I read online that the lead has cancer and that has delayed shooting the 2nd season.  Not to be cold, but I don’t think changing the lead would really hurt the series…but we’ll have to see what the network decides.  Hopefully the actor is O.K.

link

Entertainment Weekly is reporting that actor Andy Whitfield, who is starring in the Starz drama “Spartacus: Blood and Sand,” has been diagnosed with Non-Hodgkin lymphoma.

He will begin treatment immediately in New Zealand, but as a result, production on the second season of “Spartacus” has been delayed. It was originally scheduled to get underway later this month.

Whitfield’s cancer was detected early and his prognosis is good. “I’m receiving excellent care, and am feeling strong, positive and determined with an army of support behind me,” Whitfield said in a statement.

Starz president Chris Albrecht said: “Our thoughts and prayers are with Andy. His health, of course, is our primary concern. He has our complete support during this difficult time.“

Something interesting from the article was:

The physicist concluded by suggesting that extraterrestrials might not have visited Earth because of all the problems in traveling at near-light speeds, including how to deal with deadly hydrogen space mines. But for the record, he does believe that alien life exists.

“Getting between stars is a huge problem unless we think of something really, really different,” Edelstein said. “I’m not saying that we know everything and that it’s impossible. I’m saying it’s kind of impossible based on what we know right now.”

That seems pretty reasonable…considering we don’t know how to travel at light speed right now.  I would think it’s pretty arrogant to assume that because we can’t travel faster than light that no one can…that seems pretty ridiculous.  I believe there are “aliens” in the universe, but they might not give two squirts about us.

link

Captain Kirk might want to avoid taking the starship Enterprise to warp speed, unless he’s ready to shrug off interstellar hydrogen atoms that would deliver a lethal radiation blast to both ship and crew.

There are just two hydrogen atoms per cubic centimeter on average in space, which poses no threat to spaceships traveling at low speeds. But those same lone atoms would transform into deadly galactic space mines for a spaceship that runs into them at near-light speed, according to calculations based on Einstein’s special theory of relativity.

The original crew of “Star Trek” featured as unfortunate examples at a presentation by William Edelstein, a physicist at Johns Hopkins University, at the American Physical Society conference in Washington, D.C. on Feb. 13. The physicist showed a video clip of Kirk telling engineer Scotty to go to warp speed.

“Well, they’re all dead,” Edelstein recalled saying. His words caused a stir among the audience.

Edelstein’s personal interest in this thought experiment began 20 years ago, when his son Arthur asked him if there was friction in space. The father responded that yes, there would be hydrogen bumping off a spaceship. But he soon realized that the stray atoms of hydrogen gas would actually go right through the ship traveling close to light speed, and irradiate both crew and electronics in the process.

More recently, the physicist and his now-grown son calculated the scenario of a spaceship trying to travel halfway across our Milky Way galaxy in just 10 years. That’s doable in theory, because special relativity states that time slows down and distances shrink for travelers approaching light speed.

Edelstein’s work showed that a starship traveling at just 99 percent of the speed of light would get a radiation dose from hydrogen of 61 sieverts per second, when just one tenth of that number of sieverts would deliver a fatal dose for humans. And that’s not even the 99.999998 percent of light-speed necessary to make the journey to the center of the Milky Way in 10 years

At the higher speed, the human crew of a starship would experience something like getting struck by the high-energy proton beam from the Large Hadron Collider particle accelerator at CERN in Geneva, Switzerland. On top of killing the crew, such powerful levels of energy would also likely destroy the starship electronics.

“I’m not claiming this is a brilliant new discovery or anything,” Edelstein told SPACE.com. “I’m just saying that it’s interesting.”

Some audience members at the American Physical Society event protested that Kirk, Spock and the “Star Trek” crew would all still live because of the starship Enterprise having shields. But Edelstein noted some of the existing difficulties with creating an electromagnetic shield with any resemblance to “Star Trek” technology.

Solid shields seem even more hopeless. A starship might need anywhere from a 4.4 -meter to 4,400-meter thickness of lead shielding to deflect the hydrogen radiation — added mass that would make travel at near-light speed even more impractical.

The physicist concluded by suggesting that extraterrestrials might not have visited Earth because of all the problems in traveling at near-light speeds, including how to deal with deadly hydrogen space mines. But for the record, he does believe that alien life exists.

“Getting between stars is a huge problem unless we think of something really, really different,” Edelstein said. “I’m not saying that we know everything and that it’s impossible. I’m saying it’s kind of impossible based on what we know right now.”

For a little bit now I’ve had a passing interest in God of War III.  I like the simplicity of hack and slash games with just a little bit of a puzzle to figure out.  I don’t like a difficult puzzle…mainly hack and slash.  This latest incarnation of GoW looks pretty sweet.

I’m not going to fully review the game…as I haven’t played it I’d be just regurgitating what others have said.  I’m liking the brutality of it, along with the rawness and the “sex scene”.  I like the idea of a game targeted at the mature audience, as opposed to the wii where almost everything seems to be targeted for kids.

This game is really pushing me towards picking up a ps3…but then I’d need an HD T.V….etc.  And in the end, I wouldn’t play it all that much.  It’s an impulse buy…but it would be fun for a couple of hours.  I am also interested in Dante’s Inferno…but that’s the same hack and slash type game.

In the end, I doubt I’ll buy a PS3 for quite awhile, if ever…but some of these games look pretty sweet.

link

LOS ANGELES — Actor and former teen idol Corey Haim has died at the age of 38, the Los Angeles Police Department has confirmed to KTLA.

Haim died at 3:30 a.m. Wednesday of an apparent accidental overdose, according to the LAPD’s North Hollywood Division.

Coroner’s Lt. Cheryl MacWillie said an autopsy would determine an official cause of death.

Haim was found unresponsive inside an Oakwood apartment, between Burbank and the Hollywood Hills, police said.

He was at home with his mother at the time.

The Canadian-born actor, who has struggled with drug addiction, was pronounced dead Providence St. Joseph’s Medical Center in Burbank, police said.

Haim became a teen heartthrob in the 80s after appearing in the 1986 film “Lucas” and 1987’s “The Lost Boys,” which also starred fellow teen idol Corey Feldman.

Both actors appeared together on the A&E show “The Two Coreys,” which aired from 2007 to 2008.

Haim was nominated for a Viewer’s Choice Award at the 22nd Annual Gemini Awards in Canada for his role on the show, which was canceled after two seasons.

Podracer is a command line rss/podcast downloader…reader…whatever the hell it’s called.  On debian I just aptitude installed it.  It pulled down bittornado and some python crap.  Easy enough…

The subscriptions are controlled through a file called subscripts that is placed by default in ~/.podracer.  If it isn’t there, you can create one and just paste in the address to the rss feed.  After that you’ll probably want to customize a user specific config file.  Do:
cp /etc/podracer.conf ~/.podracer/
to copy a config file then open it up.  The only thing I edited in here was the “poddir” variable that controls where you want to save your podcasts to.  This will be a “top level” directory for your podcasts.  You can create something like /static/directory/$(date +%Y-%m-%d) if you want to create date named folders when it pulls something down.  You can also specify a subfolder for each podcast in the subscriptions file:  rss feed url subfolder/under/top/base/podcast/dir or something like that.

After the initial config is completed you are ready to test your podracer setup.  Podracer has no way of knowing what podcasts you may want to download or not download, so if you tell it to read a specific rss feed it’s going to try and pull everything down.  What you’ll want to do is run
podracer -c
which will do a “catch up”.  To keep track of what podcasts it has downloaded it logs each of them into a podcast.log file.  When you run podracer with the -c switch it throws everything available for download into that log file.  This prevents it from downloading everything from the beginning of this feed.  What I did was delete the last couple of lines of that log, then ran the podracer command to test the downloading with just an episode or two.

The problem I run in to after this is that the podcasts I download from lex & terry are not properly tagged.  I need to run some sort of automated process so they are updated like they should be, and then windows media player will catalog them properly.  I installed a small piece of software called id3ed from which you can specify what information to put in for the tags.  I still can’t be -sure- I’m putting in the absolute correct information, but it’s an educated guess that it will download the one from the current day.  They are named fairly consistantly…so using that information I can compose a ghetto script to tag and rename the files.

#!/bin/sh

### End Podcast Permissions ###

Throw the script into cron

0 */4 * * 1-5 /home/kbackman/scripts/podcasts.sh >/dev/null 2>&1

and we’ll see how this goes. The only podcast so far that doesn’t get tagged at all is the lex and terry stuff. If others come up we’ll deal with that at the time.

link

Last word on the Peppers deal

Posted by Mike Florio on March 9, 2010 9:11 AM ET

Our item from last night regarding the ability of the Bears to pull the plug on the Julius Peppers contract after one year, making it essentially a one-year, $20 million contract with a team option on the rest, has created a stir.

But the info is legit.  The Bears can declare the move a mistake and avoid the rest of the deal with no guaranteed money beyond what he received in 2010.

Multiple sources have pointed out that the decision to guarantee the money for injury only and not for skills arises from the reality that guarantees for injury and skill must be immediately funded.  As one source pointed out, the Giants used the same tactic with quarterback Eli Manning.

The difference?  The chances of the Giants choosing to cut Eli Manning before the money guaranteed for injury only comes due are slim.  In Chicago, a decision to part ways with Peppers after one season is far more possible.  If Halas Hall gets cleaned out after the coming season, the better adjective will be “probable.”

Amid these realities, we’re told that Peppers has received every assurance that all guaranteed money will be paid.  Apart from the fact that the Bears can get in hot water for making promises beyond the pages of the signed contract, any such promise in completely unenforceable.

Besides, the supposed assurances that Peppers will be with the team over the long haul are coming from a regime that might not be employed when the time comes to make the decision.

Finally, we have been reminded that the 2011 roster bonus of $10.5 million is due to be paid before a lockout would be imposed.  On the surface, it’s a shrewd move by the Peppers camp.  At a deeper level, however, it could make the Bears more likely to cut Peppers before the 2011 roster bonus becomes fully guaranteed on February 10, 2011, if they have any doubt whatsoever regarding Peppers’ abilities and/or effort.

Am I the only one that doesn’t give a rats ass about athletes off the field?  I don’t care if they cut the heads of puppies in their spare time…anything they do that is illegal is a matter for the police, not something I give a damn about it.  I want them to perform on the field, I want to watch them try to kill each other…what they do after that is someone else’s problem.

But there are people that do care I guess…or that show enough interest that the media keeps writing about it.

This past deer season was the only time I carried openly all the time.  I was back home (small rural town if you haven’t been paying attention) and given the time of year I expect that no one really even noticed.  I did it for a couple of reasons, I carry the side arm when I’m out hunting.  It’s nice to have a pistol to plink around with occasionally.  I also use it to “finish” an animal with a quick shot to the head, I never have liked slitting anythings throat or breaking it’s neck.  When I’m carrying it’s a real pain to take it off and put it back on so I just leave it on all the time.  I could take the pistol out of the holster and walk around with an empty holster…but what would I do with the gun?  It’s stored safely and where I can make sure it’s not touched by someone that shouldn’t if it’s on my hip.

The second reason I carried it was to see what the reaction would be.  I know the laws as well as a citizen can, and every place I walked in to with it on was well within the law.  I walked in to walmart, pamada, nodak, grocery store, and a couple of gas stations…that’s really all there is in Bottineau.  I removed the gun from the holster when I walked into a restaurant that served beer and the couple of times I went to the bar (didn’t drink, just went in to shoot the breeze).  I know I couldn’t carry in the bars, and there is some goofy thing about the restaurants and what percentage of their income comes from alcohol…blah blah blah.  When the laws are written like that I think it’s better to just avoid the situation.  There were no signs posted on any businesses and from my knowledge there are not corporate policies for any of those places…and without a sign posted their policy is meaningless anyhow.  It is perfectly legal for a manager or someone else representing the business to ask you to leave, if you refuse at that point you are trespassing and could end up with a problem.

In the brief time I was carrying openly, no one said boo to me.  I was trying to notice if anyone gave me weird looks…they didn’t, no one asked a question…nothing.  I would attribute this to two factors.  The first being a small rural town, people are more exposed to guns and don’t freak out when they see one.  It’s not unusual for someone to have one in their vehicle, granted it’s a little more out of the ordinary to see them carrying it around in town…but not a big deal.  Also, the time of year I think is a big factor.  It was deer season so chances are they saw more guys walking around with knives on them, seeing someone carry a gun as well wouldn’t have been a big stretch.  (as a side bar, I did have a knife that would be considered under law to be a dangerous weapon.  I took that off going into the bar as well.)

If I were to do this same “experiment” in Fargo at the Wal-Mart I don’t think I’d make it 10 min before someone either said something to me or the cops were called.  I don’t necessarily blame the people for being scared or on edge about something they don’t understand.  I do think they should familiarize themselves with the laws and understand that even though they disagree with carrying a firearm it is probably legal.  If they choose to not patronize an establishment because they allow people to openly carry…good for them.  Voting with your dollar is the most powerful message you can send to a company.  The problem I have is when a person or group chastises and singles out another person or group for doing something that is completely within the law.  Work to change the law, worth to change the policy of the business, but don’t tell someone they are wrong when they are not breaking the law.  That just adds conflict and hostility to a situation, which strikes me as paradoxical.  The anti-2a people are afraid of citizens being armed.  They can call it many different things, concern about being shot, not trusting someone to be safe, concern for the children! whatever you want to label it, it’s fear.  I would also argue that some people that arm themselves do so out of fear as well.  It’s been my experience that if you think you need to carry a pistol into a situation, you should probably not be going in to that situation.

That brings me to the news article that prompted this little bit of a tirade (which was only suppose to be a small bullet post but is turning into a featured post).  I check fox news once or twice a day.  I believe it’s the national enquirer of news sites, but I like to see just how out in left (or is it right?) field they go sometimes.  The main article on their page was about a pro-2a vs anti-2a standoff that Starbucks finds itself in the middle of.  Curious, I read more.  I was a bit relieved when I saw the article linked back to the wall street journal.  I would label them as more credible than fox news.  As I’m reading through the article one thought resonates in my mind…how dumb are the pro-2a people?  Well, 2 thoughts I guess…California lets you open carry an unloaded weapon?  How stupid is that?  Why would you want to carry around a gun you would have to stop and load?  That’s just carrying for the sake of looking like Rambo.  I suppose you could ask your attacker to stop while you load the gun…you go barney…you go.

But, getting back to the stupid pro-2a monkeys….how intelligent is it to all gather in one specific place that is allowing you to openly carry…and just congregate.  It seems to me that such a display would really push the place to actually change it’s policies to be unfavorable to the 2nd.  If you feel the desire/need to open carry…just do it and stay out of these damn protests.  People that are carrying are at a disadvantage.  If someone on the other side decides to get hostile, the person carrying is required to have more restraint than would commonly be “acceptable”.  If tensions escalate and things come to blows, the person carrying is by law in an “armed conflict” even if they don’t draw their weapon.  I’m not saying that’s likely to happen…but what I am trying to point out is that there is absolutely nothing to gain and the potential to lose ground.

There are a couple of lines from the article that are interesting:

The company added: “The political, policy and legal debates around these issues belong in the legislatures and courts, not in our stores.”

I think every company should take this position.  We follow state laws, if you don’t like that pester the state to change the law and we will comply with that.  It’s safe and takes the pressure off the store.

In 29 states, it’s legal to openly carry a loaded handgun, without any form of government permission.

It’s my opinion, and the opinion of most pro-2a, that “permission” is given in the 2nd amendment.  There is no additional “mother may I?” required.  Hopefully the supreme court will tell us this year if that is in fact true or not.

“We are concerned that the open display of firearms would be particularly disturbing to children and their parents,” said a spokesperson for the California Pizza Kitchen restaurant chain.

I’ve always hated it when people us “for the children” as an excuse.  It wreaks of desperation and lack of credibility.  Let people be parents and they can decide what is best “for the children”.  If the parents disagree with people carrying openly, they are free to leave the establishment.  Like I said before though, I don’t have a problem with a business saying they do not allow guns on their premises.  I would probably chose to spend my dollar elsewhere though, if there is another option available to me.

It sucks that any business gets caught up in this issue.  It’s something that should be handled at the legislative level, not by hassling the businesses that are doing what they can to appeal to the masses.

link

By VANESSA O’CONNELL And JULIE JARGON

Starbucks Corp. and some other chain stores in the U.S. are finding themselves caught in the middle of a firearms debate, as gun-control advocates go up against a burgeoning campaign by gun owners to carry holstered pistols in public places.

The “open carry” movement, in which gun owners carry unconcealed handguns as they go about their everyday business, is loosely organized around the country but has been gaining traction in recent months. Gun-control advocates have been pushing to quash the movement, including by petitioning the Starbucks coffee chain to ban guns on its premises.

Anti-gun activists gathered at the original Starbucks in Seattle to push retailers like the coffee chain to ban customers from openly carrying guns, WSJ’s Nick Wingfield reports.

Journal Community

Businesses have the final say on their property. But the ones that don’t opt to ban guns—such as Starbucks—have become parade grounds of sorts for open-carry advocates.

Starbucks on Wednesday, while bemoaning being thrust into the debate, defended its long-standing policy of complying with state open-carry weapons laws, in part by stating that its baristas, or “partners,” could be harmed if the stores were to ban guns. The chain said that in the 43 states where open carry is legal, it has about 4,970 company-operated stores.

The company added: “The political, policy and legal debates around these issues belong in the legislatures and courts, not in our stores.”

In 29 states, it’s legal to openly carry a loaded handgun, without any form of government permission. Another 13 allow an unconcealed loaded handgun with a carry permit, according to opencarry.org, which is a loosely organized Web forum for the movement.

In California, where it’s legal to carry a gun openly without a license in most places as long as it’s unloaded, growing numbers of armed people have been turning up at Starbucks, restaurants, and retailers, with handguns holstered to their belts to protest what they contend are unfair limits on permits to carry a concealed weapon.

View Full Image

Associated PressAn “open carry” gun advocate watches a gun-control protest Wednesday in Seattle, Starbucks’ home turf.

The open-carry movement began spreading in 2004 after some pro-gun advocates in Virginia began researching state laws and discovered that many states don’t have laws to prevent unconcealed carry of handguns.

“The concealed carry movement has been successful but open carry is coming up,” in popularity, said Mike Stollenwerk, a retired Army lieutenant colonel and co-founder of the opencarry.org site.

“I feel other people have the right to carry firearms into a business if it’s okay with the business,” said William Moore, a carpenter from Lynwood, Wash., and an open-carry advocate who says he doesn’t carry firearms into Starbucks coffee shops.

Supporters are spreading in Wisconsin, Michigan, Pennsylvania, Louisiana, and other areas. Some are making lists of “OC-friendly” locales, and encouraging boycotts of businesses with no-weapons signs. Wal-Mart Stores Inc., Home Depot Inc., Best Buy Co. and Barnes & Noble Inc., are designated as “open-carry” friendly in some online forums or say they abide by existing laws. “Our practice is to comply with local and state laws,” said Best Buy spokeswoman Sue Busch Nehring.

Open-carry proponents are also taking advantage of some momentum in state legislatures to expand gun rights, although most new and pending measures don’t specifically address unconcealed handguns.

Should people be allowed to carry guns into places like Starbucks? The company says it’ll abide by local laws, but customers in San Francisco tell Rex Crum they really don’t relish handguns with their lattes.

Open carry hasn’t been part of the official focus of the pro-gun lobbying group, the National Rifle Association, which has 4 million members.

In the past 20 years, the NRA has focused on expanding the ability of U.S. gun owners to carry a handgun in a concealed manner.

Today, 38 states have a “shall issue” permit process. Two states don’t require a license to conceal carry. Eight states have “may issue” concealed carry laws, meaning permits will be given with the discretion of a local politician or police officer.

“We support the self-defense rights of law-abiding Americans in accordance with local, state and federal laws,” says Andrew Arulanandam, an NRA spokesman, who declined further comment on open-carry activity.

Some chains have banned guns from their restaurants, even in open-carry states, because of the impact it could have on non-gun-carrying customers.

“We are concerned that the open display of firearms would be particularly disturbing to children and their parents,” said a spokesperson for the California Pizza Kitchen restaurant chain.

A Peet’s Coffee & Tea spokesperson said that while the firm “respects and values all individuals’ rights…our policy is not to allow customers carrying firearms in our stores or on our outdoor seating premises unless they are uniformed or identified law enforcement officers.”

The Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence, which partnered with Credo Action, an activist group that uses mobile phones to effect social change, says it has collected more than 28,000 signatures on a petition to get Starbucks to change its policy.

Pro-gun advocates have taken to openly carrying guns to Starbucks as a way of testing corporations’s stances on state weapons laws, William Spain reports.

Journal Community

• discuss

“ Carrying a gun is an extreme response to a problem that, for the vast majority of Americans, doesn’t exist and never will. ”

—Scott McIntyre

Allowing customers who are armed with unconcealed guns on the premises “can’t be good for business—it galvanizes people, and some of them won’t patronize Starbucks after this,” said Joshua Horwitz, executive director of the Educational Fund to Stop Gun Violence, a gun-control organization in Washington, D.C.

Indeed, not all baristas agree that the Starbucks policy protects them. “I think the policy shows complete disregard for the safety and sentiments of their workers. The only thing worse than a yuppie upset with how their frappuccino turned out is a yuppie with a gun who’s unhappy with how their frappuccino turned out,” says Erik Forman, a Starbucks barista and union member in Minneapolis.

The IWW Starbucks Workers Union on Wednesday issued a statement, saying “We appreciate the vigorous debate taking place by principled individuals on both sides of this issue. However, to date we are not aware of any efforts by Starbucks to widely engage its workers who are directly affected by open-carry gun laws. We believe an appropriate solution cannot be reached without doing so.”

—Nick Wingfield and Jess Bravin contributed to this articleWrite to Vanessa O’Connell at vanessa.o’connell@wsj.com and Julie Jargon at julie.jargon@wsj.com

BEST PICTURE
Avatar
The Blind Side
District 9
An Education
The Hurt Locker
Inglourious Basterds
Precious
A Serious Man
Up
Up in the Air

BEST DIRECTOR
Kathryn Bigelow, The Hurt Locker
James Cameron, Avatar
Quentin Tarantino, Inglourious Basterds
Lee Daniels, Precious
Jason Reitman, Up in the Air

BEST ACTOR
Jeff Bridges, Crazy Heart
George Clooney, Up in the Air
Colin Firth, A Single Man
Morgan Freeman, Invictus
Jeremy Renner, The Hurt Locker

BEST ACTRESS
Sandra Bullock, The Blind Side
Helen Mirren, The Last Station
Carey Mulligan, An Education
Gabourey Sidibe, Precious
Meryl Streep, Julie & Julia

BEST SUPPORTING ACTOR
Matt Damon, Invictus
Woody Harrelson, The Messenger
Christopher Plummer, The Last Station
Stanley Tucci, The Lovely Bones
Christoph Waltz, Inglourious Basterds

BEST SUPPORTING ACTRESS
Penelope Cruz, Nine
Vera Farmiga, Up in the Air
Maggie Gyllenhaal, Crazy Heart
Anna Kendrick, Up in the Air
Mo’nique, Precious

BEST ORIGINAL SCREENPLAY
Mark Boal, The Hurt Locker
Quentino Tarantino, Inglourious Basterds
Alessandro Camon & Oren Moverman, The Messenger
Joel & Ethan Coen, A Serious Man
Peter Docter, Bob Peterson, Tom McCarthy, Up

BEST ADAPTED SCREENPLAY
Neill Blomkamp & Terri Tatchell, District 9
Nick Hornby, An Education
Jesse Armstrong, Simon Blackwell, Armando Iannucci & Tony Roche, In The Loop
Geoffrey Fletcher, Precious
Jason Reitman & Sheldon Turner, Up in the Air

BEST FOREIGN LANGUAGE FILM
Ajami, Israel
El Secretro de sus Ojo, Argentina
The Milk of Sorrow, Peru
Un Prophete, France
The White Ribbon, Germany

BEST ANIMATED FEATURE
Coraline
Fantastic Mr. Fox
Princess and the Frog
The Secrets of Kells
Up

ART DIRECTION
Avatar Art Direction: Rick Carter and Robert Stromberg; Set Decoration: Kim Sinclair
The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus Art Direction: Dave Warren and Anastasia Masaro; Set Decoration: Caroline Smith
Nine Art Direction: John Myhre; Set Decoration: Gordon Sim
Sherlock Holmes Art Direction: Sarah Greenwood; Set Decoration: Katie Spencer
The Young Victoria Art Direction: Patrice Vermette; Set Decoration: Maggie Gray

CINEMATOGRAPHY
Avatar Mauro Fiore
Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince Bruno Delbonnel
The Hurt Locker Barry Ackroyd
Inglourious Basterds Robert Richardson
The White Ribbon Christian Berger

COSTUME DESIGN
Bright Star Janet Patterson
Coco before Chanel Catherine Leterrier
The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus Monique Prudhomme
Nine Colleen Atwood
The Young Victoria Sandy Powell

DOCUMENTARY FEATURE
Burma VJ Anders Østergaard and Lise Lense-Møller
The Cove Nominees to be determined
Food, Inc. Robert Kenner and Elise Pearlstein
The Most Dangerous Man in America: Daniel Ellsberg and the Pentagon Papers Judith Ehrlich and Rick Goldsmith
Which Way Home Rebecca Cammisa

DOCUMENTARY SHORT
China’s Unnatural Disaster: The Tears of Sichuan Province Jon Alpert and Matthew O’Neill
The Last Campaign of Governor Booth Gardner Daniel Junge and Henry Ansbacher
The Last Truck: Closing of a GM Plant Steven Bognar and Julia Reichert
Music by Prudence Roger Ross Williams and Elinor Burkett
Rabbit à la Berlin Bartek Konopka and Anna Wydra

FILM EDITING
Avatar Stephen Rivkin, John Refoua and James Cameron
District 9 Julian Clarke
The Hurt Locker Bob Murawski and Chris Innis
Inglourious Basterds Sally Menke
Precious: Based on the Novel ‘Push’ by Sapphire Joe Klotz

MAKEUP
Il Divo Aldo Signoretti and Vittorio Sodano
Star Trek Barney Burman, Mindy Hall and Joel Harlow
The Young Victoria Jon Henry Gordon and Jenny Shircore

ORIGINAL SCORE
Avatar James Horner
Fantastic Mr. Fox Alexandre Desplat
The Hurt Locker Marco Beltrami and Buck Sanders
Sherlock Holmes Hans Zimmer
Up Michael Giacchino

ORIGINAL SONG
Almost There from The Princess and the Frog Music and Lyric by Randy Newman
Down in New Orleans from The Princess and the Frog Music and Lyric by Randy Newman
Loin de Paname from Paris 36 Music by Reinhardt Wagner Lyric by Frank Thomas
Take It All from Nine Music and Lyric by Maury Yeston
The Weary Kind (Theme from Crazy Heart) from Crazy Heart Music and Lyric by Ryan Bingham and T Bone Burnett

ANIMATED SHORT
French Roast Fabrice O. Joubert
Granny O’Grimm’s Sleeping Beauty Nicky Phelan and Darragh O’Connell
The Lady and the Reaper (La Dama y la Muerte) Javier Recio Gracia
Logorama Nicolas Schmerkin
A Matter of Loaf and Death Nick Park

LIVE ACTION SHORT
The Door Juanita Wilson and James Flynn
Instead of Abracadabra Patrik Eklund and Mathias Fjellström
Kavi Gregg Helvey
Miracle Fish Luke Doolan and Drew Bailey
The New Tenants Joachim Back and Tivi Magnusson

SOUND EDITING
Avatar Christopher Boyes and Gwendolyn Yates Whittle
The Hurt Locker Paul N.J. Ottosson
Inglourious Basterds Wylie Stateman
Star Trek Mark Stoeckinger and Alan Rankin
Up Michael Silvers and Tom Myers

SOUND MIXING
Avatar Christopher Boyes, Gary Summers, Andy Nelson and Tony Johnson
The Hurt Locker Paul N.J. Ottosson and Ray Beckett
Inglourious Basterds Michael Minkler, Tony Lamberti and Mark Ulano
Star Trek Anna Behlmer, Andy Nelson and Peter J. Devlin
Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen Greg P. Russell, Gary Summers and Geoffrey Patterson

VISUAL EFFECTS
Avatar Joe Letteri, Stephen Rosenbaum, Richard Baneham and Andrew R. Jones
District 9 Dan Kaufman, Peter Muyzers, Robert Habros and Matt Aitken
Star Trek Roger Guyett, Russell Earl, Paul Kavanagh and Burt Dalton

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OTTAWA (Reuters) – Canada’s parliamentary restaurant will be serving seal meat on Wednesday in a gesture of defiance aimed at a European Union ban on imports of seal products.

Canada’s Conservative government says it will fight the EU ban, which was imposed last July on the grounds that the annual seal hunt off the east coast was cruel and inhumane.

A dish of double-smoked bacon-wrapped seal loin in a port reduction will be on the menu on Wednesday, the office of Senator Celine Hervieux-Payette said on Monday.

“All political parties will have the opportunity to demonstrate to the international community the solidarity of the Canadian Parliament behind those who earn a living from the seal hunt,” she said in a statement.

Ottawa says the hunt — which takes place in March and April — provides valuable income for Atlantic fishing communities. The seals are either shot or hit over the head with a spiked club called a hakapik.

An aide to Hervieux-Payette said that, depending on supplies, seal meat could be available once a week when in season. (Reporting by David Ljunggren; editing by Rob Wilson)