Recapping part of the weekend

Lorne Michaels made his way to Chicago recently. He was personally scouting the troupe at Second City and some of the long-form improvisational teams. Does this mean some cast members and writers will leave the show during the summer? Maybe, as SNL needs some funny back.

No less than Lorne Michaels, creator and executive producer of the NBC show, has been in town this week checking out the talent. It's a rare visit for the SNL top dog, who usually sends underlings on the scouting missions.

On Wednesday, Michaels saw a Second City troupe and a selection of teams at ImprovOlympic. Return visits were scheduled for Thursday. It's likely some players will be called to New York to try out for acting and writing jobs.[...]

And it may be time to move on for several veteran cast members, among them Chris Parnell and Horatio Sanz (seven seasons each) and Darrell Hammond (who just completed his 10th season, an all-time show record).

For his part, Michaels told GLARE he expects to make changes during the summer hiatus, but "no more than usual."

What makes this town such a great source of talent for "SNL"? He pondered a bit before deciding he couldn't do the question justice: "It's too long an answer."

Georgetown is the second city in the state to ban smoking indoors. The city joins Lexington, KY. I hope Louisville is next.

Georgetown's ban, which also applies to outdoor arenas and stadiums, is stricter than the Lexington law. The ban will take effect Oct. 1.

Georgetown Mayor Everette Varney, who had opposed a ban in the past, cast the tie-breaking vote for it, saying, "I've got an obligation to my grandkids" to do so.

Thank you, Mayor Varney. Even is tobacco is a major cash crop, I cannot tolerate the smell at all.

Tracy Morgan likes being an acquired taste. I enjoyed his years on SNL and I almost saw him during spring break.

Like his characters, Morgan can be a little over the top, too. He's friendly, but loud and crude when the mood strikes him. And he's not lacking in confidence. When asked if he sees himself living bicoastal with his wife and three kids as a star of stage and screen, Morgan's voice rises. Of course he does.

"It's a vision, it's like Brian Fellow was a vision that I had," he says. "It's Noah when he was building the ark, baby, he had a vision."

Part of that vision comes from people-watching in his native New York, where Morgan has been known to take the mannerisms of friends and even strangers and turn them into characters. Brian Fellow was a family friend. Spoonie Luv, the character he voices on Comedy Central's Crank Yankers, was a high school football teammate.

"Sometimes you can go outside and find some stuff," he says. "As long as you walk slow and drink a lot of water, you won't miss anything. And that's the type of person I am -- I don't like to miss anything. I love details."

Translating his vision from Saturday Night Live to film and prime-time television hasn't been a totally smooth ride. In late 2003, Morgan got his shot at a network sitcom, The Tracy Morgan Show, which died, after constant tinkering, before it reached a second season.

"I don't think we got a fair shot, but I think that we came around at a time when reality TV was at its height," he says. "I just don't think that we were able to compete with that."

Morgan knows he's something of an acquired taste, and he doesn't see himself compromising to make himself more accessible.

"Just keep doing what you do, they're either going to love you or hate you," he says. "There's no in-between with me. Either you love me or you hate me."

On to sports news from Friday...Cardinal player Al Reyes and Coach Hal McRae used to be on the Tampa Bay team that they play over the weekend. The Red Sox take on Pittsburgh. The Sox have over 175 sellouts now. It is the 3rd longest streak and I expect they will break the 455 sellouts that Cleveland had from 1995 to 2001. The Sox topped 1 million in attendence this season.

Is Bayh testing the waters? I say he might be. As far as I know, no decision has been made.

Politician works the bathroom. Any politician that plans to do that would probably end up on The Daily Show.

Dan Aykroyd signs on to host Live 8 concert in Canada. London is the place to be on July 2 this summer. I hope they put the concert out on DVD. I'd buy it in a heartbeat.

Time-Life releases some exclusive DVD's that NBC refuses to do so. If I'm wrong on the latter, I'll post something about that as soon as I get it confirmed. Another DVD to get would be Paul McCartney in Red Square.

Iowa Governor Tom Vilsack gives felons the right to vote.

The governor's order, which he plans to sign on July 4, will make an estimated 80,000 ex-felons eligible to vote. Advocates hope that the order, which comes after a similar restoration of voting rights in Nebraska, will encourage other states with similarly restrictive laws to broaden voting privileges for ex-felons.

Nationally, about 4.7 million people are ineligible to vote because of felony convictions, about 500,000 of them war veterans, according to the Sentencing Project, a nonprofit organization that promotes alternatives to incarceration. About 1.4 million are black men.

I hope this works out for the better.

Karen Linn's campaign for Kenton Circuit Clerk is looking for volunteers. Some events are for parades or cookouts.

Uh, oh. Jim Edmonds got an MRI exam and he has a small non-displaced hairline fracture in his middle rib. He's day to day and he's on my fantasy baseball team. Crap! Tony LaRussa should tie Bucky Harris for 4th all-time in managerial wins tonight with his 2,157th win. Tony is a Tampa native. He went to Jefferson High School before graduating from University of South Florida with a degree in industrial management.

The Red Sox have a 5 game winning streak.

The following article was reported in the Washington Post and was not anywhere to be seen in the New York Times:

The session took an awkward turn when witness Ray McGovern, a former intelligence analyst, declared that the United States went to war in Iraq for oil, Israel and military bases craved by administration "neocons" so "the United States and Israel could dominate that part of the world." He said that Israel should not be considered an ally and that Bush was doing the bidding of Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon.

"Israel is not allowed to be brought up in polite conversation," McGovern said. 'The last time I did this, the previous director of Central Intelligence called me anti-Semitic."

Rep. James P. Moran Jr. (D-Va.), who prompted the question by wondering whether the true war motive was Iraq's threat to Israel, thanked McGovern for his "candid answer."

At Democratic headquarters, where an overflow crowd watched the hearing on television, activists handed out documents repeating two accusations -- that an Israeli company had warning of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks and that there was an "insider trading scam" on 9/11 -- that previously has been used to suggest Israel was behind the attacks.

The event organizer, Democrats.com, distributed stickers saying "Bush lied/100,000 people died." One man's T-shirt proclaimed, "Whether you like Bush or not, he's still an incompetent liar," while a large poster of Uncle Sam announced: "Got kids? I want yours for cannon fodder."

This is not what I need to read. Israel was NOT the reason we went to Iraq! If I hear that one more frickin' time, I will not be happy and might switch parties. I don't want to but there's that rising faction in the Democratic party that is anti-Semitic (which includes anti-Zionists. Read Why the Left Hates Israel. 30 Members of Congress were at the hearing held by John Conyers. Jewish members of Congress were there and they included Massachusetts Congressman Barney Frank, New York Congressman Jerry Nadler, New York Congresswoman Nita Lowey, and Illinois Congresswoman Jan Schakowski, etc.

According to the American Thinker, Barney Frank was out of the room when the mess occured. Howard Dean denounced the hate literature that was being distributed.