...and a happy new year

Christmas week was wildly insane, finding me in the car every day and exhausted at the end. It was fine, I could have been a better person, but I wasn't. Anyway, it has been a hellish year, who knows what fresh hell 2009 has in store?

Perfect movie moment

The Bishop's Wife is one of my favorite movies. It's a romantic comedy that was released in 1947 with David Niven as the harassed bishop, Loretta Young as his unhappy wife, and Cary Grant as a very suave angel. Originally, Niven was the angel, but after some casting problems, Cary Grant agreed to appear in the movie on condition that he could be the angel--which leads to the perfect movie moment. All three are in the back of a taxi, Niven seething with jealous rage as Grant seems to be wooing (and winning) Young. There's this great moment when the two men indulge in some low key, subtle, verbal fisticuffs which is perfect, for what is not said, and what is said with only a look.

Movie making at its best.

Dana Young was originally cast as the bishop, which would have made for a less enjoyable film.

The movie has since been remade (what isn't these days) as The Preacher's Wife with Denzel Washington as the angel, Whitney Houston as the wife, and Courtney B. vance as the preacher. It's not as good, although the soundtrack (song by Houston) was  nominated for an Academy Award. They kept the skating scene, but, well, it's pallid. There are no perfect moments in The Preacher's Wife.

Which makes me wonder why perfectly good movies are remade and perfectly awful ones are not. I guess turning a pigs ear into a silk purse is more difficult than putting lipstick on a pig.

A box of rocks

That beleaguered Illinois governor Rod Blagojevich is in trouble is no surprise, that he is dumb as a box of rocks might be. He was swept into office in the back draft of Republican George Ryan's spectacular flame out. Ryan, you may recall, won re-election even though he was being investigated for the illegal sale of government licenses, contracts, and leased--and for which he is now doing time. Blagojevich, the first Democratic governor in 30 years, promised he was different, honest, and ethical, which really annoyed his father-in-law, Chicago Alderman Dick Mell, who incorrectly assumed that with a relative in the Governor's office, Mell's own questionable dealings would remain untouched. And when they were touched, Mell took the "moral high ground," claiming that his son-in-law was engaged in that great Chicago tradition of "pay-to-play." The family argument died down, but the Feds were listening. Reminds me of those long ago Nixon days, when the president believed that he could do what he wanted because he was president.

Fast forward to 2008, when Blagojevich KNEW he was being scrutinized by the Feds, knew that someone on his staff had turned on him, and went ahead and tried to sell President-Elect Obama's senatorial seat. He may be little, but Blagojevich has enough nerve to light the city of Chicago for eons. Meanwhile, although he is estranged from his wife's family, Dick Mell is considering entering the fray to defend his daughter who is apparently as unethical as her husband--and, if the truth be told, as unethical as dear old dad.

It's difficult to predict what will happen now. Blago, as he is known here in the city of the big shoulders and bigger hubris, is as combative as he is short. The man has made enemies everywhere and can only count on Emil Jones, the kingmaker who is behind Obama. And why is Jones so loyal? Does he admire Blago's political acumen? Are they buds from the hood? Do they share the same political vision? Hell no, Jones wants to be senator, and would follow Blago into hell if it meant Jones would become the next senator representing  the great state of Illinois.

Meanwhile, Congressman Jesse Jackson Jr., who learned political blackmail at his father's knee, is shocked--shocked, I tell you, AND appalled, because he would never, ever offer to pay Blago for the right to be called Senator Jackson. Jackson has PR problems of his own, with foes in the House and at home. Clearly, Jackson believes that he deserves the vacant Obama seat and now we will see if he made financial promises to see that he gets bumped from House to Senate.

Ahh, Chicago politics--the days when Dick Daley would shut off the mic of any alderman with whom he disagreed--nice to know it's alive and well in Springfield. The problem with a cheap Chicago pol is that sometimes they don't know when to shut up--even when the feds are listening in.

58 days and counting

It's a dirty job, but someone has to do it and since no one seems to want to, George W has been patting his own back on a job well done.

He is content with the occupation of Iraq. Bush likes to see it as the liberation of 50 million Iraqis--none of whom asked us to liberate them, and few who welcomed the US and the coalition of the greased palms. Saddam Hussein was a brutal dictator, but his removal has made Iraq a magnet for suicidal Islamic warriors. And while our casualty count is in the hundreds, thousands of Iraqis have died since the US occupation. The United States has yet to bring democracy, peace or prosperity to the region. But Bush is happy with the outcome of the occupation, which, by the way continues--so how can it have an outcome?

However, Bush did tell ABC's Charlie Gibson, "I think I was unprepared for war." But it wasn't his fault because the 9/11 attack was unexpected.

Bush is also pleased with No Child Left Behind, which any teacher will tell you is an educational disaster. Teachers now teach the test upon which schools are judged and through which they receive federal funds. For example, if  the teacher knows that the test focuses on simple addition, they will not invest in teaching their students anything other than simple addition. The system of incentives and penalties provide strong motives for schools to lie or manipulate data. No Child Left Behind forces schools to ration education guaranteeing mandated skills in reading, right and arithmetic--which pretty much guts programs for gifted children.

Bush is very proud of No Child Left Behind, regardless of what educators say are the serious drawbacks.

George is also very sorry about the financial downturn, accept no responsibility for refusing to crack down on "no money down" mortgages, for ignoring warnings that a financial meltdown was coming, and for knuckling under to the pressure brought about by the same financial institutions who are gobbling up government handouts. Apparently, the banks knew in 2005 that the house of cards was, well, a house of cards and they fought any attempt for regulation. Too bad someone didn't tell Bush--but he's sorry now.

George Bush wants you to drink poisoned water

Not content to have reduced the United States to third world nation status, Dubyah has decided to salt the earth behind him. There is no end to the evil this man will do.

According to an article in the New York Times (Nov. 29 by Robert Pear), the Shrub is "racing to complete a new rule" designed to make it "much harder for the government to regulate toxic substances and hazardous chemicals to which workers are exposed on the job." The proposed 20 new rules will deal with abortion, auto safety and the environment. The plan is to make it more difficult for the Obama administration to protect workers. Another rule would allow coal companies to dump dirt from mountaintop mining operations into streams and valley. And for those of us struggling to keep our heathcare coverage, states will be authorized to charger higher co-payments for physician office visits, hospital care, and prescription drugs provided to low income families under Medicaid. And the topper: Protection for healthcare workers who refuse to perform abortions because of religious or moral grounds.

How is this a good thing for the country?

And what does the administration say to its critics? We/they misunderstand the proposal. This is the same man who dared people to attack us--"bring  it on." I don't believe Obama walks on water; I don't believe he can accomplish half of what he has promised. But he's not George W. Bush and that's good enough for me. 

It must suck to be the Shrub

Last week there was some online video showing George Bush at the end of the G8 meeting being dissed by everyone. Well, that's how it looked. You know, there was that end-of-game handshaking line and everybody shook everybody else's hand except W's. Not one person shook his hand and it seemed to me that no one would even make eye contact. I thought it must be wishful thinking on my part, until I saw this picture of the Shrub at the end of some heavy duty PR tour of Peru, standing alone in his poncho looking forlorn and forgotten. For a moment I felt some sympathy for the little guy, until I remembered just how little sympathy he had/has for me and my kind, the vanishing and vanquished middle class.

Barak Obama talks economic recovery as Dubya pardons a turkey. I suppose it's always the same for a lame duck president, and Georgie boy is the lamest duck ever, but couldn't he have found the time to utter one more of his platitudes about how he's working for our economic relief? We wouldn't have believed him, but it would have sounded as if he knew what was happening and was concerned.

I'm sure that in time the picture of George in a flight suit strutting before a Mission Accomplished banner will be replaced by something more dignified. I mean, he did get some things right, just not during Katrina or in Iraq or during our rapid decline to third world status. He could, I suppose, save his legacy by funding transit projects already approved by Congress. He could release those fund for the green-jobs program to insulate public buildings. But he won't do either I suppose because strutting around in a flight suit is the best George could do as president. I guess we can't expect more of him now.

So while Barak Obama holds press conferences and creates a recovery program for the nation, George, who could stimulate the economy now by providing jobs--and green jobs at that--stands around looking uncomfortably out of place on the world stage and pardons turkeys.

Tossed Salad

You'll be pleased to know that unemployed, unlicensed Joe-the-plumber Sam Wurzelbacher has a job. He's taken time out from writing his political biography to shill for VelocityStore.com, one of those stores that sells whatever it is you will need to convert your TV to digital. He will be doing a series of "educational" videos to explain why the conversion is taking place, how to connect the converter to the TV, and where you can get your government handout to help pay for the transition.

When the government started throwing money at failing banks and mortgage companies nobody, but nobody, made an issue of how much money AIG pays in salaries. But auto workers are another matter. For some reason, the New York Times reported, and everyone else is repeating, that auto workers make upwards of $70 an hour. I realize this is the favored mantra of auto industry executives and their conservative friends, but it is as bald faced a lie as a lie can be. These are the same jerks who insisted that the reason the built big trucks and SUVs is because that's what the public wanted and now they are crying poor because nobody bought the crap they were selling. I find this whole thing so personally offensive.

Auto industry executives had the unmitigated gall to fly by private jet to Washington, DC, so that they can beg for a hand-out without having to sit three across in coach--and now they are placing the blame for their failures on the UAW. Give me a break.

For the record, auto industry workers earn about $28 an hours, which is slightly less than workers earn at Toyota. In short, auto worker salaries are average. Now, the Big Three Fat Cat Honchos will tell you that when they say $70 an hour, they include benefits such as vacation, health care insurance, and retirement. But what these miserable liars do not tell you is that when they average out the per hour cost of making a car, they include the pensions of retired workers as well as other costs, you know, like electricity and real estate taxes. So, no, auto workers really do not earn anything near $70 an hour, although it does cost $70 an hour to make a car.

Surely, the Big Three Fat Cat Honchos would love to stop paying retirement benefits, want to reduce health care premium contributions, and would like to roll back salaries to 1927 rates--but what they are not willing to do is to reduce their own multi-million dollar annual salaries or travel by public conveyance to Washington, DC, or make a car that people will want. Oh, wait, I forgot the Chevy Volt is due out in 2010 or maybe 2011.

Meanwhile, like pigs to the trough, AIG is back for a third helping. Do you get the feeling that the entire $700 billion will be spent by the end of the year and where to get the rest of the cash will become the other guy's problem come January 20?

Citicorp CEO Vikram Pandit said that management did a bad thing when it dove willy-nilly into real estate. He even allowed as how he understood why people are so angry. He did not fly to Washington, DC, in a private jet, but he did accept the government's plan to rescue him from the management mess with a timely injection of $20 billion. Pandit also said the error was caused by prior management so apparently he feels no need to resign or reduce his salary or stock options or Christmas bonus. The Saudis are expressing their support by increasing their stake in the bank. If this continues it'll be called Riyadhicorp.

In other news, Ann Coulter's jaw has been wired shut. No word on who or what broke her jaw in the first place or how long we will enjoy the silence. Her book, Guilty: Liberal Victims and their Assault on America, is available for pre-order on Amazon. So, I guess she will be doing the talk show circuit some time in January. Enjoy the peace and quiet while you can.

Sarah Palin is back on the campaign trail. She's in Georgia lending a helping hand to the shuttering campaign of Sen. Saxby Chambliss. You have been warned.

Europe at the end of the war

I know how they feel, those jubilant hoards dancing in the streets in 1945 at the end of the war. The foreign occupier was vanquished and life would get back to normal. That's how I feel as we count down the final days of the Bush regime. So much of what has happened  in the past four years is foreign, and should be foreign, to us. If you thought this was a Republic, Dick Cheney set you straight in a TV interview when he said that the American people get their say every four years, after which they can be ignored. And that's just what the Bush Administration did. We, that is, the United States, established the United Nations so that there would be someone to stop military aggression and imperialism--which did nothing to stop Bush in Iraq. Although everyone with a brain knows that torture is not a realizable way to elicit useful information, the Bush Administration reinstituted the practice. While spending our money on their imperial agenda, bridges, roads, and environmental standards have fallen into disrepair and decay. As the infrastructure languished, and education and healthcare headed for  the dumpster, the Bush Administration has dumped billions of dollars into their aggressive and destructive foreign adventure in Iraq.

Bush, who is not known to hand out reprieves or pardons either as governor or president, just pardoned Leslie Collier of Missouri, who was convicted of unauthorized use of pesticides and violating the Bald and Golden Eagle Protection Act. In his "Shermanesque" march to Crawford, it seems Mr. Bush will leave a scorched American behind him, passing as many acts and laws as he can to further weaken environmental protection laws. 

We have pursued an aggressive and expensive foreign policy and, like Germany in 1919, we are vanquished and broke. Today Bush said he was pleased with our efforts in Iraq. What's worse is that the press, our press, those people who are suppose to be on our side, has become an organ of propaganda, endlessly churning out misinformation and crude scare tactics so that like a totalitarian government, Bush could do what he wanted when he wanted and no one had the guts to ask a question or offer a contrary opinion.

So on Jan. 20, I will be one of those dancing in the streets. No, I don't think Obama can resolve all of our problems--I'm not even sure he can resolve some of them within his first term. But it's a start. The alien will have returned to the mother ship, the occupation is over and perhaps this government will remember that they represent the people. Indeed, it will be a day for dancing in the streets.

Joe the Plumber spreads the wealth

Joe-the-unemployed-unlicensed plumber is writing a book. Well, actually novelist Thomas Tababck is writing the book, all about Joe the Plumber: Fighting for the American Dream, that's the title. I don't know what Joe is doing in his battle for the American dream, but I do know that he proudly said that he is not working with a conglomerate, which could mean to reputable publisher wanted him. But apparently PearlGates Publishing does want him and promises that the book will be available December 1, in time for Christmas giving. He chose the publisher, Joe said, as a way to spread the wealth. Joe also has a Web site. For a yearly fee of merely $14.95, you will receive direct access to Joe The Forum. a subscription to his monthly newsletter, free shipping on ALL Joe merchandise, a free signed copy of his new book, and the opportunity to become an integral part of the movement to restore our government to the people. Do I sniff a senate run in the air? Coming to a ballot box near you, Joe the Candidate.

How the Republicans won the election

1. The Republican Party feels victorious because although they may have lost the White House, it was not  the terrible rout experienced by Walter Mondale in 1980 (Ronald Reagan won a record 525 electoral votes--out of a possible 538--and received nearly 60% of the  popular vote).

2. The Republican Party still represents the Heartland of American--having lost both coasts, the Republicans seem to have a lock on some of the middle, some of the West, and most of the South.

3. Those Republicans who crossed the aisle did so not because of the Republican Party or its policies but because they are dissatisfied with George W. Bush.

4. The recession is now Obama's Recession.

5. The Republican Party can now get in the way of every initiative and at the end of four years claim that Obama did not keep all of his campaign promises.

Sarah Palin: Stupid idiot or Idiot savant?

I don't question Sarah Palin's intelligence because she reportedly didn't know that Africa is a continent--it is, after,  a common mistake often made by the average third grader. I'm not upset abut her clothing bill--which  is something that concerns the Republican National Committee and no one else.  I'm not even angry that she is forcing her pregnant teenaged daughter into what seems to be a doomed marriage. I am angry with her because she is a mean-spirited, divisive harridan who thinks the American public agrees wither her--the most recent election results notwithstanding. Sixty-seven percent of Republicans may want her to run in 2012, but the Republicans lost by how many points? And Sarah Palin didn't help.

The Republicans wanted to hold on to the White House in the worst way. They attempted to portray Obama's service on two charitable boards with William Ayers as a life-long friendship with terrorists.  Palin characterized Obama as anti-American and as a shadowy figure that should evoke fear in the rest of us. The harsh rhetoric of the recent election, and Palin's pandering to the lowest common denominator should be remembered, but Americans have short attention spans and are often distracted by shiny objects, such as how much Sarah Palin paid for her wardrobe.

Palin portrayed Obama as an unpatriotic terrorist who is not "one of us," and never once addressed any of the economic issues confronting this country, other than to say that the Democrats mean big government and higher taxes. Although she did suggest that God had a plan for Iraq, although he has not yet revealed it to anyone. She also suggested that criticism of her was unconstitutional, and given the way the Bush Administration has shredded the Constitution, Palin may be right. What scares me most about Palin, and the people like her, is her contempt for intelligence and education. In a way, I understand them, after all most of the people who voted for the Republican Party in 2008 were old, white and undereducated. When Palin said " We grow good people in our small towns, with honesty, sincerity, and dignity," only the educated knew that she was quoting Wetbrook Pegler, an American Journalish who supported John McCarthy's fascism and who hated Catholics and African-Americans. Pegler once famously remarked that he hoped some "white patriot" would spatter Robert F. Kennedy's "brains in a public premises."

John McCain was looking for a uterus as a running mate. He had many from which to choose and he chose Sarah Palin. Now she is the darling of the Republican Party. And here we thought that the bad times were in the past.

One year and counting

Today is the first anniversary of my unemployment. I went to work as usual and by 10 a.m., I was back home and unemployed. I thought it would be a tough row to hoe, but that in the end I would have found some sort of employment by now. I was sadly mistaken. I even stopped applying for work as an editor, thinking I would have a better chance as a part-time receptionist or general office help. Nobody wanted me, no how, no way. Frankly, I've been depressed since losing out on an opportunity in April for a job that had mine name written all over it. I don't know what I did to blow that interview, but I did something. Since then I have been concentrating on simple office jobs, but as I said, the pickings are slim. Now, I really need some form of employment with the economy in the toilet, and major appliances in my house disintegrating before my very eyes. In the greater scheme, it's not what you know but who you know and it seems that not only don't I know many people, but those I do know, wouldn't throw water on me if I was on fire. Well, tomorrow is another day, which is what I've been saying since this nightmare began.

The evil empire and the good Christian from South Carolina

This is a story I heard today, 9/11/08, on NPR. Phillip Miles, a South Carolina pastor, was detained in Russia in February for bringing hunting bullets into the country, which, apparently is against Russian law. Although he is now free, Pastor Miles is on the air, and everywhere else, recounting his tale of unfair incarceration. He seems to think that US officials would greet with open arms a Russian (or any other foreign national) who entered the United States with live ammunition packed away in his luggage and a story about how these bullets were gifts for a friend.

Let's start at the top. The barely literate, poorly trained TA guards at our security points routinely pull out of line for special scrutiny women wearing unwire bras and men with knee transplants (and the documentation and scars to prove they've had knee surgery). However, the same brain trust allowed Pastor Miles to pack live ammunition in his luggage as long as it wasn't carry on. These are the same people who told me I could get back into the US from Mexico with the three wrapped and sealed bottles of Mexican hot sauce only to have said hot sauce confiscated by US officials who then disposed of them. And while doing this, they said, "The law in the US says you cannot pack these items in carry on." Too bad the people at the other end were ignorant of the US law, just as the people at the start of Pastor Miles flight seemed ignorant of Russian law.

It gets worse, because the charge was then upped to smuggling, which really got Pastor Miles' goat because, he maintained, this was a box of ammunition that could be purchased anywhere in the US--except he was bringing the bullets into Russia where the law is different. Pastor Miles was particularly incensed that no one spoke English, although he had visited Russia for a decade and did not speak Russian. Even after his six month incarceration, Miles did not have enough Russian to understand when his name was called during the trial.

Pastor Miles was shocked--and appalled--by his tiny, overcrowded cell, by the demand that he hand wash his own clothes (and the requirement that he dip each piece 10 times in the soapy, which he seemed to find onerous), and by the fact that his cell mates watched TV at all hours (and once had the never to watch some porn). Obviously, Pastor Miles has never visited, much less been incarcerated, in a US jail, so he may be excused for his belief that jails here are spacious and spotless. He was also surprised that unlike US justice, he was jailed for six months awaiting a full trial. Ahh, these novices.

It's unfortunate that Pastor Miles did not realize that brining live ammunition to another country is illegal. But it is and can you imagine how much hell there would be to pay if some foreign national brought a box of bullets into the US? Not that they would have to because, as Pastor Miles noted, you can buy bullets here in the US with little problem. "But sir, these bullets are for my friend who lives in Chicago, where bullet sales are restricted."

Pastor Miles, like so many Americans, somehow believes that the US Bill of Rights follows him wherever he goes--and worse, that as a Christian American, he is entitled to special treatment. "Yes, of course, I broke the law, but I am an American, and a Christian American, surely the law does not apply to me."

He did draw a three-year sentence but only served six months and, I suspect, will not be a welcomed guest in Russia for some time. Meanwhile, he is telling his tale of unfair incarceration (had he spoken the language, Miles could have figure out at one point that the whole matter would have been resolved with a bribe) without realizing that other countries have laws and customs (and languages) that we have to follow even if we are good Christian Americans and this has nothing to do with the left overs of Godless Communism but has a great deal to with American arrogance and the misguided belief that our laws apply everywhere.

Vice President Barbie

According to Karl Rove, having a unmarried 17-year-old pregnant daughter makes Sarah Palin more sympathetic to millions of Americans, presumably not  those Americans who would have cast stones had the pregnant daughter been Democrats, or just some body who lived down the street.  Sometime during her "abstinence only" lecture, Palin might have added that having unprotected sex is not the best choice for a child still in high school. Should McCain win, I hope Palin has a clearer line of communication with the military, or with whomever the vice president communicates. "Families are off limited," because the family in this case is White and Republican, can you imagine the field day Palin would have had if the unwed pregnant teen had been Obama's?

The Conservative Right, and maybe the whole right wing, agree with Sarah Palin that birth control is a form of abortion. Sarah Palin does not believe that women should have birth control and she believes that educating girls about condoms is wrong because it prevents them from becoming pregnant. Sarah Palin believes that if you are raped, even by a member of your family, you must prolong your agony by carrying to term and giving birth to a child of that rape or incest. She is also against helping pregnant women in any way. And she now has the power to make these beliefs law. Can you imagine what she will be able to accomplish as vice president or president.

Statistically, John McCain is more likely to suffer some catastrophic illness or die while in office than any of  the other candidates or the incumbent. That means that the United States will have a woman president, who, in this case, is the female version of our current Commander-in-Chief. Statistically, we now have a better chance of having a woman as president. And although Palin has compared herself to Harry Truman, that buck won't stop at her desk. When Harry Truman became president he had served as a judge and a US Senator, he had more than 40 years experience as a public official, a politician, and a businessman. Palin's comparison of herself to Harry is dishonest and uneducated, and maybe designed to attract those who are ignorant of their own history.

The Republican Party seems to think that a female, any female, is enough to attract the votes of disenchanted Clinton supporters. And they think that because they have nothing but contempt for women. Sarah Palin is the female George Bush, she is as sarcastic, she is as mean-spirited, she is as narrow, and she is as dangerous. She is a sideshow that pulls attention away from John McCain 's inability to understand the economic ills of this nation, much less propose a solution. The Republican elite have created a situation in which any criticism of Palin can and will be characterized as more proof of Democratic elitism. The Republicans have thrown Palin to the media wolves in an attempt to draw attention away from John McCain whose answer to our fuel crisis is to increase drilling for more oil--or maybe Palin believes that if she prays hard enough her God will replenish the Earth's depleted fossil fuel sources and all will be well for us and the oil industry.

All in the fragmented family

I was born into a working class family, white collar only because my dad had an administrative job at a university (so that we could obtain a free education), but blue collar in an economic sense. I have never felt the need to apologize for my upbringing or my ethnic heritage, although I do not think of myself in hyphenated terms.

We were different from everyone else in the neighborhood because we had a summer home--a cottage on a lake in a town known as the Blue Collar Riviera for Chicago's working class. Wauconda, then a farm community on a lake with cheap summer rentals--and my grandmother owned property on which a house was built by my dad (an in-law), uncles and various extended family members. We spent our summers there, although I often dreamed of going to a sleep-away camp, which we could never afford. Our summers were perfect, spent in the company of various cousins, watched over by various adult relations, in a then idyllic setting outside the city. I always knew when we reached Chicago city limits, the air pollution made us ill.

The house and land remain but my mother was not included as one of the owners in the will. Instead, she was left some property in the city, which was lost in a harbinger of what would happen to the summer home when all the uncles were dead. The property fight for the remaining city building was ugly. One cousin wanted to buy it and live in it, another, wealthier cousin wanted to buy it as an investment and eventually sell it outside of the family at a profit. Regardless of what the majority wanted, the wealthy cousin won the property and I knew then that unless I won the lottery, the Wauconda property was doomed once the last uncle died. And that has happened.

So what does this mean? Do I hang on to the past because I have no future? Do I need the cottage because it gives me a sense of my place in this world? Do I simply love it because I was once so happy there? Yes, the property will be sold and others will profit and that is the way of the world. But I feel poorer for it. My full name was inscribed in the concrete cover of the cistern for god's sake! The ramshackle place with it's many expensive peculiarities is part of my life. And I had hoped to be dead when it was sold. I feel again my dad's disappointment and hurt when he discovered that regardless of all the work he did on that place, he was not considered enough a part of the family to participate in ownership. I remember once when he had an opportunity to buy a smaller property nearby and turned it down saying, "Why do we need that when we have the big house?" Little did he know.

Someone once said of me that I'd be poor within a year of winning the lottery because I would give it all away. Yes, but I would have done what I can to ensure that that stupid house with its iffy plumbing would be kept together until there was no one left who cared--and that is only one generation away. People who claim that money does not buy happiness have enough money to make sure that their dreams and hopes become real.

I hate that they are selling that property. I hate that I cannot save it. I feel raped and robbed and left bleeding by the side of the road. This is progress and what happens when it steam rolls over the majority.

Nuts anyone?

Pity poor Jessie Jackson who was caught saying out loud what he really thinks when it comes to Barak Obama.  Nothing is more galling to Jessie Jackson that Obama's success. According to Jessie Jackson, white people are racist until they can prove otherwise. Only he can determine who is and who is not a racist, what is and what is not racist. Along comes Obama who claims that some of the problems are self-inflicted, who challenges people to take responsibility for their own actions, and who acknowledges the existence of racism but does not accept it as the reason form people's failure. Jackson has been nipping at Obama's heels for some time. And while he could never say it, no one hopes for an Obama loss as much as Jackson because it will be an affirmation that the old extortionist ways are best. 

Following orders

Today, June 1, in 1962, Adolph Eichmann was hanged after having been found guilty of crimes against humanity. He remains the only civilian executed in Israel, which has a general policy against using the death penalty. Since his death, some argue that Eichmann was unfairly tried and condemned because he was only following orders. But I think, given what we know about Eichmann, and others like him, everybody is capable of committing horrendous crimes under the appropriate set of circumstances. In this instance, it was the German governments policy to eradicate Jews from Europe by any means possible. And in doing so, Eichmann was following the law. What hasn't been adequately address is how people allow the enactment of these laws. In every instance where the German population acted as a group to stop the slaughter, the SS backed down. Of course, in those instances, German citizens believed that THEIR rights were bring trampled, because there was little hue and cry when the Nuremberg Laws were enacted in 1935. We do the same thing in the United States. In our misguided attempt to protect ourselves, we allow our government to abrogate our rights, believing that somehow when the threat eases, the government will back off. Of course, the threat never eases and the government never backs off. Worse, we assume that the laws do not effect us because we are not identified as "the other."  Once you allow  the government to listen to the conversation of others, you invite scrutiny of your activities because who is to guarantee that what is legal today will be legal tomorrow? It has never been against US law for any citizen to be a member of a political party, including the Communist Party, and yet under McCarthyism citizens were deprived of their right to work simply because they were a member of the Communist Party or, if not, knew someone who as. And this happened on the heels of World War II when we should have known better. We are all in danger when the government decides that it can determine who is and who is not an enemy combatant and who can be incarcerated indefinitely without being charged. If we are not willing to protect our own freedoms, then we must accept what follows, and if we accept what follows than we are all guilty of what happens next. 

On the other hand

I've been thinking about Sex and the City, and while I still think it appeals to those who love the series, there was something in it that stayed with me. A terrible thing happens to Carrie, and because it is terrible, she needs her friends and because this is TV/Movies they are there. And that's what stayed with me. It's rare to have friends who will rush to your side and stay there when terrible things happen. But this is the movies and in the movies Carrie's friends are there and have the financial means to make a bad situation somewhat better. That's what friends are for. And to have friends like that in real life is rare. I wish I had the facility to make and keep friends like that, but I am careless. Friendship, like a garden, needs constant maintenance and care. So, in the end, it's not the fabulous jobs or terrific apartments, or luscious men, or expensive shoes that stays with me, but the fact that when a terrible thing happened, Carrie has her friends, who cannot take the sting away, but who are there to apply balm and comfort. And who, in the throes of terror, do not need the warmth of a loving embrace? Occasionally, that's all that stands between us and the long dive off a high bridge. Boyfriends come and boyfriends go, jobs are lost, marriages disintegrate, but friendship remains. So, my babies, if you have friends, call them tonight and ask how they are, and really listen when they speak, and don't let them slip away. Because if you don't, if you are not a friend, than you will end up like me, old, alone, and broke. The alone part hurts the most and is the thing that is forever.

Indiana Moans and the Temple of Groom

Know from the get-go that I planned to like Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom, I hoped to love it, but I planned to like it. So when Indy appeared, first his hat and then his foot (did you ever notice that Harrison Ford had a small foot? Did I mention that I like small feet). And then his shadow and the music wells and there he is, looking every bit of his 65 years. Okay, here's the thing: I found all those references to every Lucas/Spielberg movie annoying (except I did miss Bruce the Shark) and distracting. Unless you know about Area 57, and not everybody does, you are lost, lost, lost. And then Cat Blanchett channeled Natasha (I truly expected someone to yell, "Stroke, stroke," to her "Bail, Bail"--and if you don't know what I'm talking about you're too young to remember Boris and Natasha). Anyway, I hated what she was doing. BUT, and this is my constant complaint with Spileberg: He does not know how to end a movie. What I wanted, at the end of the, the very last scene, was for Cate Blanchett, who now knows everything, locked-up in a nut house. The movie was fine, bloated, talky, but fine--no matter what the Russian government says (and who doesn't believe that Spielberg didn't bride the Russians to ban Indiana Jones etc). And, had this been a better world, instead of making those lame Star Wars prequels, Lucas would have done Indiana Jones ten years ago so we could have been on number 5 by now. Have you ever noticed how Indiana goes into a cave that has no one has seen for thousands of years and he finds a torch and it lights on the first try? And how everybody and everything gets sucked into the vortex but them? And no matter how lame the movie is, if it's Indiana Jones, I know I will have a good time (Ok, with number two I had to will myself to have a good time) even if the ending is lame.

$15 a gallon gas

This would be an excellent time to invest in oil because as gas prices increase so do profits, and I've seen estimates that gas will reach $15 a gallon come September. The oil companies insist that they are not price gouging and claim that their profits are so high because they are investing profits elsewhere. The problem, as I see it, is not  the price of gas but the refusal of our government to invest in alternate energy sources. Fossil fuels are finite. We can despoil every single protected wild life area and we will still run out of gas. That's the reality. Gas prices have increased 100% (and maybe more) since we occupied Iraq. We are told that prices are tied to increasing demands from China and India, which, I assume, will continue. Meanwhile, the current administration does nothing to improve supplies, to seek alternatives, or in any way to stop or slow down the predatory practices of oil companies. And good conservation gets us no where, because prices increase whether or not we use fossil fuel in our cars or to heat our homes. I don't see any end in sight unless people rise up and say, "Enough." Food shortages may be the catalyst we need to demand that someone in power place public good before private profit. There's no reason why we can't have affordable electric powered vehicles, if there is a will to do so. Maybe we can start by rationing gas, but we have to do something yesterday because it's already too late to save the economy. It seems that our government is tied to the oil industry and unless we, the people, do something to cut those ties, $15 a gallon will seem like a bargain. 

Sex and the City

Although I'm not a die-hard Sex and the City fan, I will go see the movie, but I have always been mystified by the story line. Here you have three with-it ladies living in New York and making enough money to buy every fashion victim style that came down the pike (not to mention all those shoes) and what do they obsess about? Men. Getting men. Keeping men. Marrying men. All that money and all those shoes and all our gals want is a wedding ring. So, the series ends with Sarah Jessica Parker being saved from her own mistake, and another bad boyfriend, by Big, who is wealthy, handsome, and willing to wed. The wedding, I guess from the coming attractions, is the point of the movie. I'm sure there are some booby traps into which Sarah will fall on her way up the aisle, but it seems she gets her man and closet space to die for. I haven't seen the movie yet, but  think I have a better idea than a rice filled ending. How about this: Sarah gets to the church on time but Big is a no show. Or, Big has a fatal heart attack as he runs up the church steps (it has to be him because we need her for the sequel). Or, they both decide at the last minute that marriage is not for them, well, not now anyway. You get my drift. In the real world, few people get the great job, the great guy, and the great closet space. Usually you get one, maybe two, but never all three. Some how I always felt a little cheated by the series, which seems to celebrate the single life, in which women mistake meaningless sex for a relationship, but really what the gals want is their guy with a ring on his finger and a kid in the oven (and great closet space). I suppose the sequel will be devoted to the trials and tribulations of getting their little off-spring into the right school.

And it always ends in tears

On Top Chef this week (5/13), Lisa, who was given a pass for not including a key ingredient, makes sure that the judges are aware that another contestant, the always annoying Andrew, failed to include a key ingredient in his losing lunch box menu. Lisa and Andrew, but mostly Lisa, are examples of what happens when a good idea runs out of steam.

My minor reality show addiction was given impetus during the writer's strike, which introduced me to Roto Rooter ghost hunting plumbers, a family of  twins and four-year-old sextuplets, and little people in a big world. Normally, my reality limit was Top Chef and Project Runway. When the strike ended, I was frequently confronted with the decision as to whether to return to Eight and a half men, and whatever reality series was running against it. 

But what I've noticed is that Top Chef, and other contestant shows, suffer after a time because of the type of personalities who apply for participation. They are less about  the process and more about winning, like the Jag debacle on Food Network. What used to be interesting is watching talented people find ways to reinvent what they do within the parameters of the challenge becomes an ego fueled brawl between mean-spirited Tiffani and egoist Stephan on Top Chef, and the whole process becomes less interesting.

How do you know when an entire genre jumps the shark? When something called Groomer Has It shows up on your basic cable. Animal Plant, which I love, entered the competition sweepstakes with its own game show pitting dog groomers against each other on a low budget competition for the title of Groomer of the Year and $50,000. Everything about it has to be seen to be believed.

In addition to over-the-top, often  bottom feeder contestants, is the alarming number of weeping losers. Not content with a teary-eyed farewell, these losers blubber and wail their way out the door--and this is across the board. One wonders what kind of border line personality puts all of his or her eggs in a game show basket. It's like the people on Survivor who express surprise and outrage when thrown under the bus by a campfire pal. There can only be one winner and very few contestants are able to suppress their own competitiveness or trust their own creativity. If given the chance, contestants such as Lisa will be sure that the judges know that Andrew failed to include a grain in his already questionable box lunch. Had I been the judge who had already given Lisa a pass for failing to include the main ingredient in a dish, I'd have bounced her for a poor dish that matched poor sportsmanship. But that's not how these things are done because in the end these are game shows that are only loosely based on skills or talents.

So, who is the moron in this scenario? Surely not the producers who have found a way to present cheap entertainment for which they can charge top advertising dollars--which leaves the viewer sucked in by this crap. Marcel almost did it for me on Top Chef and now Lisa may have completed the process in the same way Project Runway did me in by giving Christian Siriano top honors. The problem, of course, is that the Animal Planet's Groomer Has It is so awful on so many levels that I may be permanently hooked on a genre, the high point of which may have been the first season of Survivor.

Not this year

As the Hillary Clinton campaign balloon sinks slowly into the sunset (even Ted Kennedy got the boot in), the next question is who will be chosen to run as Vice President. Will she settle for the second spot? Who knows what the Dems will do, but I fully expect the McCain to run with Condoleeza Rice. It makes perfect sense, she is a woman, she is an African-American, and she has always been a good party member. I don't know who Obama will run with and I'm pretty sure it won't matter, but the Republicans have an excellent opportunity to get into office with a woman and an African-American.

Smart career moves

There's Cher, there's Oprah, there's Valentino--what there isn't is a lot of people who are easily identifiably one name. Today, May 6, is the 113th anniversary of Rudolph Valentino's birth. He was one of  the most popular stars of the silent era and his name is recognized 81 years after his death. It's difficult to know if Valentino would have survived in talkies, many better actors didn't, but when he died he was still perched precariously at pinnacle of success. A messy divorce, questions about his sexuality, and mixed box office returns were nipping at Valentino's heels. Had he lived even a few years. he may have died forgotten. But something like 100,000 people turned out at the Valentino funeral, re-releases of his films still found an audience in the 1930s, long after movies talked, and some of us still tune in when a Valentino movie pops up on TCM. Of course, Valentino was the first. Darkly handsome, there was an undeniable sexuality about him that moved beyond the camera. But best of all, like Princess Diana and James Dean, he died young, at the top of his game and full of promise. So he never aged, his career never withered, and the public never turned on him. Dying young was a good career move as others have discovered!

Mission Accomplished

On May 1, 2003, George Bush landed aboard an aircraft carrier and declared the end of conflict in Iraq, behind a massive banner declared, "Mission Accomplish." Five years later, the occupation of Iraq continues and George Bush has provided a series of explanations to clarify what he meant when he said that the major conflict in Iraq was over, in the latest, he again blames the banner and said it should have been "more specific." They keep going back to the banner, as if that's the problem and not the fact that US men and women die daily as  the ill-conceived occupation enters its fifth year--and we've been in Afghanistan since 2001.  Meanwhile, the United States commits billions of dollars sustaining the occupation and the country slides into something that looks like an Economic Depression as oil companies continue to post record breaking profits. And I don't see any way out or any politician with the will to end the debacle anytime soon. We were tricked into the occupation because the people of the United States are clearly  the stupidest most gullible people on the planet, and because our news media failed it its primary duty to inform the public forgetting that a free press is the watchdog of democracy.  And in this corner we have a President and Supreme Court who seem intent upon dismantling our Constitution (in John Scalia's opinion, the Constitution is dead, and he ought to know because he stabbed it--and us--in  the back). So, if Bush's plan was to disassemble the United States and reform it so that it better serves oil companies and pharmaceutical giants and his buddies at Bechtel, that the mission is truly accomplished. These are the things I will be thinking about on this May Day, as the media spins its wheels about Rev. Wright and an in-depth analysis of Vanity Fair's photos of Miley Cyrus, while reporting that this economic downturn is anything but a recession and people continue to die in Iraq as the US occupation enters its fifth year.

In Dreams

I live more in dreams these days, dreams where I am employed, valued and at peace. More and more I spend my waking hours pouring over my past, examining the moments in a vain attempt to find the exact moment when my fate was sealed. And now that I know how it ends, I wish again for the moment when speaking would have made no difference but would have made me feel better. This happens because have again been rejected,  this time for a job that I believe I could have filled perfectly. And I wish I knew what it was that lead to someone else getting that job. The past is always bearable of there is a future, or, at least, a future I would have wanted for myself. Enforced retirement isn't it. I think the time between is ending, the time when I believed I was employable. I'll try some freelance, I'll try finding some contentment in what my life has become. Maybe, I will forgive myself.

Colin Firth's Penis

Now that I have your attention...I read somewhere, that Colin Firth has quite a following among the older than 60 set--you know, those geriatric hippies who just don't know when to throw in the towel. Colin, who is not even 50, could be the son of some of those panting chicks, provided they were doing something naughty in the back seat of dad's Chevy in 1960--not me, of course, I was too young then. But I do find Colin Firth yummy and I have to say  this was pre-Darcy and the 1995 production of Pride and Prejudice. Anyway, a mention of Colin Firth, or Harrison Ford (another ancient heart throb), is liable to elicit a "EYEW" from my 15-year-old source on what is currently hot. I have it on good authority that Zac Efron turns teens on these days, leaving Brad Pitt, Justin Timberlake, and The Jones Brothers in his well-coifed dust--and the Jones Boys also have something for the 'tweens market. But for me, it's Colin's rugged good looks, aura of approachability and killer smile--with a side of Harrison Ford. Colin Firth is about to open in a new movie, Then She Found Me, which looks like a frothy comedy, but which is probably a dud (it's been finished for some time and only now opening in select theaters). Doesn't matter, I will go see it and love him. Besides it has a pretty good cast that includes Bette Midler and Matthew Broderick, and Helen Hunt, who stars and directs. The story is about a teacher whose husband leaves her and then her adoptive mother dies and then her biological mother shows up and she begins seeing the father of one of her students (Colin Firth). It was a really good book and I hope a good movie. Anyway, I recommend it to thems who can find it.

Blame it on Jane Austen

I've been a Jane Austen fan since that long ago day when a friendly librarian recommended one of her books--I was 12 at the time, and my love affair with Jane continues unabated regardless of impending old age, numerous broken hearts, a divorce, and a cat that hates me. For many years, Jane was one of  those secret loves us bookish types kept to ourselves. But then along came Hollywood, and Colin Firth, and the proverbial cat was out of that velvet bag.

I can give you all sorts of reasons why I love Jane Austen; her heroines are intelligent, strong and mature. And the movies are just so beautiful. Be honest, wouldn't you love to live in a remote but adorable vine-covered cottage confident that Prince Charming was just down the road and headed in your direction? Some wealthy individual who might be a little grumpy, but who would find your intelligence, wit, and resourcefulness irresistibly charming? Because the guaranteed happy ending is what I love best about Jane Austen.

Yes, Austen's novels are visions of a world of prescribed rules of conduct, and if one masters those rules, one is rewarded with love, fulfillment, and security. Honesty, loyalty, and industriousness are always rewarded and the bad guys never, ever, prosper. 

Women today have it better than ever. We don't need beautifully appointed cottages or magnificent mansions, we pay our own mortgages from our own salaries for our own overpriced condo. We don't have to wait for Prince Charming, we can approach him armed with nothing more than snappy patter and our own supplies of condoms. We can make our own deals, negotiate our own futures, break barriers, and maybe be elected president. But unlike Jane's heroines we cannot seem to find serenity, or even a happy ending.

I cannot decide if my discontent is based on my own inability to accept that bad things happen even if you are intelligent, honest, loyal, and industrious or if through a series of bad choices I blew my happily ever after because I was too busy looking for something else. In any case, I blame Jane Austen who made me believe that no matter how bad things seem there is always a happy ending at the end of the road. And in the end, I long for the serenity that all of her characters achieve.

Coming to a mall near you: Food Riots

Yes, folks, none other than the Wall Street Journal suggests that Americans begin stockpiling food. As oil companies, unhappy with last year's record profits, continue to gouge the public for gasoline, food prices climb. And I have trouble feeling your pain because I am unemployed. Rice, a cheap staple for all of us, is being rationed at Wall-Mart. Eggs are up 30% and as raw materials increase, there is no end in sight. We can blame the demand for ethanol or we can place the blame squarely on the shoulders of this miserable excuse for a government, which does not care if you starve in dark of an unheated house. Provided you still have a roof over our head. We are spending billions of dollars on our ill-fated occupation of Iraq, we are enriching the already over-filled pockets of every single one of Bush's cronies and we are now facing the inability to purchase a decent meal. Let's extend this: If you cannot afford to buy staples to cook and eat in your own home, you will not be able to afford eating out, when people stop eating out, restaurants close, when restaurants close, people become unemployed. And we won't even touch the service industries that will be adversely effected by restaurant closing. But here's the good news, when you get your $600 some time this summer, you may be able to afford a pound of potatoes.

Journey of Disharmony

The ceremonial relaying of the Olympic Flame from Olympia to the site of  the games is the brainchild of none other than Joseph Goebbels. That's right folks, the whole torch thing was a Nazi good idea. I only mention this because of  this controversy surrounding the current Journey of Harmony, which has met some resistance by the rest of the world in light of China's treatment of Tibet.

Some people worry that the violence that has confronted the latest edition of the flaming tour will crush a sacred tradition. Most people don't know that the whole torch thing originated with the 1936 Berlin Games--you know, the one's that was closed to Jews. The United States considered boycotting  the games, but then Germany put a couple of Jewish names on its athletic roster, not that they were allowed to compete. In the United States, Jewish organizations staged rallies against the German Olympics and two Jewish-American competitors abstained from competing.

That's the trouble with boycotts, the reason for the boycott never changes, but athletes pay the price by not competing.  The Olympics will survive this, and so will the torch relay. But before we become teary-eyed about  the whole process, it's good to remember how it started. By the way, the  Berlin Olympics were also the first games to be televised live, albeit only in Berlin and Potsdam. 

Crocodile tears

George W. Bush wept yesterday at White House ceremonies honoring 22-year-old Marine Jason Dunham who died two years ago in Iraq. I'm not sure I'd call that single tear that dribbled down his mottled left cheek weeping, but Georgie's eyes watered. Could have been emotion. Could have been hay fever.  No word on whether he has wept buckets over the other 3,999 US servicemen who have been killed in Iraq, or the thousands who have been permanently injured, or the hundreds of  thousands of Iraqi's who are living in a war zone. We have been in Iraq for five years, and no one's life is better and no one is safer, and the economy is in the tank, crushed under the weight of an ever escalating, never ending war debt. It's about George Bush shed a tear for something. The invasion was a failure, the occupation is a failure, the surge is a failure, and the government wants to continue. I have no idea where these soldiers are coming from, short of a draft. Bush continues to characterize this debacle as central to the "war on terror," which would be laughable if it were not so tragic. All Bush has managed to do is to turn more people against the United States, make it citizens the focus of Islamic distrust, and make the whole world generally more dangerous for the rest of us. So, why can't we just cut our losses and walk away?

Why bother?

I'm way past  the time when I voted on principle. Ralph Nader wants to be president, and to get there he will be hammering at the Democrats, once again, pushing more people into the arms of the dysfunctional Republican party. And yes, I am talking about independent voters who believe that John McCain is the best alternative to Hilary Clinton or Barak Obama. We have already seen the kind of damage Nader and his single digit has in an election. Nader may not he able to derail the Juggernaut that is Barak Obama, but do you really want to take the chance? Do we really need John McCain as president? 

Obama-rama

I have a problem with Barak Obama, and it has nothing to do with his African father or his Caucasian grandmother. My problem is that since his election to the Senate, Obama has been running for president. He has no senatorial record to attack because he has done little, so, people may begin looking at his record in Illinois, or they will continue to spin their wheels about what his pastor said and what his pastor meant when he said what he said. In the end, the issue of race may trump everything else, you know, the failing economy and the increasingly expensive colonization of Iraq. With his very liberal voting record in Illinois, I, for one, am not convinced that Obama can gain important non-partisan support for issues that will challenge the next administration. I am not moved by Obama's politics of joy. My fear is that Hillary Clinton cannot beat a Republican candidate in the fall and I don't think we can stand four more years with business as usual. Once again, I feel backed into a wall with all the exits blocked. I think we deserve better, but barring a sudden resurrection of Al Gore, I don't know what that could be.

Maybe hated cousin Angela has a point

I have a cousin who I call Hated Cousin Angela. Maybe the reason why I dislike her has more to do with the fact that she might be right, instead of the ungrateful, shiftless, lazy, grasping bitch I have always thought her to be.

Thirty-five years ago, Angela shocked everyone in our little corner of the world by presenting us with our very first illegitimate (gasp) off-spring. Although most of the principles are now dead, the rift remains and occasionally rears its ugly head. Anyway, in addition to that, Angela has provided me with years of hysterically stupid anecdotes and cooking tips. She has yet to trump my cancer with an illness of her own, but not for want of trying, although now that I have a bionic knee, she wants one of her own.

But let's get to the point. From her surprise, surprise motherhood on, Angela has avoided gainful employment, living off her parents and the State. Then, to prove she was smarter than everyone else, Angela went back to school in her 40s and received a degree in Anthropology. But shocked and appalled to discover that those government loans had to be repaid, she quit her job in the university's registration office, applied for social security claiming her fibromyalgia made it impossible for her to work, and she moved in with (again) her aging father when the government turned her down for assistance. Now, he's gone, and she's stills squatting in his home, making it impossible for her siblings to either sell or rent the place. But her retirement plan is in full force, which was to live off her dad until his death and then live off her daughter, which is coming down the line. Meanwhile, she has become an expert on Jane Austin (you know, the stuff we loved as teens) and tiresome on that most tiresome of all authors, Charles Dickinson (so many words, so little reason).

Meanwhile, I scramble like a demented chipmonk trying to get writing gigs, or receptionist gigs or whatever gig I can get that will pay me cash money. Yes, the dreaded day arrived, I'm out of unemployment compensation and into my pitiful 401K. But, had I the forethought to eschew birth control and produced a retirement plan of my own, I would have been saved. While I meet my monthly health insurance premium and pay my mortgage and generally scrimp along, Angela lives off the state. Am I annoyed? You bet I am. She was right all along. One does not have to work or be self-supporting when a whole world of people are out there willing to give me their tax dollars. So, who's the chump in this scenario.

Meanwhile, allow me to share with you the latest, and maybe best, of the Hated Cousin Angela stories. In his later years, my uncle's health was dicey at best and Angela, because she is a scientist (and has the degree to prove it), decided that her dad would be best served by a sodium free diet (sodium was the least of his problems). One day, another cousin brings a pot of freshly made spaghetti sauce (chicken soup to an Italian's soul). Angela never made sauce, preferring bottled, because, she maintained, her father didn't know the difference. Anyway, all she had to do was boil the water for the spaghetti. "You're putting pepper in the water," the cousin observed, thinking Angela had mistaken the pepper for salt.

"Yes," said Angela. "My dad can't have salt, and I need to put something in the water or it won't boil."

That's right, Angela said that water will not boil unless there is something in it, and as a scientist, she said, she knows these things.

Pointless as it was, the other cousin tried to explain about salt and water and boiling points and the stupidity of pepper, which rendered the entire meal impossible to eat (even with liberal amounts of very salty cheese).

Everyone has a hated cousin Angela, but honestly, I think ours is the best.

Meanwhile, hack writer needs work, gives good phone and can be receptionist, an old receptionist, but a receptionist nevertheless.

Spitzer lives and dies by the embarrassing press conference

Elliott Spitzer has covered himself with glory with his no holds barred evisceration of various Wall Street insiders, banks, and insurance companies. He was the law and it was his way or the highway.  There were no mitigating circumstances when Spitzer was on the case. And now, Spitzer seems hoist on his own petard.  New York Republicans, who smell blood in the water, have threatened to impeach the New York governor if he doesn't step down after being linked to a prostitution ring. What I want to know is why law enforcement was interested in a "suspicious money trail" that lead to that specific bank. Could it be that Spitzer has so annoyed any number of high powered people and institutions that they went looking for something with his name on it? I'm not one for conspiracy  theories but traders reportedly cheered when CNBC broke the story. The problem with holding one's self out as holier  than thou, is that one must be holier than thou and hiring high priced hookers just doesn't cut it. I'm sure that even as I type this, Spitzer is writing his comfortable ticket to a low-key resignation. It's a sorry end to a career that held such promise and did so much good for the rest of us. Maybe Spitzer's greatest sin had nothing to do with a hooker, but in having so mightily pissed off white collar criminals who are used to having it their way.

The spare goes to war

CNN's Chris Cuomo did not win any friends over the water recently when he referred to Britain's Prince Harry as the expendable spare. Poor Prince Harry fought for and won the right to serve his country in Afghanistan. He was there for only a few weeks, when the media blackout, designed to protect him and the men with whom he served, was broken by an Australian women's magazine. Not that the initial squib garnered any notice--it took Matt Drudge's reprint of the news to blow Harry's cover, which resulted in his early removal from the front lines.

Since then, things have gone from bad to worse. After an initial flurry of hailing Harry as a hero, the British tabs are back at it, today publishing a front page photo of Harry at a pub with his girlfriend. That segment of the British publish that lives to comment on the lives of others are now decrying the fact that Harry remains Harry. The "darling Diana" group, who have all but canonized the dead Princess of Wales, want a pristine icon are furious that Harry has returned to his life rather than beginning a life of prayer and contemplation.

My cynical take on the whole mess is that the military used Harry's honest desire to serve as a publicity stunt to drum up support for an increasingly unpopular war. But  these things have a way of backfiring with everything from negative comments from the parents of soldiers who died there to a public who expected Harry to return home a changed man.

Well, war, even a brief encounter with war, does change people and it also makes them yearn to return to life as they knew it, away from the heat, the dust, and gunfire aimed in their direction. Harry has done what all returning soldiers have done when they arrive home in one piece: He took his best girl out for a drink. 

Given recent history, one assumes the British government is aware that spares have a way of becoming heirs. King George V and King George VI were both spares. So, maybe the issue is not one of expendable spare, as suggested by Chris Cuomo, but one of expendable young men sent off to do fight on foreign lands. If we think that spare Harry is expendable, aren't we actually saying that all troops everywhere are made up of equally expendable young men?

Apparently, young Harry served with distinction and enjoyed the brief anonymaty in the process and that should have been enough. Now he's back in the world, which persists in the blood sport of comparing him to his dead mother, who also did her job with distinction right up to the moment that her arranged marriage crashed and burned. I don't know where Harry goes from here, and I feel confident to say  that he probably doesn't either, but I'm pretty sure that wherever he goes it will not be in the direction ordained by a public that creates icon just so they can whittle them down to size and then is dissatisfied with what they find. And the tabloids will be there to record every moment.

 

The more things change...

Daniel Day-Lewis Oscar win for "There Will be Blood" is sure to spark greater interest in the movie. I hope it encourages a new generation of readers to become acquainted with Upton Sinclair's Oil, on which the movie is loosely based.

Published in 1927, Oil is written in the context of the Teapot Dome Scandal, during which oil reserved for emergency use by the US Navy is leased to to Sinclair Oil without competitive bidding. At the same time, Naval oil reserves in California were leased to Pan American Petroleum in exchange for personal, no interest loans, benefitting New Mexico Republican Senator Albert B. Fall. So, while the leases were legal, the exchange of money was not. 

As you read the book (and I hope that you will), it will become painfully apparent that the more  things change, the more they remain the same. In 1927, Teapot Dome garnered little public interest, but that changed when The Depression hit.

The movie traces a robber baron's quest for power, and while it is inspired by Oil, it is not a retelling or adaptation of Sinclair's book. The themes, however, are similar. It is, essentially, how big business rapes the land and cheats workers to achieve wealth and power. And that, of course, is at the heart of what Sinclair wrote about. It is also about the willingness of government to cater to the needs of big business at the expense of everyone and everything else. Does any of this sound familiar?

Eighty years after Oil's publication, natural resources, religion and patriotism are woven together to maintain a war that benefits only those businesses that have a stake in ongoing hostilities. Although Sinclair was hopelessly naive about Communism, he created a sprawling novel that right exposes the failings of Capitalism. But in 1927, he wrote about issues that continue to bother us: the monopolization of industry, corporate greed, propaganda, sexual double standards and religion. The downside is, he needed 500 pages to tell his  story.

Maybe we don't need free speech after all

I love Penn and Teller's Showtime series Bullshit because it provides a forum for blithering idiots to do what they do best: Sink their own ship with their own words. Last season, P and T did a story about Mt. Rushmore, which dovetailed into a discussion of free speech. And you would be surprised--well, I was--at the number of people who were willing to sign a petition to curtail Free Speech--in most cases because they don't think that they, as patriots, will be effected. This is how a dictatorship starts.

Free Speech is necessary to a participatory democracy because it enables voters to make informed decisions based on the open exchange of ideas. Free Speech enables the public to express their concerns to their government, even if their concerns run contrary to public policy of the moment. In the 1930s, Nazi's claimed that speech should be restricted as a way of "protecting" democracy. Of course, the free speech they wanted restricted was anything that smacked of criticism of their policies. In the United States Socialist Eugene Debbs was jailed for speaking against the US involvement in World War I. In the 1960s, government attempted to curtail anti-war speakers from airing their sentiments with the claim that this kind of free speech lead to civil unrest. More recently, free speech in the UK was curtailed in 2005 when Maya Evans was convicted under the Serious Organised Crime and Police Act. Her crime? She read a list of British soldiers and Iraqi civilians killed during the Iraq War without police permission. How free is your speech if you have to ask permission to speak?

The freedom to express and exchange ideas seems to me to be central to what we claim the US stands for. And if the government cannot withstand criticism, maybe the problem lies with the government rather than the people. Again, we get back to the super patriots at Mt. Rushmore who believe that by curtailing the speech of others, they are protecting their own freedoms. The only way to prove them wrong is to allow them to prevail and then it's too late for everybody.

If O'Rielly cannot come to the homeless

Over the last few weeks, Bill O'Reilly has outdone himself attacking John Edward's vow to "never forget" the plight of poverty-stricken Americans, specifically homeless veterans. In fact, O'Reilly claims there are no homeless veterans--and he's been looking. Well, apparently, the non-existent homeless veterans are planning to visit Fox Studios today with a petition demanding an apology from O'Reilly. I'm betting that O'Reilly will call in sick or take an extended lunch, but I doubt that he will meet with the homeless, even if they camp on his doorstep for the next two weeks. But it's one of those developing stories that promises to be interesting, if not amusing. 

Notes on the job hunt

If you fail an Excel test the first time, be sure to study, and study well, for the second opportunity or you will blow that as well. I know this from bitter personal experience. My job hunt limps along, as I slog through one waisted interview after another. I figured my life as a writer has effectively ended, so what about customer service--the fall back of more than 40 years ago. Well, them thar jobs have all gone to India. Receptionists are young, and more attractive then I. And all of them have exceptional Excel skills. All I want is the chance to answer someone's phones and send out their mail. My Excel skills will improve as I use Excel and as long as I have Excel for Dummies at my side. Being unemployed and under-educated at 61 is the pits. So, stay in school kids, and learn your Excel well.

God bless the insurance companies

I had another of those long, miserable days marked by long, miserable conversations about health insurance. I am uninsurable because I have a chronic disease. So, I thought to throw myself on the mercy of the state. It was a long fall onto hard ground. Well, yes, there is a sort of program that I can apply to but no it will not pay for chemotherapy. Do we love this story or what? I'd have a better chance if I was the unwed mother of several. So, I can kick myself for poor planning or I can kick myself for poor planning, but I cannot hope to have access to care because I planned poorly. As each hour of this enforced retirement passes, I feel more isolated, more obsolete and more alone. I have too much time to review my past sins, mistakes, and foolishness, and I just don't see any way out. I passed panic long ago and went directly to outright terror. I cannot believe that I cannot get a job. I cannot believe that I am superfluous. How's that for hubris? Things could be worse, is my new mantra. But really, being dead is better than this. I kid you not.

Hillary Clinton: The Villeinous Victim

There is something about Hillary Clinton that brings out the worst even in misogynists. Either she is a villein or a victim, but she is just never who she is.  Yet, Hillary never refers to her husband's extracurricular activities unless asked, and she is always asked. No one ever asked Ronald Reagan about his failed marriage, or the short time between his marriage to Nancy Davis and the appearance of the eldest child. But the salacious questions about Democrats never seem to end, particularly when it comes to Bill Clinton. And no one ever asks how an investigation into a land deal somehow focuses on the President's interesting hobbies. But the Republicans will have us believe that Hillary runs as the victim of a cheating husband--that is, when she is not the architect of everything that went wrong with the current administration.

The opposition stubbornly clings to the fiction that Hillary got where she is because of her husband and his infidelities. Not only is that insulting, it simply is untrue. MSNBC's Chris Matthews was recently made to apologize for positing on his TV show that Hillary got where she was because her husband cheated on her. The people of New York seem to think that Hillary is a good senator. 

As a woman, Hillary has to work twice as hard for recognition that comes easily to her male counterparts. There are a lot of women in the US who honestly believe that women should not be allowed to run for elected office. The second class citizenship of women in the United States is well documented. As a woman who is bucking the system, Hillary is running an uphill battled, and I don't think she is helped when people drag her dirty laundry out for a second or third or fourth look.  He cheated on her, which should have remained private, and how they dealt with it is private. If you don't like her politics, don't vote for her. If you don't like her voting record, don't vote for. But don't make your decision based on what you think she should have done, or what you have done, when resolving a personal situation.  Hillary Clinton is a victim only in that is the role the opposition has cast her. And maybe we should ask why that, of all her other decisions, sticks in the collective craw the most.

And some point we will have a female head of state. It's bound to happen. Maybe it will be Hillary Clinton, maybe not. But I would hate to think that she lost an election because she remained married to an unfaithful man. And if that is the benchmark, why doesn't it apply equally to men?

Whatever gets you through the night

I am the last person to care what god or philosophy people believe in, because I believe that people have to believe in something, even if it is nothing. But I cannot get past the cynicism that seems to permeate Scientology. Founded by science fiction writer L. Ron Hubbard in the 1950s, seems to draw from self-help programs and the search for a magic bullet to make life bearable. I'll never be absolutely certain that Hubbard created his religion because in the US, these organizations are tax exempt. So, maybe I am more cynical that Hubbard.

What I think is interesting is that the same people and organizations who so vociferously condemn Scientology promote their own religion with the same single minded zeal. And they are not above some unsavory chicanery to convince others that their god is the only god. But those who strap bombs to their bodies and die for Allah (taking out a bus load of "non-believers" in the bargain) are no different than fundamentalist Muslims or Christians or Jews or Scientologists. And really, what is the difference between a god who lives in an invisible heaven or a being from another planet who lives underground and awaits rebirth? Every one of have put all their spiritual eggs into a single basket held by a very mortal man.

If we have to believe in something "better," or at least something else, if we have to look skyward to receive forgiveness for our crimes and misdemeanors, does it matter if we speak to Allah or Jesus or Yahweh or a Thetin? Isn't it better to think that whatever god we believe in has a purpose for our suffering, than to accept that bad things happen, regardless of who we are or what we do? Is it wrong for people to seek order in an increasingly disordered world?

The penultimate place in the funeral parlor

The youngest, and last surviving of my mother's brothers, died yesterday. An entire generation is gone, leaving us, the only layer between the young 'uns and our eternal reward. I'm not sure what hits me the hardest. The fact that somebody I liked as a person is gone or the fact that although I have jokingly referred to myself as a "family elder," I now am.

My maternal extended family was large, warm, highly amusing and slightly crazy. They always took the toughest path but arrived at their destination in peals of good natured laughter. They created for us a world of safety and comfort, in which we were blissfully unaware of what material goods we lacked. They gathered for birthdays and anniversaries, forever on diets, but demolishing rich, creamy confections "one silver" at a time. Mostly what I remember about them is that they never argued and that they were always there when you needed support or help. From the vantage point of a child, they were a strong, solid block against whatever ills awaited us in the world. I miss them for their quirky take on the world, their belief that every ending is a good ending, and their sheer love of living.

They were used to living on top of one and other and even when families moved away and lived miles apart, they were into each other's lives on a daily basis. On the night I was born, my father was attended by my mother's eldest sister and older brother. In fact, informed that she could not accompany her baby sister into the delivery room, my aunt took up a position right outside the delivery room doors. "You cannot sit  there," said some long forgotten nurse.

"Of course, I can," my aunt replied. "I am the older sister." And she would not be moved.

Because we spent entire summers with our maternal grandmother at a cottage, we came under the care of various aunts and uncles, learning more about them than other kids knew about their relations. Each loss, to a greater or lesser degree, was like losing my parents again. But this one, the final loss, is greater because it is an end to an entire generation.

My Uncle Joe was the baby of the family, born two months after his eldest sister had her first child. Uncle and niece were raised together, and Tessie was surprised when she realized that Joe was her uncle and not her brother. His life might have been one of thwarted dreams and stunted ambition, but his sense of humor and endless curiosity never failed him, or us.

I will remember him because he dumped five teaspoons of sugar in his coffee (so that he didn't have to stir), for his ability to never really grow old (until worn done by illness), and for his devotion to Frank Sinatra and Abraham Lincoln. I will miss his silly jokes, his bad puns and his other worldly way of doing things. Uncle Joe was an original. And the only comfort is that if there is an afterlife, he was welcomed there by an entire generation of his family drinking his over sweet coffee and laughing at his bad jokes.

When my mistakes were all ahead of me

I was looking at a photo of Bill Clinton today and realized he looks OLD, and then I remembered that we are contemporaries. This year, the start of the baby boom generation celebrates its 62nd birthday, which means they can retire and collect Social Security. How the hell did this happen? I realize that time marches on but when did it start marching in quick step? When did the possibilities become limited?

Now, I realize that we are limited by what we can imagine and if we have an unlimited imagination we have unlimited possibilities. But time and age take their toll. At some point we, the baby boom generation, have to accept that there are limits.

We've been very lucky. We had the best of everything. The whole world changed to suit our needs. And I am proud to have been at the forefront of a time when the sex was safe, the drugs were pure and the rock and roll was better. But maybe being at the head of the parade has warped my sense of what it means to be an "elder statesman." Most of us had grandparents who spoke English with a pronounced foreign accent. Our parents grew to adulthood during the Great Depression. Many of our fathers fought in World War II. We were there when TV was in its infancy. We are online in great numbers because we like shinny objects and new things. We wear jeans instead of sedate polyester pants suits. We eat granola instead of donuts. We yearn to be free and unfettered, even now when many of us are have grandchildren on our knees. We never grew up and I think we never will. But it gets harder to ignore that I am at the penultimate place in the funeral parlor and I don't like it one bit.

I disagree with those who claim that those born between 1946 and 1965 are part of the same generation. I put it at 1956 or 1957. Our defining moments included Howdy Doody, Leave it to Beaver, John F. Kennedy and the Vietnam War. Because we are less tied to tradition, we are more prone to questioning. As a group we believe in individual freedom, and have pushed forward change such as women's rights, civil rights, gay rights and the right to be downright nuts if that's what suits us. We love gadgets like transistor radios and IPods and we have the money to buy them.

Our generation includes Bill Clinton, Osama bin Laden, Steven Jobs, Stephen Spielberg, and The Prince of Wales.

But as we stare down the inevitable, we have to admit that we have not left a better world. Karl Rove, George W. Bush and Dick Chaney are also baby boomers. The earth is a mess, our oceans are polluted and we are no closer to living environmental-friendly lives than we were 30 years ago--when we could have, should have, made a difference. We were born in a time of great prosperity and even greater hope, and what we leave (should we leave today) is something less. And a lot of that anomosity between the left and right is really an argument over what kind of legacy our generation will leave.

On the upside, we have  turned the whole notion of aging on its head. When you speak of "senior citizens," I think you're talking about my parents. They were old,  I am well worn.  And like everyone else of my generation, I like to believe I still have my mistakes ahead of me and I have all the time in the world.

This and that

Matt Roloff was found not guilty today of charges driving under the influence. Oregon cops are not pleased. The whole thing will, I am sure, be part of the new Little People, Big World season. And if I was Roloff, I'd be very, very careful when driving for a very, very long time.

Dominck Dunn's column in the new issue of Vanity Fair is devoted to the never-ending Diana, Princess of Wales, inquest. Talk about a litany of hear-say. Today, the London Times reports that a therapist friend of Diana's said that she listened in as Nicholas Soames told her to stay out of the land mines controversy and suggested that Diana's safety might be "in doubt." The therapist apparently assumed that this meant that Mr. Soames, a senior Conservative MP, grandson of Winston Churchill and friend of the Prince of Wales, was threatening Diana's life, when he could just as easily have been warning her that visiting land mines might be dangerous. Or maybe, it was a veiled threat. Who knows, the issue is not as clear to me as it seems to be to those who support Mohammed al Fayed's theory that Prince Philip had Diana killed. The same therapist claims that Prince Philip wrote two nasty notes to Diana, although no such notes have been read into evidence.

In 2003, Israel's then Prime Minister Ariel Sharon said that occupation of the Gaza strip is a bad thing. In fact, the majority of Israelis support a "land for peace" concept. So, you have to forgive them if they were less than moved or surprised by George Bush's demand that the Israeli's give the West Bank, the Golan Heights, the Gaza and East Jerusalem to the Arabs for a Palestinian homeland. Naturally, Bush's suggestions lacked specifics, he is, after all, the "big picture" guy. 

Pundits have offered a number of reasons why Hilary Clinton won the New Hampshire Democratic primary--none of the reasons had anything to do with her experience as a Senator or her programs. The more cynical types claim she cried on cue to grab attention. Some suggest that the "iron my shirts" comments angered women who then support Clinton. Karl Rove wrote in the Wall Street Journal that Hilary won because she targeted single women and that she pretended to be more likable. No one seems to consider that voters might like the Clinton platform, or at least have more confidence in her than they do in a newly elected senator who has since the day he took office been running for president. Liz Cox Barrett in the Columbia Journalism review believes that Clinton won because voters hate Chris Matthews who announce her defeat in New Hampshire hours before the polls closed--so voters rushed to the polls to vote against Chris Matthews by voting for Hilary Clinton.

Frankly, a crying Hilary made me cringe.

Did you know that New Mexico Governor Bill Richardson was running for president? Well he was, but he isn't any more. 

Spider-Man fans are furious with Marvel Comics for putting an end to Peter Parker's 21-year marriage to Mary Jane Watson. In fact, in the new book, Peter has no memory of Mary Jane at all. Apparently Marvel has regretted the union since 1962, but just figured out how to keep Peter forever young and on the hunt. Sounds like all the men I've dated.

Michael Vick, who does not have a drug problem, has been told that if he participates in a drug program, he could shave enough time off his sentence to be out of the can in time for the 2009 seasons. 

Did you know that Sir Edmund Hillary, who in 1953 was the first man to scale Mt. Everest, was still alive? Well, he was, but now he's dead. Hillary died today at the age of 88.

When 18-year-old Josue Herrios-Coronilla crashed his Camaro into a yard, he took off on foot to elude police. Unfortunately, the lad also stepped into some dog doo-doo, leaving tracks that led police directly to him. Yes, alcohol was involved.

A little too much

Matt Roloff and his family star in a TLC Reality Series, Little People, Big World, which follows a dwarf mom and dad and their four children, one of whom is also a dwarf. It's actually interesting as the family meet daily challenges that we average sized people don't even think about (such as getting into and driving a van). It's actually kind of uplifting, although I'm not so sure that the youngest child, age 10, is as thrilled or as used to the camera intrusion as the others in this 24/7 coverage of their life on an Oregon farm.

Last summer, Matt was arrested for DUI while driving the family van in Oregon. According to reports, Matt failed the sobriety test in what turns out to be his second citation for the same offense. Apparently, he just came off a 16-month sentence of court supervision, after which the first charges were dropped.

Anyway, Matt appeared in court today and, as one might expect, because he is now a famous personage, the whole thing hit the Web along with his booking photo. It's the booking photo about which I am writing because in it Matt appears relaxed and smiles for the camera. Gives me the feeling he knew it would end up on the Internet (what doesn't) and he wanted to look like the respectable farm dad he portrays on TV. No wild hair, no wild eyes, no disheveled appearance. Today, his lawyer said Matt was tired and that's why he was swerving. Also, Matt walks unsteadily with the aid of two crutches, so I don't think he could walk that straight line under any circumstances. But then he did refuse to take the breathalyzer.

The Roloffs don't strike me as fabulously wealthy. In fact, if not for TLC, I doubt they could have afforded that family vacation (duly recorded for our consumption) in the Bahamas or the newly installed swimming pool. They already have two sons in college (and we know what that cost) and a daughter who will be in college in a few years. They raise pumpkins and corn for sale to the public and have created a farm wonderland for summer tourists. I'm wondering now what will happen if Matt is convicted of DUI. I know that the court proceedings will part of the show (everything else is).

Which gets me back to the whole issue of fame and why we (and I include myself in this) watch ordinary people, like the Roloffs live their lives (regardless of the extraordinary circumstances). Having sold his family to TLC, Matt has a lot more to lose than just his driving privileges. And I think he knows that and that's the reason for his pleasant suburban dad mug shot.

On the other hand, I sure wish my life was so interesting that someone would pay me to star in my own reality series. Lord knows, I need the money, and the fan love wouldn't be unwelcomed.

Some one should stop that man

Dr. Phil, TV's lovable shrink, may have stepped into ethical doo-doo this time, by visiting Britney Spears toward the end of her recent 36 hour stay at a mental health facility. I'd have no problem if Dr. Phil's visit was private, but what happened Sunday (Jan 6) seemed more like a "house call." Or maybe he was just lining up another guest for his talk show. According to one story, it was Britney's worried dad who invited the good doctor to visit Britney, but in what capacity? As a family friend? As a therapist? Dr. Phil certainly thought this pathetic tale was worthy of a TV show, having announced that he was going to focus on Britney's problems on Monday (Jan 7)

My problem with Dr. Phil and his show is that it masquerades as something other than entertainment--if watching people with real problems slug it out in public can be called entertainment. The only difference between Dr. Phil and Jerry Springer is that Dr. Phil has a PhD, well that and the fact that most of his guests have all of their teeth.

But when not judgmentally brow beating his guests, Phil dispenses dime-store psychology in front of his cheer audience. Further exposing Spears and her problems in television does not an intervention make, even if it is good for the ratings.

Phil has backed off with a face saving statement, which may not appease the psychiatric staff at Cedars Mount Sinai where Britney was admitted. Meanwhile, Britney is out and about. I smell death in the air.

And what does it say about us? Why do people eschew real help and comfort by  turning instead to a TV expert, whether it's Dr. Phil or Pat Robertson. Why do we place our trust in people whose major accomplishment is writing a best selling self-help book or dispensing one-size-fits all advice? Only in America, folks, only in the United States.

Enough already

Pictures of a disheveled and possibly drugged Britney Spears are everywhere as the news of her major meltdown is reported by a sanctimonious press. Meanwhile, her children are in the custody of their father, who drove like a maniac so as to block chasing papparazzi who wanted photos of the tots. Everything about this story stinks of schandenfreud, the taking delight in the suffering of others. At 26, Britney has been on view for half of her life. She became the family cash cow in 1993, when at age 12 she was chosen to appear in the New Mickey Mouse Club. By age 17, she was an international sensation.

Although there are labor laws to protect child performers, nothing is done to protect them from the pitfalls of being in a competitive business. Yes, there is competition in real life, but your family won't be forced into bankruptcy if Johnny fails to make the football team.

The essential role of a child star is to be famous, but fame is not intrinsic. You don't have to be talented or smart or attractive to be famous. Paris Hilton is famous for being famous. Fame exists in the mind of the observer. And if you are famous, the public can also make you infamous. And what does it mean really if you are famous but lose custody of your children and the whole thing becomes a media circus? I return again to the series finale of Extras, in which Ricke Gervais explores the nature of fame and what happens when we pursue it or place it above all else.

All of Britney's current fame is based on her recent bad behavior. Her divorce, the photos of her without panties, her current melt down is why she is famous now. We, the public, are watching the systematic destruction of a human being and loving every minute of it.

It's time, past time, to turn off the cameras and let the little girl go. Maybe she can recover, maybe not, but enough already. We know more than we should and all of it is ugly.