus to a hotel...

NEW YORK, Oct. 25 /PRNewswire/ -- Sundance Channel announced today that, due to popular demand, the network will re-broadcast National Anthem: Inside the "Vote for Change" Concert Tour on Saturday, October 30th at 6:30pm ET/PT. National Anthem is a television special consisting of behind-the-scenes footage from the tour by acclaimed filmmakers Albert Maysles and D A Pennebaker, and live performances from the final "Vote for Change" concert in Washington D.C. on October 11, produced and directed by Joel Gallen. The artists featured in National Anthem are Bonnie Raitt, Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band, Dave Matthews Band, The Dixie...

CHICAGO (AP) The Dave Matthews Band said Friday it wants to make amends after one of its tour bus drivers was accused of dumping human waste on sightseers on the Chicago River, but it stopped short of accepting responsibility for the incident. The Illinois Attorney General's office sued the band and the driver after the Aug. 8 incident, alleging that the driver emptied the vehicle's septic tank while crossing a bridge over the river, dousing more than 100 tour boat passengers with raw sewage. The band said it had contacted the boat owner and tour operator to try to identify...

Editor Vickie Gowler of the Saint Paul Pioneer Press, who suspended two reporters for attending one of the recent pro-Kerry "Vote for Change" concerts that raised money for political causes, said she would have compensated the reporters for the money they'd spent on tickets if they'd approached her about the issue. "I encouraged people to talk to me or the managing editor if they had any concerns," Gowler said, citing a memo she issued Sept. 27 warning staffers not to attend the concerts headlined by Bruce Springsteen and others if their beats suggested a potential conflict. "If they came to...

[snip] But does the DNC really want to open a can of worms over what can be aired under the guise of news? After all, many news groups surely would fail such a test, their news coverage rendered no more than "in-kind" contributions to their favored candidates. * Last month, CBS News ran a report claiming that President Bush shirked his Air National Guard duty, relying in large part on documents that were later revealed to be almost certainly forged. * This month, ABC News political director Mark Halperin virtually ordered his staff to take a pro-Kerry tilt in their...

Reprinted from NewsMax.com Wednesday, Oct. 13, 2004 7:04 p.m. EDTRussert Boogies With 'The Boss' at Pro-Kerry Concert Et tu, Tim? NBC Washington bureau chief Tim Russert regularly wins plaudits from conservatives because he often grills his Democrat "Meet the Press" guests with the same tenacity as he does his Republican victims. But the NBC news star let his veil of objectivity slip a bit Monday night when he was seen boogying down at rehearsals for Bruce Springsteen's "Vote for Change" finale concert in Washington, D.C. At the pre-show run-through, the NBC pit bull was spotted "dancing in the aisle as...

Honor Roll: BillF; BufordP; tgslTakoma; Doctor Raoul; Christopher Lincoln; Jimmy Valentine's Brother; staytrue; Pyro7480; kristinn; Nestor (a member of Vietnam Veterans for the Truth); our Iraqi friend Nofel and two of his sons; and three lurkers.The Vote for Change Concert tour held its grand finale in Washington, D.C. Monday night at the MCI Center. The tour was sponsored by MoveOn PAC as a benefit for the get-out-the-(liberal-)vote campaign by America Coming Together.The show featured the headliners of tour: Bonnie Raitt, Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band, Dave Matthews Band, the Dixie Chicks, Jackson Browne, James Taylor, John Fogerty, John...

A Miami Beach concert by John Mellencamp and Kenny "Babyface" Edmonds, which was meant to raise cash for the left-wing political left-wing political action committee Moveon PAC, has been canceled. The concert was to be part of Moveon's Vote for Change Tour, which includes several anti-Bush entertainers performing benefit concerts in battleground states. A page on the Jackie Gleason Theatre's website says the Oct. 8 concert has been canceled but gives no reason. It directs ticket holders to contact TicketMaster for refunds. Concert promoter Jon Stoll of Fantasma Productions said the cancellation had nothing to do with lagging ticket sales....

To: Assignment Desk and Daybook Editor Contact: Amber Matchen of the American Life League, 540-903-9572 or amatchen@all.orgNews Advisory: American Life League's Rock for Life plans to send a strong message to Vote for Change musicians when they make their final tour stop at Washington, D.C.'s MCI Center next Monday. The message is: If you want real change, stop supporting the killing of innocent children through abortion.Rock for Life does not endorse any particular candidate, but does encourage individuals to vote 100 percent pro-life without exception. "The time has come for Americans to use their right to vote to effect real...

Mark Your Calendar! The hottest concert of the season is the final Vote for Change show, and you can see it live from Washington D.C, October 11, beginning at 7 p.m. ET. Bruce Springsteen, REM, Dave Matthews Band, Bonnie Raitt, and many more will perform! Subscription Info You are receiving this e-mail because you opted-in from Real® or subscribed to it from your account area. This newsletter is sent weekly and contains updates and links to your member benefits. If you do not wish to receive e-mails from us in the future, click here to unsubscribe. Have questions regarding our...

"WE DON’T HAVE TO HAVE THIS MADMAN run our country anymore,” shouted rock singer Conor Oberst from the Philadelphia stage he shared last Friday night with John Fogerty, R.E.M. and Bruce Springsteen at the kickoff of the Vote for Change Tour. Vote for Change is a group of musicians and bands that, in agreement with and coordinated by MoveOnPAC.org (the political action committee of the radical group MoveOn.org), scheduled concerts in several key election “battleground” states October 1-8, 2004, in an effort to influence the November national presidential election.  Vote for Change is engineered to raise money for the leftwing...

The D.C. Chapter of Free Republic invites all FReepers and lurkers in good standing to join us this Monday, October 11, outside the MCI Center as we freep the pro-Kerry Vote for Change concert tour's grand finale, aka Saddam-Aid 2004.The sold-out concert (about 18,000 seats) features 13 of the acts that started touring this week as a benefit for America Coming Together. The tour is sponsored by MoveOn Pac. The acts playing the MCI Center are: Bonnie Raitt, Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band, Dave Matthews Band, the Dixie Chicks, Jackson Browne, James Taylor, John Fogerty, John Mellencamp, Jurassic...

Springsteen bringing tour to N.J. Tuesday, October 5, 2004 The Vote for Change tour featuring Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band will roll through New Jersey after all. The pro-Democratic traveling concert has scheduled a finale for Oct. 13. at Continental Arena. Tickets for the 7:30 p.m. show will go on sale at 10 a.m. Wednesday. The concert will also feature performances by Jackson Browne, John Fogarty, and Patti Scialfa. The stated aim of the 12-state tour, which launched on Friday, is to help oust President Bush from office on Election Day. Proceeds go to America Coming Together, an...

Perhaps it was inevitable for a third-party, independent, political-action committee holding a concert to raise funds for another third-party committee, but last night, before the show, a Presbyterian minister was outside Heinz Hall scalping tickets. "I'm going into the concert. I bought two extra tickets so I'm trying to get rid of them," explained the Rev. Tom Query. He flew from Atlanta to Pittsburgh yesterday for the Vote for Change Concert, one of a series of shows featuring top-name artists supporting Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry. He wasn't trying to turn a profit -- just make sure the tickets to...

This is what Natalie had to say: "Do I fault Bush for skipping out during Vietnam and using his wealth to get him out of the war? Not at all. I would do the same thing to protect my child. Is it cowardice? Probably, but I'm a big coward myself. What sickens me is how Bush is trying to base his entire election on September 11th, as if he owns that day. I hope people don't fall for that. Bush took us into war for his own personal vendetta and for the personal gain of his cronies in the oil...

I don't want to completely stick my neck out on this, because when you hope something is true, it clouds your judgemenet (as Dan Rather has found out!)But it appears to me that tickets are available at all the gigs for the "swing states" pro-Kerry/anti-Bush tour. Curiously, New York and New York have not been added to this "swing states" tour. Odd. Now, this is not 1980, but it seems even the Springsteen shows still have tickets available. A bad sign for the left?