KWCH: The surveillance video shows a Lincoln Towncar crashing through the East-facing doors of Wichita’s City Hall, barreling through the hall in an almost perfectly straight line.  The car exits through the west side of the building, destroying security equipment and a revolving door, before stopping in the attached parking garage. MORE KWCH: A man who pleaded no contest to driving his car through Wichita City Hall has been sentenced to just over ten years in prison. No one was hurt in the crash. The crash in January of 2008 caused at least $200,000 in damage to city hall. MORE

TELEGRAPH: A cure for baldness has come a step closer after scientists identified a gene that is connected to hair loss. The breakthrough should help scientists develop new treatments as well as help pinpoint early in life which men are likely to lose their hair. The Sox21 gene has in the past been shown to be linked to the formation of nerve cells, but the new study is the first to indicate its function in ensuring hair retention.  Researchers made the finding during experiments on mice which, like humans, carry the gene. The scientists blocked the activity of the gene […]

LOS ANGELES TIMES: The California Supreme Court today upheld Proposition 8’s ban on same-sex marriage but also ruled that gay couples who wed before the election will continue to be married under state law. The decision virtually ensures another fight at the ballot box over marriage rights for gays. Gay rights activists say they may ask voters to repeal the marriage ban as early as next year, and opponents have pledged to fight any such effort. Proposition 8 passed with 52% of the vote. Although the court split 6-1 on the constitutionality of Proposition 8, the justices were unanimous in […]

RADIO TIMES w/ MARTY MOSS-COANE BRIAN TIERNEY, Publisher of the Philadelphia Inquirer and Daily News senior writer WILL BUNCH discuss the issues around hiring John Yoo as a commentator for the Philadelphia Inquirer. 11:00 a.m. Call in number is 1-888-477-9499  IT’S OUR CITY: Will Bunch is the Philadelphia Daily News staff writer and blogger who raised hell when he found out that torture memo author John Yoo was now a monthly columnist for The Philadelphia Inquirer. Seeking more information about all of this, I emailed the Inquirer’s editorial page editor, Harold Jackson, this afternoon. What exactly was Yoo’s arrangement with the […]

BY DIANCA POTTS mewithoutYou’s super sold out CD release show started off with Greensboro hip-hoppers Urban Sophisticates. Currently signed to Right Hook Records, the classy stylistics of MC Benton James rocked the Troc to the back beat of the act’s rock-funk jam band sound. A surprising opener for Tooth and Nail’s mwY, Urban Sophisticates’ squeaky clean but catchy “Head Nod Head Rock” got hands in the air and ample applause by the song and set’s end. Quickly thanking the crowd and the evening’s headliner, the southern sextet turned the stage over to New Jersey’s Danielson. Dressed alike in uniforms like […]

BY JONATHAN VALANIA FOR THE INQUIRER Saint Vincent Ferrer (1350-1419), was a missionary and logician. Annie Clark (1982- ), the American singer-songwriter-multi-instrumentalist who goes by the name St. Vincent, brings a missionary zeal to her current status as indie’s ambassador of goodwill from The Other Side. Likewise, despite all its head-spinning detours and U-turns, her music follows the pristine logic of a flowchart. Such was the case Thursday night when St. Vincent stunned a near-capacity crowd in the sweaty basement of the First Unitarian Church with a flawless recreation of selections from Actor, her just-released and deservedly hyped sophomore collection […]

BY PHILLYGRRL Perhaps it’s best to start at the beginning. When I was a girl of three, I lived with my parents and my older brother in the first floor of a row house on South Farragut Street in West Philadelphia. Occasionally, when my father was using the family’s orange VW Beetle or when my mom didn’t feel like driving, she would take me and my older brother on the Girard Avenue Trolley (Route 15). She’d say she needed to finish errands, but more than likely she just wanted to get out of the house – stuck as she was […]

INQUIRER: One hundred years ago, thousands of people believed. “WHAT-IS-IT VISITS ALL SOUTH JERSEY” declared the front page of The Inquirer on Jan. 21, 1909 – above a photograph of “actual proof-prints of the strange creature.” “Hooflike tracks” could be seen in the snow “in practically every block in Burlington city” – including rooftops – throwing “this section into a state bordering on panic.” Even dogs were scared. “Hounds put on the trail refused to follow the tracks, and, with bristling hair and the picture of terror, ran home,” the article stated. Armed with shotguns, a party of young farmers […]

INQUIRER: The city’s judges fired Joseph A. Russo from the Board of Revision of Taxes today, after a scathing report from the city inspector general said he had manipulated property assessments, abused his power, and committed perjury. The sudden firing of Russo, a longtime ally of former State Sen. Vincent J. Fumo, appeared to be unprecedented in the 155-year history of the BRT, the agency that sets tax values for all properties in Philadelphia. “He did not uphold the standards expected of appointees,” President Judge Pamela Pryor Dembe said. She said the vote was unanimous and the firing effective immediately. […]