On tonight's "60 Minutes," former California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, on the eve of releasing a new memoir, further elaborated on the affair with the family maid that led to the birth of another son. He also talked about the opposition that wife Maria Shriver had to him running in the recall election in 2003, and that she even "had tears in her eyes" when he told her that he was throwing his hat in the ring.

But one of the more revealing interviews comes from Laurence Leamer on The Daily Beast. He sat down for an interview with him recently, and not only challenged notions that his troubled marriage was a recent concern, but confronted him over the quality of his friendships. Moreover, he got Schwarzenegger to talk about his plans to become a major star again, given that. at 65, he's now a senior.

Former California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, about to release an autobiography on Tuesday, sits down with "60 Minutes" on Sunday. He calls his affair with the family maid, with whom he had a son, the "stupidest thing."

 

 

There's a case to be made that the first presidential debate, the first of which is Wednesday, favors the challenger. That's a reason why President Obama's team is getting the word out on how little prep time he's had, how skillful Mitt Romney was in the GOP debates and how green Obama is on the debate stage. It has been four years, after all. Lower expectations, then see what happens.

Ronald Reagan in 1980, Walter Mondale in 1984, Bill Clinton in 1992, John Kerry in 2004 and Obama in 2008 all were perceived to have won their first debates. In Reagan's case, it was the only debate that year. While this may be attributed to skill, default or the mere fact that the challengers were elevated to a presidential platform, the Norman Lear Center's Marty Kalan has a story in the Jewish Journal that suggests another element at work: The media's need to keep the race competitive.

He writes, "Think of mass media as Scheherazade, and think of us, the audience, as the Sultan. If the campaign narrative is a snooze, we’ll sentence its storyteller to death and turn the show off; Romney-is-a-goner is totally a ratings-killer. But if each night’s episode is a cliffhanger, we’ll keep coming back to find out what happens next. 

"The drama of the debates isn’t the only campaign X-factor that’s tailor-made for marketing. The two jobs reports between now and the election will also be hyped and spun. The tens of millions that billionaires will secretly spend late in the game will be framed as a looming November surprise. Even if Romney persistently lags by several points, voter suppression laws and Election Day vigilantism will inject tension into the ending. All these are legitimate reasons — independent of the media’s stake in a photo finish — to believe that Obama doesn’t have it in the bag. But the hoopla surrounding the four debates is the industry’s best opportunity to attract eyeballs, sell them to advertisers and keep the story going down to the wire."

That's why it may be just as important to watching social media next Wednesday, which is gaining influence in shaping real-time perceptions of how the candidates do. The most apparent example may be Clint Eastwood's speech at the Republican National Convention, which, in the end, was well-received in the arena but took on a life of its own on Twitter. In other words, watch the hashtags.

 

Alicia Keys released this web video for President Obama's campaign, aimed at getting women in Philadelphia out to vote.

 Meanwhile, "Seinfeld" actor Jason Alexander was dispatched through Iowa on Thursday to promote early voting. He was in Neceda, Arel, Winterset and Des Moines, and Tweeted this photo from John Wayne's hometown.

On Wednesday, Mitt Romney campaigned with Mike Rowe, host of Discovery Channel's "Dirty Jobs." Rowe said, per ABC News, "There's got to be a better way to be happy and successful in your career than simply assuming a massive amount of debt and exiting an educational program that gives you a degree without training." It wasn't technically an endorsement of Romney, although the candidate did respond to an appeal that Rowe made to both candidates.

Samuel L. Jackson is among the many celebrities doing get-out-the-vote spots, but this one from Jewish Council For Education & Research takes a new approach: Profanity. It certainly sets a new threshold for celebrity PSAs.

 

Former President Bill Clinton is raising money for President Obama's reelection campaign on Oct. 8, with a breakfast at the Pacific Palisades home of syndication mogul Michael King and his wife Jena.

Tickets for the event start at $1,000 per person, going up to $40,000 per couple to serve as an event co-chair, to get a meet-and-greet and a photo with the former president, according to an invite.

The day before, Obama will attend a concert at Los Angeles' Nokia Theater, where Katy Perry, Stevie Wonder and Earth, Wind & Fire are among those on the bill. He'll also attend a more intimate dinner, with Jeffrey Katzenberg among the hosts.

Primetime has "Modern Family," "Glee" and "The New Normal," but according to the Associated Press, same-sex couples are missing from campaigns fighting for gay nuptials in four states with November ballot initiatives.

Even as straight supporters --- conservatives like Paul Singer and corporate chieftans like Jeff Bezos --- have poured money into campaigns, the strategy has been to feature straight people talking about the issue. It's already generated consternation among bloggers and other activists who fear that the tactic resembles many of the commercials designed to defeat Proposition 8 in 2008.

"If we don't show ourselves, people aren't going to get comfortable with who we are," Wayne Besen of Truth Wins Out, a Vermont gay rights group, told the AP.

Critics of the way that the No on 8 campaign was run --- and there were many --- even cited the movie "Milk," released just after the election in which Prop 8 passed, for historical perspective. In the scene, Harvey Milk attends a planning meeting to defeat an initiative on the California ballot to force schools to fire gay teachers. Milk looks at a campaign flyer, which casts the battle as a ``human-rights issue'' but kept gays invisible. ``This is shit,'' Milk says. ``It's just a coward's response to a dangerous threat.''

Initiatives are on four state ballots this November: Washington, Maine, Maryland and Minnesota.

One org, TheFour, has been using celebrities to try to call attention to the campaigns, which also face the challenge of breaking through the clutter of election spots hitting the airwaves through the election. Gay marriage has been on the ballot 32 times, and supporters have lost each time. That's why gay rights leaders are saying that even a victory in one of the states will be significant, as it will go a long way toward reversing the narrative that gay marriage is not the will of the people.

The head of Google's Brazlian operations has been detained for failing to remove election-related videos, but the company could face even more sanctions after a judge ordered YouRube to remove "Innocence of Muslims."

Al Gore will lead Current TV's coverage of next week's first presidential debate, presiding over a panel that includes Jennifer Granholm, Eliot Spitzer, Cenk Uygur and John Fugelsang.

Gore also led the network's coverage of both political conventions. Current said that its coverage will include analysis, "instant alerts regarding campaign spin," and fact-checking via social media.

Running along the side of the screen will be Twitter streams specific to topics and swing states, as well as to categories of users, like media figures, celebrities and team Obama and team Romney.

The first debate will take place on Oct. 3 at the University of Colorado in Denver.

Mitt Romney is furthering his hardline rhetoric on China this week in speeches and a campaign ad that hit President Obama for failing to do more to "stand up" to the Beijing government, including on piracy.

In addition to China's currency manipulation, the Romney ad says that China is "stealing American ideas and technology," and that Obama's policies "have cost us two million jobs."

The 2 million jobs figure actually comes from an International Trade Commission estimate of jobs that could be created if China enforced intellectual property laws.

"They steal intellectual property," Romney said in a speech on Tuesday. "What do I mean by that? Patents, designs, know-how, even counterfeit our goods....We can't compete with people who don't play fair, and I won't let that do on. I will stop it in its tracks."

Last week, Romney said that China's "theft of intellectual property has cost us more than two million jobs. And again, President Obama failed to protect those rights. It's bad enough that he won't stand up for companies and workers that are cheated by China. What's even worse is that his policies are making America less competitive.'

Romney's line of attack actually has shades of many in show biz who have urged greater action on piracy: They can't compete with free. But the Obama campaign today unveiled a new web video that targets Romney investments in Chinese firms.

"China is stealing American ideas and technology.' That's what's what Mitt Romney says in his campaign, but when it comes to making money those Chinese companies suit him just fine,” says a narrator in the video, per The Hill. “Romney invested in China's version of YouTube, a haven for stealing American videos, and Romney's even invested in a Chinese electronics company being sued by Microsoft for pirating its software."

FactCheck.org challenges Romney's 2 million jobs lost claim, and has yet to issue a story on the latest Obama web video. But this is one of the few moments when piracy has, however abstract, been cited in a national campaign.

Most of the studio chiefs support Obama's campaign, and MPAA chairman Chris Dodd, obviously an Obama supporter, dismissed Romney's Chinese rhetoric earlier this month. "In campaign season it has become almost routine for certain politicians to want to bang that drum so to speak," Dodd said. "So I don't think, I dont put great value in a a line at a political convention. A shot at China has been pretty standard fare."

Marking the passing of Andy Williams, The Atlantic's David A. Graham has a great piece on the singer's friendship with Robert F. Kennedy. On the night of June 5, 1968, it often has been reported that Williams was in Kennedy's suite at the Ambassador Hotel waiting for the senator to return after giving a victory speech to supporters in the ballroom below. But according to an interview he gave to the Daily Telegraph, Williams was not at the hotel but waiting to meet up with Kennedy later, watching the speech on TV along with his then-wife Claudine Longet.

The Daily Telegraph: "On the June night in 1968 that Bobby Kennedy won the election for California's delegates to the Democratic presidential convention, the senator concluded his televised victory speech with a secret signal to Andy and [his then-wife] Claudine, who were watching at home.

'It was almost midnight and we were going to meet up at the Factory, which was a very trendy disco. Claudine and I were half-dressed and were lounging on the bed waiting for Bobby to make the little hand gesture that was the signal to leave for the Factory. He made it, then walked away from the podium and we started to get dressed.'

"Williams was looking in the mirror putting on his tie when he heard chaotic noises coming from the television speakers. He ran to the set and discovered to his horror that his friend had been shot. Almost immediately after Kennedy left the ballroom at the Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles, he was met by a Jordanian gunman -- Sirhan Sirhan -- who fired several shots, gravely wounding the senator in the head."

At Kennedy's funeral, Williams sang "Battle Hymn of the Republic." "I started singing it and then everybody in the church just joined in, and it was the most moving moment I have ever experienced," Williams said.

Williams considered himself a Republican, and several years ago said that President Obama was following "Marxist theory." But as Graham points out, he also performed at a campaign event for the 1972 Democratic nominee George McGovern.

Williams rendition of "Battle Hymn of the Republic" at Kennedy's funeral is below.

Talk to Hollywood lobbyists about the ill-fated Stop Online Piracy Act, and they will tell you that they'd rather put it behind them. But the anti-piracy bill that stalled out in Congress earlier this year is still a flashpoint in the race between two Democrats in the San Fernando Valley, Brad Sherman and Howard Berman.

In a Valley Industry & Commerce Assn. debate on Tuesday, SOPA came up again, as it has in other forums, with Sherman contending that the legislation was so poorly written that foes could exploit it, and Berman defending the bill.

Jonah Lowenfeld of the Jewish Journal writes, "Sherman, who co-sponsored the legislation and said he agreed with its objectives, said the lawmakers had written the legislation in a way that played into its opponents’ arguments.

"'It was the worst script since ‘Ishtar,'" Sherman said, winning a few laughs from the 75 or so VICA members in attendance. 'It was the worst rollout since Edsel.'

"Berman, who is often referred to as 'the Congressman from Hollywood' thanks to his advocacy for entertainment industry interests, and also co-sponsored the legislation, defended SOPA, calling the opponents’ arguments 'bogus.' He went on to accuse Sherman of kowtowing to public opinion, and said that Republican Congressman Darell Issa, who forcefully opposed the legislation, endorsed Berman in April specifically because he was confident that he and Berman could 'go into a closed room and ... work out the differences on SOPA to provide something effective to deal with the scourge of digital theft.'"

Berman has commanded a big lead over Sherman when it comes to contributions from Hollywood. According to the Center for Responsive Politics, he is the top recipient of showbiz money of all congressional candidates this cycle. But a recent KABC poll showed Sherman with a 13-point lead over Berman.

They are facing each other because of redistricting, and an open primary in June in which the two top vote getters went on to the general election.

There's some puzzlement as to why Madonna, in telling D.C. concertgoers on Monday night to vote for President Obama, called him a "black Muslim." Was it ironic, or does she really believe it? Anyhow, far from being a non-endorsement, endorsement, she seemed to be making the case for his re-election, even if it is doubtful she'll show up on the campaign trail anytime soon as an official campaign surrogate.

 

Jon Bon Jovi, Jennifer Hudson and Stevie Wonder will perform at a fundraiser for President Obama on Oct. 7 at Los Angeles' Nokia Theater, added to a bill that includes Earth, Wind & Fire and Katy Perry.

The event is expected to be Obama's final Los Angeles fund-raising visit before the election, and also will include an intimate dinner for high-dollar donors after the concert event.

Tickets for the concert start at $250 per person, and run to $2,500 per person for a VIP lounge pass and lower orchestra seating, according to an invite.

The event is being billed as a "30 Days to Victory" concert.

Also appearing with Obama will be San Antonio Mayor Julian Castro.

Arnold Schwarzenegger launched a new think tank at USC on Monday devoted to "post-partisanship," but what was clear was that he will draw on Hollywood in his foray into academia.

The inaugural symposium of the USC Schwarzenegger Institute for State and Global Policy included a dose of policymakers and politicos, but also a panel devoted to innovation included all entertainment industry figures, including Schwarzenegger, Lionsgate co-chairman Rob Friedman, Imagine Entertainment chairman Brian Grazer, Interscope Geffen A&M chairman Jimmy Iovine and U Studios president and COO Ron Meyer.

The participation was significant in that moderator Ben Smith cited the growing influence of Silicon Valley not only as an economic engine but in politics. He noted that a recently released list of Obama campaign bundlers showed the tech industry outpacing Hollywood when it came to raising money.

Asked whether he was concerned about this, Meyer said, "They certainly have a lot more money than we do."

But he said that "there's a lot of advantages" for Hollywood when it comes to Silicon Valley, as tech needs content.

"We just need to find a more symbiotic relationship," he said.

Said Friedman, "It is symbiotic. There are just certain issues we don't have in common, like piracy."

Iovine said that the industry shouldn't be afraid to use its leverage in dealing with tech companies, even to the point of withholding content from sites like YouTube, in order to extract more favorable terms.

"We have to be smart about this now, not be intimidated, and build our own platforms," said Iovine, sporting a backwards baseball cap and T-shirt with a photo of Bruce Springsteen from his Born to Run album.

He pointed to his own success in the launch of Dr. Dre headphones, a venture inspired in part by the rampant piracy that was crushing the music industry. What he was able to do, he said, was to "market it though our culture, that we designed, that we built, that we control."

While the movie business has learned lessons from music, Meyer noted, a vexing problem is the changing nature of piracy. There's also a difference in cultures that has bought the film business more time.

"People are used to getting music for nothing," he said. "Movies are different."

As Friedman said, "Our ice cube is melting a lot slower than the music business."

In a diversion from the topics at hand, Meyer was asked about "chatter" that plans are in the works for his retirement from U, a company he has led since 1995 through six different owners.

Meyer said he has "I wouldn't know what to do retiring, so no. I have no plans to retire."

"I like what I am doing, and as long as they will have me, I can stay."

The panel inevitably focused on the role of entertainment in shaping political opinion, including in some of Schwarzenegger's signature initiatives as governor, like climate change.

During the recession, public opinion may have tilted away from a sense of urgency on climate initiatives, but Schwarzenegger said that he held out hope that the power of movies could help draw attention as it has in the past. He said there needed to be a sequel to "An Inconvenient Truth," perhaps with "different people who can jump in" and take Al Gore's role in making the case for action.

"The power of films and television is enormous," Schwarzenegger said. "It is much more powerful than politicians could ever be" in convincing the public of a need to solve a problem.

He cited efforts in the 1970s to promote fitness. Despite endless studies and expert panels, it took "Saturday Night Fever" and the subsequent launch of the disco craze to get people off their feet, he noted. "All of the policy and debates couldn't come close to the calorie counts that (disco) can burn off."

Schwarzenegger's institute will operate under the Sol Price School of Public Policy, with Bonnie Reiss as global director and Nancy Staudt as academic director. The former governor also will have a professorship. His unlikely career trajectory was perhaps evident when USC President C.L. Max Nikias, in delivering a glowing introduction to Schwarzenegger, mistakenly said that he was once the winner of the Miss Universe contest.

Reiss indicated that the institute would cover the media's role, as well as the impact of celebrity in drawing attention to issues and causes, as Sean Penn has done with Haiti, George Clooney with the Sudan and Brad Pitt with New Orleans.

Schwarzenegger has returned to acting with "The Expendables 2" and the upcoming "The Last Stand," and he frequently promotes fitness on Twitter.

So it was apparent through the daylong symposium that the institute will play a big role in carrying out Schwarzenegger's legacy as governor, in particular efforts that he said required him to reach across the aisle or to challenge the status quo. He cited not just climate change but healthcare and redistricting reform.

At a morning panel, moderated by Cokie Roberts, he appeared with three former governors --- Tom Ridge, Bill Richardson and Charlie Crist--- as well as former Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle and current Sen. John McCain (R-Arizona).

They all bemoaned the hyperpartisanship in Washington, and even the role that the media plays in delivering not so much what the public needs to know, but what they want to know.

A bit provocatively, McCain also cited the influence of money into politics, singling out the Obama campaign and SuperPAC expenditures on negative ads over the past summer about Mitt Romney. Citing an estimate of $9 billion being spent overall this cycle, from both parties and interest groups, he predicted "major scandals" from all the money flowing in, and then new calls for reform.

He suggested that the urgency for Congress to change will come from record low approval ratings, down to 11% in some polls.

"We are down to paid staffers and blood relatives," McCain said.

While the institute will be dedicated to "action," as Schwarzenegger said, perhaps the most urgent test for Washington will be the "fiscal cliff" looming, something that could send the economy into a new tailspin.

But McCain said that there was no need to organize new commissions or create new studies.

"The answer to our fiscal cliff is out there," he said. "It's called Simpson-Bowles."

 

Mitt Romney's fundraiser at the Beverly Hilton on Saturday drew a sizable turnout among show biz figures, many of whom have long been supporters of GOP candidates.

Among those present were Linda and Jerry Bruckheimer, Frank and Katherine Price, Burt Sugarman, Terry Semel, Gary Sinise, Patricia Heaton, John O'Hurley, Kerri Turner, Lionel Chetwynd, Pat Boone and Connie Stevens, according to a source who was present. David Foster performed, as did Robert Davi, who sang Frank Sinatra's "My Country."

"The mood was amazing," said the source. "Really upbeat, exciting." Also present was Romney's wife Ann, who spoke before her husband. According to press reports, Romney spoke of his wife's emergency landing in Denver on Friday, when smoke filled the cabin as she and a campaign team were headed to Los Angeles.

Romney's predecessors as the GOP standard bearers, George W. Bush and John McCain, each held Hollywood-centric events early in their campaigns.

By contrast, Romney didn't enter the race with the same connections to the industry as Bush and McCain had, so the turnout was significant in showing that show biz conservatives and even self-described independents are still behind Romney. Democrats greatly outnumber Republicans in the industry --- the split has been running about 72% to 28% according to fundraising figures from the Center for Responsive Politics. But the number of conservatives in the business is still a significant and even visible share, something that Clint Eastwood pointed out when he spoke at the Republican National Convention.

Mitt Romney appeared at a fundraiser in Beverly Hills on Saturday where supporters made a point of showing that, despite a rough week for the campaign and even criticism from some fellow Republicans, his campaign was still on track.

About 1,500 donors attended the event at the Beverly Hilton Hotel, with about $6 million raised, per the Los Angeles Times.
Dennis Miller and producer David Foster spoke to the crowd.

The Times' Seema Mehta wrote that portions of the evening were open to some press coverage, including a remark that Romney gave about the leftward tilt of Los Angeles' Westside. In fact, he said that he had had lunch with a very famous liberal actor.

"I know in some of the communities around this particular hotel it's hard to let people know you're conservative without them looking at you funny," Romney said, per the Times. He said that his lunch was with "a very famous actor --- very famous. Very liberal. I won't tell you his name or he'd shoot me...He pulled me aside, he said, 'In this town, you really can't get work unless you're known as a liberal,' and he said, 'But no one knows how I really vote.' And there are a lot of people that feel that way."

Tantalizing --- let the guessing game begin.

"Saturday Night Live" takes aim at "Fox & Friends" in its special election Thursday edition, spoofing how the Fox News morning show spins the bad news, like that of the "47%' video.

The skit, via Mediaite, is here.

The White House has selected Cheryl Saban, a philanthropist and wife of mogul Haim Saban, to serve as representative to the upcoming session of the U.N. General Assembly.

Cheryl Saban has been one of Los Angeles' most prominent philanthropists for causes including children's health, women's empowerment and welfare. Her husband was once one of the top donors to the Democratic party, and, after strongly supporting Hillary Clinton in the 2008 race, had a cool relationship to the Obama campaign.

But that has changed, as he gave to the re-election campaign late last year, hosted a fundraiser with Bill Clinton to raise money for this year's convention and has contributed to the pro-Obama SuperPAC Priorities USA, along with two others supporting Democratic candidates. Nevertheless, Democrats are anxious for him and other megadonors to step forward and contribute more to try to overcome a Republican advantage in outside money.

Cheryl Saban founded the nonprofit Women's Self Worth Foundation in 2009, and serves on the boards of the Saban Research Institute, Girls Inc. and Children's Hospital Los Angeles.

A Los Angeles Superior Court Judge on Thursday denied an actress' effort to get YouTube to remove the incdendiary anti-Muslim video in which she appears.

Cindy Lee Garcia, who appears in the movie that has sparked protests throughout the Middle East, said that she was deceived into the movie by the film's producer, Sam Bacile. Instead of a historical film about the Middle East, the movie was made into a hit piece on the Prophet Mohammed. Garcia sued on Wednesday, citing a variety of claims and charging that the video has put her personal safety at risk.

But Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Luis A. Lavin said that he could would not grant a temporary restraining order that would require the Google and YouTube remove the video. He found fault with Garcia's claim, including that it lacked a contract.

A mystery is what was signed. At a press conference outside the court, Garcia's attorney, Cris Armenta, said that they "haven't been able to locate one." She reiterated that they believe it is irrelevant to the case because they are claiming that Garcia was fraudulently told about the nature of the project.

Timothy L. Alger, appearing on behalf of Google and YouTube, argued that Garcia's claim was superceded by the Communications Decency Act of 1996, which limits states from extending liability to third parties.

He also said that her privacy and right of publicity claims did not pass muster because she was playing a character. An example, he said, would be Arnold Schwarzenegger claiming that the "Terminator" movies reflected badly on him because he appeared as a cyborg.

But Armenta, who appeared in court with Garcia, said Schwarzenegger "signed on to act as a cyborg. Ms. Garcia did not sign on to be a bigot."

Bacile, identified as Nakoula Basseley Nakoula, has not yet been served with the suit. He was not present at the hearing in downtown Los Angeles.

Armenta said after the hearing that she planned to file a new claim with a trial court judge.

David Letterman is responding to Mitt Romney's contention, in the fundraising video leaked this week, that the late-night host "hates" him because he's done "The Tonight Show with Jay Leno" more often than "Late Show."

CBS released this video of Letterman responding to Romney, which at once skewers the Republican nominee and at the same time extends an invitation for him to appear on "Late Show." It probably won't erase any preconceptions that Letterman favors President Obama --- who appeared on the show on Tuesday.

President Obama's appearance on "Late Show with David Letterman" on Tuesday gave the show its best overnight rating since February, 2010, CBS said.

"Late Show" averaged a 4.0/10, up 60% from the year-to-date Tuesday average and up 67% from its Monday through Friday average from the 2011-12 season. The last gih mark for the show came on Feb. 9, 2010, with guests Jennifer Garner, Brooklyn Decker and Sade.

According to ABC, "Live with Kelly & Michael," which featured an interview with the Romneys, grew its day-to-day numbers by 3% in households, with a 3.1/11 rating, as well as among women 25-54, with 1.8/12. Compared to ratings from a year ago, it grew by 7% in homes and 13% in women 25-54.

The ratings are for overnight markets.

In the campaign fundraising video posted by Mother Jones magazine, Mitt Romney is heard talking of the "high risk" of going on "The View," noting that only one of the hosts is a conservative. But today, Elizabeth Hasselbeck announced that Romney would be guesting on the show some time in October.

 

An actress featured in the incendiary video “Innocence of Muslims” has filed suit against the movie’s producer as well as YouTube, seeking to have the video removed as she claims fraud, invasion of privacy, slader and violation of her right of publicty.

Cindy Lee Garcia, who came forward last week to express dismay at the project that triggered protests throughout the Middle East, filed her claim on Wednesday in Los Angeles Superior Court in Los Angeles. Listed as defendant is Nakoula Basseley Nakoula, also known as Sam Bacile, identified as one of the producer of the film. Also named as defendants are Google and YouTube.

She claims that in July of 2011, she responded to a casting call in Backstage for a project called “Desert Warrior,” and that Bacile “represented to her that the Film was indeed an adventure film and about ancient Egyptians.”

Given pages of the script for “Desert Warrior,” her suit states that “there was no mention of ‘Mohammed’ during the filming or on the set. There were no references made to religion nor was there any sexual content of which Ms. Garcia was aware.”

Her suit also claims that her acting work “has been changed grotesquely to make it appear that Ms. Garcia voluntarily performed in a hateful anti-Islamic production. The Film is vile and reprehensible.”

She also claims that the voices of her and her castmates were dubbed into Arabic.

After the film set off violence and protests in the Middle East, her suit said that she received death threats and that her family, “fearing for their own safety, informed her that she was no longer permitted to see her grandchildren, whom she previously babysat regularly.”

She also said in her suit that she was fired from her job, “in as much as she is now considered a target and the safety of those in her presence cannot be guaranteed.”

She also said that she requested that YouTube remove the film, but informed her in writing that they would decline to remove the content.

Her claim for slander charges that statements were literally “put in her mouth,” and that she “never called the founder of Islam a child molester, either on the set of the Film or at any other place or time.” In her claim of invasion of privacy, her suit states that the film was made to appear as if “she made outrageously bigoted statements that she never said and does not endorse.”

She is seeking unspecified damages and injunctive relief.

Update: Cris Armenta, who is representing Garcia, said that is is "currently unknown" whether there is a contract that her client signed, but she suggested that it would essentially be irrelevant to the claim. "I don't care how broad it is," she said. "Our view is it was induced by fraud."

She said that they have served the suit on Nakoula's criminal defense attorney, his federal probation officer and taped it to the front door of his home, although not him personally.

Garcia is also represented by Credence Sol, a civil litigator in France.

They will be seeking a temporary restraining order at a hearing on Thursday in Los Angeles Superior Court.

Update

Katy Perry will perform at a concert fundraiser for President Obama at Los Angeles' Nokia Theater, according to campaign sources.

The concert event --- with tickets starting at $250 per person --- is expected to be Obama's final Los Angeles visit before the election.

The event will be followed by a dinner, with tickets starting at $25,000 per person.

News of Perry's performance was first reported in The Hollywood Reporter.

An update: Some organizers caution that entertainment has not been finalized yet, and that the lineup is still fluid, although some fundraisers are promoting Perry in their pitches.

The Courage Campaign, the progressive org founded by Rick Jacobs, holds its annual Spirit of Courage awards on Thursday at the Peterson Museum. Honorees this year include California Attorney General Kamala Harris; Brian Burke, president and general manager of the Toronto Maple Leafs and Patrick Burke, scout for the Philadelphia Flyers.

Patrick Burke and Brian Bruke are being honored for the You Can Play project, which is pushing for an atmosphere of inclusion for LGBT atheletes.

President Obama's final fundraiser of this evening too him to Manhattan's 40/40 Club, a $40,000 per person event that drew about 100 donors.

Undoubtedly, a draw was the presence of co-hosts Jay-Z and Beyonce, who said very little in introducing Obama, according to a pool report.

But referring to them as "J" and "B," Obama thanked them for their "friendship," and told the crowd, "Michelle, Sasha and Malia are mad at me because they aren't here."

He said the couple has been generous to his children. "Beyonce
could not be a better role model for my girls."

He said he and Jay-Z have a lot of common. "We both have daughters and
our wives are more popular than we are. So, you know, we've got a
little bond there. It's hard but it's okay."

Obama echoed many of his campaign themes, and warned supporters not to get "complacent."

"We've made history in the past and we're going to make history in the
next seven weeks."

A kindergarten teacher from Pennsylvania, Ericka Dungee, was the winner of an online contest in which entrants won tickets to the fundraiser.

Harold Holzer, perhaps the foremost Lincoln scholar alive today, wasn't jarred by the bits we've seen of Daniel Day-Lewis' portrayal in the trailer for Steven Spielberg's "Lincoln." The high-pitched voice is what was surprising to those expecting Hal Holbrook, Gregory Peck or Disneyland's Mr. Lincoln.

Holzer tells Slate's Forrest Wickman: "Uncanny, convincing, and historically right." Wickman write, "Holzer pointed specifically to 'the combined Kentucky-Hoosier twang' and, again, 'the surprisingly high-pitched voice.' After all, as Holzer reaffirmed, 'Lincoln didn’t growl—in fact some people said he whined!'"

The trailer is below:

President Obama travelled to Manhattan today, stopping at the Ed Sullivan Theater to tape an appearance for this night's "Late Show with David Letterman."

Based on a pool report, Obama appears to have called Romney's comments a mistake, even though the candidate has not backed down from the remarks. Romney appeared on Fox News this afternoon to further respond to criticism of his remarks.

Letterman asked him about the Romney video, and per the pool report, Obama said, "One of the things I learned as president is you represent the entire country. If you want to be president, you have to work for everyone.''

''All of us make mistakes..."What I think people want to make sure of, though, is you’re not
writing off a big chunk of the country...This is a big country. And people disagree a lot but
one thing I’ve never tried to do and I think none of us can do in public office is suggest that because somebody doesn’t agree with me that they’re vicitms or they’re unpatriotic."

"There are not a lot of people out there who think they’re victims,” he said. “There are not a lot of people who think they’re entitled to something.”

“We’ve got some obligations to each other, and there’s nothing wrong with us giving each other a helping hand so that that single mom’s kid, even after all the work she’s done, can afford to go to college.”

“When I won in 2008, 47 percent of the American people voted for John McCain,” Obama said. “They didn’t vote for me and what I said on election night was: ‘Even though you didn’t vote for me, I hear your voices, and I’m going to work as hard as I can to be your president.’”

Obama also commented on the violence in Lebanon and the death of American ambassador Chris Stevens as well as the video that has sparked protests throughout the region.

"The message we have to send to the Muslim world is that we expect you to work with us, to keep our people safe, and as offensive as this video was -- and obviously we denounced it, the United States government had nothing to do with it -- that's never an excuse for violence."

Obama will appear later this evening at a fundraiser featuring Jay Z and Beyonce.

Letterman did get in a Clint Eastwood joke, asking Obama whether he wanted to say anything to the empty chair next to him.

Photo: CBS.

 

Mitt Romney has made no apologies for the video, his campaign's Libya statement last week, or uneasiness among the conservative establishment over how his campaign has been run. But as he struggles to reclaim momentum, Clint Eastwood doesn't seem to have any trouble on his press tour for his next movie, "Trouble With the Curve." He doesn't make any apologies for his performance at the Republican National Convention, as he says that is just the way he is. And on "The Ellen Show," hosted by a donor and supporter of President Obama's, he's actually a bigger defender of libertarian views than he is Republicans or the Romney campaign. If he was polarizing in the Tampa arena, he's likable here.

"It was an interesting reaction," Eastwood said of the fallout from his convention speech. "The Democrats who were watching it thought I was going senile and the Republicans knew I was."

"I was just actually trying to enjoy myself in a lot of ways."

Eastwood also talks about his support for same-sex marriage, calling "part of the libertarian idea of leaving everyone alone."

He told Extra on Monday, “I figure if somebody’s dumb enough to ask me to go to a political convention and say something, they’re gonna have to take what they get.” That's not exactly a ringing endorsement of the smarts of the Romney campaign. Moreover, he told "Good Morning America" that he thought that Obama was "charming," even though he has not backed away from criticism of the President.

Watch the interview, and you will see he's genuinely unfazed by all of the reaction, including a "Saturday Night Live" skit, and a perception in the D.C. media that his speech may have marked a turning point in the campaign.

 

 

The Mother Jones release of the full Mitt Romney fundraising video includes a few nuggets of the candidate commenting on his decision not to appear on "Saturday Night Live."

“You want to show that you are fun and you’re good person, but you also want to appear presidential,” Romney said. He feared that such an appearance would come across as "slapstick."

Romney also noted that he had guested on "The View" twice, but saw risks because of only one conservative was on the show. Ironically, the release of the full secret video comes on the same day that Romney and his wife Ann appeared on "Live! with Kelly and Michael," where they talk, among other things, what they wear to bed.

The complete video is here and here.

Mitt Romney is defending his remarks in the now infamous "47 percent" video as inelegantly stated, but his campaign's hasty press conference last night does not mark the end of it. Mother Jones released more footage this morning, and plans to release the entirety later today.

The baffling question is why Romney felt so free as to deliver such remarks in the first place, given is campaign's propensity for caution, dozens of other examples of politicians caught saying embarrassing things on tape, and the general sentiment among campaigns that in the digital age cameras and recording devices are everywhere. It's not even like it's a new concept: George Allen was burned by the YouTube "macaca" video at a campaign event in 2006; and Barack Obama was hurt by the impolitic "clinging" to guns and religion remarks at a campaign fundraiser in 2008.

For some time now there has been a push-pull among presidential campaigns and the media over how much access should be given to fundraisers. The Obama campaign opened up most of theirs to at least some limited media coverage in 2008; the Romney campaign started granting access in the spring.

But as was the case with Romney's May 17 event, campaigns do not grant access to some of the most candid moments, the Q&As, when the high dollar donors press candidates on issues that they are most concerned about. This can run the gamut from the very trivial to the very obvious, and the questions often say more about the person asking the question than it does the way that the politician answers them. Last fall, when Obama attended a dinner in West Hollywood for high-dollar donors, sources say comedian and entrepreneur Byron Allen asked him a rather pointed and critical question of why his administration hadn't done more to stop media consolidation, while Danny DeVito's query went on so long that observers remember it more as a speech.At a Silicon Valley fundraiser around the same time, Lady Gaga asked Obama a question about school bullying. The press wasn't there, but word sure leaked out quickly.

But campaigns still seem to operate under the notion that what gets said at Q&As won't leave the room, as if donors or anyone willing to pay $50,000 or so a ticket is under any obligation not to spill the beans. Donors sometimes have to check cell phones and cameras at the door --- an even more awkward request given the sums of money they are paying to be there --- but as we see with the Romney video, it's not difficult to still get some kind of device in. The idea is that for the huge sums donors are paying to get in, they are also gaining access to the candidate giving more candid comments, although the idea that none of what gets said will ever get out still seems a bit naive given that they are often speaking before dozens of people.

Had some kind of press been allowed in, or even donors free to record or photograph at their will, it's safe to assume that Romney's remarks would have been at the very least, more elegantly stated. Transparency can be a burden but also a saving grace.

Update: Via Daily Dish is this Romney quote, from the New York Times in 2007: “Running for president in the YouTube era, you realize you have to be very judicious in what you say,” Mr. Romney said. “You have to be careful with your humor. You have to recognize that anytime you’re running for the presidency of the United States, you’re on.”

 

Jon Stewart and Bill O'Reilly will stage "The Rumble in the Air Conditioned Auditorium," a 90-minute debate from George Washington University in Washington on Oct. 6.

The event, to be moderated by E.D. Hill, will pit the Comedy Central host against the Fox News primetime star, who are often at odds yet have guested on each other's show in what is generally playful sparring.

Tickets to the event start at $75 per person, and it will be streamed live for $4.75. Half of the net profits from the event will go to charitable causes. Anyone who pre-orders online before Oct. 1 will have a chance to submit a written question to be asked during the debate.

"I'm excited to debate Mr. O'Reilly," Stewart said. "I believe this will be a very enjoyable night for fans of our programs, partisans and people who just enjoy yelling."

O'Reilly said, "I had no idea my agent signed me up for this. How can I get out of it?"

In advance of the 2010 midterms, Stewart and Stephen Colbert staged the Rally to Restore Sanity and/or Fear, drawing about 210,000 people to the Mall in Washington for an event that called for improving political discourse.

Former California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger will kickoff the new USC Schwarzenegger Institute with a daylong symposium on Sept. 24.

Schwarzenegger, former Florida Gov. Charlie Crist, former Senate majority leader Tom Daschle, Sen. John McCain (R-Arizona), former New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson and former Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge will participate in a morning panel on "post-partisanship." Cokie Roberts will moderate.

A noontime luncheon will feature  R.K. Pachauri, chair of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change and Long Beach Mayor Bob Foster talking about "local solutions to global problems," with Conan Nolan as moderator.

An afternoon panel features James Cameron, Rob Friedman, Jimmy Iovine, Brian Grazer, Ron Meyer and Schwarzenegger talking "The Power of People and Innovation – Media/Hollywood Leaders’ Perspectives." Ben Smith of Buzzfeed will moderate.

Schwarzenegger announced the formation of the institute last month.

The invite is here.

Bonnie Reiss, an entertainment attorney who served in Schwarzenegger's administration, is global director of the institute.

 

 

Jimmy Buffett will perform a mini-concert, Judy Collins will do dinner cabaret, and Anna Wintour and Scarlett Johansson talk Paris fashion week.

The Obama campaign is making heavy use of celebrity surrogates for the final stretch, relying on a series of famous names including Eddie Vedder, James Taylor, Gwyneth Paltrow, Yo-Yo Ma and Tom Ford for fund-raising events from now until Election Day. Only a handful of events feature appearances by President Obama or First Lady Michelle Obama, although the President appears in Manhattan on Tuesday for a fundraiser featuring Beyonce and Jay Z.

It used to be that campaigns were a bit more cautious about deploying celebrities this close to Election Day, but the dynamics are different for fundraising events, in which media access usually is limited. For the Obama campaign, the risks appear to be outweighed by the rewards with the pressure to raise money given the warchest coming from pro-Romney SuperPACs.

Here are some of the events coming up in the next six weeks:

Sept. 19: Gwyneth Paltrow, Anna Wintour and Tom Ford co-host a dinner at Mark's Club in London, with tickets starting at $15,000 per person.

Sept. 19: James Taylor performs at a "chords and conversation" event in Silicon Valley, with tickets starting at $20,000 per person.

Sept. 20: Eddie Vedder performs for an appearance by Obama at the Tampa, Fla. home of Lisa DeBartolo and Don Miggs, with tickets starting at $20,000 per person.

Sept. 21: Leon Fleisher, Pamela Frank, Hilary Hahn, Jaime Laredo and Yo-Yo Ma perform at a fundraiser in Phoenix, Md.

Sept. 22: James Taylor performs at a "Chords and Conversation" event at the Montecito home of Victoria Riskin and Davind Rintels.

Sept. 24: Yo-Yo Ma performs at the Wellesley, Mass. home of Cynthia Strauss and Harry Sherr, with tickets starting at $2,500 per person.

Sept. 24: Artists for Obama unveils the Obama Gemini Portfolio, at Gemini G.E.L at Joni Moisant Weyl gallery in Manhattan.

Sept. 29: Diane Greene, Douglas Osheroff and Eric Schmidt are special guests at a Tech for Obama event at the Atherton, Calif. home of Caroline Donahue. Tickets start at $250 per person.

Oct. 1: Scarlett Johansson and Anna Wintour co-host a Paris Fashion Week reception at La Maison 8, with tickets starting at $2,500 per person.

Oct. 5: Judy Collins headlines a cabaret concert at Solera in Minneapolis, with tickets starting at $1,000 per person.

Oct. 5: The National performs at Queen City Club in Cincinnati, with Debbie Wasserman Schultz among the speakers. Tickets start at $500 per person.

Oct. 7: President Obama appears at a fundraising gala at the Nokia Theater in downtown Los Angeles.

Oct. 12: Jimmy Buffett performs at the Orlando, Fla. home of John Morgan, with tickets starting at $500 per person.

Oct. 12: James Taylor performs at the Blowing Rock, N.C. home of Bonnie and Jamie Schaefer, with tickets starting at $500 per person.

Oct. 26: James Taylor performs at the Norwich, Vt. home of Jane and Bill Stetson, with tickets starting at $2,500 per person.

 

During the day on Tuesday, Mitt and Ann Romney sit down with Kelly Ripa and Michael Strahan, and later that night, President Obama chats with David Letterman.

Given that we already know from a pool report much of what the Romneys will say on "Live! With Kelly and Michael," as their appearance was taped on Friday, and that Obama already has appeared on "Late Show with David Letterman" several times, by most expectations the guest spots will be light-hearted and humanizing. They will likely fulfill campaigns' goals of reaching voters who may not otherwise be paying much attention, or who may be among the small cadre of undecided voters.

There is not much data on the impact that daytime and late-night talk campaign stops have on the race itself, but they traditionally do provide a ratings boost for the shows.

These type of guest shots largely got their start with the success that Bill Clinton had in playing sax on "The Arsenio Hall Show" in 1992, and accelerated after George W. Bush and Al Gore each appeared on "The Oprah Winfrey Show" in the fall of 2000. Last cycle saw the entry of "Entertainment Tonight" and "Access Hollywood" as spots for candidates to do People-esque interviews, and that has continued in 2012. Oprah Winfrey's endorsement of Obama in 2007 underscored the sway that a daytime persona can have.

Yet given that these shows are perceived to be "soft," they do carry a degree of risk, particularly when serious and unpredictable events are unfolding. As protests spread across the Middle East, how does it look if Mitt is talking Snooki or Obama is yukking it up with Letterman?

Yet as I wrote in November, campaigns have evolved in the weight they place on the softer side of the media. On the day that accusations of sexual harassment were publicly leveled at presidential candidate Herman Cain, he didn't cancel an appearance on  "Jimmy Kimmel Live!" but went ahead anyway to do damage control.

Perhaps the most infamous lesson learned was by the McCain campaign in 2008. The week that Lehman Brothers collapsed, and the economy was in freefall, McCain was scheduled to go on Letterman. Instead, he cancelled, but scheduled an interview with CBS News anchor Katie Couric. The result was withering ridicule from the late-night host.

McCain's senior adviser Steve Schmidt still considers the decision a mistake.

As I wrote last year, "Schmidt said there was a big internal debate in the campaign on whether to cancel. Given that the campaign was trying to convey the gravity of the financial crisis, skipping Letterman was the conventional wisdom, but 'it was old wisdom,' Schmidt said. 'The notion that voters filter the content depending on the type of show it is on is wrong,' he said, adding that with voters getting their information from so many non traditional sources, going on Letterman would have given McCain the chance to explain, without a filter, the context of his decision to suspend his campaign.

Romney's appearance --- which generated headlines not just for Snooki, but for the candidate's suggestion that he wears little to bed --- may take on even greater importance this cycle as his campaign tries to overcome a polling deficit among women voters, as well as a perception that he is awkward in the campaign stump.

So instead of these appearances by Romney and Obama giving voters a rare glimpse into the softer side of themselves, they actually are now part of the routine. This isn't the end of the softer part of the fall campaign, but the start.

Photo: ABC

Harvey Weinstein is among President Obama's campaign bundlers, having hosted fundraisers for the commander-in-chief twice at home in Manhattan and Connecticut. Today he is making headlines for a comment he gave to the BBC, in which he said that conservative British Prime Minister David Cameron told a group of people during the Olympics that England is against Mitt Romney.

"I also witnessed Prime Minister David Cameron say to a group of people, myself included, that Mitt Romney had that unique distinction of uniting all of England against him with his various remarks," Weinstein said.

Romney caused a stir on the eve of the Olympics in August, questioning British preparedness for the Games. His remarks drew a rebuke from Cameron, as well as some irate headlines in the British press.

 

Given how influential "Saturday Night Live" was in the last cycle in shaping perceptions of Sarah Palin's character --- Tina Fey won an Emmy for her portrayal --- there was a lot of attention paid to how "Saturday Night Live" would size up the feld so far. The verdict: Not bad. Much of the humor spoofed well-worn material: Mitt's awkward persona, Clint & the empty chair, Obama's luck. So the show had some catching up to do, with the coming debates providing what may be the freshest opportinities for satire. The highlight on Saturday was the debut of Jay Pharaoh as Obama, replacing Fred Armisen.

 

 

Mitt Romney treks to Los Angeles on Monday for an address before the U.S, Hispanic Chamber of Commerce. The lunchtime event will be held at the J.W. Marriott downtown.

Los Angeles City Councilman Eric Garcetti has a cameo in the upcoming Jake Gyllenhaal pic "End of Watch" playing the mayor of Los Angeles. That just happens to be the office the Garcetti is seeking, with a heavy amount of support coming from Hollywood.

So taking a cue from the Obama campaign, which has featured celebrities fronting contests in which donors can win tickets to star-filled fundraisers, the Garcetti campaign held a drawing where the winner could attend a special screening of "End of Watch" with Garcetti, Gyllenhaal and other supporters today. The suggested contribution was $50.

This isn't the first time that Garcetti has portrayed the mayor of L.A. He appeared on an episode of "the Closer" last year. His father, former District Attorney Gil Garcetti, is consulting producer for the show.

 

Mitt and Ann Romney taped their appearance on "Live with Kelly and Michael," the syndicated talk show hosted by Kelly Ripa and Michael Strahan. Judging from the pool report, the conversation was light, bright and personable --- just what the campaign wants in the final stretch. Expect more appearances on daytime talk and late night comedy from now until Election Day, as campaigns see this as a way of reaching the very few voters who may not be paying attention to politics --- or may be doing their best to avoid it altogether.

Here's what was gleaned from the Romney's interview: Mitt sees Gene Hackman playing himself in a movie, Michelle Pfieffer playing Ann. In a visit to the White House during the years of George W. Bush, Ann went exploring through the Executive Mansion, opened one door and there was the President getting a massage. When she saw Bush later that day, she was embarrassed, but he told her, "I look pretty good, don't I?" And both of the Romneys reaffirmed what their favorite TV show is: "Modern Family." Mitt also is a Snooki fan.

None of this is going to shed light on what kind of a president Mitt Romney will be, but it is now part of the process. (Could you imagine the Nixons doing this?) Ripa asked the Romneys about some of their guilty pleasures, and for those who are satiated on the whole election after a long campaign, their interview itself probably fits in that category.

The full pool transcript here.

 

 

Details are still being worked out for President Obama's Oct. 7 visit to Los Angeles for what is in all likelihood his final fundraiser in the city before the election, but the event is being billed as the "30 Days to Victory Concert and Dinner" at the Nokia Theater.

"This will be a large scale event with multiple performers and speakers preceding the President’s remarks," reads an invite to the event. Tickets will be sold through Ticketmaster, priced from $250 to $5,000, with a limited number of tickets available for $44. A $10,000 ticket gets a photo and VIP access, according to the invite.

The concert will be followed by a high-dollar dinner at a nearby restaurant, with tickets starting at $25,000 or available to those who raise $250,000. The higher price point of $40,000 or those raising $500,000 includes a greet, photo and dinner.

Obama's final L.A. events before the 2008 election raised more than $10 million, raised from a Barbra Streisand concert and a dinner at Greystone mansion.

Update: The dinner will be priced at $50,000 per couple, and $75,000 per couple as cohosts.

 

Some of the actors who appear in "Innocence of Muslims" are speaking out against it, and are claiming that they were duped into believing that the project was a more generic, albeit shoddily produced, film about the ancient Middle East.

Tim Dax, who has acted in gay porn, told the blog Joe.My.God that he never "saw a full script or any lines after the day we shot them."  He said that he was paid for a week and a half of work (at $75 per day), and that the voice over work in the film is "dubious at best." The project, he wrote in an email to the blog, also had a different title, "Desert Storm." An actress in the movie, Cindy Lee Garcia, told Gawker that she had no idea that the movie would portray the prophet Muhammad.

"It was going to be a film based on how things were 2,000 years ago," Garcia said. "It wasn't based on anything to do with religion, it was just on how things were run in Egypt. There wasn't anything about Mohammed or Muslims or anything."

Gawker also has posted a 2011 casting notice for the project, with a series of roles but no performer playing Muhammad. It says that the project would shoot for 18 days in August of last year, was open to SAG and non-SAG actors and that it would be called "Desert Warrior." The director is listed as Alan Roberts.

With the cast and crew having issued a statement on Wednesday claiming that they were "grossly misled about its intent and purpose," it raises the question of whether they would have some kind of legal recourse against its makers, whose identities still are the subject of some mystery.

Alan Brunswick, labor and employment attorney at Manatt, Phelps & Phillips, is skeptical and says that this "might be a tough case for them." On sets, he wrote via e-mail, "scripts are changed on set quite frequently, so not sure that means that she or anyone else was duped."

Jonathan Faber, an attorney with Luminary Group who specializes in the right of publicity, said that an obvious starting point is in what contracts they may have secured.

"If they signed an agreement and gave full editorial rights, as likely could be the case, then it would be hard for them to claim after the fact that a wrong was committed," he wrote via email. "It could come down to a question of degree --- almost every actor cedes editorial discretion to the director --- but to what extent were they misled and misrepresented? If that could be substantiated, the claim could sound in right of publicity and right of privacy. There could be some difficulty in navigating possible exemptions for movies in a given state's right of publicity statute --- but we have determined what state such a claim could be brought in, for one thing."

It's not hard to see why some of the actors are stepping forward: "Innocence of Muslims" may be the most exposure their careers have ever gotten, but it's not the kind of attention that they ever wanted.

The Agenda Project, the progressive org behind the Mitt Romney skewering Romney Girl video, said that they have received a cease and desist letter from Universal Music, asking them to remove the video from YouTube by Friday.

According to a letter sent by U Music Publishing Group's Cory Greenwell to Heidi Svenda Bernasconi, the woman identified as playing Romney Girl, the satirical video infringes on the copyright to "Barbie Girl."

"Please be advised that in the event that you fail to comply with any of our demands made herein, we shall take whatever legal action we deem necessary and appropriate to protect our rights and interests in and to 'Barbie Girl,' including, but not limited to, commencing legal action against you," the letter states.

The Agenda Project Action Fund, which financed the video that has almost 700,000 views on YouTube, plans to remove the video, but they argue that it is fair use. 

"We feel very strongly that we are both legally and morally justified in our use of the Barbie Girl song through the 'fair use' exception," said Erica Payne, president of the Action Fund, in a statement. "We are speaking to counsel about this and hope to continue sharing Ms. Bernasconi's wonderful taxless life with her admirers across the world. However, there is a strong possibility that our lawyers will advise us that despite our legal right to use the the song, we should not risk being attacked by a major multi-national corporation with resources that far exceed our own.

"This is about who has the most money, who has the most political influence, and who has the highest paid lawyers."

She pointed to the zealousness with which Universal Music has pursued claims. In 2007, a court refused to dismiss a mother's suit after her 29-second video of her daughter singing Prince's "Let's Go Crazy" was removed.

While fair use has generally covered parody, where it gets murky are in cases where a video is deemed satire. "Romney Girl" mimicked the entirety of "Barbie Girl,"  and although there is no hard and fast time length set on what falls into the category of fair use, there is a more recent case that makes a distinction based on what it is that is being satirized. In 2010, Chuck DeVore, a candidate for the U.S. Senate in California, lost his case against Don Henley over two songs that the DeVore campaign used to skewer Barbara Boxer. "Boys of Summer" was made into "Hope of November," and "All She Wants to Do Is Dance" recreated as "All She Wants to Do Is Tax."

The court ruled that since DeVore was not using the music to "comment or criticize" on the originals, he was not entitled to the fair use defense. "Rather, ‘November’ uses those themes and devices to mock a separate subject entirely, namely Obama and his supporters," the judge wrote.

So that may be why Universal feels that it can issue such a notice, in what many have claimed as just another form of political speech.

As protests and violence believed to be tied to the anti-Islam film "Innocence of Muslims" spreads to Yemen, more light is being shed on the source of the project, seen primarily via a 14-minute trailer posted on YouTube.

According to Talking Points Memo, a Los Angeles blogger, John Walsh, waned the Los Angeles City Council about plans for a screening of "The Innocence of Bin Laden" that was to be shown at the Vine Theater in Hollywood. Walsh raised the prospect that the group behind the movie had been anti-Semitic, even as the title of the project apparently was changed.

Was there a screening? Christine Pelisek at The Daily Beast, citing a law enforcement source, writes that authorities did monitor a screening in late June, with less than a dozen people attending. Of particular concern was that the director, who identifies himself as Sam Bacile, watched the event from a restaurant across the street. Questions have been raised about Bacile's true identiy, and the Associated Press reported on Wednesday afternoon that Bacile is believed to be Nakoula Basseley Nakoula, a Coptic Christian with a criminal record.

The rule for drawing attention in spam-infested inboxes is to create an intriguing subject line. That seems to be where the Obama campaign has directed a lot of its effort, even if some of them sound a bit too much like stalking.

The latest is from Beyonce, who with the subject line "I don't usually email you," asks donors to enter a drawing to attend a fundraiser next week for President Obama. She's on the bill along with Jay-Z, in what could be Obama's final Manhattan event before the election.

Donors are asked to contribute $7 --- or whatever they can --- although no contribution is actually necessary.

Ever since the campaign sponsored a contest in which winning entrants could attend a fundraiser at the home of George Clooney last May, the use of celebrities has proven especially lucrative. Similar contests were held to attend events at the home of Sarah Jessica Parker and with a host of NBA stars, and the campaign of Mitt Romney held one to win a dinner with the candidate and Donald Trump. (We're waiting for Clint Eastwood).

The Clooney event raised about $14.8 million, according to campaign sources, with the majority of the money coming from the online contest. The campaign has tried to boost its small-dollar contributors, which is one reason that the Obama team has unleashed a nonstop flurry of emails to supporters this season. The New York Times today examines the role of large dollar fundraisers in bankrolling Obama's reelection bid, and finds that they are playing a far bigger part in the campaign than they were in 2008.

According to the Times, citing internal campaign documents, Andrew Tobias is the top bundler of the current cycle, having raised more than $4 million. But Jeffrey Katzenberg and Andy Spahn, his political adviser, top all donors since 2007, with more than $6.6 million raised. The figures do not include amounts that have gone to a pro-Obama SuperPAC, Priorities USA Action, for which Katzenberg has been among the biggest benefactors, donating $2 million last year to get the org launched.

The full list is here. Others high up on the list include Anna Wintour, Colleen Bell, Ken Solomon, John Emerson and Noah Mamet.

The Beyonce email (with links removed) is below.

As the White House and congressional leaders condemned the assaults on U.S. missions in Egypt and Libya, the mystery deepened over who is responsible for the anti-Muhammad film trailer, “The Innocence of Muslims,” and perhaps more importantly, who financed it.

The alleged producer is Sam Bacile, based largely on interviews he gave to the Wall Street Journal and the Associated Press from an undisclosed California location. But that identity is in doubt.

 He told the AP that he is a real estate developer and an Israeli Jew, but Israeli officials said that they had not heard of him and had no record of him being a citizen.

“This is a political movie,” Bacile told the AP. “The U.S. lost a lot of money and a lot of people in wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, but we’re fighting with ideas.”

A trailer for Bacile’s “Innocence of Muslims” dubbed into Arabic and posted on YouTube, sparked protests that have led to the death of U.S. Ambassador Chris Stevens and his three security guards in an attack on the U.S. Consulate in Benghazi by protesters angry over the film that ridicules Islam’s Prophet Muhammad. In Cairo protesters climbed the walls of the U.S. Embassy, pulling down the American flag and replacing it with a black Islamic banner.

Bacile, who said he directed and wrote the movie, told the AP that it was financed at a cost of $5 million with the help of more than 100 Jewish donors. But Steve Klein, who has been described in press accounts as a consultant on the film, told The Atlantic’s Jeffrey Goldberg that Bacile is not Israeli and is most likely not Jewish.

The name, Klein said, is a pseudonym. “I would suspect this is a disinformation campaign,” Klein told Goldberg. Klein is a Christian activist in Riverside, Goldberg wrote.

Although some sources are pointing to coptic Christans as the financiers of the film, the lack of sophistication of the project underscores the ease with which a film and trailer can be made to have an impact outside the mainstream of the indie and documentary community in Los Angeles.

The movie’s trailer has the air of a skit, with actors portraying Muhammad and his followers, and casting the prophet as a philanderer. The violence has ignited fears that throughout the Arab world, there will be further censorship in Islamic media.

“From my personal point of view we can’t be dealing with this movie in such a violent way, even if it does make fun of Muslim religion,” Arab film analyst Alaa Karkouti, who runs Cairo-based film marketing firm Mad Solutions, commented to Variety.

“The main concept for any religion is that to be a true believer you need to be prepared to suffer abuse,” Karkouti said. “To make this (movie) such a big deal is disproportionate to the real issues the Arab world has faced, like people getting killed in the streets during the revolution and until now the facts still being hidden about who killed them,” he went on to add.

Karkouti and several other prominent members of Cairo’s film and TV community, who spoke on background but would not be quoted, were also quick to point out the manipulative aspect of the mayhem. “Let’s not forget that this film is old,” said Karkouti. “Why is it being bandied in the (Egyptian) media now? Why did this break out on September 11?”

 The perception among those interviewed is that the timing is linked to the upcoming U.S. elections and the fact that Mitt Romney is running on a more conservative agenda towards the Arab world than Barack Obama. The dubbed-into-Arabic 14-minute trailer of the movie, depicting Muhammad having sex and calling for massacres, surfaced in the Egyptian media in the past few days.

But the two-hour movie was completed in 2011 and screened earlier this year in a Hollywood theater.

“What has been happening proves how easy it is to control and manipulate a certain segment of the Arab population,” said Karkouti. “But this is a very small percentage of the Arab population which is reacting this way,” he noted.

Karkouti and the others who chose to speak off the record are concerned that, since the Muslim Brotherhood, which is Egypt’s top force, is emerging as having the most political clout in all countries affected by the Arab Spring, this induced violent outbreak could, albeit indirectly, exacerbate growing forms of Islamic censorship in the region.

For example Egypt’s state TV, Egyptian Television Network is no longer airing vintage classics featuring couples kissing, which used to run until recently, and the second installment of a TV series on the Muslim Brotherhood titled “Al-Gama’a,” written by well-known writer, Waheed Hamed, was recently pulled from production.

By Nick Vivarelli in Rome and Ted Johnson in Los Angeles. The AP contributed to this report.

Assemblyman Anthony Portantino hosts the AIDS Action Summit with "Project Runway" star Mondo Guerra, who will keynote. This is the sixth summit, which will be held at City of Hope in Duarte.
Also speaking will be Dr. Alexandra Levine, chief medical officer of the City of Hope.

Filmmakers David France and Howard Gertler screen "How to Survive a Plague" in Beverly Hills, with special guest Peter Staley.

President Obama's campaign is firing back at "2016: Obama's America," the unexpectedly successful documentary from Dinesh D'Souza that has generated $26.7 million at the box office.

On the campaign's Truth Team page, the Obama team calls the film a "deliberate distortion of President Obama's record and world view."

The campaign says, "A self-proclaimed expert on the President, D’Souza bases the film around his own past works, which were previously described as “the worst kind of smear journalism,” and riddled with “lazy" errors. The result is what Variety calls a “cavalcade of conspiracy theories, psycho-politico conjectures and incendiary labeling” and what the L.A. Times labels a “badly disguised and overly long attack ad.” A look at D’Souza’s record is a look at a history of demonstrably false and ridiculous claims about the President, and “2016” is no exception. In fact, admitting President Obama was born in the U.S. is what Bloomberg calls 'as close to moderation as this nutty film gets.'"

The campaign's decision to respond to the movie is perhaps the best reflection of its success, as the Obama team deployed a similar "truth team" in 2008 to books and articles and simple rumors that had garnered enough traction. It has now surpassed "An Inconvenient Truth" in box office gross.

More surprising than the flurry of stories that Nikki Minaj was apparently supporting Mitt Romney was that President Obama was so pop culturally aware that her apparent nod really wasn't one at all.

He said in an interview with a Florida radio station, "I think she had a little rap that said that, but she likes to play different characters. So I don't know what is going on there."

As it turns out, her endorsement of Romney was gleaned from the lyrics of the song "Mercy," in which she said, “I’m a Republican, voting for Mitt Romney." But as Obama pointed out, her lyrucs can't be taken at face value, as some blogs took it last week announcing her support of the Republican nominee.

In a tweet today, Minaj said, "Ha! Thank you for understanding my creative humor & sarcasm Mr. President, the smart ones always do... *sends love & support* @barackobama."

That, apparently, is an endorsement.

 

The MPAA is distributing a list of talking points to candidates in the event that they are queried about show biz related issues.

Although the movie business rarely is brought up on the campaign trail for much beyond celebrity, the issues of Internet freedom and piracy actually did come up at points during the Republican party, and both parties addressed it in their platforms.

The MPAA memo talks about the impact of the movie and TV business on the economy, and casts the business as an "industry of innovators," as Silicon Valley usually gets the lion's share of the credit when it comes to perceptions about creativity for the future. It also pushes back against notions that protecting copyright means reducing free expression online.

The full memo is below: