Word: star
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...name of this creed is evangelical atheism. Now, atheism is certainly not a religion, and the phrase “evangelical atheism” certainly appears oxymoronic. But we have witnessed in our time the rise of a virulent strain of atheism championed by Bill Maher, the comedian and star of Religulous, the secularist philosopher Richard Dawkins, author of The God Delusion, and their often indignant ilk. For all its schooling and pretense of intellectualism, this godless vanguard unknowingly adopts the very aspects of religion its leaders passionately lambaste and turns atheism into the kind of evangelical ideology it opposes...
...days later, Soderbergh and his star, Benicio Del Toro, presented Che at the Havana Film Festival. The authorities had warned they would not allow the picture to be shown if it was critical of Fidel Castro, and they found nothing objectionable. (One scene included in the original Cannes Film Festival version of Che, showing Castro the commandante in an ambiguous light, was apparently cut.) "The Cuban public gave its endorsement with a strong ovation," reported Granma, the island's official Communist Party newspaper, which hedged its bets by observing that the Castro character (played by Demian Bichir) lacked "charisma...
...Occasionally, the film is enlivened by the guest appearances of familiar actors, sometimes cast appropriately (Lou Diamond Phillips as Mario Monje, Catalina Sandina Moreno as Che's second wife), sometimes not (Matt Damon as a priest-negotiator in Bolivia!?). But the major burden falls on its star, who nurtured the project for almost a decade. And Del Toro - whose acting style often starts over the top and soars from there, like a hang-glider leaping from a skyscraper roof, thinking there's nowhere to go but up - is muted, yielding few emotional revelations, seemingly sedated here. Except for one pungent...
...That's exactly what's going on in Minnesota, where 2.9 million voters left Senator Norm Coleman just 215 votes ahead of Saturday Night Live star Al Franken. Since then, both sides have politely allowed a legally required hand recount to take place, one with very clearly specified rules and no scheduled end date. But the recount ended on Dec. 5, just as Minnesota's secretary of state said it would, and the result didn't differ much from the initial count. "We didn't have to do a lot of overtime," says Cindy Reichert, the elections director of Minneapolis...
...Florida recount, but he watched it in a particularly Minnesotan way. "I was especially interested in the bonus features of the disc," he says. Meantime, reviewing the wacky ballots - available to the public as PDF files - is by far the most popular activity on the Minneapolis - St. Paul Star Tribune website...