The documentary Hopper/Welles, which screened at the 34th annual AFI Fest (https://fest.afi.com/), is to film history what 1989’s When Harry Met Sally… is to romcoms. It consists of a conversation/interview between two renegade actor/directors who made touchstone movies but were nevertheless Hollywood outcasts. Following a stunning career as a radio and Broadway wunderkind, Orson Welles starred in, co-wrote and directed his first Hollywood feature when he was only 25. That 1941 masterpiece Citizen Kane scored the Best Writing, Original Screenplay Oscar for Welles and Herman Mankiewicz and received eight more nominations, including in the Best Picture, Best Director and Best Actor Academy Award categories. But as far as the Tinseltown studio system went, it was all downhill from there in terms of directing for RKO, et al, for poor Orson.

BANGKOK, Thailand -- Embattled Prime Minister Prayuth Chan-ocha on
October 22 revoked his mostly ineffectual "serious state of emergency"
in Bangkok, one day after saying he "will do so promptly if there are
no violent incidents."

The Royal Thai Government Gazette published his order which took effect at noon.

Prayuth clamped Bangkok under a "serious state of emergency" on
October 15, extending an existing state of emergency declared in March
to fight the coronavirus.

The emergency edict banned gatherings in public of five or more
people, distributing or publishing data that the government perceived
to be instigating fear or distorting information, and forbid using
public transportation or buildings for dissent.

Tens of thousands of protesters however repeatedly defied the
emergency edict by continuing to gather at daily demonstrations which
began on October 13.

Security forces, enjoying immunity under the emergency edict, could
detain people for 30 days in military camps without access to a
lawyer.

Less than two weeks to go until Election Day – what can you do?

Begin by reading Greg Palast’s How Trump Stole 2020: The Hunt for America’s Vanished Voters and then go out and stop the theft.

Not only is Palast one of our premier investigative reporters he is also a great storyteller, and the best part, the stories are all factual.

This latest tome reads like a rogue’s gallery of real crime. Because they are rogues and they committed real crimes.

Palast came to notoriety in 2000 when he revealed the illegal voter purges in Florida that cost Gore the election. Back then he focused on Governor Jeb Bush and Florida Secretary of State Katherine Harris. In the new book he stalks, rightly, the likes of Georgia Governor Brian Kemp and documents in detail how he helped rig the election he ran against Stacey Abrams in 2018. Kemp used his power as Secretary of State to purge 665,677 voters, overwhelmingly Democrats.

Now Palast spells out the big purge states of 2020: Ohio with 432,000 axed from the voting rolls; North Carolina with 576,534 purged; Arizona with 258,000; and Wisconsin with 99,000.