Heckling

Raul Mondesi has been among the Dodgers' most popular players throughout his five-year career, and his relationship with fans is important to him. And that's why the center fielder is upset about comments that have been directed at him after his June arrest on suspicion of driving under the influence of alcohol. On the road and at Dodger Stadium, fans heckle Mondesi.

Out at the old ballyard exploring the status of that 1st Amendment staple, the baseball heckler, because it's a cool ambivalence that will do us in, not the screamy passions of the borderline insane. The issue came to mind after hearing that Broadway types are developing a musical about perhaps the greatest heckler of all time, Hilda Chester, who famously shook a cowbell as she snarled at players at Ebbets Field. For you kids, that's where the Dodgers once toiled under the watchful eye of Howling Hilda, her booming Brooklynese bouncing off the walls.

Chile's president delivered his last address to the nation Friday, a speech overshadowed by demonstrations for the immediate liberation of Gen. Augusto Pinochet, the former dictator held in Britain. Rightist opponents of Eduardo Frei's government gathered outside the legislature where he delivered the annual address. The Senate president, Andres Zaldivar, had to order demonstrators expelled from the galleries when they heckled Frei and prevented him from speaking.

Justin Timberlake says that Jimmy Fallon heckled him during his wedding speech. The "Suit & Tie" crooner, who married actress Jessica Biel in October 2012, put the late-night host on blast in his essay about Fallon for Time's 100 most influential people . "Picture this: I'm in the heart of an impromptu speech at my wedding reception in front of 150 guests, pouring it out to my lovely new bride," Timberlake wrote ...

A small group of protesters, apparently opposed to Pope John Paul II's stand against artifical birth control, shouted and whistled at him Friday as he spoke to students outside a Rome university. State television said the hecklers at La Sapienza University weren't students and were apparently led by a group of feminists. Some of the 2,000 to 3,000 students in the crowd intervened and persuaded the hecklers to stop, the broadcast said.

Radicals campaigning for Maori rights heckled Queen Elizabeth II in New Zealand during celebrations marking the 150th anniversary of a treaty between Maori chiefs and British colonial authorities. One young woman was arrested for throwing a T-shirt at the British monarch. The queen, accompanied by her husband, Prince Philip, appeared shaken by the incident in Waitangi. Maoris are descendants of Polynesians who arrived in what is now New Zealand more than 1,000 years ago.

An increasingly militant series of anti-abortion demonstrations aimed at Democratic presidential candidate Michael S. Dukakis turned violent for the first time Tuesday as shouting demonstrators and Dukakis supporters engaged in a shoving match here, partially disrupting Dukakis' speech. Ignoring the candidate's appeals for calm, roughly a dozen demonstrators shouted "Abortion is murder!" at Dukakis, preventing him from being heard in a crowded Polish union hall in this Chicago suburb.

George Bush carried his happy message of prosperity to a throng of ardently unhappy shipyard workers here Tuesday, and the GOP presidential nominee got a surprise earful--starting with a thunderous chorus of boos. After that, the reaction of many of the 1,200 union workers toward Bush grew still coarser, even unprintable. Virtually each point in his 10-minute speech was hooted, hissed, heckled or worse.

Hey, Donald, grow a conscience!! It might seem unprofessional to heckle Clippers owner Donald Sterling from this column space but, you know, he started it. News broke this week that Sterling regularly heckles his players from his courtside seat, with Yahoo Sports reporting that Baron Davis has been a recent target, and Chris Kaman confirming that the boss yells at everybody. "It happens, sure, but it's cool," Kaman told me yesterday. Kaman is a nice guy who would never rip somebody paying him millions, so, while I appreciate his attitude, I'm not buying his characterization.

Do you love making snarky comments during sappy movies? Then you'll love Doug Benson's "Movie Interruption" series at Cinefamily. During his latest installment, Benson and friends will take on the schmaltzy holiday classic "Love Actually," starring easy target Hugh Grant. Cinefamily at the Silent Movie Theater, 611 N. Fairfax, L.A. 7:30 p.m. Thurs. $14. (323) 655-2510, http://www.cinefamily.org.

  So Yankees Manager Joe Girardi was just minding his own business, giving a news conference Wednesday night after his team lost to the Chicago, completing a sweep by the White Sox. He's answering a reporter's question when in the distance he hears "Yankees swept? Yes!"  But he ignores it, and continues answering, when he starts to hear it again. And then Joe Girardi gets angry and stops his answer mid-sentence. "Hey, hey, shut up! We're doing an interview!" he says as he moves toward the guy. But that's not the best part.

After a vocal advocate for the controversial Malibu Lagoon restoration turned a gun on herself late Saturday, some closest to her were left wondering if the increasing vitriol surrounding the project drove the 35-year-old over the edge. Stephenie Glas, a Los Angeles city firefighter, shot herself in the head shortly before midnight at her boyfriend's Corral Canyon home, according to the boyfriend, Steve Woods. Authorities said only that a 35-year-old female died of "apparent suicide" at the home but did not release the woman's identity Sunday.

At a gay rights dinner last year in New York City, when President Obama listed gay-friendly policies he had enacted, hecklers shouted, "Marriage!" At a similar event Wednesday night in Beverly Hills, nearly a month after the president embraced gay marriage, there was no heckling. Instead, 600 supporters at the LGBT Leadership Council event rose to their feet as one, chanting, "Four more years!" L.A.'s gay community turned out in force to celebrate the man who has been dubbed the nation's "first gay president.

In an ornate room of the golden-domed Iowa Capitol building this morning, Newt Gingrich stepped before cameras to thank two state House speakers for their endorsements. Kraig Paulsen of Iowa and William O'Brien of New Hampshire had just given their blessings to his quest for the Republican presidential nomination. But Gingrich had barely gotten a sentence out when a young man who had been sitting behind him -- perfectly positioned for the cameras, it must be said -- leaped out of his chair, moved toward Gingrich and yelled, “Mike check!

Rick Perry took another shot at Mitt Romney's offer of a $10,000 bet, but the Texas governor found himself under fire himself Sunday, heckled at a campaign stop over anti-gay bias, including by a man identifying himself as a Marine veteran from the Iraq war. The heckling followed Perry's brief remarks to Iowa voters at a coffee shop in downtown Ames. "Why are you demonizing gay and lesbian people?" shouted one heckler. "Why can't gays compete in the military?" chimed in Jason Arment, 24, an English major at nearby Iowa State University.

TEXAS A man who disrupted a speech being given by former President Bush should be tried for heckling, a court in Austin ruled. Thomas Markovich was a university student in 1998 when he stood up in the House gallery and yelled at Bush, who was speaking as part of the Texas Book Festival. Markovich's attorney, Kenneth Houp, said the outburst was prompted by a reference to Nicaragua Bush had made in his speech.

New York Yankee pitcher Steve Howe, who has been suspended six times for drug and alcohol abuse, suggests that he could retaliate with either fists or fastballs for opponents who taunt him about his past. "Let me say this, nothing happens until I throw the ball, and I throw the ball 95 miles per hour with accuracy," the New York Post quoted Howe as saying Tuesday in reaction to heckling by Toronto Blue Jays in Monday night's game.

I take some time off, and so I see the Lakers and Chargers do the same. It's one thing for the Lakers to underachieve, two NBA titles and three straight visits to the Finals, no reason to panic, although I will be going to San Antonio on Tuesday to help fire up the guys. The Chargers are another story, our very own football team after next season, and they are notorious underachievers with no resume to earn them anything but ridicule. They try that stuff in L.A., and they might just as well stay where they are, because L.A. has a history of ignoring football teams that are no good.

As far as this NFL football-starved fan is concerned, the three beautiful stadium renderings on Thursday's sports page may as well been pictures of a unicorn, the Loch Ness Monster, and Atlantis; all fantasies. How many times must the city populace be teased by the dangling NFL carrot before they abandon hope once again? Note to AEG or the NFL: Put up or shut up; if not, then leave the sensationally delusional ideas and imagery to the movie studios. Mark J. Featherstone Windsor Hills :: It's not crowded enough downtown at LA Live, now these egotistical megalomaniacs want to build an NFL football stadium at this site.