Ed Koch, the former New York City Mayor who took the city back from the financial brink before presiding over its crack epidemic and AIDS crisis, died of congestive heart failure early this morning. He was 88.
A man in Tunisia lost a bet and his life after consuming 28 raw eggs in a single sitting for the entertainment of his friends.
Hawaiian Sen. Daniel Inouye, a Democrat, has died of respiratory complications, according to his office. Sen. Inouye was 88 years old and a veteran of World War II. He had held his Senate seat since 1963; before that, he served in the House of Representatives, meaning he had represented Hawaii in Congress since it became a state in 1959.
Norman Joseph Woodland, the man who invented the bar code, died on Sunday at the age of 91.
Legendary jazz pianist Dave Brubeck died of heart failure in Connecticut today en route to a routine appointment with his cardiologist, his longtime manager has confirmed. Tomorrow would have been Brubeck's 92nd birthday.
Arlen Specter, a five-term senator from Pennsylvania, has just died, the AP reports. A Republican since 1965, he switched party affiliations in 2009 and ran as a Democrat, losing in the primary to Joe Sestak. After his defeat, Specter continued to teach law at the University of Pennsylvania, where last year he was named by the National Jurist one of the "23 professors to take before you die." He was 82.
British intellectual Eric Hobsbawm, the pre-eminent historian of his generation, died Monday morning in a hospital in London, where he was being treated for pneumonia. He was 95.
Rap mogul Chris Lighty, the much-beloved manager of artists like Diddy, 50 Cent, and Mariah Carey, died this morning in New York City from a self-inflicted gunshot wound to the head, according to police. Lighty, who had founded the Violator record label and management company, was reportedly in the middle of an argument with his estranged wife, Veronica, who filed for divorce last year. Police say Lighty walked out of his Bronx apartment and, moments later, a gunshot was heard. Lighty was found dead with a handgun sitting next to him.
Writer, performer, and frequent NPR contributor David Rakoff has died following a three-year battle with cancer. Rakoff was born in Montreal, and lived, variously, in Toronto, London and Japan before settling in New York City, which he called "the great love of my life" and was the subject of much of his writing. Rakoff worked as an actor — usually playing, he later wrote, "Jewy McHebrew" or "Fudgy McPacker" — and in publishing before quitting to become a full-time writer, penning the interview column "The Way We Live Now" for The New York Times Magazine for several years in addition to his work as a freelance journalist and contributor of personal essays to This American Life.
Donald A. Perry, vice-president of public relations at Chick-fil-A, died this morning from a heart attack, in the midst of a growing national controversy over the fast-food restaurant's opposition to gay marriage. "We are saddened to report the news to you that our dear friend Don Perry, vice president of public relations, passed away suddenly this morning," said a company statement.
TMZ is reporting that Sherman Hemsley, who played George Jefferson on The Jeffersons and All in the Family, has died. Hemsley, who was born in South Philadelphia, was a postal worker before becoming a full-time actor. After a stint on Broadway, he was cast as George Jefferson in All in the Family by Norman Lear, the legendary producer; from there, the character was spun off into The Jeffersons, which ran for more than a decade. No cause of death has been announced.
Andrew Sarris, the charmingly disputatious Village Voice and New York Observer film critic who helped make New York's film community in the '70s and '80s a cauldron of intrigue and joyous rhetorical sniping, died this morning after suffering a fall. He was, as the Times put it, an "intellectual duelist" whose frequent battles with rival Pauline Kael didn't stop him from inviting her to his wedding to Molly Haskell. Kael declined: "That's OK. I'll go to Molly's next wedding." (Haskell and Sarris remained married; she is his only survivor.)
While some will likely lament the passing of Chuck Colson, who died today at age 80, his legacy does not exactly inspire mourning. While he devoted much of his later life to Christianity, Colson went to prison for his involvement in Watergate. To ensure Richard Nixon's reelection, Colson once said he would "walk over my own grandmother."
Provocateur, website founder and collector of America's largest wads of spittle Andrew Breitbart died last Thursday morning, when some sentient shred of his cardiac organ kamikazed out of an exhausted sense of justice.
