Hot Topics : Wednesday November 28, 2007

HOT TOPICS: Wednesday , November 28, 2007 

 Greetings everyone. I am finally back from Costa Rica.  I tried to publish my daily articles while on vacation but the Internet Cafe's were few and far between .  And once I found them I was limited in time.

These are just some of the 'Hot Topics' in the news today that are inspiring conversation.  Please discuss in the comment thread below if you would like to write about any of the following topics or would like to pursue another current event.  If you post to the appropriate Essential, you will have a chance to be featured on the homepage.

Daily Quotation:

On This Day In History:

• 0587 - Treaty of Andelot: King Guntram takes cousin Childebert II as heir
• 1340 - Battle of Salado Spain: last Moor invasion driven back
• 1520 - Ferdinand Magellan begins crossing Pacific Ocean
• 1660 - London Royal Society forms
• 1745 - French troops attack Indians of Saratoga, NY
• 1821 - Panama declares independence from Spain
• 1908 - 154 men die in coal mine explosion at Marianna Pa
• 1919 - US-born Lady Astor elected 1st female member of British Parliament
• 1929 - Adm Richard E Byrd makes 1st South Pole flight
• 1942 - Cocoanut Grove nightclub fire kills 602
• 1961 - Ernest Davis is 1st black to win Heisman Trophy
  

A&E Essential :

• Spice Girl Mel B finishes second in US TV show Dancing with the Stars following a close-fought final. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/entertainment/7116364.stm 
• 1895 - America's 1st auto race starts; 6 cars, 55 miles, winner avg 7 MPH
• 1917 - Sigmund Rombergs revue "Over the Top," premieres in NYC
• 1922 - Capt Cyril Turner (RAF) gives 1st skywriting exhibition (NYC) Turner spelled out "Hello USA.
• 1930 - Howard Hanson's 2nd Symphony "Romantic," premieres
• 1988 - Picasso's "Acrobat and Harlequin" sells for $38.46 million

Book Essential :

• Author Norman Mailer, who died earlier this year, is named winner of the Bad Sex in Fiction award. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/entertainment/7115451.stm
  
  1953 - Raymond Chandler's The Long Goodbye was published. Many say it is his best novel, and the biographers trace many connections to Chandler's personal life
• 1859 - Washington Irving writer of Rip Van Winkle and the legend of Sleepy Hollow dies in NY on the eve of the Civil War.

Family Essential :

Food Essential:

• 1837 - John Wesley Hyatt was born. He developed the process for making celluloid, the first synthetic plastic. He also invented a water purifying system and a sugar cane mill.
• 1863 - Thanksgiving was first celebrated as a regular American Holiday.
• 1869 - W.F. Semple of Mount Vernon, Ohio, was issued the first chewing gum patent
• 1942  -Coffee rationing began in the U.S.
• 2006 - Texas Republican state Rep. Betty Brown filed a bill (HCR 15) in the Texas legislature which would declare Athens, Texas as the "original home of the hamburger.” Residents of New Haven, Connecticut strongly objected.

Health Essential:

• Gene-modified mice, apparently invulnerable to cancer, may help unlock better human treatments. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/7116675.stm
• South Africa's handling of the HIV/Aids pandemic has been mismanaged and graft-ridden, a report says. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/7116836.stm
• Scans have shown that paedophilia may be the result of faulty connections in the brain. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/7116506.stm

Money Essential:

• US stocks rise strongly after comments from a Federal Reserve official boost hopes of an interest rate cut. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/7117568.stm
• US manufacture orders fell for the third month in a row, a further sign of the slowing economy  http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/7117254.stm
• People are spending longer at work, with one in eight people working 48 hours a week http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/7116274.stm
• 1795 - US pays $800,000 and a frigate as tribute to Algiers and Tunis

Movies Essential :

• 1907 - Louis B Mayer ( a scrap metal dealer) purchases a small rundown Movie theater in Haverhill Mass. then in 1917 he started his own production co. - MGM
• 1909 - James Agee, born on this day, reviewed John Huston’s 1948 film of Key Largo. Huston hoped to make his film a comment on contemporary America. Key Largo was the fourth and last of the Bogey-Bacall films.
• 1927 -  Disney's the Bankers Daughter was released
• 1948 - "Hopalong Cassidy" premieres

Music Essential :

• Pop star Kylie Minogue reveals plans for an "exhilarating and innovative" tour, kicking off in France next May. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/entertainment/7117152.stm
• 1925 - Grand Ole Opry premieres as WSM Barn Dance on WSM radio Nashville Tn
• 1929 - Motown founder Berry Gordy is born in Detroit, Mich.
• 1932 - Groucho Marx performed on radio for 1st time
• 1964 - Willie Nelson makes his debut on the Grand Ole Opry in Nashville, Tenn.
• 1974 - Elton John and John Lennon sing a duet of `I Saw Her Standing There'' at Madison Square Garden in New York.
• 2000 - Madonna takes her "Music" to London's 3,500-capacity Brixton Academy for her first U.K. performance in seven years.

News Essential :

• A US judge is removed today from his post for jailing everyone in court after none admitted to owning a ringing phone. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/7116426.stm
• CNN is forced to explain a caption which the Venezuelan leader claimed could incite attempts to kill him. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/7117287.stm
• 1775 - 2nd Continental Congress formally establishes US Navy
• 1776 - Washington and his troops cross Delaware River
• 1833 - Charles Darwin rides through Las Pietras, returning to Montevideo
• 1930 - After a sandstorm in Morocco, there was a rain of mud in Paris and yellow sand fell in Spain.
• 1948 - The first Polaroid Land Camera went on sale in Boston. This was the first successful self-developing camera; it took a photo about 1 minute to develop.

Politics Essential :

• Six provinces in Bolivia start a strike against plans by President Evo Morales for a radical new constitution.  http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/7117552.stm
• The Mexican Congress wants action to stop Chinese producers targeting the tequila market. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/7116602.stm
• US President  Bush has renewed his pledge to give the Israeli and Palestinian leaders support http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/7117744.stm
  1871 - Ku Klux Klan trials began in Federal District Court in SC
• 1934 - Churchill tells Premier Baldwin not to under estimate German air power
• 1943 - FDR, Churchill and Stalin met at Tehran to map out strategy
• 1961 - General Meeting of UN debates about New-Guinea

Travel Essential:

• Nasa releases details  for sending a human crew to Mars within the next few decades. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/7116834.stm
• 1962 - Telegraph between Netherlands and Indonesia restored
• 1964 - Mariner 4 launched; 1st probe to fly by Mars
• 1983 - 9th Space Shuttle Mission-Columbia 6-is launched

Writing Essential:

•  India vows to protect controversial Bangladeshi writer Taslima Nasreen after violent protests by Muslims. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/7116434.stm
• 1582 - Playwright and poet William Shakespeare weds Anne Hathaway
• 1928 - Don Marquis published “Give Me Your Mirth” in Collier’s magazine on this day
• 1939 - Maxwell Anderson the playwright dominated American theater during the early decades of the century. Anderson’s Key Largo opened on Broadway on this day

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