Ironic, don't you think?

Wokette notes this item from the WaPo gossip column:

Famed sci-fi writer Ray Bradbury is not very happy with filmmaker Michael Moore.

The 80-year-old author is peeved that Moore's latest documentary, "Fahrenheit 9/11" -- which just picked up the highly coveted Palme d'Or at the Cannes Film Festival -- is trading on the title of Bradbury's famous 1953 novel "Fahrenheit 451."

"Michael Moore is a dumb [expletive], that's what I think," Bradbury told the Swedish newspaper Dagens Nyheter during a phone interview from Los Angeles. "He stole my title and changed the numbers without ever asking my permission." Not one to hold back, Bradbury said he tried to contact Moore's production company to express his grave displeasure, but to no avail. It would be nice, he added, if Moore changed the title of his soon-to-be released film.

I guess some people aren't flattered when phrases they coin gain such cultural resonance that they an be used as a literary shorthand for any critical view of an authoritaian mindset. And, um, isn't Fahrenheit 451 a reference to the supression of critical ree expression through the burning of paper?

Britain not ready for FoIA

Many UK government agencies' computer systems are not ready to implement the Freedom of Information Act when it comes into force in January 2005, reports ComputerWeekly.

Brian Flynn, imbiber of own medicine

As Alexandra Polier, who was subject of false rumours of having had an affair with John Kerry, tells it, the Sun reporter who first picked up her name from the Drudge Report sure can't take it as well as he dishes it out:

In the end, I liked [the New York Observer's Alexandra Wolfe]; she’d had the courage to meet me--more than I can say for The Sun's Brian Flynn, who had first named me. Afraid I would lose my temper, I asked my editor to call him first.

“I was calling to ask you who your source was for your story which named Alex Polier as the intern in the Kerry story,” she said.

“Ah, many people have asked me; it was a fantastic source,” he said. “I broke that story to the world, you know,” he added proudly. “But your source was wrong,” she pointed out. He paused, startled. “You’ve just ambushed me,” he cried. “You’ve ambushed me!”

“I think you should speak to Alex,” she said and passed me the phone.

“Hello,” he said, sounding nervous.

“I’d like to talk to you. I’m writing a piece and have some questions.”

“It’s not a good time right now,” he said. “Let’s meet up next week.”

“Why did you quote my mother when she wasn’t even home?” I persisted.

“I really can’t talk about this right now, Alex,” he said.

When I finally tracked him down the following week, he was brusque and told me to go through The Sun’s PR office. I asked him about my mother again, but he kept saying, “Sorry, Alex, proper channels.” Reached in London, Lorna Carmichael, The Sun’s PR manager, refused to comment. I went to Flynn’s apartment, and spoke to his wife through the intercom. “Go away and leave us alone!” she cried. “He’s not going to come down or speak to you.”

Waiting for a doorstep ambush of a Sun reporter. I love it.

Update: D'oh! Gawker found this amusing long before I did.

Chalabi (and news sources generally)

New York magazine:

If [Judy] Miller is an extreme example of the Times’ ultracompetitive mind-set, she is also an example of an inherent problem of journalism: its reliance on sources.

This is especially true when the key source is a now-discredited head of the Iraqi National Congress, but why isn't the New York Times controversy prompting broader questions about the universal problem of journalists' reliance on sources with vested interests?