Happy Labor Day

Being stuck on campus with nothing do will not stop me from blogging on a federal holiday.

Connecticut lawmakers react to the death of Chief Justice William Rehnquist.

Sen. Joe Lieberman argued a First Amendment case before the U.S. Supreme Court in 1985 when he was the Connecticut attorney general. Lieberman lost the case on an 8-1 vote, but never forgot that Rehnquist was the lone dissenter. The case involved a devout Presbyterian who had sued his employer for the right to be excused from working on Sunday as was allowed under Connecticut law at the time.

"I will always have a warm spot in my heart for Justice Rehnquist because in the one case I had the honor to argue before the Supreme Court, in which we were trying to protect the right of a Christian man not to be forced to work on Sunday, Justice Rehnquist was the only member of the Court to agree with our position," Lieberman said in a statement Sunday. "His legacy of selfless dedication to the law, the courts and his nation will be a source of inspiration for generations to come."

What does this fall hold for tv news? I'm not sure other than the times, they are a changin'.

An old act hits Soldier Field and it is not the Rolling Stones.

Aykroyd and Belushi have appeared in Chicago once before as Have Love Will Travel, at the Vic Theatre in June 2003. Could it be the Blue Brothers still have some outstanding warrants in Illinois?

The choice of material and general high-quality instrumental support should remind concertgoers of the Blues Brothers, and even Aykroyd seems to make no distinction between the two acts.

"I've known the boys and Michael Cohl [the Stones' chief of staff] for some time now. They really are showing us a lot of love with this incredibly generous invitation. We don't take it lightly," Aykroyd said in a statement to the Sun-Times. "The Blues Brothers will do Chicago and the Stones proud with an opening set worthy of this induplicable night of music and fun."

Wal-Mart won't sell a book written by a Jew yet it will sell a book that says to hate Jews?

Then there's the bit about how Wal-Mart refused to sell Jon Stewart's "America: The Book," but it sold the anti-Semitic tract "The Protocols of the Learned Elders of Zion" (which says that Jews drink the blood of Christian children). Wal-Mart gave the following description: "If...the Protocols are genuine (which can never be proven conclusively), it might cause some of us to keep a wary eye on world affairs. We neither support nor deny its message."

Considering the extent to which Wal-Mart serves as cultural gatekeeper, this is quite scary.

I'm a Jew and I don't drink blood. So how can the protocols be genuine? It's a bunch of bull to get people to hate people like me!

The Red Sox sit a top first place and have a 3.5 game lead in the AL East. They have a 46-20 record at home which is not bad. The next win, the 81st, will guarantee them a .500 season for the 33rd time in the past 39 seasons.

Have a safe, healthy, and happy labor day. Time to hit the books.