New York

The colours are vivid, the lines simply drawn, a strangely idealised version of what Nelson Mandela saw — or wished to see — through the bars of the tiny cell where he spent 27 years for resisting South Africa’s apartheid regime.

United States Senator John Kerry criticised President George Bush for failing to back Haiti’s elected leader, Jean-Bertrand Aristide, saying the administration’s policy was ”shortsighted” and sent ”a terrible message” to the region and democracies, the New York Times reported on Sunday.

Mel Gibson’s The Passion of Christ is only the latest in a very long line of celluloid portrayals of Jesus that have, in their turn, aroused controversy, delight, outrage and ridicule. About 47 actors — among them Max Von Sydow and Willem Dafoe — have taken a crack at the title role, with wildy varying degrees of success.

There are a slew of products at the American International Toy Fair that that are either smelly or just plain gross. Spin Master is offering 24 different Stink Blasters — kids can squeeze the heads of such characters as Garbage Truck Chuck or Barfin’ Ben, releasing foul smells.

Actor-writer Spalding Gray, noted for his one-man shows in which he tells of his life in artful, witty monologues, has been reported missing, police said. Police in New York City and in Southampton, New York, were searching for the 62-year-old actor, who has homes in both places.

There is something eerily familiar about the American court system. Every now and then the prosecution interrupts the defence with the words: ”Objection — argumentative,” or the judge asks the legal adversaries to ”please approach the bench”, and you look over your shoulder for Cagney and Lacey or Ally McBeal.

Officials are likely to recommend the creation of a state-run company to own and manage the Iraqi oil industry, shutting out foreign investment and countering, in part, allegations that the United States-led invasion of the country was merely an oil grab.

The barmaid leaned over the counter, folded a beer mat into a crude ashtray, then stubbed her cigarette out in it. ‘We call that a Mike Bloomberg,’ she said with venom, referring to New York’s tough-talking mayor. One city newspaper asked last week: ‘Is Fun City turning into Blandsville?’.

American news media provide too little coverage of the conflicts in Colombia, Chechnya, Burundi and Congo, and on the refugee crisis on the Chad-Sudan border, the medical aid group Medecins Sans Frontieres said in its sixth annual list of ”underreported humanitarian stories”.

The recording industry’s legal onslaught against internet song-swappers appears to be having its desired effect. The percentage of Americans who download music online has been sliced in half. Only 14% of internet users surveyed from November 18 to December 14 said they sometimes download songs to their computers, according to a report.

The United States economy added 57 000 jobs during November but that figure was far fewer than expected, adding to fears that the upturn is failing to translate into significant employment growth. The jobless rate in the US fell from 6% to 5,9%, the lowest it has been since March. November was the fourth consecutive month of employment gains.

Viacom is reportedly set to offload listed video-rental chain Blockbuster as the United States video market takes a knock. The media group has been looking for a way out of Blockbuster. The chain faces the threat of obsolescence as new technology such as video-on-demand becomes more widely used and the retail price of DVDs continues to fall.

After swearing never to give another public lecture, JM Coetzee, this year’s Nobel laureate for literature, wondered aloud why he was speaking in front of a crowded auditorium. The 63-year-old South African said little to the crowd at the New York Public Library on Thursday night.

The phenomenal success of Google, the internet search engine, has attracted the attention of the biggest name in hi-tech business, the Microsoft founder Bill Gates. Microsoft is said to be pursuing talks to buy the Silicon Valley firm, recently valued at between -billion and -billion.

On Halloween, when legend says disembodied spirits return in search of living bodies to possess, Joe Nickell goes on the prowl, too — for ghosts, ghouls and other things that creep in the night. The former private eye is now a senior research fellow at the Committee for the Scientific Investigation of Claims of the Paranormal.

An American publisher of Christian books has come up with a novel answer to help keep teenage girls from straying from the straight and narrow. Recently Thomas Nelson launched Revolve, a magazine that, instead of ”should I, shouldn’t I” sex tips and confessionals, contains the words and advice of Jesus and the Apostles.