Subscribe | UPI Odd Newsletter Subscribe PRISONER WANTS SEX CHANGE Marks Brooks, serving 50 years to life in prison, is suing New York state to get a sex change on the public's dime and to serve out the rest of his time in a women's prison. Advertisement Albany federal Judge Lawrence Kahn is allowing his $500,000 suit to go forward, finding the state might have subjected Brooks to a form of "cruel and unusual punishment" by refusing to allow him to even consult with a doctor about treatment. Brooks, who now calls himself Jessica Lewis, says in court papers he "believes that she has the gender identity of a female and can find comfort only though living and presenting as a female." He would like the state to provide him electrolysis, "voice modulation," hormone therapy, breast-implant surgery and "genital reassignment." BRITAIN BATTY FOR ATKINS Britain is in the grip of the Dr. Robert Atkins meat-and-a-few-veggies-but-no-starch diet, according to sales figures showing the late doctor's books outselling other nonfiction books. The "New Diet Revolution" is selling at the rate of 30,000 a week in Britain -- three times more than any other book except the latest Harry Potter tome. Advertisement The merits of the high-protein, high-fat, low-carbohydrate regime devised by Atkins in the late 1960s might have been derided by nutritionists and scientists, but its ability to shed pounds rapidly has won the support of millions of dieters, the London Telegraph reports. Jennifer Aniston, Brad Pitt, Minnie Driver and Catherine Zeta Jones swear by it. 'HEDGE RAGE' Pivit hedges in New York are causing controversy on Long Island's tony neighborhoods. Some let their hedges grow high and broad, billowing over the property line like a woolly mammoth. Others keep them as clipped as a stone wall, in the Hamptons. When the owners cannot agree, the hedge is of two minds, woolly on one side, clipped on the other. The different philosophies of hedges have not reached the fever pitch recently reported in Britain, where in June a man shot and killed his neighbor in an incident attributed to "hedge rage," but passions do run high, The New York Times reports. ADS SHIFTING TO CABLE There has been a slight shift in ad dollars from broadcast news to cable news programs. Advertisement Ad sales growth in broadcast news is trending downward but for cable news it is rising. Fox will grow its ad revenue 60 percent to more than $400 million in its fiscal 2004, which runs through June, predicts Paul Rittenberg, senior vice president of sales. Rittenberg predicts CBS, NBC and ABC will be forced to cut their losses and ax their flagship nightly newscasts in coming years, USA Today reports. "A 22-minute show with a $10-million-anchor is not where the world is going," Rittenberg says. "It's enormously expensive to maintain the bureaus and the talent. Then when the biggest story of the decade happened, the viewers went away" to 24-hour Iraq war coverage on cable."
