American Newsreel

Reports The Associated Press:

The pilot of a Continental Airlines flight became ill after takeoff and was later pronounced dead after the plane made an emergency landing Saturday, a company spokeswoman said.

The 210 passengers on the flight, which departed from Houston, were never in danger and the co-pilot landed the plane safely, Continental spokeswoman Macky Osorio said.

The airline said only that the pilot suffered a “serious medical problem.” Continental believes the pilot died of natural causes, Osorio said. The pilot’s name was not released.

The flight, bound for Puerto Vallarta, Mexico, took off from Houston’s George Bush Intercontinental Airport and was diverted to McAllen-Miller International Airport. The flight continued to Mexico with a new crew, Osorio said.

The Denver Broncos were eliminated from the National Football League playoffs Sunday. Later that evening, one of their stars was eliminated from life.

Reports The Associated Press:

Broncos cornerback Darrent Williams was killed early Monday when his white stretch Hummer was sprayed by bullets after a nightclub dispute following a New Year’s Eve party.

Police have no motive and no indication the 24-year-old player was targeted in the drive-by shooting of the limousine. The burst of violence occurred hours after the Broncos were eliminated from playoff contention.

“All of us are devastated by this tragedy,” Broncos owner Pat Bowlen said in a statement. “To lose a young player, and more important, a great young man such as Darrent Williams, is incomprehensible. To lose him in such a senseless manner as this is beyond words.”

A little after 2 a.m., the limousine was fired on from a vehicle that pulled up along its side, hitting three people, police spokesman Sonny Jackson said. As many as a dozen bullet holes were visible on the driver’s side of the vehicle. One window was blown out.

A man and a woman, Brandon Flowers and Nicole Reindl, were wounded. They were taken to St. Anthony Central Hospital.

Coach Mike Shanahan said the killing left him “speechless with sadness.”

Actor Peter Boyle is dead at 71. I remember his breakthrough performance at the violent racist in the independent film Joe in 1970 but he is probably remembered more as the monster in the Mel Brooks spook Young Frankenstein.

According to Newsweek, Wal-Mart sales are way off and management is singing the blues. Seems the retailer to the masses tried to upscale and that turned off the masses. First rule of sales: You’ve got to know the territory.

Noticed a lot more spam in your email box lately? You’re not alone. Spam is on the rise and efforts to block the glut of useless messages are failing.

Reports The New York Times:

Hearing from a lot of new friends lately? You know, the ones that write “It’s me, Esmeralda,” and tip you off to an obscure stock that is “poised to explode” or a great deal on prescription drugs.

You’re not the only one. Spam is back — in e-mail in-boxes and on everyone’s minds. In the last six months, the problem has gotten measurably worse. Worldwide spam volumes have doubled from last year, according to Ironport, a spam filtering firm, and unsolicited junk mail now accounts for more than 9 of every 10 e-mail messages sent over the Internet.

Much of that flood is made up of a nettlesome new breed of junk e-mail called image spam, in which the words of the advertisement are part of a picture, often fooling traditional spam detectors that look for telltale phrases. Image spam increased fourfold from last year and now represents 25 to 45 percent of all junk e-mail, depending on the day, Ironport says.

The antispam industry is struggling to keep up with the surge. It is adding computer power and developing new techniques in an effort to avoid losing the battle with the most sophisticated spammers.

Another cruise ship, another virus. Reports WESH-TV:

Cruise officials said almost 400 passengers and crew aboard the world’s largest cruise ship have been given over-the-counter medication for a virus.

The outbreak struck Royal Caribbean’s Freedom of the Seas, which returned Sunday as scheduled to the Port of Miami.

A statement from the Miami-based company said crew members sanitized frequently touched surfaces such as railings, door handles and elevator buttons after the short-lived outbreak began. The cruise line also said that a guest previously exposed to norovirus likely brought it on board Nov. 26.

The Freedom of the Seas carries 4,000 passengers on 15 decks. Am I missing something here? How is spending several thousand bucks for a week or so with 4,000 others people on a floating city a vacation?

From the banking world comes news that Mellon Bank of Pittsburgh and the Bank of New York will merge. These mergers continue to create megabanks and names from long ago have disappeared into the woodwork. My files are filled with statements and cancelled checks from banks that no longer exists: Virginia National Bank, NationsBank, Soran, 1st Virginia Bank, Central Fidelity, MBNA and so on.

Pfizer announced Saturday it is pulling the plug on development of a highly-anticipated drug to treat high cholesterol because of an unfortunate side effect.

People taking the drug died.

Reports The Associated Press:

Pfizer Inc. said Saturday it has cut off all clinical trials and development for a cholesterol drug that was supposed to be the star of its pipeline because of an unexpected number of deaths and cardiovascular problems in patients who used it.

The world’s largest drugmaker said it was told Saturday that an independent board monitoring a study for torcetrapib, a drug that raises levels of HDL, or what’s commonly known as good cholesterol, recommended that the work end because of “an imbalance of mortality and cardiovascular events.”

Pfizer said it is asking all clinical investigators conducting trials to warn patients to stop taking the drug immediately.

The news is devastating to Pfizer, which had been counting on the drug to revitalize stagnant sales that have been hurt by numerous patent expirations on key products.

Not as devastating as it was to the people who died.

American Newsreel returns from the ashes. I gave up publishing this web site about a year ago, tired from trying to do too much at once.

But I’ve missed Newsreel and I hope you have too.

Please give me a day or two while I get everything up and running.

From that nasty little hamlet up in Pennsylvania comes word that Punxsutawney Phil, the weather-forecasting rhodent, saw his shadow, which means six more weeks of winter.

Ironically, the rat that roared saw his shadow on a warm, unwinter-like day and the revelers turned the event into an inpromptu rally in support of the Pittsburgh Steelers, who play in the Super Bowl Sunday.

The Associated Press reports:

Punxsutawney Phil saw his shadow, but it was hard to find a complainer in the crowd on Gobbler’s Knob, where the morning temperature was well above freezing and Thursday’s high was expected to hit 48 degrees.

There were a few boos at the groundhog’s prediction of six more weeks of winter, but most of the hundreds of revelers instead turned the event into an impromptu Pittsburgh Steelers rally.

Fans in football jerseys sang “Here we go Steelers,” and members of the Punxsutawney Groundhog Club’s Inner Circle — the top-hat- and tuxedo-wearing businessmen responsible for carrying on the groundhog tradition each year — threw black and gold Steelers “Terrible Towels” as they waited to rouse Phil from his burrow.

The furry forecaster may be popular, but the Pittsburgh Steelers are playing in the Super Bowl on Sunday.