Tuesday thoughts? Fire away. Close-outs: UPDATES: 1) LR TAXES: Clayton J reports that the city board punted to the city manager tonight to come up with a sales tax increase of up to 1.5 to 2 cents on the dollar (against the current half-cent). City needs money. I’ll be surprised if the ballot issue doesn’t turn out [...]

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THE JUDGE’S ACTORS: State documents reveal plan to use state-supervised defendants for TV reality show. Nobody organizing the enterprise is responding to my calls or e-mails, but work continues apace on a reality TV show, “Last Shot With Judge Gunn” in which Circuit Judge Mary Ann Gunn of Fayetteville plans to play a fictional judge doing [...]

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Google Streetview SITE OF PROPOSED BUILDING: Currently a parking lot at Sixth and Woodlane. Judge James Moody today invalidated a permit granted by the Capitol Zoning District for a five-story office building at Sixth and Woodlane Streets across the street from the Capitol. We wrote about this earlier. Dan Cook, who’s been active in downtown historic preservation, had [...]

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Interesting story in the Russellville Courier. It seems the student-produced Russellville Middle School yearbook included a feature on the “Top 5 worst people of all time.” Hitler, check. Osama, check. Charles Manson, check. George Bush and Dick Cheney? You might say check and doublecheck, too, particularly if your worldly experience dates back to about 1998. School officials [...]

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CNN has just sent a breaking news bulletin on this story: Radiation from cell phones can possibly cause cancer, the World Health Organization said today. This puts cell phones in league with lead, engine exhaust and chloroform as “possibly carcinogenic to humans.” What that means is that right now there haven’t been enough long-term studies conducted to make [...]

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The Little Rock Police Department has sent along two reports of robberies of people after they left the Riverfest grounds over the weekend. * A 20-year-old Mabelvale man said he was robbed of a cell phone and beaten by a group of young men while walking on West Markham Street near the Capital Hotel after leaving [...]

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John Brummett rounds up legislators’ comments at a recent panel discussion, including Republican Sen. Gilbert Baker’s prediction that the GOP will take control of the state Senate in the next election. If 2010 is a guide — when Republican predictions were right and Democratic ones were bad wrong — this should light a fire under someone. SOMEHOW, [...]

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So, back home. A quiet day from all appearances. I do see the slime-bucket Andrew Breitbart has been flogging (aided by every usual-suspect Repub) a story that, on evidence so far, appears to be a dirty trick against Rep. Anthony Weiner by the stalker of a young woman who admires Weiner. The trickster may [...]

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UNION STATION CONCERT: Symphony performed in shell; light show and fireworks followed. I’ll be driving home today and plan to check in this evening. A quick look indicates a quiet Memorial Day. * RIVERFEST: Here’s a gallery of closing day photos from Brian Chilson. His personal Riverfest report was that wearing the wristband for three days was [...]

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Just consider this the all-day, all-night open line. As I mentioned, I’m in Kansas City, one of my favorite cities in part because of old memories of riding the train up from Louisiana with my dad every summer to watch the Kansas City A’s. The video is a small taste of Darcus Gates, singing an appropriate song [...]

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