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 U2 frontman Bono performing with Adam Bevell, a blind guitar player plucked from the sold out crowd of 45,000 at Saturday night's U2 concert in Nashville. Photo from U2.com. Nashville – It was stunning, uplifting, and unforgettable.
 Adam Bevell holding up his sign near the stage. From U2.com's FanCam. The world’s greatest rock band had just finished a rousing concert performance at Vanderbilt Stadium, taken its final bows, and was exiting the stage when U2′s frontman made what seemed like an inexplicable U-turn, going alone to the front of the stage to speak with a man in the raucous crowd. The 45,000 fans in attendance and Bono’s bandmates were bewildered. The show was supposed to end following U2′s usual set closer, “Moment of Surrender.” But on this night, the 100th show of U2′s two-year-long 360 tour, Bono had an epiphany.
The fan who attracted Bono’s attention was a man who for the duration of the concert stood in the jam-packed pit at the foot of stage holding up a sign that read “blind guitar player, bring me up!!” Bono said to the man, “What do you want to play?” Whatever the man said to Bono prompted Bono to say to the stagehands, “Get a guitar for this dude…. Get him my guitar.” Bono said to the other members of U2, “Gents, we have a surprise guest.” Bono told the security guards at the foot of the stage, “Just get him up the steps here,” and when he started walking up the steps, Bono said, “I got you here…. I gotcha.”
On stage, Bono strapped his green guitar around the shoulders of the man, and Bono asked him, “What’s your wife’s name?” “Andrea,” the man responded, adding, “This is dedicated to her.” Then, “I’m really nervous, man!” A moment later, the man was strumming the guitar, and Bono began singing U2′s love song “All I Want Is You”:
 From U2.com. You say you want diamonds on a ring of gold
You say you want your story to remain untold
But all the promises we make
From the cradle to the grave
When all I want is you
After Bono and the blind guitarist performed the song’s first verse, the rest of the band joined in, with U2 guitarist The Edge playing the electric piano. After the song concluded, Bono hugged the man and gave him the guitar, prompting the man to pump his fist in excitement – a moment that moved me to the brink of tears.
I have seen U2 perform many times, including with Bruce Springsteen and Mick Jagger, and in Dublin. No doubt this will be among my fondest U2 concert memories.
 Nashville’s newspaper described the concert as “mesmerising” – arguably an understatement.
I later learned the blind guitar player’s name: Adam Bevell, a long-time U2 fan who made the trip to Nashville from his home in Arizona.
On his Facebook page, Bevell posted a video of his U2 concert cameo, writing, “Me playing with U2!!!!!!!!!!!!” In response, one of his friends chimed in, “Adam, that is the coolest thing in the world.” Indeed.
Here is the U2.com-provided video of”All I Want Is You.”
Here is a fun fan-shot YouTube video of the performance.
 Photo by Tanya Malott, photographer extraordinare, http://tanyamalott.com  Photo by Eason Jordan.  Adam Bevell celebrating with a fist pump after Bono gives him his guitar. Photo from YouTube video by MrDocholiday76.
 Clarence Clemons performing during a November 2009 Nashville concert of Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band. I was shocked and saddened to learn that Bruce Springsteen’s long-time sidekick, Clarence Clemons, suffered a massive stroke a few days ago. He is best known as the incomparable saxophonist in Springsteen’s legendary E Street Band. I have been a huge fan of Springsteen and the E Street Band since 1978, when, at age 18, I first saw them perform (I also met Springsteen that night, but that’s another story). I have seen them in concert dozens of times all over the country – Atlanta, Asbury Park, Red Bank, the Meadowlands, New York City, Boston, Indianapolis, Birmingham, Jacksonville, Lakeland, Richmond, Nashville, and beyond. Springsteen concerts have always been amazing, exhilarating, joyous experiences for me and countless others, and Clemons was a big reason for that. I snapped this photo of The Big Man the last time I went to one of their shows. The main reason I went to that Nashville concert: Knowing of Clemons’s deteriorating health, I suspected it might be the last time I’d see Springsteen and Clemons perform together. I hope I was wrong about that. Rebound, Big Man. We’re keeping you in our thoughts and prayers.
 Former CNN President Burt Reinhardt, who died last month at age 91. Ted Turner was the trailblazing visionary. Reese Schonfeld was the brilliant, maniacal first CNN president. And Burt Reinhardt was CNN’s godfather: a soft-spoken man of few words, great intelligence, and cutting candor. Like a mafia don, Burt had a sly smile and a twisted sense of humor.
During his decades as a top CNN executive, Burt made you feel lucky to be alive, to have a job, and to have a penny in your pocket. As far as CNN’s pennies were concerned, Burt was a scrooge, and his thriftiness helped keep CNN afloat during the network’s financially challenging early years. When I joined CNN in 1982 earning the legal minimum wage of $3.25 an hour, I felt fortunate because I knew if the law permitted it, Burt would pay me less.
During those early years, I got to know Burt by calling him at home at three o’clock in the morning, and I did so many, many times. His home phone number is etched in my mind: 953-3397. As I worked on the overnight shift on the International desk for six years in a row, a key part of my job was calling CNN’s bosses in the wee hours to alert them to breaking news or to ask an urgent question about whether to spend big money on news coverage. I took twisted delight out of calling some of my bosses at 3am, but I dreaded calling Burt at that hour because he had strategically placed his bedroom phone next to his wife, Diana, who I always awakened first. Diana and Burt were good sports about being called in the middle of the night, and they somehow spoke coherently at that hour, unlike other CNN executives.
Burt was always gracious but blunt. In 1989, when my immediate boss, the head of international newsgathering, was fired on orders of Ted Turner, I was the second-ranking person in the department. Burt summoned me to his office the next day, saying there was no way I would be promoted to oversee international newsgathering because I had worked so many years on the overnight shift, no CNN executive had ever seen me in the light of day. The big CNN bosses knew me only from my endearing 3am phone calls. Burt told me, “You don’t deserve the job, and you won’t get it.”
Those harsh words coming from anyone other than Burt would have been heartbreaking or infuriating or both. But Burt’s calm, confident demeanor was such that when he spoke it was like a Jedi mind trick; As much as you might disagree with Burt, you knew he was right. So I never asked for the promotion. When the job went to me, anyway, Burt told me he strongly objected. But Burt said he liked me and would do all he could to help and support me. He delivered on that promise again and again.
I did not like Burt Reinhardt. I loved him. He was a living legend, a wonderful mentor, and a treasured friend.
Diana, we extend our condolences to you, and we extend our heartfelt thanks to you for sharing Burt with us.
Burt, thank you and bless you.
 The cover of the exhibit's outstanding companion book. I urge you to visit the Washington Holocaust Museum’s powerful and disturbing special exhibit “State of Deception: The Power of Nazi Propaganda.”
The exhibit provides graphic and engrossing proof that Hitler, Goebbels, and the Nazis were master propagandists, brainwashing many of the German people before and during World War Two.
During my hour-long walk through the exhibit yesterday, I learned a lot – no small feat because for decades I have had an intense interest in Nazi propaganda, reading Goebbels’s diaries and other books on the subject.
Even more enlightening than the exhibit is its superb companion 194-page hardcover book, which I heartily recommend and which you can order online.
You can learn more about the museum exhibit here.
The museum exhibit concludes with an examination of modern era propaganda meant to inspire hatred and, in the case of Rwanda, for example, mass murder.
 Onlookers watch hundreds of vigilantes march the thief (surrounded upper left) to the police station after they captured, beat, and stoned him. Frame grab image from video shot by Tanya Malott. Ourika, Morocco – The pickpocket struck in a flash, triggering chaos that left me dazed, bloodied, and bruised.
The thief suffered far worse: Local heroes chased down and beat him, pelting him with rocks before hauling him to a nearby police station.
The surreal episode began in a jam-packed outdoor market in the heart of Morocco’s scenic Ourika Valley, surrounded by the snow-capped Atlas Mountains, an hour’s drive west of Marrakesh.
Last week, my partner Tanya and I ventured there with a local guide on the third day of our first ever journey to Morocco – the world’s only nation the well-traveled Tanya and I had never visited but wanted to go. The trip was Tanya’s 50th birthday present to me.
Ourika’s weekly Berber market features everything from the mundane to the grotesque: cellphones, sheep heads, flowers, cow feet, fruits and vegetables, and half-skinned alive animals. The Berbers, non-Arab descendants of nomads, account for 60% of Morocco’s population of 35 million, and they are a fiercely proud people with their own language and traditions.
 Our guide Aziz buying oranges in the market minutes before the pickpocket triggered mayhem. Photo by Tanya Malott. As Tanya and I explored the market with our wonderful Berber guide, Aziz, who accompanied us from Marrakech, I at one point pulled a wad of money out of one of my jacket pockets so I could buy Aziz’s family a batch of oranges. Aziz thanked me for the offer but urged me to put away my money. In hindsight, it is clear the thief lurked nearby, spotting my cash and where I pocketed it. He apparently stalked me at a distance, waiting for the right moment to strike.
A few minutes later, when Tanya, Aziz, and I walked into an especially crowded bottleneck in the market, it was impossible to move forward without a bit of polite shoving. I was bumped once on the right side and thought nothing of it. Then I was bumped a second time by the same short, stocky, middle-aged man. I sensed something was amiss. Simultaneously, Tanya, who was behind me, saw a few stray Moroccan bills fall from my pocket to the ground prompting her to say to me, “He just took your money.”
As I saw the thief shuffle away quickly into the masses, I decided in a snap to try to chase him down and retrieve my money, the Moroccan equivalent of roughly $250. I wanted the money back not so much because of its value but because as a point of pride I refused to fall victim to a pickpocket, and I thought I could take him down – perhaps an irrational, hasty judgment, especially since I did not know whether he was armed.
Within moments of the money being lifted from my zippered jacket pocket, the chase was on. As I surged after him, the thief looked back in horror, realizing I was hot on his trail. He was maybe 15 feet ahead of me as I sprinted in his footsteps, with both of us knocking down and pushing aside people in the initial moments of the chase.
I gained ground on the thief before I was suddenly tripped up by a market seller’s ground-level display of pipes and pans, sending me crashing to the ground, bloodying me knees, stomach, and hands. I was embarrassed, furious, and confused about where I was and what was happening.
Then I realized the pickpocket was making his getaway while I tried to re-gain my senses. I crawled for a bit and finally stood up at the urging of local Berbers who pointed me in the direction of the fleeing thief. Tanya and Aziz were nowhere in sight.
Locals were screaming at me and at each other in their Berber language, and dozens of men were running in the direction of the thief, if not in pursuit of him. I heard men repeatedly yelling “Amhar!,” which I later learned meant “Thief!” in Berber.
In my stunned state, locals urged me to go to a nearby riverbank to witness what was becoming a wild spectacle: the capture, beating, and stoning of the pickpocket.
Just before I stumbled to the riverbank, I was reunited with Tanya, who had the presence of mind to snap photos and take video of the amazing scene.
 Vigilantes on the far river bank throw a few final punches and rocks at the surrounded thief before taking him to the police station. Photo by Tanya Malott. Below us in the riverbed, we saw dozens of men beating the thief and pelting him with rocks. Soon the thief was surrounded by at least 200 men, many of whom joined in the melee before marching the pickpocket off to a nearby police station. Blood streamed from the thief’s head. Tanya and I were among at least a thousand onlookers, some of whom urged us in broken English to rush to the police station.
At the police station, we were reunited with our guide Aziz, who we learned was the first to nab the thief. It turns out when I bolted in hot pursuit of the pickpocket, Aziz was right behind me. When I took my nasty tumble, Aziz took point in trying to run down the thief – a frenetic chase in which many others joined in and that ended badly for the pickpocket in the riverbed 500 yards away from where the crime occurred.
Tanya, Aziz, and I spent the next hour at the police station where the thief was jailed. As I filled out forms, signed paperwork, and was given back all my money, we learned local residents were reeling from a string of pickpocket thefts in recent weeks. Local pickpocket victims who heard a thief was apprehended came to the police station to see if they recognized him. The answer was yes – same guy. Police officers said the pickpocket faced at least three years in prison.
Aziz later told us the thief, fearing the vigilante mob would kill him in the riverbed, begged to be taken to the police.
His desperate request granted, the pickpocket might have second thoughts in a few weeks after coming to terms with the notorious Moroccan prison system.
As Tanya and I departed the police station, one local resident after another approached us with this message: “Not Berber,” meaning the thief was not a Berber. Implicit in their message, no one from their small town would commit such a crime. In fact, the thief was an Arab from a town hundreds of miles away.
Refusing to allow the thief to ruin our day, Tanya, Aziz, and I departed the police station and went on to climb a steep nearby mountain, where the views were dreamy.
Aziz and all the good Berber people will forever be heroes of mine, and I am thrilled we were able to rid the community of the serial thief.
Tanya is a superstar photographer. I urge you to check out her website.
 Gadhafi with his female bodyguards. Moammar Gadhafi once had such a mad crush on a prominent U.S. official who the Libyan leader knew only from her TV appearances, Gadhafi tried sending her a secret message asking if she reciprocated his love for her.
For this loopy story to make sense, you need to know three things about Gadhafi.
First, for decades, Gadhafi has been a notorious womanizer. His bodyguards are snappily-dressed young women, the “nurse” who often accompanies him is a voluptuous Ukrainian, and virtually all the journalists permitted to interview him are female, some of whom claim to have rebuffed unwanted sexual advances from Gadhafi.
Second, Gadhafi is obsessed with the color green. He led a “Green Revolution,” Gadhafi’s “Green Book” is the Libyan regime’s gospel, and the heart of the Libyan capital is “Green Square.”
Third, Gadhafi is a megalomanical nut.
In 1991, Gadhafi called a female newspaper journalist in London and demanded that she travel to Libya immediately to discuss an urgent matter. The journalist, who had interviewed Gadhafi previously, pleaded with him for details, but Gadhafi would only say it was a issue of utmost importance and urgency.
 Former State Dept. Spokeswoman Margaret Tutwiler. The correspondent flew to the Libyan capital, Tripoli, and was taken straight to meet Gadhafi.
According to the correspondent who soon thereafter told me her story, Gadhafi made a stunning admission: He was madly in love with then-U.S. State Department Spokeswoman Margaret Tutwiler, who served in that role from 1989 to 1992. Gadhafi said he fell in love with her by watching her State Department briefings on CNN.
The correspondent was aghast and furious for being summoned to Libya on an emergency basis to hear Gadhafi’s nonsensical love confession. But there was more.
Gadhafi asked the correspondent to relay a message to Tutwiler: If you, Margaret, reciprocate my love for you, please wear a green dress at your next State Department briefing.
To my knowledge, the correspondent never conveyed the message to Tutwiler, and there is no evidence Gadhafi and Tutwiler ever met or communicated directly.
But an exhaustive Google Image search provides no evidence that Ms. Tutwiler ever wore a green dress.
 As Moammar Gadhafi fights for his life amid a bloody revolt in his country, I am reminded of my bizarre encounter with the Libyan leader.
In 1991, as the U.S. was poised to invade Kuwait to expel Iraqi occupiers, the CNN International Desk in Atlanta was abuzz. Phones were ringing off the hook as CNN’ers made their final preparations to cover what seemed like a near-certain war. During this madness, a caller phoned the CNN switchboard and demanded to be allowed to make a statement live on CNN immediately.
After the caller claimed to be Moammar Gadhafi, the CNN operator transferred the call to the International Desk, which I oversaw at the time. The desker who answered the phone turned to me and said, “I have a guy on the phone who claims to be Moammar Gadhafi, and he wants to speak on CNN right now.” My colleague told me the caller was speaking in near-perfect English. I told my colleague that Moammar Gahdafi doesn’t speak good English – I knew this because every time CNN had interviewed Gadhafi previously he spoke only in Arabic – and I instructed my colleague to hang up on the prankster. Done.
Two minutes later, the man claiming to be Gadhafi called back, irate that he was being treated so rudely by CNN. My colleague asked me, “What do I tell this guy?” I picked up the phone and berated him for trying to perpetrate such a fraud, especially during such a busy news time, and then I slammed down the phone.
He called back a third time, and this time he was beyond livid. I sarcastically told him if he was Gadhafi, he needed to pay for a satellite transmission so we could see it was him live on TV before we put him on the air.
Much to my embarrassment, within the hour, up popped the satellite feed from Tripoli, with Gadhafi sitting in his tent ready to tell the world via CNN of his plan to avert the U.S. war against Iraq. When I saw it really was Gadhafi, I picked up the phone and asked him via his speakerphone, “How did you learn to speak such good English?” Gadhafi’s response: “I learned English by watching CNN.”
 Trombone players on Havana's waterfront Malecon wall. Our U.S. government permits us to travel anywhere and everywhere in the world, right?
Wrong.
By U.S. government edict, Cuba is the only country off limits to virtually all Americans.
The U.S. government allows Cuban-Americans and a few others to visit Cuba, but bans the other 99% of Americans from venturing to the island nation of 11 million people.
Here is why: The U.S. remains entrenched in an archaic and nonsensical de facto cold war with Cuba.
During the actual Cold War, the U.S. never banned its citizens from visiting the Soviet Union or China.
Is Cuba such a dire threat to the U.S. and Americans that the U.S. should deprive Americans of the right to visit that country?
No.
Here are the top five reasons we should demand an immediate end to the U.S. government’s Cuba travel ban:
1. Our freedom: We should be free to travel wherever we choose without U.S. government hindrance.
2. Human rights double standard: The U.S. and the international community rightly call for human rights in Cuba, but the U.S. call rings hollow when the U.S. forbids its own citizens from visiting Cuba – a violation of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights – and the U.S. is the only nation in the world with a Cuba travel ban.
3. Travel ban double standard: If the U.S. government believes it appropriate to ban Americans from visiting nations that have a deplorable human rights record, the U.S. should declare dozens of countries off limits to Americans. Yet Americans are free to visit China and Saudi Arabia, U.S. allies whose human rights records are far worse than Cuba’s, as well as Iran, Syria and North Korea.
4. Failed policy: The U.S. government’s attempts to isolate, undermine, and change the Cuban government have failed miserably for nearly five decades. It’s time for a new approach that includes allowing all Americans to visit Cuba.
5. Popular opinion: Most Americans and Cuban-Americans favor ending the travel ban, according to public opinion polls. During my dozens of trips to Cuba as a journalist, the overwhelming majority of average Cubans I encountered wanted the U.S. travel ban ended, too.
President Obama and Congress should do what is right: End the Cuba travel ban now.
 If you think this looks like a silly, mindless game, bingo: you’re right.
Dopey, simple, fun games are all the rage among many iPad and iPhone owners.
Here is the Cubicle Golf Web site.
You can find the Cubicle Golf news release here.
Buy the game in Apple’s app store for the bargain price of $1.99 – please.
In the weeks ahead, Headline Apps will crank out two, more ambitious games, including one that I conceived.
© 2011 Eason Jordan.
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Nashville’s newspaper described the concert as “mesmerising” – arguably an understatement.
