Why Tom Cruise may be pissed, meth + tennis = interest and a contrast in quality on Tuesday night television

- Tom Cruise is going to be pissed. Hearing that acclaimed film director Paul Haggis has decided to leave the Church of Scientology is going to have the diminutive, couch-jumping kook that is Cruise ready to storm Oprah’s studio and bounce up and down on her comfy couch for hours on end. A private letter written by Haggis to the church's spokesman, Tommy Davis, was released and in it, the director expressed anger at the Church of Scientology of San Diego's alleged public support of Proposition 8, which eliminated the right of same-sex couples to marry in California. "I called and wrote and implored you, as the official spokesman of the church, to condemn their actions," said the letter. "I told you I could not, in good conscience, be a member of an organization where gay-bashing was tolerated." Haggis himself has not commented on the story and his publicist explained that he won't be doing so any time soon, as he is currently in Pennsylvania directing a film starring Russell Crowe and Liam Neeson. Haggis’ de-Scientologizing isn't a big stunner because he hasn’t been an active member for many years. "The church's refusal to denounce the actions of these bigots, hypocrites and homophobes is cowardly," the letter says. "I can think of no other word. Silence is consent, Tommy. I refuse to consent.” The local church in San Diego contends that it was incorrectly listed in some materials as supporting Prop 8 and the church's name was eventually removed. Davis insists that his organization is "absolutely not anti-gay" and that its doors are open to everyone. "As a church we don't take active stances on political issues," Davis said. "Being a minority, we are absolutely all for civil rights and the rights of any minority. We have a pretty complete understanding of what it is like to be persecuted or marginalized...being a minority religion ourselves." Blah, blah, blah. Look, I have my own beliefs on the issue and I believe that homosexuality is morally wrong, but that’s not the issue here. No, what I want to know is whether this is going to be enough to spark a heated red-carpet faceoff between Cruise and Haggis in which T. Cruise uses his Level 24 Scientology powers to Jedi mind trick Haggis into stepping in front of a speeding limo. If you’re unfamiliar with Haggis’ work, he wrote the Academy Award-winning "Million Dollar Baby," co-wrote and directed "Crash” and has been a part of several other big-name films. To Messrs Cruise and Haggis, I say this: In the words of the immortal Mills Lane, Let’s get it on………

- I would watch a lot more men’s professional tennis if there were more stories like this. If Andy Roddick or James Blake were to become a meth addict, I can safely say that my interest in men’s tennis would skyrocket immediately. But sadly, the meth head in question is former ATP player and legend Andre Agassi, who has written an autobiography, to be released next month, in which he admits to using crystal meth while he was playing professional tennis. Excerpts from the book became public this week and the allegations of meth use were confirmed by the director of media relations at Knopf, a division of Random House which is publishing the book. According to reports, the meth use took place in 1997, when Agassi failed an ATP drug test and claims that he immediately sat down to write a letter to tour officials about why he had tested positive. According to Agassi, he blamed his positive test on an assistant he identified as “Slim” (no joke) who liked to spike his drinks with meth. In the letter, Agassi lied and said he had accidentally taken a drink from Slim’s cup and thus gotten the crystal meth into his system. He also stated that Slim had since been fired and that the problem was taken care of, claims Agassi now admits were false. Who knows why an über-successful athlete who had won multiple majors, an Olympic gold medal in the 1996 Atlanta Games and had millions of dollars in the bank and endorsement deals out the wazoo would turn to crystal meth, the drug of your average trailer park junkie. Perhaps the pressure of not having won a major that year was getting to him, I don’t know. What I do know is that having a meth addict involved in your sport is going to earn my interest every day of the week. I couldn’t care less about the non-sport that is auto racing, but when NASCAR driver Jeremy Mayfield was revealed to be an (alleged) meth addict, I seriously considered taking up in interest in auto racing. The bottom line here, as always, is that if your sport is suffering from a lack of interest and needs to do something to get itself back on the sports map, having someone develop a meth habit is always a good place to start………

- Tuesday night, I was struck by an incredible contradiction as I sat down to watch television. On the one hand, there was NBC kicking off prime time with its hit weight-loss reality show The Biggest Loser. It’s two hours of inspiring television featuring morbidly obese people leaving their normal lives, going to live on a ranch in sunny Southern California and literally losing hundreds of pounds as they save their lives in every sense of the word. These are people who often have truly tragic stories of losing people they love, having loads of medical problems because of their immense weight and literally facing a life-or-death battle to lose weight. They travel to Southern California and spend as long as three months there, working out, learning how to eat better and shedding pounds. In the process, they gain self-confidence and shed loads of emotional baggage. After two hours of uplifting television, viewers can then switch their televisions over to MTV where they can see……well, TV that isn't uplifting. Suffice it to say, The Hills and The City are not only not uplifting, I can literally feel my soul dying watching vapid, spoiled, clueless rich people b*tch fight at their beach parties, worry about who talked to whom at last night’s Manhattan charity event and who has the better Mercedes or Christian Dior handbag. In truth, The Hills is worse in terms of vapidity, shallowness and sheer lack of any redeeming social value. I don’t know how to fully describe the depths to which this show sinks, but just look at those two talent-less tools Heidi and Spencer and know that they are a) great representations of what’s wrong with the show and b) aren’t even the most vapid, dislikeable people on the show. The City is basically the same show, only with the beaches and sun of SoCal exchanged for the skyscrapers and pavement of Manhattan. As much as Biggest Loser uplifts you and makes you feel good, these two MTV reality TV hatchet jobs bring you down just as much. It’s a truly jarring juxtaposition and it’s only Tuesday nights on a television near you……………

- Far too much was made of New York Jets quarterback getting caught on camera Sunday eating a hot dog on the sideline during the Jets' 38-0 victory against the lowly Oakland Raiders. Guys who have played the game or are active NFL players disapproved of the act because they viewed it as disrespecting an opponent by basically saying, “This game is such a joke that I can get my grub on sitting on the bench before it’s over.” I disagree for a number of reasons, mostly because Sanchez explained that he wasn’t feeling well before the game, didn’t each much prior to kickoff and was simply looking to get something into his stomach. "I want to apologize for that," he said. "I wasn't feeling very good and didn't eat much before the game, so I was feeling a little queasy. Toward the end of the game, I probably should have eaten one of those bars or something, but someone offered [a hot dog], so I grabbed it and tried to be discreet about it, but obviously not discreet enough. So I shouldn't have done that, and it won't happen again." But I’m not here to chat about the incident any more because it’s already been done ad nauseum. Instead, I’m happy to see that Sanchez, the team and his agent have found a way to turn Hot Dog-Gate into an opportunity to help the less fortunate. Sanchez has bought 500 hot dogs and 500 hamburgers, along with buns and rolls, through A&P supermarket, and donated them to the Community Soup Kitchen of Morristown, N.J. Make no mistake about it, this is something that the team’s PR rep and Sanchez’s agent helped set up, although he probably had some input. Regardless, having fun with this whole situation and turning it into a way to provide food for people who very much need it is a worthwhile ending to any controversy, no matter how large or small it may be. Props to Sanchez and Co. for making it happen…………

- You’re not helping your argument that you are not a repressive, fascist dictator Zimbabwean dictator Bob Mugabe, you’re hurting it and you shouldn’t be barring U.N. special investigators on torture from your country, man. Special investigator (man, I want that title) Manfred Nowak learned that his mission had been canceled after he arrived in Johannesburg, South Africa, en route to Zimbabwe. He was to make an eight-day trip to look into alleged attacks against opposition party members, but Mugabe’s (illegitimate) government shut it down. Their claim is that the mission was canceled to allow for consultation with southern African leaders over the country's power-sharing agreement. Uh-huh, sure it wasn’t. Nowak said the right tings about be happy to see the consultation planned for Thursday in Harare, but he rightly said it was not a valid reason for the government to cancel his mission. No, more than likely the cancellation came because Mugabe and his posse don’t want their horrendous, abusive and oppressive treatment of the country’s opposition groups exposed. Mugabe and Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai, the two leaders in the parties involved in this showdown, have been at each other’s throats once again after a short period of relative calm. In truth, the uproar over Zimbabwe’s disputed presidential election has never died down and the so-called unity government that formed in its aftermath has bickered constantly since it was formed in February. That’ll happen when one party in a coalition accuses the other of repeated human rights violations. A sticking point for Tsvangirai’s Movement for Democratic Change party is the ongoing case against Roy Bennett, a key MDC official facing charges of possessing weapons for sabotage, banditry and terrorism. While he is jailed and awaiting trial (although out on bail now), Bennett’s nomination for deputy agriculture minister is on hold. Of course, Mugabe vehemently denies that the charges are politically motivated, which is clearly a ginormous lie. The dictator also declared that Bennett would be appointed only if he were cleared of all crimes, which is rich because Mugabe is the one who is wrongly pressing these charges against Bennett to begin with. U.N. officials did not say if or when Nowak’s mission would be rescheduled, although the need for them to visit Zimbabwe is clearly still present. "Allegations that MDC supporters and human rights defenders have been arrested, harassed and intimidated in recent days underscore the urgent need for an objective fact-finding mission by an independent U.N. expert," Nowak said. Agreed and agreed, but that statement being true doesn’t mean that the Zimbabwean government will let any U.N. investigator in. Actually, it’s quite the opposite. The fact that there is a clear need for a U.N. visit in order to expose human rights violations is the very reason that investigators won't be allowed across the border any time soon…..or ever……..