Roger Daltrey to go country?

But before we get to that, I'd like to wish Roger Waters -- of Pink Floyd -- a happy birthday as he turns 62.

Plenty of Roger Daltrey in the news. First, he slams The X Factor. I don't blame him. I do the same thing every day, every single day. I should note that I try to keep this as clean as possible.

And despite the programme's ever-growing popularity, Daltrey can't see the appeal.

He says, "Do I watch The X Factor? No! God forbid! They wouldn't know the X Factor if it smacked them. They haven't got a f**king clue.

"I don't understand why anyone would watch it. Whatever happened to drama?"

Daltrey loves charity events. So do I. I'm putting on one up here but I'm not sure of the date or the venue.

He says, "I like it because it's something that needs to be done and I can finish it in my lifetime.

"I've been doing charity events all my life, but you very rarely see a result of your work.

"With this charity I manage to see results. It's incredibly rewarding, seeing hospitals being built. They just have to be maintained."

Reporters and anchors are human. It will be interesting to see how Jon Stewart does his first post-Katrina Daily Show episode tonight.

Reporters covering Hurricane Katrina on the scene showed their human — and often angry and frustrated — face as they questioned the slow response over the weekend.

"The government said, 'You go here, and you'll get help,' or 'You go in that Superdome and you'll get help,' " Fox News anchor Shepard Smith fumed on-air from New Orleans Friday, in a tone echoed by other correspondents. "And they didn't get help. They got locked in there. And they watched people being killed around them. And they watched people starving. And they watched elderly people not get any medicine."

Says Fordham University communications professor Paul Levinson, "The media rose to the occasion, shone their light on the desolation and the needy, and kept it focused there until the cavalry finally began to arrive."

The story also proved how, even in this emerging new-media age in which bloggers sometimes seem to rule, television news still does it best when it comes to conveying the scope and the depth of emotion in a quickly evolving tragedy.

John Roberts has been nominated for Chief Justice. Truth be told, I have yet to make up my mind against him.

The book on the 1927 flood is in demand again.

The publisher began to see increased demand for the title on Tuesday and Wednesday, said Simon & Schuster spokesman Adam Rothberg. Rising Tide, which had 150,000 copies in circulation, is going back to press to print an additional 10,000 paperback copies, Rothberg said.

Back to Roger Daltrey, this time he slams the television coverage of Live 8. I admit, they didn't need to break in during the sets of all the bands. I'd rather see it commercial free.

"The bits of Live 8 in between the music. I wished they'd shut the f**k up!" The Who frontman Roger Daltrey insists Live 8 would have been vastly improved without the charity chat.

Is Roger Daltrey going country? It looks like we may be on the verge of breakup of The Who or Daltrey is going to record a solo album. I'm not sure on this quite yet.

The My Generation hitmaker is convinced he has exhausted his inspiration for rock music, and is looking forward to the challenge of writing a traditional country album.

He says, "Music is my passion and I have done opera, theatre music and rock 'n' roll. So I am thinking about getting a band together to do a country album, a type of music I have never tackled.

"I don't have a name for my new band but a country album would be a fantastic direction for me and would fulfill an ambition."

And he is particularly inspired by country legend Hank Williams: "He was a genius, a man who wrote songs which celebrated life and drew happiness from the gloom.

"I love his take on country music - so different from country music today, which can best be described as music to commit suicide to!"

That would be, well, different.

Republicans will be doing their best to get the relief funds down there.

Senator John Kerry to stump for Coleman? Not that Coleman! A different Coleman named Chris.

Is Eugene Levy The Man?

"Taking a chance," stars say is what improv is all about. It just hit me that Northern Kentucky does not have BRAVO on the regular Insight Communications cable here, only Insight Digital. In Louisville and Cincinnati, it is on the regular package. Northern Kentucky: Get with the picture!

Before Rubber Soul came out, a band named The Overlanders aquired a copy and released a cover of "Michelle" a week before the album was released. Of course, the Fab Four were furious.