A Barack Obama impersonator was pulled off the stage Saturday (June 18th) at a Republican forum in New Orleans after he made fun of the GOP presidential candidates and joked about Obama's biracial heritage. Speaking about Newt Gingrich's advisers quitting all together, he said they, quote, "are dropping faster than Anthony Weiner's pants." Of Tim Pawlenty, he said he missed the conference because, quote, "he's having his foot surgically removed from his mouth." Brown also joked about Mitt Romney's Mormon faith and polygamy, and Rep. Michele Bachmann's Tea Party support, before organizers cut off his microphone and escorted him off the stage.

The end of Brown's routine before it was cut short:

Women worry the most about how their stomachs look when they're buying a swimsuit, a new poll shows. Almost half (45%) of women have purchased a suit that claims to trim down their figures, including offering tummy control and overall slimming, according to a survey of 1,009 women, ages 18 and up, conducted for ShopSmart (shopsmartmag.org). About 18% of women don't like how they look in a bathing suit, 40% are impartial, and 36% are OK with it.
Other findings of the poll:

• 45% of women say they have a hard time finding a bathing suit that fits properly.
• 42% have regretted at least one swimsuit purchase.
• About a third of women buy a new suit every year, paying an average of $47.
• About half of women say it's fine to wear a bikini at any age; the other half say that at a certain age, you're just too old. The age limit: 48.
• 50% of women expect to wear a one-piece suit the most often this summer.
• A bikini is the least popular style overall, but the most popular style with women ages 18-34.
  
  
  

From SundanceChannel.com: "With the whole Weiner scandal going on, we were discussing how there's got to be something in between flirting and actual physical cheating. What Weiner did goes beyond mere flirting -- even though it didn't involve physical contact with anyone other than his wife, it did involve sexual antics (and release?) with other women via social networking services and the telephone. So it's not full-blown, full-body-contact, STD-and-pregnancy-risking cheating, it's more like virtual or cyber cheating. But "virtual cheating" isn't catchy or fun to say and "cyber cheating" just sounds so lame and '90s. And that's when it struck us: Chweeting! Anthony Wiener is a chweeter!"

Scientists have found out why smokers tend to gain weight when they quit, discovering that nicotine can rev up brain cells that normally signal people to stop eating when they're full, according to a report from Yale University researchers in today's (June 10th) edition of the journal Science. People who quit smoking gain on average less than 10 pounds, but if the potential weight gain is a concern, the study's senior author suggested that nicotine-based programs for stopping smoking should be tried.

Weight Watchers came out on top in a rating of diets done by weight-loss experts for U.S. News & World Report. The top diets on the list are:

1. Weight Watchers
2. (tie) Jenny Craig
2. (tie) Raw Food Diet
4. Volumetrics Diet
5. (tie) Slim-Fast Diet
5. (tie) Vegan Diet

On Gabrielle Giffords' last birthday - her 40th - her husband, Mark Kelly, tricked her into thinking they were going for a hike in the Coronado National Forest.

When they pulled up to the entrance to Finger Rock Trail, a mariachi band was waiting, along with 20 or 30 members of Giffords' staff, relatives and friends.

Today the scene will be vastly different as the homesick congresswoman marks her 41st birthday in a hospital out of state. It's a birthday she might not have lived to see, if not for the brave bystanders and talented doctors who tended her after she was shot in the head on Jan. 8.

"That's something that I think crosses everyone's mind," said her spokesman, C.J. Karamargin. This year, he said, the occasion "will be a little bit more low-key."

"The congresswoman is going to spend most of her birthday the same way she spends every day: in rehab, working hard at getting better."

That means about six hours' worth of physical therapy, speech therapy and occupational therapy at TIRR Memorial Hermann in Houston, where Giffords has been recovering since late January.

After the sessions wrap up, Karamargin said, there will likely be a small gathering in her hospital room with Kelly and a few friends and loved ones.

But the birthday gift she wants more than anything - a trip home to Tucson - may not happen for a while.

Giffords is expected to leave the hospital and start outpatient therapy sometime this summer, though it isn't known yet whether that will take place in Houston or in her hometown.

"Hopefully it won't be long before she'll be able to come back and see the mountains and breathe the air," Karamargin said.

"That has always been a source of strength for her."

Contact reporter Carol Ann Alaimo at calaimo@azstarnet.com or at 573-4138.

Apple CEO Steve Jobs, who is out on medical leave, was on hand yesterday (June 6th) for the unveiling of the company's new iCloud storage system. In cloud computing, data and software are stored on remote servers and users get access to it on their devices via the Internet. The new iCloud music streaming service will let users play their stored music and get access to their stored data from any Apple device. Also introduced was a $25-a-year service service called iTunes Match, which will scan users' devices and hard drives for music acquired other than through iTunes and store it in their individual iClouds, where they can access it. New and old iTunes purchases will be moved over for free. Apple reached a deal with recording companies that gives them more than 70 percent of the fees from the iTunes Match service, giving the record companies a way to recoup some money from the large percentage of songs people have acquired without paying for them. Apple believes users will pay for the service because instead of people having to upload all their music to their iCloud themselves, which could take hours, Apple will in minutes identify and match users' songs from its 18 million-song database and transfer them to the users' iClouds for them.