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BOSTON.COM Chazz Palminteri is pointing to a spot on East 187th Street in the Bronx a few yards down from its intersection with Cambreleng Avenue. It was there, back in the early '60s, that a neighborhood wise guy gunned down a man in broad daylight who had come out of his car with a baseball bat to beat another man in a car vying for the same parking space. (Read the article by Sam Allis)
DailyRecord. Didier Aubert , a French professor teaching at Brown University in Rhode Island, is working on a research project about Morristown's Italian community in the early 20th century.(Read the article by Matt Kadosh)
LOS ANGELES TIMES. The island of Lampedusa has become a steppingstone for immigrants hoping to reach the Italian mainland. But the official policy is toughening, and tensions have risen among those detained. (Read the article by Sebastian Rotella)
ANSA. Lance Armstrong is set for Saturday's season-opening Milan-Sanremo classic in his first European test since his comeback at the start of the year. (Read the article)
THE INDIA POST. In a statement issued in Nevada (USA) the president of Universal Society of Hinduism, Rajan Zed said that it was very humiliating to one billion strong Hindus of the world when Pope Benedict referred their God as “just any god”.
His Holiness Pope Benedict XVI, in a recent letter to the Bishops of the Catholic Church. said “In our days, when in vast areas of the world the faith is in danger of dying out like a flame which no longer has fuel, the overriding priority is to make God present in this world and to show men and women the way to God. Not just any god, but the God who spoke on Sinai…”
"We fully agree that the world needs God," Zed argued in response, "but it was not necessary to denigrate Hindus to make his point across by apparently referring so unceremoniously our God as “just any god." (Read the full press release)
AFP. Thousands of people, including the acclaimed author of mafia expose "Gomorrah," marched in southern Italy's Naples Saturday against decades of mafia violence that has killed some 900 people. "The mafia and the Camorra (the Naples-area mafia) are not eternal. They can be beaten," Antonio Bassolino, president of the Compania region that includes the city, told the crowd marking a remembrance day for victims of organised crime. (Read the Article)
REUTERS. Italian makers of mass-market and mid-range jewelry hope to see a boost in demand from resource-rich Middle Eastern countries whose economies could see a quicker recovery than others, jewelers said. "The crisis has hit all export markets, but maybe it is less felt in the Middle East," Laura Falcinelli, designer at Falcinelli Italy jewelers, told Reuters at a trade fair OroArezzo that showcases Italian mass-market jewelry. (Read the Article by Svetlana Kovalyova)
THE BOSTON GLOBE. Calogero Lorenzo Palminteri - Calogero to friends and family, "C" to Sonny and his wise guys - moves like a don. He's an imposing man, almost 6 feet 4 inches, who walks with the commanding presence and ease of a creature at the top of the food chain. He enters the Arthur Avenue Retail Market, an Italian souk of a place just off 187th, and glides past the hand-rolled cigars at La Casa Grande Tobacco, past Boiano's Food to Mike's Deli, famous for its "throwdown" eggplant parmigiana...
In the 1993 movie "A Bronx Tale," he recounted his life growing up around East 187th in the Belmont section of the Bronx. Robert De Niro directed and starred in it as Palminteri's father, Lorenzo, with Palminteri playing the gangster Sonny, who is an amalgam of three people, including that wise guy.(Read the Article)
TELEGRAPH. Jay Leno was born in La Rochelle, New York, to a Scottish mother and Italian-American father. Heavy-set with bouffant, salt and pepper hair, Leno, 58, could pass for a mobster on The Sopranos if it weren't for his protruding chin. Political candidates regularly appear on his show, one of the most popular of the country. He will soon be promoted to primetime with a new show at 10pm. He is already on a five-year $100 million (£70 million) deal with NBC. (Read the Article)
REUTERS. Italy is looking to help its fashion industry with a plan that includes tax credits and access to funds for companies feeling the strains of the global economic crisis. The industry warns its members risk "falling to pieces", with small companies being the hardest hit as demand for clothes and accessories falls. (Read the Article by Marie-Louise Gumuchian)