Fresh Loaf

Robert Novak, the man Jon Stewart caricatured as the “douchebag of liberty,” died today at the age of 78. Before he became known as one of the men who was “hurting America” with the show Crossfire, however, Novak was one of the most high-profile and well-respected political writers in the business, most notably with his colleague Rowland Evans and their Evans-Novak Political Report.

In his memoir, published a little over a year ago, Novak managed to weave in an incredible number of revealing vignettes concerning some of the most prominent men of the last half century, including this memorable anecdote on Atlanta tycoon Ted Turner:

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1) CL hosts King Tut After Dark at the Civic Center.

2) American Memory Project and Ohgr play the Masquerade.

3) Annie Leibovitz discusses her book, Annie Leibovitz at Work, at Marcus Jewish Community Center’s Zaban Park.

4) Neil Diamond performs at the Arena at Gwinnett Center.

5) Ted Turner discusses Call Me Ted at Jimmy Carter Library & Museum.

(Photo © Sandro Vannini)

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Longtime Atlanta Braves announcer Skip Caray, who died this week at 68, once described himself as the “wise-ass cynic” of the Caray broadcasting dynasty. Eschewing his famous father’s effusiveness, he won over Braves fans with his dry, pithy humor and unabashed honesty. He was often at his best when the Braves were at their worst.

“The bases are loaded again and I wish I was, too.”
— Caray, during a disastrous outing by the Braves’ bullpen in 2007

“It’s another partial sellout.”
— A line Caray used often in the late ’80s when games were drawing just a few thousand fans

“Have you looked at the standings lately?”
— Caray’s response to then-owner Ted Turner after Turner asked him to stop being so negative in the booth during a losing season in the ’80s

“Good point. Say whatever you want.”
— Turner’s answer

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FIRE ANTS: All U.S. fire ants can be traced back to a handful of queens that stowed away on a boat from Argentina to Mobile, Ala., in the 1930s, according to a UGA entomologist.

BRETT AND THE JETS: Brett Favre was traded early this morning by the Packers to the New York Jets, ending his historic tenure in Green Bay on a sour note.

KWAME KILPATRICK: The mayor of Detroit is ordered to jail for violating the terms of his bond.

CRACKDOWN: Atlanta police begin an “indefinite” crackdown on panhandling, drug-dealing and other tourist-worrying behavior in Five Points.

CHAMBLISS: Says he’s ready for the Democratic “onslaught” now that Jim Martin is the nominee.

TED TURNER: Naturally occurring anthrax is found on his Montana ranch.

WAIT WATCHERS: CDC researchers in Atlanta report that the average nationwide emergency-room wait time has grown from 38 minutes to almost an hour over the past decade, due to increases in patients and decreases in hospital resources.

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Is Ted Turner the real Captain Planet? That’s what he says in Lizz Widdicombe’s hilarious “Talk of the Town” segment of this week’s New Yorker (“Born Green”), in which she catches up with the man who claims to be the one who beat Al Gore to telling the world an inconvenient truth with his now-defunct TBS cartoon, “Captain Planet and the Planeteers.” (Sounds like a bad ’70s funk ensemble.) The story comes from an Atlanta fundraiser for Turner’s Captain Planet Foundation. In the article, he boasts that he was his own inspiration for the Captain Planet character, who does battle with all the earth-unfriendly nasties out there.

Here’s a sample from the article:

With the show, Ted Turner is fond of saying, he invented a television genre that he called “edu-tainment” — a noble endeavor but one that has taken a lot of grief over the years. Critics of “Captain Planet” have pointed to the broadness of its allegory (characters include “Kwame from Africa” and “Gi from Asia”), and the heavy-handedness of its plots (battles against a villain named Hoggish Greedly and a Pollution Syndicate), to suggest that it’s less entertainment than a vehicle for “left-wing propaganda,” as one watchdog group put it. But Turner remains unfazed. “In terms of programming, it’s the best thing I ever did,” he said the other day.

Really, Ted? As opposed to, um, non-programming? Whatev, it definitely struggles to stand the test of time, as this clip demonstrates. But there is a kitschy charm about the whole thing. See for yourself, Planeteers!

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Ted Turner was walking kind of gingerly and holding his midsection after he finished lunch today at Ted’s Montana Grill on Luckie Street, but I don’t think it was the burger.

He was wearing a jacket over hospital scrubs and was with his daughter Laura Turner Seydel, and her husband. Folks at various tables applauded as he left (presumably to head back up to his apartment, which is upstairs). He waved.

I didn’t get a chance to ask him, but did I miss something? Did my favorite Atlanta billionaire just have surgery? (Didn’t see anything in a web search, but I have asked his people.)

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PEABODYS: Winners of the 67th annual media awards are announced at UGA, including “60 Minutes,” “The Colbert Report,” “Planet Earth,” and CNN, ABC News, CBS News and NPR. Not among the winners, as Spacey Gracey notes at Peach Pundit, is FOX News.

TED TURNER: Tells PBS’s Charlie Rose that global warming could kill “most of the people” in 30 or 40 years, and “the rest of us will be cannibals.”

DOG WILD: Screaming Chinese schoolchildren swarm visiting Georgia poultry official when he pulls out a photo of his dogs.

YELLOW JOURNALISM: WSB-TV Action News covers the pollen onslaught, including this insightful “explanation” from meteorologist Karen Minton: “The skies are filled with pollen as we move into spring.”

GUNS: Bill to allow guns in public transit and restaurants passes the state Senate.

SANCTUARY CITIES: House passes bill outlawing “sanctuary cities” for illegal immigrants in Georgia, even though none exist.

CLAYTON COUNTY: “Bleeding,” according to school board Chairwoman Ericka Davis, who, along with board Vice Chairman Eddie White, announced Wednesday that they’re stepping down in June.

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The September issue of Portfolio magazine reports that Ted Turner is behind on his payments to the United Nations. According to the Huffington Post, Turner promised to wipe out the $1 billion debt owed by the United States to the United Nations in $100 million increments.

According to the magazine, Turner gave $83 million the first two years of his pledge, then only $48.9 million last year. But he still pledges to contribute the full $1 billion by 2015.

Hey, give the guy a break: Much of his fortune was tied up in Time Warner/AOL stock. Remember how the companies lost $99 billion in 2002, the largest one-year loss ever in American business?

Show Ted your solidarity by buying a buffalo burger today.

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Robert Olen Butler and Elizabeth Dewberry are popular writers and scholars at Florida State University in Tallahassee. They were also married — until Atlanta’s billionaire bad boy, Ted Turner, stole Dewberry’s heart. Now Dewberry, 44, is leaving her husband for Turner, 68.

Butler, 62, won a Pulitzer Prize in 1993 for a collection of stories. Butler informed five graduate students via e-mail, assuming they’d keep things confidential. They have informed the world about the love triangle.

Butler’s e-mail states:

She will not be Ted’s only girlfriend. Ted is permanently and avowedly non-monogamous. But though he has several girlfriends, it is a very small number, and he does not take them up lightly and he gives them his absolute support when he does.

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OK, baseball fans, the last-place Chicago Cubs (5-8) begin a two-game series with the division-leading Braves (9-4) tonight, so I thought a small comparison of the team histories was in order — that is, considering they are so drastically different.

Being a Braves fan has been easy. It’s like being a baby: Every time we open our mouths, someone shovels more food in; when we take a shit, someone else cleans it up. There are no curses, no bad joo-joo, nada. The only thing difficult, it would appear, about being a Braves fan is showing up to the games! This is not true for Cubs fans.

All of that said shit has been dumped on the Cubbies, those lovable losers from the North Side of Chicago. Not since 1908 have the Cubs won a World Series — the longest dry spell in all of baseball and of every major sport in the United States. I’d list the huge events that have occurred since the last time the Cubs won the championship, but you are probably planning on going to bed tonight before 3 a.m. (If not, well, maybe you should get a job.)

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