Newman knocks Princeton day

Princeton, N.J. — Paul Newman has appealed to Princeton University to end a campus tradition in which participants binge drink, trying to consume a beer an hour for 24 hours.

Newman’s Day, set for Saturday the 24th, derives its name from a questionable quote attributed to the actor: “24 beers in a case, 24 hours in a day. Coincidence? I think not.”

On Newman’s Day, students have been known to show up for class inebriated or with beer poured into coffee mugs. Part of the event’s challenge is to make it through classes.

Because it falls on a Saturday this year, there was concern some students also would observe it Thursday, the week’s last day of class for most students.

Cirque settles with gymnast

San Francisco — Cirque du Soleil agreed Thursday to pay $600,000 to settle a lawsuit filed by an HIV-positive gymnast who was fired by the Canadian circus last year because it thought he posed a health risk to other performers.

Matthew Cusick, 32, voluntarily disclosed his health status and spent four months training with the circus. He was fired just days before he was to perform in Las Vegas.

Cusick filed a complaint in July under the Americans With Disabilities Act.

The Montreal-based circus offered to reinstate him six months later, just hours after federal labor investigators found reason to believe it engaged in job discrimination. But Cusick refused, saying he could not return to “a company that stood so strongly against me.”

Diana photos raise a ruckus

London — Princess Diana’s brother, Lord Spencer, said Thursday he was “sickened” that CBS had broadcast photos of the princess as she lay dying after a car accident — the first time a major media outlet has published pictures of the injured princess.

The British press expressed front-page outrage, while Prime Minister Tony Blair called the broadcast of the grainy black-and-white images “distasteful.”

Wednesday’s “48 Hours Investigates” briefly showed two pictures taken by paparazzi at the scene of the Aug. 31, 1997, accident in Paris. Diana died hours later. Her companion, Dodi Fayed, and chauffeur Henri Paul also were killed.

The network insisted the pictures — which showed an unconscious Diana being treated by a doctor as she lay slumped in the back of a car — were not graphic or exploitative, and said the broadcast had not been seen outside the United States.