Shenanigans

Would you hire a company to undertake a $7 million job that had virtually no employees, no equipment and no experience to handle the task?Of course not, but the Schaefer administration may have other ideas.That's because the company in this instance is WBS Inc., a year-old Baltimore-based firm associated with William L. "Little Willie" Adams, a longtime political ally of the governor. When the lottery giant GTECH Corp. bid and won Maryland's $65 million lottery computer contract, it identified WBS as one of the minority businesses that would receive a sizable chunk of the financial action for printing lottery tickets.

Having made allegations of widespread voter fraud a signature issue for their party in recent years, you'd think Republicans would know better than to tolerate anything that smacked of similar irregularities in their own ranks. So it's ironic that the first major alleged instance of voter fraud this election cycle is being attributed to Republicans rather than Democrats. It must be galling for the party that's sponsored ID laws across the country to prevent voter fraud to now find itself accused of the same shenanigans it accuses Democrats of perpetrating.

When people from L.A. proper are in the Valley, it can feel like they're very far from home, and that no one they know is watching. The usual internal controls might not work for a stressed-out celeb without their familiar landmarks around them. That's when you get bizarre shenanigans like poor Britney's hara-kiri scene the other night." - KIM COOPER, cultural historian and author LOS ANGELES DAILY NEWS

News Roundup •••• The 26th edition of the Game Developers Conference kicks off in San Francisco today. Follow the official #GDC tag on Twitter for a bunch of people reporting on how hung over they are. [ GDC ] •••• Valve is reportedly working on a “Steam Box” gaming console to pair with their crappy PC game purchasing service (which inspired the name of our Friday rant feature ). Doesn't “Steam Box” sound like something that would blow up pretty quickly?

WALL STREET IS a-twitter about Martha Stewart's improbable role in an insider stock trading scandal, wondering who called whom and when did they call and what did they know when they called. But I can tell you what the rest of America wants to know: What's really going on between Martha and her hunky stockbroker? I'm sorry to be so banal, but it is hard for those of us who don't summer on the Vineyard or in the Hamptons to care how the rich and famous protect their investments. And those of us who made People magazine the success it is want to know if 40-year-old Peter Bacanovic is Martha's arm candy or Martha's boy toy. I mean, really.

Chalk it up as a coup. The Orpheum, the heroic but tiny little rep house on Thames Street, has scored a nifty first-run item which might have otherwise fallen through the cracks, the German sex comedy "Maybe Maybe Not," which opens today.Said to be the highest-grossing film ever made in Germany, passing even "Das Boot," the antic little comedy is set in that no-man's land where etiquette and protocol have never dared to venture: the place where straight and gay males confront each other through gimlet eyes, dry throats and awkward pauses.

Citizens for Bert Rice will hold fund-raiserCitizens for Bert Rice will hold a fund-raiser at the Odenton Fire Hall Oct. 10 in support of the Republican 4th District County Council incumbent's re-election bid.The Best of the West Party will run from 6: 30 p.m. to midnight and feature a chuck wagon supper, beer, wine, music, dancing and door prizes. The cost is $20 for adults and $10 for children 6-10. Younger children are free.For tickets or information, call Pappu Khera at 410-551-2777.County workers union backs Democrat BurlisonBill Burlison, Rice's Democratic opponent, has won the endorsement of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, the union representing county workers.

Neil Simon has done it in New York and California, so why not try it abroad?"It" is a series of one-act plays set in a hotel, and in this latest incarnation, the hotel is London's Connaught. "London Suite," which was Simon's first-ever off-Broadway premiere, will have its Baltimore premiere at the Spotlighters Theatre beginning tomorrow, under Bob Russell's direction.The four playlets include the tale of a Welsh writer who has caught his financial adviser with his hand in the till; the comic account of a daughter playing matchmaker for her widowed mother; the heart-rending reunion of an actress and her bisexual ex-husband; and the farcical shenanigans that result when an American couple planning to attend Wimbledon discovers the husband has lost the tickets.

MEMBERS of Congress are just concluding a five-week summer recess euphemistically titled a "district work period." But only the most dedicated and most insecure burned a lot of shoe leather bounding from barbecues to ice cream socials and vying for attention with Elvis impersonators at senior sock hops. Indeed, Democrats and Republicans in California's delegation joined forces instead in a fierce campaign to protect a redistricting process that makes such voter contact superfluous. They're waging a cynical battle for political insulation from their constituents that would make an old-style machine boss blush.

Stevie Wonder has been called a "musical genius" since the beginning of his career, when at age 12 he topped the pop charts with the electrifying swinger "Fingertips." Over the years, the Motown legend (the only one who has stayed with the label since its halcyon days in Detroit in the 1960s) has proven over and over the tag is no hype. On stage has always been the best way to experience the wonder of his musical brilliance. And at a sold-out, nearly three-hour concert Sunday night at Pier Six Pavilion, Wonder showed that the talent hasn't diminished a bit. For the past month, he has been crisscrossing the country on a 13-city tour dubbed "A Wonder Summer's Night," playing intimate, mostly outdoor venues with no opening act. (Something he doesn't need, anyway.

Good thing Ron Shapiro isn't a told-you-so kinda guy. Not after The New York Times reported recently on how Chinese companies are finding a back door into the U.S. stock market . Shapiro, a prominent sports agent-attorney whose clients have included Cal Ripken Jr., warned about the same sort of stock market shenanigans 42 years ago, as lead author of a Maryland Law Review article titled, “The 'Going Public Through the Back Door' Phenomenon...

Federal investigators looking into Baltimore's tax-sale auctions have found their canary. Steven L. Berman, a veteran real estate investor from Pennsylvania, has agreed to cooperate with U.S. Justice Department prosecutors as part of a guilty plea in a bid rigging scheme. Mr. Berman is not just any canary. He has participated in tax-sale auctions in the city and five counties for several years and should be intimately familiar with the system, its vulnerabilities and payoffs. Tax sales remain a largely unnoticed, little understood process by which governments recoup unpaid property taxes and other municipal bills.

Stevie Wonder has been called a "musical genius" since the beginning of his career, when at age 12 he topped the pop charts with the electrifying swinger "Fingertips." Over the years, the Motown legend (the only one who has stayed with the label since its halcyon days in Detroit in the 1960s) has proven over and over the tag is no hype. On stage has always been the best way to experience the wonder of his musical brilliance. And at a sold-out, nearly three-hour concert Sunday night at Pier Six Pavilion, Wonder showed that the talent hasn't diminished a bit. For the past month, he has been crisscrossing the country on a 13-city tour dubbed "A Wonder Summer's Night," playing intimate, mostly outdoor venues with no opening act. (Something he doesn't need, anyway.

When people from L.A. proper are in the Valley, it can feel like they're very far from home, and that no one they know is watching. The usual internal controls might not work for a stressed-out celeb without their familiar landmarks around them. That's when you get bizarre shenanigans like poor Britney's hara-kiri scene the other night." - KIM COOPER, cultural historian and author LOS ANGELES DAILY NEWS

There were no wild post-catch celebrations or post-game histrionics, no finger-pointing at opponents after making them look bad or at his teammates for not making him look great. At least for one week, his first official game with the Dallas Cowboys, T.O. simply stood for Terrell Owens and not Totally Outrageous or Terribly Obnoxious or, perhaps, Ticking (Everybody) Off. Owens caught six passes for 80 yards and a touchdown in a 24-17 loss at Jacksonville on Sunday, had two other receptions for 31 yards called back because of penalties and would have had a few more if Cowboys quarterback Drew Bledsoe found Owens when he was wide-open.

Herewith, a couple of election year thoughts on citizenship and our democracy. Thought Number One: When the Brits uncovered a scheme to blow up airplanes bound for the U.S., a crisis arose. Would-be suicide bombers were planning to take certain materials - gels and liquids of some sort - onto the planes. These items were to be mixed into an explosive cocktail. But they were foiled. Hail Britannia. Those guys are good. But who knew if all the miscreants had been apprehended? Were others in the plot still at large, their liquids and gels at the ready?

A FEW MONTHS ago we moved into a new home, and one of our top priorities is to get along with the neighbors.As far as we can tell, the neighbors are all wonderful people, although of course I would say this (and certainly write it in the newspaper) even if it weren't true. Which it is, don't get me wrong.The fact is, our new neighbors have very few annoying habits that we can detect. Thus far there have been no incidents of anyone asking us to keep an eye on their house while they go on vacation (what am I, Wells Fargo?

There were no wild post-catch celebrations or post-game histrionics, no finger-pointing at opponents after making them look bad or at his teammates for not making him look great. At least for one week, his first official game with the Dallas Cowboys, T.O. simply stood for Terrell Owens and not Totally Outrageous or Terribly Obnoxious or, perhaps, Ticking (Everybody) Off. Owens caught six passes for 80 yards and a touchdown in a 24-17 loss at Jacksonville on Sunday, had two other receptions for 31 yards called back because of penalties and would have had a few more if Cowboys quarterback Drew Bledsoe found Owens when he was wide-open.

MEMBERS of Congress are just concluding a five-week summer recess euphemistically titled a "district work period." But only the most dedicated and most insecure burned a lot of shoe leather bounding from barbecues to ice cream socials and vying for attention with Elvis impersonators at senior sock hops. Indeed, Democrats and Republicans in California's delegation joined forces instead in a fierce campaign to protect a redistricting process that makes such voter contact superfluous. They're waging a cynical battle for political insulation from their constituents that would make an old-style machine boss blush.