Time-lapse video of installation of Biltmore Flower Carpet.

Detroit Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick, who gave one of his last major speeches in Asheville back on Martin Luther King Jr. weekend. During that weekend, Kwame allegedly shared a room and a rub-down at the Grove Park Inn with a woman identified as "Carmen Slowski." Only nobody knows who Carmen Slowski was.

All the details here, brought to you by Ashvegas.

Here's the story from Associated Press:

DETROIT (AP) — Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick pleaded guilty to felony charges Thursday in a sex scandal and will step down after months of defiantly holding onto his job leading the nation's 11th-largest city. He was ordered jailed for four months and fined $1 million.

The plea deal brings to an end a seven-months-long ordeal that led to felony charges against Kilpatrick and plunged the city, region and state into political chaos.

"I lied under oath," Kilpatrick said in court.

As part of the deal, the 38-year-old Democrat is to serve four months in jail and five years of probation. He also would pay the $1 million in restitution over the five-year probationary period.

During a separate hearing moments after Wayne County Circuit Court Judge David Groner accepted the mayor's plea, Kilpatrick offered a no contest plea in an assault case.

The judge also accepted that plea, which called for Kilpatrick to serve a four-month jail sentence that would run at the same time.

Kilpatrick had faced 10 felony counts in the two separate criminal cases.

Groner asked Kilpatrick if he understood he was giving up the right to be innocent until proven guilty.

"I gave that up a long time ago," Kilpatrick replied.

Kilpatrick also read a statement in court and admitted his guilt, saying "I lied under oath ... I did so with an intent to mislead the court and jury and to impede and obstruct the fair administration of justice."

The married mayor and former top aide Christine Beatty were charged in March with perjury, misconduct and obstruction of justice. They're accused of lying under oath about an affair and their roles in the firing of a deputy police chief.

Beatty did not plead guilty and next will appear in court on Sept. 11. Groner said a plea deal in Beatty's case appeared likely.

The mayor will be sentenced on Oct. 28. He will report to jail that day, said Wayne County Prosecutor Kym Worthy. 

I wrote about it here for Mountain Xpress.

The challenge for teams of Western North Carolina college students sounds simple enough: Take a piece of garbage and create value out of it, while getting across a message of environmental responsibility. The underlying objective: to help teach young people what it feels like to be an entrepreneur.

Who’s got the juice? Creative Juice is a competition among teams of college students who will be challenged to take a piece of everyday garbage and turn it into something valuable that communicates environmental responsibility.

That’s the essence of the Creative Juice Collegiate Competition, which started at AdvantageWest Economic Development Group but has grown to include several regions around the country.

“The goal is, through this emphasis on youth engagement, to tap into the creativity and innovation of our youth,” says AdvantageWest CEO Dale Carroll. That’s critical now because the generation of young people in college and just entering the workforce, known as the Millennials, “has a higher interest and potential for entrepreneurship than any generation in the history of our country,” he says.

Teams in the region have until Sept. 10 to register, and the competition begins at 9 a.m. on Sept. 11 when the throwaway item will be announced during a live Webcast from the Carolina Connect conference at the Grove Park Inn in Asheville. The annual conference brings together investors and entrepreneurs from across the Southeast for networking and professional development.

If you do anything this weekend, go see Tift Merritt at the Grey Eagle. She rocks, people. I saw her earlier this year at Merlefest, and she put on one of the best performances of the entire weekend. She's a gem. Go see her.

Mountain Xpress story here:

The marriage between Merritt and the Lost Highway label worked well enough to garner a Grammy nomination for Country Album of the Year in 2004, but it has also helped foist stereotypes upon Merritt that just aren’t true, the singer insists.

“I don’t resent [the alt-country tag] at all,” she explains. “When you get pigeonholed, I don’t like it, but at least some people know who you are. I’m not going to complain about it. I don’t get frustrated by it. I get frustrated when people call me country. I don’t fit into that mainstream country role at all; it just implies that I’m part of a family that wouldn’t have me. What I do is a little more handmade and personal.”

The handmade music that Merritt crafts is too quiet for the rock crowd, and not hokey enough for Nashville, but that’s just the way the singer likes it.

“I just don’t think about genre very much,” she says. “Maybe I’d be a smarter woman if I did, but I don’t think so. I just think it’s a very natural progression. Musically you are always learning.”

Another story here:

Singer-songwriter Tift Merritt spent her formative years honing her skills in small clubs in Raleigh and Chapel Hill. Her debut album, 2002’s “Bramble Rose,” established her as a favorite among the alternative-country crowd. Her latest CD, “Another Country,” features a heady mix of Stax-flavored roots rock and introspective balladry. Merritt will perform at the Grey Eagle in Asheville, N.C., this Friday and at the Variety Playhouse in Atlanta on Saturday.

Russell Hall: What led you toward rhythm ‘n’ blues and roots music, as opposed to straight-ahead rock and roll?

Tift Merritt: I think soul music, and rock and roll, and blues and country are all in the same family. All the people I listened to and admired, growing up, pulled from a lot of different places. Carole King and Van Morrison are prime examples. They’ve always written really honest songs, and put a great feel to them, but they also make you want to dance and sing. That’s what I’m trying to do.

The city of Asheville has just issued a press release, warning us all that traffic is supposed to be horrendous on Sept. 9 because of a motivational seminar at the Civic Center in downtown Asheville. The city says to expect 3,000 people to descend upon the civic center at 8 a.m. that morning.

I'd never heard of the speakers, Peter and Tamara Lowe, so I looked them up.

Boy, am I motivated!!! From their web site:

The GET MOTIVATED Seminar is world famous for its energizing, action-packed, star-studded, fun-filled, spectacular stage show. CNN, 60 Minutes, USA Today, TIME, PEOPLE, The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal all rave about it! This motivational mega-show packs more inspirational firepower than a stick of dynamite! 
For more than 25 years, corporate leaders, Fortune 500 companies, educators, business owners, salespeople, medical professionals and more have made Peter and Tamara Lowe's GET MOTIVATED! America's #1 Business Seminar. Husband-wife team Peter and Tamara Lowe, are the dynamic duo who create and produce The GET MOTIVATED! Seminar, and have been happily married for 20 years. 

Together they have built numerous successful companies, travelled to more than 100 countries, served as advisors to the world's most influential leaders and are the proud parents of two terrific sons. Peter and Tamara make their home in South Florida.  

Here's the city's press release:

ASHEVILLE- Get Motivated Seminar will be held at the Asheville Civic Center Tuesday, Sept. 9 at 8 a.m. With an estimated attendance of 3,000, the city expects traffic delays and some difficulties in parking downtown throughout the day of the event. The city encourages commuters and downtown residents to car pool, use public transportation or an alternative source of transportation.

Get Motivated will be providing a free shuttle service from the Asheville Mall to the Asheville Civic Center from 6 a.m.-5 p.m. All event attendees and downtown commuters will be able to use the free shuttle.

The city’s parking services expects all city parking garages to be full by 7 a.m. with event attendees. Parking services encourages individuals to not park in private parking lots where towing signs are posted. APD urges commuters to be mindful of pedestrians and to please use caution when driving downtown the morning of the event. For further information please visit  http://www.ashevillenc.gov/parking.

 

Mountain Xpress has the story, and the court documents:

Pete Bradley was released from the Buncombe County Detention Center Wednesday afternoon. A jail employee confirmed that Bradley was no longer being held there, and court records show that Bradley was released on $25,000 unsecured bond. 

Here's a fascinating story about a true North Carolina beer pioneer. Note the end of the story, which explains how the Weeping Radish Farm Brewery is changing. It could provide a great model for the growth and expansion of micro-breweries here in Western North Carolina:

The Raleigh News & Observer has it:

Spend an hour talking with Uli Bennewitz and the conversation may start with beer, but it darts with lightning speed to health care, the German autobahn, the American manufacturing revolution, the integrity of our food supply, national security, the nightmares of bureaucracy and the education of chefs -- then it's back to beer.

Bennewitz is the single figure who completely changed the North Carolina beer scene when he got legislation passed in 1986 to make brewpubs legal. More than two decades later, he's trying to reshape our view of food and drink again.

Bennewitz moved to North Carolina in the early '80s to take a job as an agricultural consultant in Manteo. His brother back in Bavaria convinced him that a restaurant that brewed its own beer -- a brewpub -- would be a sure winner in America. The brewing equipment was en route to North Carolina before this newcomer discovered two obstacles: brewpubs were illegal in North Carolina, and Manteo was in a dry county.

Bennewitz managed to get legislation enacted, navigated the local dry laws and in 1986 opened his restaurant and brewery, the Weeping Radish, named for a snack that accompanies a good beer in Munich. It was the first microbrewery and brewpub in North Carolina: there are now about 30.

Now, the new Weeping Radish Farm Brewery, opened in Currituck in 2006, integrates all of Bennewitz's diverse passions about beer, agriculture, food, health and community in one enterprise. The farm is a home for the traditional crafts of brewing, farming and butchery, all organized in an environmentally sustainable manner. The concept can be summed up as shortening what he terms the "food chain"-- the steps, both in distance and in increasingly sophisticated processing, that food and drink undergo before they reach the consumer.

He explains his concerns: "In 2008, we have the most efficient food distribution system in the world. We also have the most polluted food chain in the world, because in order to do that, you have to take a perishable food and turn it into a nonperishable commodity." That, in turn, takes a toll in human health and environmental quality.

Taking his example from beer, Bennewitz puts it this way:

"The best beer you ever see is perhaps at Oktoberfest in Munich. They make it, they age it for six months, they haul it across town and serve it in the beer tents the same day they tap it from the brewery. This is the issue of the food chain. If you can control the distribution, and the temperature and the pressure from the brewery to the tent all in the same day, you get quality.

"Small-scale farming is the same way. The farmers markets are superior in their products. Why? Because the farmer digs the vegetables the night before and hauls it to the farmers market." With these parallels in mind, the Currituck site is home to a brewery and a 14-acre organic farm, so both of these perishable commodities are available fresh on site.

In an unusual step, Bennewitz has opened a butchery and smokehouse, in a joint venture with a German master butcher. Here, he points out similarities between the crafts of brewing and butchery, where specialized skills and labor are required to transform raw materials -- grain or meat -- into beer or properly prepared cured meats and sausages.

The brewery, the farm and the butchery all interact: The brewery's Black Radish beer has been incorporated into meat dishes served in the farm restaurant; a liver pâté from the butchery contains organic sweet potato from the farm; and in the future, malts smoked in the smokehouse could be used to brew genuine German-style rauchbiers at the brewery. 

I've been touting the greatness of Ray's Weather for some time now, and it appears that others are starting to take notice as well. The Western North Carolina-based crew of smart and accurate weather forecasters makes the other local weather-guessers -- namely the ones on local television -- look like rank amateurs by comparison.

Go to Ray's Weather. Read the local forecasts for your area. Bookmark their sites. These guys are reliable and deliver the weather news in a straight-up fashion that's useful and thoughtful.

Here's the latest endorsement, from the Waynesville Smoky Mountain News:

"Heads up, readers. Turn to the Classified Advertising Section and you’ll notice The Smoky Mountain News has added a weather forecast. But it’s not just any weather forecast.

"Ray’s Weather — founded by Appalachian State University professor Ray Russell — is already legendary in other parts of Western North Carolina for its consistently spot-on predictions of mountain weather.

"Ten years ago, Russell had a passion for meteorology and a new weather station his wife had given him for Christmas. He put the station in his backyard and started publishing forecasts on his personal web page. His snow forecast discussion became a hit with students and professors, and word spread quickly. He launched raysweather.com — and the rest is history.

"Today, Ray’s Weather is the most widely read media outlet in most of the mountain region. The astonishingly accurate forecasts are a result of Russell’s on-the-ground strategy — a team of six people monitor nearly 50 weather stations around WNC three times daily.

"In contrast, most weather forecasts, particularly in more rural areas, rely on a single weather station located at the closest airport. The National Weather Service uses data from a station at the Asheville airport for the Waynesville forecast, though the two are 30 miles apart.

"Ray’s team is rarely wrong. To see evidence of this, look no further than the campus of Appalachian State University, where it all started. It’s easy to tell who’s scanned Ray’s Weather forecast — they’re the ones carrying a rain jacket on a crystal clear morning, or layering a tank top under a heavy sweater with flip flops sticking out of their backpack. “Ray said,” is a common sentence starter, and there’s never a need for explanation."

Ray’s Web sites remains the center of the forecast. Readers praise its clear format and thorough, easy-to-understand play-by-play of the weather for that day and week. If there’s snow, a cold front, a heat wave, or a rainstorm, Ray knows exactly what time it’s coming and predicts, usually accurately, just how hot, cold, rainy or snowy it will be.

As of now, Ray’s Weather has only expanded as far west as Waynesville, with a weather station located on top of Mast General Store in the downtown area. Access a more in-depth forecast online at waynesvilleweather.com.

Plans call for expanding into more western counties. 

Here's the press release: RiverSculpture Festival will hold a preview party and fundraiser Sept. 18. The festival, which was held at French Broad River Park but this year moves to Woodfin, is an annual event that features awesome works of art.

The event, featuring 32 sculptures by 27 artists from three states, will be held from 6:30 p.m. to 9 p.m. at Blue Spiral 1 art gallery on Biltmore Ave. The suggested donation at the door is $25 per person.

RiverSculpture at Reynolds Mountain will be open free to the public starting Sept. 27 and will be open through Jan. 5. A series of special events on the weekends integrates music, dance, theater and kids’ art with the sculpture. There will be school field trips and guided group tours by participating sculptors. For times and dates, go to www.riversculpture.com.

RiverSculpture is sponsored by the town of Woodfin and Reynolds Mountain in conjunction with the Asheville Area Arts Council and YMI Cultural Center, as well as by corporate sponsors and private contributors.

Mountain Xpress has the story:

"The removal of an on-air personality at Asheville’s WPVM, a low-power FM station, and the subsequent resignation of the station’s manager has roiled some station volunteers and has the executive director of WPVM’s parent organization defending his move. 

"In the wake of the cancellation of the “7 Layer Dip” show co-hosted byGillian Coats and another station volunteer, another on-air personality has announced that he’s put his show on hiatus, and several other show hosts have protested by not speaking during their shows.

"Meanwhile, the station operations manager, Jason Holland, has tendered his resignation. Holland, the station’s only paid employee, didn’t respond to requests for an interview Tuesday.

"Wally Bowen, executive director of the Mountain Area Information Network, which holds the WPVM broadcast license, told Xpress Tuesday that he cancelled Coats’ show because of “a pattern of behavior that’s just antithetical to our organization’s mission and our right to carry out that mission.” Bowen said the program — a humor show that featured a selection of off-beat, older music — included some “questionable” content, but that that wasn’t the reason for his move."

From USA Today:

Jaime Huffman of the Grove Park Inn Resort & Spa in Asheville, N.C., said more 50-minute massages have been made available recently instead of more expensive 80-minute massages. The Cliff House Resort & Spa in Ogunquit, Maine, offers a $99 spa sampler on Sundays.

Booking midweek is usually cheaper than weekend trips, and spa owners suggest asking about specials like a mother-daughter discount or a family discount. Most spas have them but don't necessarily talk them up.

Along Haywood Street in downtown Asheville during the remnants of Tropical Storm Fay.

Sunday September 7, 2008

11 am – 10 pm; FREE and kid friendly!

www.arts2people.org

www.myspace.com/lexfestasheville

 

Arts 2 People is excited to announce the stage lineup for the 7^th annual FREE, Lexington Ave Arts and Fun Festival (LAAFF).  Three blocks of N. Lexington Ave will be lined with all local art, food, beer and street performers on Sunday, September 7^th from 11am – 10pm between College Street and the I 240 overpass.  The street will be brimming with a celebration Asheville's diverse and unique culture.

 

The stage lineups are as follows; placed in visual order:

 

Electric Stage

Josh Phillips Folk Festival- Official CD Release

Kitchen Furniture Drum Ensemble

David Earl and the Plowshares

Snake Oil Medicine Show

Jon Scales Fourchestra

Firecracker Jazz Band

The Asheville Horns

Shannon Whitworth

Town Mountain

Crystal Kind

Jar-E

 

 

Performing Arts Stage

The Runaway Circus and the Loose Caboose!

Asheville Dance Revolution

Ruby Slippers with Mingle

Hunab Kru Breakdancing

Secret Agent 23 Skidoo

Lisa Zahiya Bellydance

Duende Mountain Duo

South French Broads

Ensemble Djembeso

Vertigo Jazz Project

Hip Hop Revolution

The Honeycutters

Hellblinki Sextet

The Broomstars

Moving Women

Unifire Theatre

The Sireens

Josh Blake

 

Bobo Stage

Brian McGee & Hollow Speed

Secret B-Sides

Pierce Edens

Angie West

Ba Man Bia

Chakra Bird

Cabo Verde

Sirius. B

Arundas

 

The Freaky Tiki: DJ's Inside Vincent's Ear Courtyard

Funk , House, Tribal and Soul Rhythms

Sex Panther

Brett Rock

DJ Trevor

DJ jOshU

Gilbot

 

Inside Shady Grove Courtyard

LAAFF Grass; the best of Asheville Bluegrass Pickers!

Old Time String Music- hosted by Leigh Hilliard

Circle For Song- hosted by Jenny Juice

 

LAAFF Aftermath!

Sun Clash Productions Special Guest DJ @ Bobo's

Trouble @ the Emerald Lounge 

Cross-posted from BlogAsheville:

Each year, the mighty bloggers of BlogAsheville come together for a uproarious night of celebration, congratulation, and community. The 3rd Annual Extravablogiversapaloozathon is going to be the biggest bash yet. With over 130 bloggers on the roll and lots of love from area techies, artists, and businessfolk, we expect to invite well over 200 people to tip their glasses to our collective efforts.

September 27th, 6pm - late, downtown Asheville

We'll be letting details about the party trickle out over the next couple of weeks, but the very exciting centerpiece of the bloggy bacchanal is the BlogAsheville Awards. You can see 2006 results here and 2007 results here.

Here's how the 2008 Awards will work:

- Nominations will open today in the various categories
- You can nominate any BlogAsheville blogroll blog
- You can nominate yourself
- Any BlogAsheville reader can make nominations
- A blog can be nominated for multiple categories
- Smart people will link to the blogs they nominate
- Nominations will remain open until September 10th at 1:34pm

- You can copy and paste the list of categories into the comments and go through them all, or just pick and choose the ones you'd like.
- If you don't want to leave your nominations in the comments, you can email them to me at scrutinyhooligans AT yahoo DECIMAL com

- Please post something at your home blog letting folks know that the nominations are up.

On September 12ish (primarily because anything done on September 11th is inherently creepy for the foreseeable future), I'll post the list of nominees, and folks can get to voting.

Here are your categories:

UPDATED: 8/20


Best Craft Blog

Most Likely to Make Money by Blogging

Least Likely to Make Money by Blogging

Blogger I'd Most Like to Have a Beer With

Least Likely to Care About Traffic

Most Likely to Make You Laugh Out Loud

Best Art/Photos

Best Food 

Blogger you'd most like to see naked

Biggest Slacker

Best Design

Best Local Happenings

Best Political

Best Blog Beginning with the word "The"

Makes Me Feel Happiest

Most Inspirational

Most in Need of a Redesign

Most Likely to Have New Material

Best New Blog (created in the last 12 months)

Most Deserving of Wider Recognition

Best Writing

Best Overall

I've had a couple of people recently mention this Radar magazine article to me, and it's worth checking out. The story updates that status of British-born Genesis P-Orridge, a cult icon who redefines the term "really weird guy."

I can't explain it better than this. Is the Asheville music scene ready?:

A cult icon best known for his fearsome, and sometimes transcendent, stage performances, Genesis was one of the most influential musicians of the UK's post-punk era. He invented the genre known as industrial music and later helped pioneer acid house and the rave scene, all the while crafting an unsettling persona—shamanistic, sinister, and unabashedly deviant—that would inspire countless acts. His own output never found a mass audience, but as author Douglas Rushkoff, who briefly played keyboards for Psychic TV, points out, "If it weren't for Throbbing Gristle, people like Marilyn Manson and Trent Reznor would never have existed at all."

The art world, too, owes P-Orridge a considerable debt. One of his early sculptures, displayed at the Museum of Modern Art in Paris, was a vitrine filled with live maggots that fed on menstrual blood and eventually grew into fruit flies—not exactly Matisse, perhaps, but a hot enough idea that when Damien Hirst did almost exactly the same thing (replacing the tampons with a cow's head) more than a decade later, the piece instantly launched his career. Genesis was also a performance artist before the genre had a name, doing everything from masturbating onstage to publicly wounding himself in the name of creative experimentation.

Meanwhile, he transformed body piercing from a fetish of the hardcore gay subculture into a mainstream phenomenon. He was an eager student of occultist Aleister Crowley and a practitioner of "sex magick" (credit him, along with Jimmy Page, for giving rock its satanic edge). He experimented with a panoply of narcotics; hung out with William S. Burroughs and Dr. Timothy Leary; and founded a quasi-cult, Thee Temple ov Psychick Youth, which claimed 10,000 worldwide adherents at its peak. He was denounced as a degenerate, a satanist, and a corrupter of youth by the Fleet Street tabloids; charged with obscenity for his indecent mail art; targeted by Scotland Yard amid the ritual child-abuse hysteria of the early 1990s; and essentially banished from his home country. In short, Genesis P-Orridge was, by conventional measures, not merely weird but off the charts. And this was before he had his teeth filed down to tiny points and replaced with solid gold replicas; before the cheek implants; before the boob job.

He and Breyer wouldn't actually get to talk to each other until the next evening, when they accompanied Sellers to a party at the S&M club Paddles, jabbering away like kids while Jackie ground the heel of her motorcycle boot into some guy's testicles. On the morning in question, though, there wasn't time. Jackie had to go to work, and Gen was on his way out. He hadn't really come to Terence's dungeon for punishment, anyway; he'd already had more than enough of that in his life.

In February 14, 2003, Gen and Jackie, who'd gone on to change her name to Lady Jaye Breyer P-Orridge, lay on twin hospital gurneys, hand in hand. Having married nearly a decade before, they'd recently come up with a plan to take their relationship to the next level. The idea behind pandrogeny, as they called it, was for two people to literally become each other—or to come as close as possible. At first, it was a matter of simply dressing alike, going in for the same hairstyle, getting Jaye a set of contact lenses to match Gen's eyes. But that wasn't enough. The Valentine's Day operation gave them matching breast implants, size C. Later, Jaye had her eyes and nose done, and got a chin implant, to resemble Gen. Gen received cheek enhancements and a lip job.

...

Now Gen feels it's his duty to represent both himself and Jaye on this physical plane; as a result, he's planning additional surgeries to more closely resemble her. "I need to balance out my energy," he says.

He's been wearing Jaye's clothes almost exclusively—they were the same size, except around the shoulders—and using her cell phone, keeping her outgoing greeting, despite the protests of some of their friends.

Jaye's spirit has contacted him several times, he says, via the usual paranormal routes: pictures flying off walls, strange vibrations. (He notes that a few friends have witnessed these events as well.) Jaye has let him know she's waiting for him, but Gen has decided to stick around for now. Time in the other place moves at a different speed, he says. She'll be patient. In the meantime, she's instructed him to move to Asheville, North Carolina (a place neither one of them ever visited), and build a compound with some friends. The Queens house is on the market.

The band Junior League is opening up for Blueground Undergrass Friday at 8 p.m. at the Emerald Lounge. I wanna go.

Here's the press release:

The band continues to tour Nationally, performing at FloydFest (Virginia) and Summerfest (Milwaukee) this past July, sharing festival mainstages with David Grisman, Lucinda Williams, the Drive By Truckers, Gnarls Barkley, Railroad Earth, Golem, the Avett Brothers and more. Our music will be featured in Adult Swim editor/producer's(And Atlanta Film Festival Winner) short film "Gypsy Crepes" (Gnome Production) that hits the festival this coming Winter (inclusing SXSW, Sundance and more).

We recorded our first record "Oh Dear at NPR's Studio in Washington DC in March 2007 followed by a June release and have garnered National press from Los Angeles, Seattle, Milwaukee, New York City, DC, Atlanta and more. We will release our Second LP in Bethesda at Avalon Studios entitled "Mitchell Williams Fo Govena" named after my bus driver, an elderly white man, in the Atlanta Public School Systems who ran for Governor of Georgia in the late 80's and spent his bus routes flyering the town with his campaign posters.

Our new record features baritone sax player (of the Levon Helm Band who we have been invited to open for at his Midnight Ramble) Erik Lawrence as well as Telluride Bluegrass festival fiddler, Kailin Yong- of the Boulder Acoustic Society.

Photo credit: Russ Helgren, FloydFest 2008, Junior League Band

The Mountain Xpress has the news:

 "Pete Bradley, the former Woodfin police chief convicted of assaulting his wife in 2005, had his first appearance before a federal magistrate Tuesday morning on charges that, as a convicted felon, he illegally possessed a firearm.

"Bradley was found in possession of a .45-caliber Sig Sauer handgun, according to court records. Bradley was arrested Friday on the charge and was held in the Buncombe County jail over the weekend. According to the court documents, the federal indictment on the charge was sealed by U.S. Magistrate Dennis Howell on Aug. 5. An arrest warrant issued Aug. 6 was also sealed by the court. The court opened the documents following Bradley’s court appearance."

More on the Bradley story here.

Now that the concern over the impact of Hurricane Gustav has largely waned, folks in Western North Carolina can focus on the next storm -- Hanna. I'm expecting to see conjecture about the possible impacts of Hannah: where is it going? will it bring more heavy rain and flooding to the area? etc.

Ray's Weather, the best local weather forecasting for Western North Carolina, has this to say:

The tropics continue to be exceedingly busy. With Gustav now inland and producing torrential rainfall through the Arklatex region, attention now turns to Hurricane Hanna located in the southeastern Bahamas. We expect Hanna to track to the northwest over the next couple of days, with a landfall between Savannah and Charleston sometime on Friday as a category two or three hurricane. A track northward through central SC and then the North Carolina Piedmont is favored at this time.

On this course, rain (with the heaviest rain east of the mountains) would overspread the area on Friday before lifting north of the state on Saturday. Unlike Fay, Hanna would likely retain sufficient strength to produce strong winds around our local area. This could be a high-impact event, so we're going to be following this extremely carefully.

Justice for Patsy Bradley is a web site to keep your eyes on as we watch what happens in the latest Pete Bradley chapter. There are a lot of folks who believe Patsy Bradley did not die by her own hand.

Here's an interesting commentary by climate scientist Patrick Michaels, writing in the Washington Times newspaper. It's clear that he's writing for a conservative audience, but it's also clear that science and politics are closely intertwined when it comes to saving the environment.

Note the Asheville references:

Ever since Soviet and Western climate scientists published the first international compendium on global warming, back in 1985, we have known that scaring people to death is very good for the environmentalist business. Such documents appear once or twice a year under the aegis of sundry governmental and international agencies, such as the United States' Climate Change Science Program (CCSP).

Remember that acronym, CCSP. If its latest "Synthesis Report" on climate change sees the light of day, we may one day thank CCSP for policies that drive America into the poor house.

The problem is that our professional selfishness has a price: We have to agree the problem is so bad that it becomes, in Al Gore's words, "the central organizing principal for civilization." So we climate scientists wind up espousing policies are so drastic they will paralyze any economy.

Having been a climate scientist for about as long as these documents have been around, I have had the opportunity to review and comment on many documents that do this - not that my comments are listened to very much. I found two changes in the thousands of pages of the last (2007) IPCC report - after I sent in a 30,000-word point-by-point review.

I'll be lucky to get even that much attention after my equally long critique of a new CCSP report, Global Climate Change Impacts in the United States. The sum of my analysis: This is the worst document in this genre I have ever seen. By comparison, it makes the 1962 Mets (or, for that matter, 2008's Washington Nationals) paragons of professional excellence.

Virtually every sentence can be contested or simply ignores published science that disagrees with CCSP's preconceived message. In its own words: "Aggressive near-term actions would be required to alter the future path of human-induced warming... future generations will inherit the legacy of our decisions."

If "future generations" and "legacy of our decisions" sound more to you like politics rather than science, you're correct. The CCSP report isn't a science document at all. Not unless global warming science is a virtually one-sided world where almost everything is bad and getting worse, and where a moderate response dishonors our progenitors.

Of course, this can't be. Global warming lengthens growing seasons. Carbon dioxide, the cause of (part of the) warming (dormant for 11 years now) clearly improves crop yields in a world where stupid global warming policies (like burning our food supply in cars) are increasing food scarcity. If they have the money, by and large, Americans move to a warmer climate. And so on - which is why the CCSP document and the delete key should become intimate friends.

How did such a remarkable distortion see the light day? The "product lead" is Tom Karl, who heads the Commerce Department's National Climatic Data Center in Asheville, N.C. He is perhaps the most political and politically savvy climate scientist in U.S. history. When Al Gore was vice president, he would issue monthly briefings on the horrors of climate change. When Mr. Gore exaggerated some local flood, or claimed Florida would burn because of global warming, Mr. Karl stood by and remained mute. But now, with the prospect of an increasingly Democratic Senate, and a president who will go along with the madness of climatically futile policies (Barack Obama or John McCain on global warming? Pick em!), Mr. Karl and CCSP have picked up the scent.

From a policy viewpoint, it's even worse. The current administration has punted to the next president the question of what rules EPA should make about global warming. All the levers of political power - the presidency, Congress and the relevant agencies - are therefore all pointed in the same direction. All will cite the CCSP as their bible, and anyone who voices a more factual opinion will in fact be marginalized as insane.

Want more evidence as to the perfidy of the CCSP process? The senior editor is no climate scientist; it's Susan J. Hassol, who wrote the HBO global warming "documentary," "Too Hot Not to Handle." Laurie David, the force behind Al Gore's "An Inconvenient Truth," was the executive producer. This isn't science, it's science fiction.

The first illustration inside the front cover gives away the spin. It's a picture of people of as many races and sexes as possible holding hands. What that has to do with climate change science is a mystery, but it certainly reflects a political view.

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Trash the entire report. It's neither scientific nor logical. It's a political document. Send the product lead back to Asheville and the senior editor back to Hollywood.

But of course, that won't happen. Instead, the CCSP report and its production team will be lionized. It will serve as the basis for the most onerous environmental legislation and regulations in U.S. history. And when historians look back at a nation made poorer by foolish policies (which themselves will have no effect on warming), they will wonder how climate science could have gone so far into the wilderness of politics.

Patrick J. Michaels is senior fellow in environmental studies at the Cato Institute and professor of environmental sciences at University of Virginia.