I was wrong.

I often am.

It was not a famous Obama head fake, tied around Amendment One in North Carolina and the beginning of the General Election campaign.  Obama's "evolution", as it were, was supposed to be complete right before the Democratic Convention.  But Biden spoke out of turn and forced Obama's hand.

Which means we really do have Joe Biden to thank for this, hunh? (I was right about that.)

Even so, I am of many different minds about all of this, espec the internets frickin' exploding yesterday with Obama's announcement.

Fran the genius.

One of which reminds me of an interview Toni Morrison had with Fran Lebowitz right after Obama's election.  Morrison asked Lebowitz what she thought about the nation having its first African-American President, and, I am seriously paraphrasing the sublime Ms Lebowitz here, Lebowitz' basic reaction was, "Really?! A big deal?! This should not be an issue anymore.  This should have happened a billion years ago."

Obama should have had stated this position a dozen years ago. Welcome, buddy.  Better late than never, I suppose.

Also, are not nearly all State Propositions and Amendments the worst thing ever.  I vote No on nearly every single one of them because they are the absolute worst way to make policy.  And I encourage all my friends to do likewise.

Please everybody, watch the video below with a sense of humor.  And, I am sure every  single one my readers knows which side of the fence I am on, anyway.  It is just funny, and a little sobering.

Thank you to the guy from Scranton with the hair plugs! Right on!







-- Michael

I am working on an epic

Post, mostly aboot Peter Sellers and Roger Lewis.  That post is still nowhere near for publication, frustratingly.

In the meantime, I would strongly urge you to read two articles in the most recent Atlantic magazine.  One is by Caitlin Flanagan (normally not a big fave of mine), entitled, The Hazards of Duke (splendid title! Give that intern/copy writer/editor a raise!)  The article, actually a review of a frickin' PowerPoint that Duke student, Karen Owen, "shared" w/ three of her friends, and has thusly become a lightning-rod for feminists; the execrable, Megyn Kelly at Fox News; and others is essential reading.


But so is the article/review right after it.  That is called Hard Core and it is by Natasha Vargas-Cooper.  This article/review is about how pornography is stripping bare the notion that men and women are the same, that a heterosexual "contract" for sex is ultimately a bust.  My ears were buzzing as I read because not just a week ago I gleefully listened to Fran Lebowitz talk about how facts are facts, much as we would not like to admit it, women are different than men, especially when it comes to sex.  The article is crucial but was the tiniest bit creepy to me personally.  Ms Vargas-Cooper in her article, quotes Martin Amis (from Yellow Dog!), Susan Sontag, & Pauline Kael.  


Uh, those are three of my all-time favorite authors and I still believe that I am one of the dozen or so on the planet that thinks Yellow Dog is a good novel.  


The Atlantic is still good.  Not as good as it was even a few years ago but it is like Spy in the sense, that for me, I always go to the back pages first, looking for Sandra Tsing Loh or reviews like these two I have mentioned here.  In Spy, I always went straight to Review of Reviewers.  

Karen Owen, part of her infamous PowerPoint.

Plus, maybe that means I will get a Tsing Loh review/article next month.

Here it frickin' is:  The PowerPoint.