Jason Willis, known to Tucson music fans as a member of bands including the Weird Lovemakers and the Knockout Pills, also makes funny videos. Here is his latest, uncovering a controversy regarding catnip that you might not have been aware of.

While somehow Colin Boyd's review of Magic Mike didn't make into one of our two featured movie review spots this week, I don't personally recall a film discussed quite as much at the Weekly offices during my time with the paper. So in case you're wondering what Colin thought of Steven Soderbergh's take on male stripping, here's his take:

More Boogie Nights than Showgirls, Steven Soderbergh’s Magic Mike showcases the dark side of the high life, in this case, the nonstop party of a male strip club in Tampa, Fla. Taken (one assumes somewhat liberally) from star Channing Tatum’s own background as an exotic dancer, Magic Mike has a few stripping sequences, but Soderbergh always manages to make each dance less about strippers getting tips and more about the emotional content of the film in that moment. It’s a tricky way to go about showing Tatum and Matthew McConaughey in thongs, but by and large, the sequences in the club act in the service of a film that is a lot darker below the surface than its opening moments suggest. Tatum has found his mark; McConaughey is solid in what may or may not be self-parody; and Soderbergh again demonstrates his skill when he’s deeply invested in a project.

Thanks to Media Matters for keeping this clip handy. I don't suspect Bill O'Reilly will actually apologize for his mistaken punditry, but one can hope he's actually a man of his word, right?

If you found yourself captivated by the University of Arizona baseball team's run to the NCAA championship over the last month, extend your enjoyment of their winning season tonight at the Padres game, sponsored in part by the Tucson Weekly. Not only will you be able to get your picture taken with the championship trophy and see Arizona Athletic Director Greg Byrne, Head Baseball Coach Andy Lopez, and members of the baseball team participate in the first pitch, it's also Thirsty Thursday, so 16 oz. Budweiser and Coke products will be just $1.50 starting at 6 pm.

If you wear Wildcat apparel, you'll be able save some money as well, getting a general admission ticket for $4. See you at the ballpark.

Alas, it appears that Daniel Patterson's plans to forge ahead with a new political career in Silver City, New Mexico, have hit a snag:

On May 29, the town of Silver City received an application from a D.R. Patterson to serve on the town s planning and zoning commission. Patterson was sworn in June 19, and his appointment would have taken effect Aug. 1, following the completion of George Lundy s term, Silver City Town Clerk Ann Mackie said.

But on Thursday, Town Manager Alex Brown received a telephone call from an Arizona Republic reporter asking if he was aware that Patterson was the Arizona state representative who had been under investigation for alleged ethics violations.

Brown said he was not aware that D.R. Patterson and Daniel Patterson were one and the same, but after becoming aware, the town started Googling and quickly learned of Patterson s past.

One reason town officials might not have known about D.R. Patterson's recent problems at the Arizona Legislature:

Patterson did not list his experience in the Arizona Legislature on the application. He told the Sun-News on Monday that he didn t feel that his legislative experience was relevant to the Planning and Zoning Commission seat. He also said that he frequently goes by his initials D.R. and not using his full name on the application was not an attempt to deceive the town.

Patterson also listed on his application that he was a member of Grant County Search and Rescue. In an email to the Sun-News on Tuesday, Grant County Search and Rescue President Marc Levesque said that was not accurate.

"He has submitted an application for membership but has yet to be accepted as a member, Levesque wrote. "The GCSAR directors just wanted to clarify the situation. He has an application pending for membership and we are reviewing that at this time.

[Silver City Sun-News]

So, Mitt Romney still plans to overturn the Affordable Care Act? It's a job killer? Quelle surprise!

So, there was a ruling and the entire right wing shed a collective sad tear. Jon Justice is taking advice from Tyler Vogt, failed city council candidate, on the air. Small business owners who subscribe to Glenn Beck's pseudo-cable network are claiming they're going to give up on their life's work. Dogs are kissing cats. The whole world has lost its mind.

The money quote from the opinion [giant PDF behind the link]:

Our precedent demonstrates that Congress had the power to impose the exaction in Section 5000A under the taxing power, and that Section 5000A need not be read to do more than impose a tax. This is sufficient to sustain it.

From the dissent:

The Constitution, though it dates from the founding of the Republic, has powerful meaning and vital relevance to our own times. The constitutional protections that this case involves are protections of structure. Structural protections—notably, the restraints imposed by federalism and separation of powers—are less romantic and have less obvious a connection to personal freedom than the provisions of the Bill of Rights or the Civil War Amendments. Hence they tend to be undervalued or even forgotten by our citizens. It should be the responsibility of the Court to teach otherwise, to remind our people that the Framers considered structural protections of freedom the most important ones, for which reason they alone were embodied in the original Constitution and not left to later amendment. The fragmentation of power produced by the structure of our Government is central to liberty, and when we destroy it, we place liberty at peril. Today’s decision should have vindicated, should have taught, this truth; instead, our judgment today has disregarded it.

For the reasons here stated, we would find the Act invalid in its entirety. We respectfully dissent.

Reactions and whatnot to come.

UPDATE: The decision, "in plain English," from the Atlantic:

The Affordable Care Act, including its individual mandate that virtually all Americans buy health insurance, is constitutional. There were not five votes to uphold it on the ground that Congress could use its power to regulate commerce between the states to require everyone to buy health insurance. However, five Justices agreed that the penalty that someone must pay if he refuses to buy insurance is a kind of tax that Congress can impose using its taxing power. That is all that matters. Because the mandate survives, the Court did not need to decide what other parts of the statute were constitutional, except for a provision that required states to comply with new eligibility requirements for Medicaid or risk losing their funding. On that question, the Court held that the provision is constitutional as long as states would only lose new funds if they didn't comply with the new requirements, rather than all of their funding.

A note: please stop saying SCOTUS. It makes you sound like that asshole Jonah from Veep:

FC Tucson, in their first season in the Premier Development League and with their own home field, have been a pleasant surprise spending the season so far either at or near the top of their division. This Saturday night will be a milestone in the team's progress as they take on the Ventura Fusion for first place. It seems like a lot of people are soccer fans during major tournaments like the World Cup or the currently running Euro 2012, but here's an opportunity to cheer on an exciting hometown team in person at the Kino Sports Complex. Tickets are only $12 and based on FC Tucson's most recent games, there will be action up to the very last minute.

• Greta Gerwig in "Lola Versus."

For those of you who read Colin Boyd's review of Lola Versus (here) and want to see the film, please note it will no longer be opening at Century El Con 20 on Friday, June 29. Please check back here, The Range: The Tucson Weekly's Daily Dispatch, for updates.

Brazilian inmates can now have their prison sentences shortened by reading books from an approved list and writing essays about them.

From the Christian Science Monitor:

That’s right, Brazil’s government recently rolled out a new program, Redemption through Reading, that allows inmates to shave four days off their sentence for every book they read, with a maximum of 48 days off their sentence per year, Reuters reported Monday. The program will be extended to certain prisoners in four federal prisons in Brazil holding some of the country’s most notorious criminals.

According to Reuters, a special panel will determine which inmates are eligible to participate. Those chosen can choose from works of literature, philosophy, science, or the classics, reading up to 12 books a year. Flashback from grade school: they’ll have four weeks to read each book and write an essay that must “make correct use of paragraphs, be free of corrections, use margins, and legible joined-up writing,” according to a notice published Monday in Brazil’s official gazette.

“A person can leave prison more enlightened and with an enlarged vision of the world,” Sao Paulo lawyer Andre Kehdi, who directs a book donation project for prisons, told Reuters.

In theory, this all sounds wonderful. The Redemption through Reading program seems like a great way to tackle to problem of overcrowded prisons while educating convicts. However, I'm a little skeptical of how this will pan out in practice. As a college student, I can tell you that being able to write an essay about a book doesn't always mean that you have to read the entire thing. I don't really know how these prisons will go about checking that inmates have read and understood the material, but it's an interesting idea and I'm curious to see what comes of it.

If you're interested in helping prisoners better themselves through reading closer to home, consider volunteering with local charity Read Between the Bars, which sends packages of books to those incarcerated around the state. More information about that group can be found at their Facebook page.