Prince Charles will not attend games: Tibet rights group

by Prashant Rao
21 minutes ago

LONDON (AFP) - Prince Charles will not be attending the opening ceremony of this year's Olympic Games in Beijing, he told a group that campaigns against human rights abuses in Tibet in a letter disclosed Monday.

A spokeswoman for the prince at Clarence House declined to comment, saying only: "We would not be able discuss any private correspondence."

According to the Free Tibet campaign group, it wrote to Charles, the heir to the throne, calling on him not to attend this summer's games hosted by the Chinese capital.

In response, the prince's deputy private secretary Clive Alderton wrote: "As you know, His Royal Highness has long taken a close interest in Tibet and indeed has been pleased to meet His Holiness the Dalai Lama on several occasions."

"You asked if the Prince of Wales would be attending the opening ceremony of the Beijing Olympics in 2008. His Royal Highness will not be attending the ceremony."

It was not clear whether the prince, whose sister Princess Anne is a member of the International Olympic Committee, had been invited to the ceremony, and whether his refusal to attend had any relation to alleged human rights abuses in Tibet.

The prince is a well-known supporter of the Tibetan cause, and hosted a reception at St. James's Palace in May 2004 for Tibetan spiritual leader the Dalai Lama, whom Beijing regards as a separatist.

In a diary entry made public in 2006, Charles wrote on the occasion of Hong Kong's handover to China in 1997 that China's leaders resembled a "group of appalling old waxworks" and also lamented the "awful Soviet-style display" of Chinese troops "goose-stepping" at the event.

A Free Tibet spokesman said: "We welcome the fact that the Prince of Wales will not be endorsing China's ongoing human rights' abuses in Tibet by attending the opening ceremony of the Olympic Games and we are calling on other high-profile public figures and politicians to follow suit.

"Human rights abuses in Tibet have worsened since China was awarded the games in 2001. These games will come to be known as the Games of Shame."

The news may dent British government hopes to strengthen relations with China -- Prime Minister Gordon Brown visited Beijing and Shanghai on a diplomatic visit earlier this month.

While there, he and Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao said they had set a target to raise two-way trade between China and Britain to 60 billion dollars by 2010, roughly 50 percent higher than the present level, and Brown described the relationship as "a dynamic, comprehensive and strategic partnership."

The issue of Tibet has sparked tensions between China and other countries recently as well -- the Chinese and German foreign ministers said only last week that ties between their countries had normalised after months of tensions over Berlin receiving the Dalai Lama in September.

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New Miss America once battled anorexia

By RYAN NAKASHIMA, Associated Press Writer
1 hour, 44 minutes ago

LAS VEGAS - Just three years ago, newly crowned Miss America Kirsten Haglund was eating tiny portions of food and became so thin her concerned parents "dragged me to the doctor."

Haglund was diagnosed with anorexia, and the lack of nutrition caused her collar bones to stick out, her heart rate to drop and her relationships to suffer.

"I would feel fatigued walking up six stairs," the 19-year-old Haglund said Sunday, a day after being crowned Miss America 2008. "I was a completely different person. It's not a pretty sight."

Haglund plans to spend her yearlong reign, trying to raise awareness of eating disorders, promoting the pagaent and helping the Children's Miracle Network while maintaining a healthy lifestyle and exercise.

To win her crown, the Farmington Hills, Mich., native sang "Over the Rainbow" and walked a crowd-pleasing strut in a black and gold bikini to clinch the title.

"You have to have curves," she said proudly. "You can't look like a stick-thin model."

The aspiring Broadway star even ate the silver medallion chocolates left on her pillow in her suite at the host site, the Planet Hollywood Resort & Casino.

"Yes, oh my gosh, yes," she said. "I love chocolate. Chocolates are a girl's best friend."

The 5-foot 8-inch blonde said she doesn't disclose her weight to avoid setting standards for youths obsessed with getting lighter.

She said she stopped pursuing her dream to become a professional ballerina to escape an environment in which she was rewarded for being slim and an industry that Haglund said sweeps concerns about eating disorders under the rug.

The National Eating Disorders Association estimates eating disorders affect 10 million girls and women and about 1 million boys and men in the United States.

Haglund's job begins right away, and on Sunday she caught a plane to New York for a Monday interview on "Live With Regis and Kelly."

While the teen said she wasn't about to "let myself go," she didn't plan to skip any meals over her crowning year.

"I'm going to enjoy my food," she said.

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Marlon Brando's troubled son dies

Christian Brando had a few minor film roles
Sunday, 27 January 2008, 00:53 GMT


Christian Brando, eldest son of the late actor Marlon Brando, has died in Los Angeles, aged 49.
He had reportedly been in a coma and on a ventilator, and died of complications arising from pneumonia.

"His body was totally compromised," said his former wife, Deborah. "He'd lived so hard."

After a few minor acting roles, he hit the headlines in 1990, when he shot dead his half-sister's boyfriend, for which he served five years in jail.

In 2005, he pleaded guilty to abusing his then-wife Deborah and was placed on probation, and ordered to undergo drug and alcohol rehabilitation.

Christian Brando also figured in the murder trial of Hollywood actor Robert Blake, whose wife was shot to death in 2001.

He invoked his Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination on the stand when a lawyer for Blake, who was eventually acquitted, suggested that Brando had been the killer.


Marlon Brando died in 2004
Christian Brando had a small number of film roles, including an appearance in I Love You, Alice B Toklas! at the age of 10.

But he will be best remembered for the 1990 death of Dag Drollet, boyfriend of his half-sister Cheyenne, at the Brando family's estate.

He said in court that he had accidentally shot Mr Drollet as they struggled for a gun during an argument over whether the boyfriend had beaten his pregnant girlfriend.

Pleading guilty to manslaughter, he spent five years in prison.

Cheyenne committed suicide in 1995 at the age of 25.

Marlon Brando, star of On The Waterfront and The Godfather, died in 2004 at the age of 80.

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Miss Michigan crowned Miss America

By KATHLEEN HENNESSEY, Associated Press Writer
1 hour, 32 minutes ago
LAS VEGAS - Miss Michigan Kirsten Haglund, a 19-year-old aspiring Broadway star, was crowned Miss America 2008 on Saturday in a live show billed as the unveiling of the 87-year-old pageant's new, hipper look.

Haglund, of Farmington Hills, Mich., sang "Over the Rainbow" and walked a crowd-pleasing strut in a black and gold bikini to clinch the title. She beat Miss Indiana Nicole Elizabeth Rash, the first runner up, and Miss Washington Elyse Umemoto, the second runner up for the $50,000 scholarship and year of travel that comes with the crown.

Haglund, who studies music at the University of Cincinnati, grew up in a pageant family. Her mother is an active volunteer, and her grandmother Iora Hunt, competed for the crown as Miss Michigan 1944. Hunt joined Haglund at a news conference.

.

"The only words that come to my mind is that this is a dream come true, not just for me but for my family as well," Haglund said. "I'm not just standing up here alone."

Haglund, a cheery, classic blond, wore a revealing silver sequined dress and black bikini during the evening gown and swimsuit portions of the pageant. As her platform issue, she promised to advocate for awareness of eating disorders, an illness from which she has recovered.

The crowning at the Planet Hollywood Resort & Casino on the Las Vegas Strip was aired for the first time on TLC. It capped a four-week reality series, "Miss America: Reality Check," which followed the contestants as they were pushed to shed the dated look of Miss Americas past and adopt a more updated style.

The show was the latest in a series of attempts to find an audience with a younger demographic after more than a decade of declining ratings.

The 52 newly made-over aspiring beauty queens who sought the top tiara sported updated hairdos, sassy attitudes and red carpet-worthy fashion throughout the competition.

Usually tame by modern TV standards, the swimwear competition kicked it up a notch. Most contestants wore black bikinis, and some struck provocative poses and twirled as the audience howled. Contestants also wore blue jeans and added a bit of humor to the traditional opening number, the parade of states.

Haglund's moves won howls from the audience. "I think for the audience, the swimwear and evening wear was much more entertaining, am I right?" Haglund said when asked about the show's new look.

The changes included a chance for "Reality Check" viewers to text message votes for their favorite contestant. Miss Utah, Jill Stevens, an Army medic who served in Afghanistan, was named "America's Choice."

Stevens did not make to the final 10, but she took the disappointment with pluck. She dropped and gave the audience push ups before joining the other losers on a riser on the side.

Producers added a twist to the interview portion, as well. They asked people on the street to pose questions, and the results were edgier than usual. Contestents were asked about binge drinking, HIV and Britney Spears' pregnant younger sister, Jamie Lynn.

"No I don't think she should be fired," Miss Indiana Nicole Elizabeth Rash said. "They're still people, they're still human beings. We all deserve second chances."

The long-struggling pageant had promised a new look for this year's beauty battle. "Entertainment Tonight" reporter Mark Steines was the master of ceremonies of the show. Clinton Kelly of TLC's hit "What Not to Wear" also helped with the hosting duties. Kelly had instructed the girls on how to update their looks during the reality show.

The pageant sounded different, too. A deejay spun dance music from turntables set up on stage. Contestants danced and waved to the audience during commercials breaks. The losers were seated on risers on one side of the stage, while the parents of the finalists, in black tie, were seated on the other.

The show was the latest in a series of attempts to find a new audience after more than a decade of declining ratings. The fading institution was dropped from network television in 2004. It spent a two-year stint on Country Music Television before being picked up last summer by TLC, a cable channel reaching 93 million homes in the U.S.

TLC added the pageant to its reality-TV stable, and announced plans to reinvent the look of the show and find an "It girl" ready for modern celebrity.

In addition to the $50,000 scholarship, Haglund will embark on a year of promoting the pageant, her platform issue and the Children's Miracle Network, a pageant partner

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The Old Man Returns

By JONATHAN MILES
Published: January 27, 2008

HARVEY Wallbanger is alive and well, and living in Brooklyn.


That ’70s drink, so redolent of leisure suits, “Love Boat” and giant wide lapels, was thought to have gone extinct decades ago — or at least mostly extinct (you can occasionally spot one on the mummified menus of roadside diners).

It had experienced a meteoric rise. One of its three components, the unctuous, vanilla-scented Galliano (the others being vodka and orange juice), was the top-selling imported liqueur in the 1970s and Harvey Wallbangers were de rigueur everywhere from discos to country clubs to suburban swinger parties, dwarfing even the Cosmopolitan craze of the ’90s.

But it suffered a sweeping and ignoble demise, consigned in popular imagination to the same place where pet rocks go to die. Despite vodka’s continuing stomp across the alcoholic landscape, a generation of bartenders has never once fielded an order for a Harvey Wallbanger.

If remembered at all, it is usually with a groan. “The world is not a lesser place,” the spirits writer Wayne Curtis noted in 2006, “because nobody remembers how to make a Harvey Wallbanger.”

Stephanie Schneider, 37, remembers. Or rather, she looked up how to make one.

Ms. Schneider, along with Andrew Boggs, 31, is an owner of Huckleberry Bar, which opened in October on Grand Street in Williamsburg — one of a sudden burst of cocktaileries in beer-proud Brooklyn.

It’s a high-minded joint, serving the kinds of Chartreuse-laden original cocktails and purist classics found in downtown Manhattan. Serious drinks: Sazeracs, Negronis, even a Sherry Flip. All of which cozy up on the menu beside Harvey Wallbanger himself.

“There aren’t many classic vodka cocktails,” Ms. Schneider said, “and we wanted to feature a vodka drink.”

The Harvey Wallbanger, she decided, was ripe for exhuming. Maybe not a classic, in the snobbish sense, but “an old man drink” with its own kind of pedigree.

The drink has become a surprise hit, perhaps because Williamsburg, where Pabst Blue Ribbon was transformed into a campy statement, is not averse to kitschy drinking, or perhaps because Harvey Wallbangers go down awfully easy.

Huckleberry Bar’s rendition is a tad more nuanced.

Ms. Schneider substituted freshly squeezed orange juice for the concentrate form that predominated back then, and infuses the vodka with lemons, lime and grapefruit to add a citric grace note to the drink. But it’s groovy essence remains.


HARVEY WALLBANGER Adapted from Huckleberry Bar

2 ounces citrus-infused vodka *

4 ounces freshly squeezed orange juice

1/4 ounce Galliano

1 orange slice, for garnish.

Fill a highball glass with ice. Pour in the vodka, orange juice and Galliano. Garnish with the orange slice.

Yield: 1 serving

* To infuse the vodka: Add 3 lemons, ½ orange and 1/4 grapefruit, sliced, to a 750-milliliter bottle of vodka. Steep two to three days. You can also use infused vodkas like Absolut Citron.

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Laura Brown and Brian Vogt

By VIKKI VALENTINE
Published: January 27, 2008

IN Laura Anne Brown’s experience, few men are brave enough to call a date a date. Guys would invite her to a movie, for coffee or to dinner, but rarely would they identify it by that word, loaded as it is with potential for joy or pain.

This presented a problem for Ms. Brown, a 36-year-old lawyer for Quality Trust for Individuals With Disabilities, a nonprofit advocacy group in Washington, who has some pretty strong ideas about spirituality, service to society and about marriage.

“That is a very intimidating thing for most men, because in my experience they’re wishy-washy, they skirt around things,” said Ms. Brown, an Arlington, Va., native.

Then she met one who wasn’t afraid. That man, Brian Christian Vogt, a senior program officer for Asia at the National Democratic Institute for International Affairs, was a recent transplant to Washington from Princeton University, where he had received a master’s in public and international affairs.

Mr. Vogt, who was raised primarily in Covington, Ky., where his parents ran a premarital counseling program for Catholic couples, had joined St. Aloysius, a historic Roman Catholic church in an area of Washington that only recently began its recovery from riots in 1968. He and Ms. Brown, a Sunday school teacher at St. Aloysius, both attended Mass in the church’s basement, a plain room with industrial carpeting and a piano for the choir.

Mutual friends from the church introduced them, but each didn’t really know much about the other until a three-day church-sponsored backpacking trip in 2005. And then, a few days after that hike, it happened. Mr. Vogt sent her a simple e-mail message, containing the word: date.

“It was so refreshing,” she recalled thinking, “Here is a man I can work with.”

Humble, but direct. It was an irresistible combination for Ms. Brown. She was also charmed by his penchant for political activism, which started at age 8, when Mr. Vogt began a door-to-door campaign asking neighbors to sign a petition to change his housing development’s rules on pets so he could have a dog. She soon discovered Mr. Vogt’s deeply analytical side.

“He is very reluctant to make any decision at all until he has considered all the angles,” said Shane Dickey, a boyhood pal. “But when it comes to a marriage, how can you cover all the angles?” He added, “He needed to find a partner who would be certain to share his values."

About a year and a half into their relationship, Ms. Brown could sense Mr. Vogt was hesitant about the next step, so one quiet evening at his apartment, she took out a handwritten list of topics that she had developed. It consisted of eight discussion points, including family, spirituality and sexuality.

“I thought, ‘If I eliminate some of his uncertainty, maybe he’ll be more willing to take this risk,’ ” Ms. Brown said.

She considered asking him to marry her. Instead, over a period of several months, she brought out the list, engaging him in a discussion on one of the topics following an evening out or on a weekend afternoon.

After just a handful of discussions, Mr. Vogt, 34, recalled thinking, “Of course, this is right.” He added, “It’s really the most important decision of your life, this is much more permanent than any other decision.”

He then asked her out on their most ambitious date yet: the Maryland Challenge, a 41-mile day hike on a segment of the Appalachian Trail. When she readily accepted, Mr. Vogt recalled thinking, “ ‘If she is someone who is willing at the drop of the hat to do something crazy like that, that’s one indicator. On a deeper level, she is a person who is adaptable and very comfortable in all sorts of situations and someone who seeks purpose in their life; those are the sort of things that I really admire about her.’ ”

He scouted out one of the longest days of the year, and on June 9, 2007, the couple set out before dawn.

“The whole time I’m nervous, of course,” Mr. Vogt said of his proposal plan. “I can’t do it in the morning; what happens if one of us gets injured or if we just can’t make it?”

But at mile 29, with blistered feet, a dozen miles to go and nightfall not far off, Mr. Vogt started fumbling in his knapsack for the ring. Once he had it in hand, he said to Ms. Brown, “This might not be the best time, but. ...”

Bliss carried them through the final miles, and just before midnight, they stumbled up one last hill to a historic inn in Harpers Ferry, W.Va.

On Jan. 12, Ms. Brown and Mr. Vogt were married before 185 guests by the Rev. Si Hendry, a Roman Catholic priest, in St. Aloysius’ austere basement sanctuary. No one except the bride’s closest friends noticed the last traces of a cold she had caught while spending a week in the snowy farmland of Iowa canvassing with Mr. Vogt for the Democratic presidential contender Senator Barack Obama.

Taking to the campaign trail might seem an unnecessarily stressful diversion, coming as it did just two weeks before their wedding. But her willingness to push her limits is exactly what he loves about her, the bridegroom said.

At the couple’s reception, at the Torpedo Factory Art Center in Alexandria, Va., the bridegroom’s father, Jim Vogt, said the campaign swing seemed a fitting move.

“It says they got their priorities straight,” he said.

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A Final Curtain Call for Valentino

By CATHY HORYN
Published: January 27, 2008
Paris

AS happens with most final acts, Valentino Garavani’s career was over before it could be fully absorbed. On Wednesday night, at the Rodin Museum, he closed the spring 2008 haute couture collections and at the same time ended 45 years in fashion. The models wore identical red dresses for the finale, so that the room seemed bathed in his favorite color. The audience stood, the applause started, and Valentino walked briskly to the end of the runway, dry-eyed and tanned from a ski holiday in Gstaad.

One of the locomotives of Valentino’s career, and that as well of his partner, Giancarlo Giammetti, was that he allowed the media — and, by extension, the public — to see how lavishly he lived, whether in Rome, London or Gstaad. Although he regarded himself as a serious-minded designer, trained in Paris, few of his contemporaries seemed to derive as much pleasure from their lives. It showed in the clothes he made.

As the milliner Philip Treacy, who did the hats for the final show, said, “He’s the only designer who lived the life that people think designers should live.”

Yet many of the television and wire-service reporters gathered behind ropes outside the Rodin, or jamming into the backstage area afterward, were not there for the story. They were there for the sound bite. Stopping Mr. Giammetti backstage, a television reporter said, her voice rising for effect: “Tonight’s the final show for you and Mr. Valentino. How do you think it went?”

The smile on his face could not be read positively. “Very well,” Mr. Giammetti replied, looking in the direction of Valentino and the mob of photographers around him. “Very good.”

A temptation to say only the obvious and the necessary was precisely what the final bow of Valentino elicited, and to that extent it felt scripted. Last July, in Rome, Valentino and Mr. Giammetti celebrated the company’s 45th anniversary with an incredible weekend-long party. In a way, Marie-Chantal of Greece said, that was the real send-off. She was with her husband, Pavlos, and her in-laws, the former monarchs of Greece. “I think Rome was the big finale, and I’m seeing tonight as a little get-together,” she said.

Many clients and old friends were in the front row, as well as a handful of super models. The designers who attended were Alber Elbaz of Lanvin, Miuccia Prada and Emanuel Ungaro. News reports said Carla Bruni, the former model who is dating the French president, Nicolas Sarkozy, had been invited but declined. Gwyneth Paltrow was supposed to have attended, according to a Valentino representative, but she was not feeling well.

As for the collection, it was “true Valentino,” as the designer himself characterized the breezy shapes and sorbet colors the night before the show. The matching day suits were light, in wool crepe or double-faced wool, and one mandarin-colored jacket had a bias drape across the back.

The couture effects were subtle and fascinating. A Mikado-style suit was made of vertical strips of black silk satin; at the hem of the belled skirt, each strip was folded back to reveal white satin and then pressed into place. The same pleating technique was repeated on the sleeves of the jacket. There were flower embroideries, but the exemplary looks were cooler — like a long slim dress in pistachio duchess satin with a low back and swags of sky blue satin starting at the bust and spreading around the green into an overskirt.

Asked if his career, at the end, seemed to have gone by quickly, Valentino thought for a moment and said: “Yes, fast in a certain sense, if I think that my collection at the Metropolitan Museum was in 1982. To me, that was like yesterday. I did a lot.”

The spring couture shows were generally strong, with a huge palette and fantastical details taken from nature. At Givenchy, though, Riccardo Tisci got tangled in some tough 1980s tailoring. He seemed eager to project modern attitude, with snug black jackets and flaring wool miniskirts lined in white over black stockings and strappy stilettos. But despite some fresh-looking evening dresses with ruff collars, this ground was already broken by Azzedine Alaïa and Claude Montana.

Before Valentino’s show, Jean Paul Gaultier reminded everyone that couture goes on. Inspired by the sea, his collection was full of surprise and imagination. He opened with his chic pantsuits, now in marine blue and gray with sharp shoulders or wide, pleated sleeves. There were a few obvious show numbers, like an all-over gold sequined pants outfit that was drenched with water from a sponge the model carried.

But many of the dresses were as wearable as they were ingenious, especially a loose mini slip dress of panels of sea green embroidery interspersed with tiny loops of gold beads. The model Coco Rocha closed the show as a mermaid bride. After hobbling out on crutches, she dropped her sticks and released her latex fish gown by a zipper at the hem, and then set off toward the photographers, a pair of spiraling gold shells on her breasts.

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