...[W]hy is Chavez taking the lead in bashing Colombia?

There are several possibilities:

First, the hard drives captured from the FARC camp are absolute dynamite. So far the documents reveal that the FARC was negotiating with the Ecuadorian government at a very high level, that the FARC had given Chavez $150,000 while he was imprisoned after his 1992 coup attempt, and received $300 million from Chavez in return. ...

Second, Chavez is deterring possible Colombian attacks on FARC leaders in Venezuela. It has long been an open secret that the Venezuelan frontier regions were open territory to the FARC. ...

Third, Chavez is looking for an international crisis to distract the Venezuelans from their domestic crisis. This is the oldest play in the book for dictators the world over. ... Venezuela’s economy has been booming due to high oil prices, but there has been little trickle down. At the same time many of Chavez’s polices — particularly price controls on staples — have led to the predictable shortages and to popular discontent. ...

Fourth: Hugo es loco. There have been many rumors about Hugo’s mental health and some of his recent acts (such as calling for the exhumation of his hero Simon Bolivar’s remains for tests to see if he was assassinated by the oligarchs) are increasingly loopy. ...

... [A]s more intelligence about the FARC emerges from the late Raul Reyes’s hard drive, the nations of Latin America may be forced to make some tough decisions. Ecuador’s President Correa will have to decide if he wants to play Syria to Chavez’s Iran. But more broadly, the nations of Latin America, many of which have suffered from violence linked to the FARC, will have to decide if they can tolerate a state sponsor of terrorism in their midst or if that state should suffer the consequences of supporting terror.

Keith Thomas Tamsett
August 24, 1975 - February 22, 2008
Birthplace: Milwaukee, Wisconsin
Resided In: Milwaukee Wisconsin USA
Visitation: February 28, 2008
Cemetery: Private Interment

Age 32. Passed on to the Great Theatrical Performance of the World Beyond on February 22, 2008. Loved deeply for his individualism and artistic talent by his parents Thomas and Jacqueline, sister Kari and nephew Zachery. He shared his love of life with his grandmothers Joyce Rajchel and Barbara Boysa, his uncles and aunts Dan and Robin, Don and Jill, Joe and Tina, Bernie and Anita, Jenny and Jeff, all of his cousins and many extended family and friends. Keith had a deep love for the arts and was an enthusiastic supporter of the Soulstice Theatre Company. He shared his talents through teaching in the STARS (Soulstice Theatre Arts School) program, always encouraging young talent to shine. He often said he was inspired by the many talented people he shared the stage with, and as an artist, he was always proud to showcase his work for others to enjoy. His positive outlook and love of life was evident to those he worked with and served at the Hotel Metro.

Please join the family in celebrating his love of life at the MAX A. SASS funeral home on Thursday, February 28th from 4-7 PM. A celebration of life service will take place at 7 PM. Private interment.

To honor Keith's love of theatre, memorials to Soulstice Theatre Company are appreciated.
Theatre was in his soul.
Break a leg ''Bud''

********************************

To hear an interview with Keith and Rachel Lau, view: Say Goodnight

According to WNBC, Ledger was found with pills strewn all around him.

NYPD spokesman Paul Browne said Ledger had an appointment for a massage at the Manhattan apartment believed to be his home. The housekeeper, who went to let Ledger know the masseuse was there, found him unconscious at approximately 3:30 p.m. ET, according to the New York Times. After receiving no response from the actor after shaking him, they called authorities.

The Australian-born actor was nominated for an Oscar for “Brokeback Mountain,” where he met his wife, actress Michelle Williams, in 2005. Ledger and Williams had lived in Brooklyn and had a daughter, Matilda, until they split up last year.

Ledger was to appear as the Joker this year in “The Dark Night,” a sequel to 2005’s “Batman Begins.” He’s had starring roles in “A Knight’s Tale” and “The Patriot,” and played the suicidal son of Billy Bob Thornton in “Monster’s Ball.”

Ledger grew up in Perth, and began doing amateur theater at age 10. At 16, he moved to Sydney to pursue an acting career, quickly landing TV movie roles and guest spots on Australian television.

After several independent films and a starring role in the short-lived Fox TV series “Roar,” Ledger moved to Los Angeles and costarred in “10 Things I Hate About You,” a teen comedy reworking of “The Taming of the Shrew.”

Offers for other teen flicks came his way, but Ledger turned them down, preferring to remain idle than sign on for projects he didn’t like.

“It wasn’t a hard decision for me,” Ledger told the Associated Press in 2001. “It was hard for everyone else around me to understand. Agents were like, ‘You’re crazy,’ my parents were like, ‘Come on, you have to eat.”’

His latest role was in “I’m Not There,” in which he played one of the many incarnations of Bob Dylan — as did Cate Blanchett, whose performance in that film earned an Oscar nomination Tuesday for best supporting actress.

CAIRO, Egypt - Osama bin Laden appeared for the first time in three years in a video Friday released ahead of the sixth anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks, telling Americans they should convert to Islam if they want the war in Iraq to end...

Bin Laden makes no overt threats and does not directly call for attacks, according to the transcript, which was first posted on ABC's Web site. Instead, he addresses Americans, lecturing them on the failures of their leaders to stop the war in Iraq despite growing public opposition in the U.S.

"There are two solutions to stopping it. One is from our side, and it is to escalate the fighting and killing against you. This is our duty, and our brothers are carrying it out," bin Laden said. "The second solution is from your side," he said. "I invite you to embrace Islam."

ROME - Luciano Pavarotti, whose vibrant high C's and ebullient showmanship made him one of the world's most beloved tenors, has died, his manager told The Associated Press. He was 71.

His manager, Terri Robson, told the AP in an e-mail statement that Pavarotti died at his home in Modena, Italy, at 5 a.m. local time. Pavarotti had been diagnosed with pancreatic cancer last year and underwent further treatment in August...

The tenor, who seemed equally at ease singing with soprano Joan Sutherland as with the Spice Girls, scoffed at accusations that he was sacrificing his art in favor of commercialism. "The word commercial is exactly what we want," he said, after appearing in the widely publicized "Three Tenors" concerts. "We've reached 1.5 billion people with opera. If you want to use the word commercial, or something more derogatory, we don't care. Use whatever you want..."

Pavarotti was preparing to leave New York in July 2006 to resume a farewell tour when doctors discovered a malignant pancreatic mass, his manager Terri Robson said at the time. He underwent surgery in a New York hospital, and all his remaining 2006 concerts were canceled.

Pancreatic cancer is one of the most dangerous forms of the disease, though doctors said the surgery offered improved hopes for survival.

"I was a fortunate and happy man," Pavarotti told Italian daily Corriere della Sera in an interview published about a month after the surgery. "After that, this blow arrived."

"And now I am paying the penalty for this fortune and happiness," he told the newspaper.

Fans were still waiting for a public appearance a year after his surgery. In the summer of 2007, Pavarotti taught a group of selected students and worked on a recording of sacred songs, a work expected to be released in early 2008, according to his manager. He mostly divided his time between his home town, Modena, and his villa in the Adriatic seaside resort of Pesaro.

Faced with speculation that the tenor was near death, Mantovani, his second wife, told Italian newspaper La Stampa in July 2007: "He's fighting like a lion and he has never lost his heart..."

BAGHDAD, Iraq (CNN) -- A suicide bomber drove an explosives-laden truck into a village near the northern Iraqi city of Tal Afar on Monday, killing at least 28 people and wounding 50 others, an Iraqi army official said. At least 19 of those killed were children, Brig. Gen. Najim Abdullah told The Associated Press. The blast left a 10-foot crater in the ground and damaged 10 homes in the Shiite Turkmen village of Qubbak, about six miles (10 kilometers) northeast of Tal Afar, the army official told CNN. The suicide bomber used a dump truck and covered his deadly wares in a layer of gravel, Abdullah told the AP.

In Baghdad, three roadside bombs detonated in various neighborhoods, killing at least 11 people and wounding 33 others, according to the Iraqi Interior Ministry.

The deadliest of the blasts came in southeast Baghdad's Zafaraniya district, where eight people were killed and 16 were wounded.

Another bomb in the Ghadir neighborhood of southeastern Baghdad killed three people and wounded 11 others.

And in central Baghdad, along the Janhouriya Commercial Street, a third roadside bomb exploded, injuring six people, the ministry said.

STOCKHOLM, Sweden (AP) -- Swedish director Ingmar Bergman, an iconoclastic filmmaker widely regarded as one of the great masters of modern cinema, died Monday, the president of his foundation said. He was 89. (Bergman on IMDB)

(CBS) SAN FRANCISCO -- Talk show host Tom Snyder, whose smoke-filled interviews were a staple of late night television and an inspiration for Dan Ackroyd on "Saturday Night Live", has died after a struggle with leukemia. He was 71.

...This weekend also offers the Kickapoo County Fair, Saturday and Sunday in La Farge from 9 a.m. daily. Sponsored by the Organic Valley Family of Farms, this one-of-a-kind fair trades in the traditional deep-fried anything on a stick for homegrown organic treats... The fair offers educational experiences, informational booths, kids' activities and live music sure to fill your day. Celebrate Wisconsin's rural heritage and learn all about organic food options, renewable energy, and the latest in scientific breakthroughs for organic farming.

The Rev. Jerry Falwell, who founded the Moral Majority and built the religious right into a political force, died Tuesday shortly after being found unconscious in his office at Liberty University, a school executive said. He was 73.

Ron Godwin, the university's executive vice president, said Falwell, 73, was found unresponsive around 10:45 a.m. and taken to Lynchburg General Hospital. "CPR efforts were unsuccessful," he said.

Godwin said he was not sure what caused the collapse, but he said Falwell "has a history of heart challenges."

"I had breakfast with him, and he was fine at breakfast," Godwin said. "He went to his office, I went to mine, and they found him unresponsive."

Kurt Vonnegut, Writer of Classics of the American Counterculture, Dies at 84

Kurt Vonnegut, whose dark comic talent and urgent moral vision in novels like “Slaughterhouse-Five,” “Cat’s Cradle” and “God Bless You, Mr. Rosewater” caught the temper of his times and the imagination of a generation, died Wednesday night in Manhattan. He was 84 and had homes in Manhattan and in Sagaponack on Long Island...

His last book, in 2005, was a collection of biographical essays, “A Man Without a Country.” It, too, was a best seller.

It concludes with a poem written by Mr. Vonnegut called “Requiem,” which has these closing lines:

When the last living thing
has died on account of us,
how poetical it would be
if Earth could say,
in a voice floating up
perhaps
from the floor
of the Grand Canyon,
“It is done.”
People did not like it here.