Got the Bhutto

Benazir Bhutto, the “daughter of Pakistan” was assassinated at the age of 54, thus precluding her dream of being ousted as prime minister under the cloud of corruption for a third time. Following high fives all around, the government of Pervez Musharraf declared the traditional three days of rioting. Bhutto died from either a gunshot, shrapnel from a suicide bombing or from a bump on the head, as CSI: Rawalpindi completes its in-depth sweeping under the rug. In the Islamic tradition, Musharraf blamed Bhutto for her assassination, as she did not take appropriate safety precautions, such as the increased security personnel Bhutto had been requesting from Musharraf since almost getting blown up in October. Bhutto’s son was named to head her Pakistan Peoples Party, thus ensuring a third generation of martyrdom for the family, joining Bhutto’s father, former president and prime minister Zulfikar Ali Bhutto (hanged in 1979 for “ordering the murder of a political opponent”) and brothers Shahnawaz (mysteriously poisoned in 1985) and Murtaza (gunned down in 1996) as the Bhuttos have the life expectancy of a Spinal Tap drummer. If the kid is elected prime minister, he will be eligible for the 2008-2009 GHI… assuming he survives the year.

It Was a Wonderful Life

Frank Capra, Jr., who showed that the apple may not fall far from the tree, but that doesn’t mean the applesauce won’t taste like feet, has died of prostate cancer at the age of 73. He was nominated for an Emmy for a documentary about his father, which consisted largely of clips of his pop’s pictures and home movies that the senior Capra staged and blocked. Having only one famous parent on whom to base a movie, the rest of Capra Jr’s producing career left a bit to be desired. While his father took Mr. Smith to Washington, Lil’ Frank took Billy Jack, a half-breed Native American Green Beret Vietnam War veteran, hapkido master, and gunslinger, in a virtual remake. The filibuster scene loses a little luster when Billy Jack crushes Senator Paine’s larynx with a roundhouse kick. This was the first in a planned series of remaking classic films with the Billy Jack touch, but Capra couldn’t secure the funding. Still, scripts of Citizen Billy have brought thousands on eBay, and bootlegs of Richard Dreyfus’ screen test for William of Arabia are legendary. He also served as associate producer for Marooned, a Mystery Science Theater 3000 target consisting of Gene Hackman, Richard Crenna and James Franciscus sitting around slowly suffocating, David Janssen leading a rescue effort in a red NASA spacecraft and Gregory Peck looking grim. He was also associate producer on the last three lousy Planet of the Apes sequels. Like making a copy of a copy, the Capra DNA keeps getting diluted, as his son has been assistant and second assistant directing on such classics as Zapped!, Warlock and The Adventures of Pluto Nash.

The First Duet with Ike Turner and Dan Fogelberg

Hoosier Deady

Or
Carson Deadly
Julia M. Carson, the first black woman to represent Indianapolis in Congress, has died of lung cancer at the age of 69. The democrat had ruled Indiana’s 7th with a liberal fist since 1997. The Mobs Mabley of Congress, she was fresh off double bypass surgery when she got elected, had high blood pressure, asthma and diabetes, was hospitalized the weekend before the 2004 election for a flu-shot reaction and was treated for a severe leg infection earlier this year when she was diagnosed with lung cancer, further proof, following Dan Quayle’s 11 years in Congress, that all Indiana looks for is a pulse, no matter how faint, in its elected officials. Carson was deeply interested in cars and choo-choos, serving on the Committee on Transportation & Infrastructure, the Subcommittee on Railroads, Pipelines, and Hazardous Materials and the Subcommittee on Highways and Transit. Carson is the 5th member of the House of Representatives to die in 2007. Are we really sure these are the people who should be sorting out health care policy?

Four Pooligans are getting the most out of their subscription to Roll Call: James, Greg’s Team Matlock, Mike’s Academic List and Kirsti’s Die, Die, My Darlings take the early lead.

This is the third-earliest hit in GHI history and the second year in a row James has scored the first hit. Only once in the first 6 years of the GHI has anyone drawn first blood and taken the title.

Met My Lover in a Funeral Home
(Props to Monty, returning to headlining after a long absence)

Or
No Longer
(Cap tip to Phil and the Derby Dead Pool, where I am now in 53rd place)

Or
It's Hard to Say Much Right Now
(Huzzah for Phil)
Dan Fogelberg, the bane of elevators everywhere, has died of lung cancer at the age of 56. The drippy balladeer was recently ranked as the 5th worst lyricist ever by Blender magazine, thanks to such lines as All the long, lazy mornings/In pastures of green/The sun on your withers/The wind in your mane/Could never prepare you/For what lies ahead/The run for the roses so red, from his love ode to horsies, Run for the Roses. Fogelberg was the Sinatra of soft rock; the Elvis of easy listening, earning a place of honor on Lola Granola’s ass. Fogelberg was a master of turning his everyday life into whiny anthems for a generation that considered Alan Alda a sex symbol, with hits like Leader of the Band, a tribute to his late father and Same Old Lang Syne, based on a chance encounter with an old girlfriend.

What’s a Restraining Order Got to Do With It?

Or
What’s Life Got to Do With It?
(Can I get a Whoop-Whoop for Monty?)

Or
Not Risin’ With the Blues
(Further kudos for Monty)

Or
Ike Beats Tina to Death
(Accolades for Phil, looking over his shoulder to find the line)

Or
Rollin’ on the River Styx
(Laudatories for Phil)
Ike Turner, the Punch to Tina’s Judy, has died at the age of 76. Ike started as an R&B studio musician before finding Anne Mae Bullock in the early 1960s. She became Tina Turner, they became the Ike and Tina Turner Revue and had a series of hits in the 1960s and 1970s, in part because of the exposure they got opening for The Rolling Stones who were trying to convince people they had an R&B sound. She became one of Ike’s 14 wives, though he disputes both her inclusion and the total number, and, according to her book, the basis for the movie What’s Love Got to Do With It?, his prime punching bag. Ike matter-of-factly acknowledged slapping and hitting her, but he called them love contusions. Throughout their marriage, Ike used the groups’ back-up dancers, the Ikettes, as his personal harem, and after they divorced, they became wives 13 and 14. Ike spent most of the 1980s in jail on drug charges, and was in prison when he and Tina were inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 1991.

Why Him? Why Him?

Or
Kneecapped, and then some
(Reverie for Craig)
Brian Sean Griffith, who added the only interest in figure skating in the last, well, ever, has died at the age of 40. In 1994, when known as Shawn Eckardt, he was Tonya Harding’s bodyguard and threw a wrench into the U.S. Olympic team selection by having an associate throw a wrench into toothy rival Nancy Kerrigan’s knee. With a spine as sturdy as his boss’ shoelace, Eckardt caved within days and sold out Harding’s ex-husband Jeff Gillooly to boot. Kerrigan took the silver, humiliated herself at Disney and was the worst host Saturday Night Live has ever seen. Harding finished 8th, had her wedding night sex tape sold on the Internet and fought Paula Jones in Celebrity Boxing.

Just Me
Roger B. Smith, the General Motors executive who made Michael Moore famous by avoiding him, has died at the age of 82. Smith was the CEO when the decision was made to close the GM plant in Moore’s hometown of Flint, Michigan, resulting in Wink Martindale telling bad jokes and the citizenry selling rabbits for pets or meat. Smith had set out to reshape GM, and did, coughing up 11% of the company’s U.S. market share thanks to a line-up of dull, indistinguishable cars that broke down a lot.

Stone Cold
(Honorifics for Greg)
Don Chevrier, who called every sport they play in Canada except lacrosse, has died of a blood disorder at the age of 69. He replaced Alex Trebek as the host of Curling Classic and also called the sweeping at the last two winter Olympics for NBC. He was the first broadcaster in Toronto Blue Jays history, announced several Grey Cups, called the Canada Cup hockey tournament and gave voice to the Peter Sidorkiewicz era of Ottawa Senators hockey. He spent most of his time at the 2002 Olympics getting hazed, on the sidelines of badminton, table tennis and synchronized swimming.

See No Evel, Hear No Evel, Speak No Evel

Or
Evel Dead
(Lifted from The Derby Dead Pool, where I am now in 52nd place)
Evel Knievel, who got more out of his career despite a catastrophic crash than anyone since Ted Kennedy, has jumped the River Styx at the age of 69, succumbing to idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis. Knievel was best known for four death-defying stunts that were among the most watched Wide World of Sports events, though keep in perspective that the competition included bushkazi and elephant polo. Knievel started his daredevil career in 1966, and crashed while attempting to jump onto a motorcycle. Repeated attempts to jump 12 and then 16 cars let to grievous injuries and occasional successes, and enough notoriety to gain an audience on the Joey Bishop Show. From there, he conned his way into a stunt where he jumped over the fountains at Caesar’s Palace in Las Vegas, and his devastating crash left him in a coma for 29 days. The interest in actually getting to watch him kill himself on television led to more stunts and bigger audiences, though the U.S. government refused to allow his death wish: jumping over the Grand Canyon. He barely survived jumping Snake River Canyon on a rocket Skycycle when the drag chute deployed early and carried the cycle back into the canyon and the river. Jumps over buses in London and Seattle were ratings bonanzas, even though he broke his pelvis again in London, but signaled the beginning of the end and his last jump was in 1981. The spectacular nature of Knievel’s crashes resulted in a Guinness record for most broken bones (40) and parodies in the form of the even more ill-fated Super Dave Osborne and Captain Lance Murdock, who inspired Bart’s attempt to jump Springfield Gorge. Other highlights of Knievel’s career include knocking out Butte, Montana’s power after running into a power line while doing a wheelie in an earth mover, stealing the gate receipts from a 1960 exhibition hockey game with the Czechoslovakian Olympic team and nearly causing an international incident, and running a hunting guide service that guaranteed big game or your money back and fulfilled that promise by poaching in Yellowstone National Park. Luckily, Evel was able to go to the grave having done right by Kanye.

With Evel’s final jump at the buzzer, my Dead Men Walking take over first place with 5 hits and 53.3333334 points, and Jen Barlow climbs into a career-best 6th. And that means for the second time in three years, I call on you to join me in praise of me, for I am the champion, my friends, and they’ll keep on dying, ‘til the end. No time for living, cause they are the corpses, from around the world. I’d like to thank Lamar Hunt, Deborah Kerr, Evel Knievel, Madeline L’Engle and Jane Wyman for pushing through the medicine and the modern health advances and walking into the light anyway. This was a surprise win – even I had chalked this up to a rebuilding year. We didn’t have many injuries, but these guys didn’t let them stop them. I’d also like the rest of my teams to take a good long hard look at themselves and ask if they really gave all they could to the cause this year and if they can’t dig a little deeper – about 6 feet –next year.

Since it’s all about the bragging rights, some other champions we can crown:
Boston University Alumni: Me
New England Division Champion: Shawn DeVeau’s Team One Old
Chicagoland Division: Greg Sorenson’s Team Quincy for the second year in a row
TRASH Division (Non Terrier Class): Craig Barker, also a repeat winner

This was a resounding success all around, with records for most deaths (47) and most total hits (148). We also had 6 lists with 5 hits, after only 9 achieved that through the first 5 years of the GHI. Though be warned, all 14 of those 5-hit or more lists occurred in odd years, so 2008 could be quiet. We said goodbye to Ingmar Bergman, Lady Bird Johnson, Augusto Pinochet leaving only Ray Bradbury, Kirk Douglas, Stephen Hawking, Jesse Helms, Whitney Houston, Harry Morgan, Mickey Rooney, Eunice Kennedy Shriver, Gloria Stuart, Abe Vigoda as those who have survived on every list since the first GHI.