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Choosing and Choices and The Choice We're Stuck With

Of all the problematic aspects of the healthcare bill still (still!) not fully decided in Congress, none I think is as far reaching as the Stupak Amendment on coverage of abortion. And as much as it is revealing the complexities of applying the idea of "no federal funding of abortions" to health insurance, I think the bigger problem it's revealed is a deeper, more systemic question: is the left really as unified on abortion as we've been arguing for years?

One of the more popular lines people have been using in the new millenium is that abortion is "settled" - there's a left-right divide, easily labeled "pro-life and "pro-choice", never the twain shall meet, and almost all of the rest of anyone's politics can be determined by the simple test of picking a side on abortion.

It was never that simple, and it never quite will be... but I think up until about 2006, it was easy to mask internal tensions on the left while the Republicans were self destructing.

Blame it on the first President Bush and his "big tent" philosophizing, but for whatever reason, the drama around abortion for the past 15 years or so had been on the right. As much as religious conservatives were clearly anti-abortion absolutists and just as clearly had the power to dictate policy, the far right didn't have a lot to show for control of the Republican aganeda on abortion. For all the talk about "sanctity of life", the anti-abortion agenda of repealing Roe v. Wade, passing some sort of Human Life Amendment banning abortion, or even extensively altering laws at the state level never quite developed into much in the way of success. And many, myself included, would conclude that the problem, simply, was that anti-abortion forces were a vocal, but not powerful minority.

It's a real indication of the failure of Republicans in the northeast that "Country Club" Republican types - especially women - were never particularly interested in having government intrusion back into women's lives by excessively restricting or limiting abortions. Or, more pointedly, starting with abortions... and moving on to banning access to birth control. And the minute the Southern, religious conservatives made anti-abortion and other social issues central to whether or not you were a real Republican or a RINO... the exodus of northeastern Republicans began.

A big part of the Republican crack-up - the part that's keeping them from really figuring out how to reassert themselves into the majority - is just what the abortion tensions signify, a whittling down of the right to a smaller, more conservative core group much more homogenous in belief and approach to issues. "Prolife" is one of the easiest unifying points of the current Republican/conservative narrowing, pretty much a given among one and all, and virtually no candidate - even perceived "moderates" - can really voice any kind of support for women's reproductive freedom. That's one reason Stupak was so obviously going to pass - Republicans had no way to oppose it. And you can have unity around an unpopular doctrine... but you can't do it and be in the majority.

All of this means that, with Democrats in the majority, the question of who's got deep internal tensions on abortion suddenly switched, and in ways I think many people were unprepared to face. Yet the indications were always there - in the conservative and "Blue Dog" candidates being chosen, in the soft pedaling of "abortion rights" to rehtoric about "pro-choice" and "safe, legal and rare."  Liberals have operated under an illusion that we all supported women's reproductive rights... but never really determined just what everyone thought those rights should be.

One of the most problematic aspects of the "abortion debate" - a debate, as with other controversial topics, we talk more about having than ever actually have - is that much of the terms of debate are mush.  Neither "prochoice" nor "prolife" ever really meant anything, and both, really, served as fig leaf descriptions meant to protect people from the extremes of either side. You may not like abortions... but you'll support "choice."  You may not like clinic protesters... but surely, you support "life."

For years, feminists who believe in abortion - me included - have accepted that "choice" rhetoric was a necessary, if occasionally unhappy, compromise; you learned to live with the "I don't like the idea of abortions, myself, but I think a woman should be able to choose..." type logic even though, deep down, it meant that, at times, you couldn't count on that kind of support to keep abortion available. It's why we have the Hyde Amendment - you can be in favor of choice and believe, wholeheartedly, that it's just not "federal funding" of abortion... as opposed to keeping abortion services essentially unavailable to poor women on Medicaid.

I've argued - and still argue - privately that the real failure of progressive feminists is to stick to our terms: abortion is a medical procedure, and what we don't want, really, is government making decisions about which medical procedures we like and don't.  I want for women what I want for anyone - the right to determine, with a medical professional, the right care for a given situation. Sometimes, that choice is an abortion. And it's not about deciding what's a good abortion or a bad one, who's a woman who's suffering and who's a tramp. It's a medical procedure. And too often, the "choice" argument comes down to feelings over basic, medical facts.

We on the left have no one to blame but ourselves for where things stand, in the Democratic Party, with the Stupak Amendment still (still!) potentially standing as a possible element of healthcare reform. We have for years, blithely ignored that abortion is, for the left, hardly a settled issue, that women's reproductive rights are by no means solidly settled among liberals, and that the reason Stupak passed isn't about the hardline right, but about an inability on the left to use precise terms and come to internal agreement on a position. It may make us a (slightly) smaller party... but like many, I am convinced that most Americans believe in reproductive freedom, and believe, even in limited ways, that access to abortion is a reasonable part of that freedom.

As angry as many people are, as much as people are convinced that healthcare reform can happen without Stupak (I'd say 50-50, at best), the bigger fissure that's been blown open can't be dismissed or ignored. Until we do with abortion what needs to happen on so many issues right now - have a healthy, internal debate that is not about "right and left" but about finding common ground within our own party - we will have more Stupak moments. And we will not know how to solve them. And that, too, is a choice. A bad one.

Sunday Singalong: It's Beginning To Look A Lot Like...

Thanksgiving won't slow me down... but the two day run of "Black Friday/Saturday" work and stress (two different stores, neither one the one I belong in) laid me a little low. And I had a singalong in mind all along... oh well.

As bad as the retail climate is - I continue to find the whole Black Friday obsession just inane - for some reason, this year I am feeling good about Christmas. I even have my Christmas spirit... well before usual, and far more completely. Bring on the tree!

I have a hard time with Christmas music - I love it, but I need just the right mix of sentiment, style and freshness to keep things interesting. Chestnuts roasting on an open fire? Not so much. A little jazzy, a little moody, a little melancholy... that hits the spot. And it's why "I'll Be Home For Christmas" will always work for me. But it's not the only thing.

In that vein, a singalong for... singing along:

• Nancy Wilson, The Christmas Waltz. I never expected to be a fan of this, it's kind of hokey, and it's definitely widely played... but Wilson is a remarkable singer, and she doesn't overdo the sentiment. As she swings into "Frosted windowpanes..." I find myself transported right there.
• Kay Starr, Everybody's Waiting For The Man With The Bag. Now, for a real swingin' Christmas, this is the one - with its Billy May-era horn arrangement, and Starr's cut glass vocal, perfect for the Vegas Christmas show. 
• U2, Christmas (Baby, Please Come Home). I could be a traditionalist, and insist on Darlene Love's original Phil Spector version... but why be bound to tradition? When U2 cut this live for the first "Very Special Christmas" album, it could have been cheap sacrilege (like, say, the Pointer Sisters doing a Springsteen-ish assault on Santa Claus is Coming to Town)... but Bono nails it, right down to the yearning "Baby Please Come Home" finale. And the wall of sound ain't so bad, either.
• Mariah Carey, All I Want For Christmas Is You. No song in the past twenty years has so completely obliterated both old and new to take its place in the pantheon. Which is bizarre, really, given that the song is a Spector copycat that, while well done, does feel especially plastic. But even so, Carey, at the top of her game, is so damn sincere and into it, she does manage to eliminate any objection, and overcome almost any doubt. Almost.
• Mindy Smith, Santa Will Find You. I found this last year, in the Starbucks holiday mix. Smith, a country/folk-ish artist, did a collection of holiday songs with fairly simple arrangements, and this one is about as sweetly sentimental as possible without drifting into total cheese. Cause you're there, and shining, bright like a beacon, bright like the northern star. So don't worry... Santa will find you, wherever you are.
• Dar Williams, The Christians and The Pagans.  One of my absolute favorites, a lovely tale from Williams of a lesbian wiccan and her girlfriend spending the holiday with her Uncle's traditional Christian family. And it's sly and funny and then, out of the blue, catches you short with sincere emotion about family and coming together in the winter solstice. Which is just what I want Christmas to be.

C'mon... get merry. :)

Friday Evening Feature Presentation

jinb
 

Two Princes

Tonight, I realized how humbled I am in the presence of my nephews. I mean, just dumbstruck by their fascination with the simplest, smallest things, their inquisitive minds, their wide open acceptance. They are miraculous, and I am entirely small in a universe that could bring their existence into being.

This came to me, sitting on the floor of the front hall at my sister's, as my younger one - the little star - used a pair of electric mixer beaters to teach himself drums. While doing a little dance. And learning to sing. I was helpoing and encouraging... and then I just stopped... as I said, dumbstruck. I am humbled in the presence of a two year old.

The older one (MANU, The Most Adorable Nephew in the Universe) had some sort of stomach bug, and nearly missed out on Turducken #2 (#1 was last year), but since he seemed to keep down soup, it seemed mean to tempt him with a full table. The Little Star, meanwhile, was content with sweet potatoes and a little chicken... but he got mad when he saw that everyone else's sweet potato dish had marshmallows (he's developed an intolerance to eggs). That, and the brussel sprouts were his enemy.

Some years I worry about the balance of things - we've gone way overboard in food, some years there's the uncomfortable silences - but this year we got the balance right. The food was good... but it wasn't all about the food. The family gathering was enjoyable, never uncomfortable. And the conversation was political at times, childlike at times, but always free and easy and relaxed.

But in the end, my day and evening were about two awesome little boys, in all their wondrous youth.  I am one lucky Uncle. And that's way more better than Turducken and pie.

No Thanks (To You, Or To Me)

(Thanksgiving 2012 - Like clockwork, last night's Rachel Maddow Show featured Rachel giving a long list of Things She Was "Sincerely" Thankful For, and it brought my mind back to this post, which seems to be my Thanksgiving staple; "Being Thankful" just grates on me, as an American pastime, because it tends to reinforce our upperclasses worst impulses towards self-satisfaction and celebrations of personal privilege. Or so I find. I'm not quite as bitter as I was when I first wrote this - or even two years ago, when I reposted it - but in general I still believe we'd be better off, as a nation, with less "thanks" and more "give". Especially, for me, at a time, when so many people, so close to my home, are still suffering from the ravages of Hurricane Sandy. I hope you get to spend the kind of day I get to have, with family and friends and great food. And yes, gratitude for all we have. And maybe we can resolve to keep trying to do better, and give more. More tomorrow.

As I was preparing for Thanksgiving 2010, I noticed a new round of Twitter "I'm so thankful" topics, and immediately thought of this post, which I put together for Thanksgiving 2009. I also caught a wearying, drippy segment by Chris Hayes of The Nation, filling in for Rachel Maddow, full of self-satisified glibness - "thanks for the little bell that tells me to put on my seatbelt." What's remarkable to me is not that I still have the opinion expressed below, but how much of the description of the world we're still in - economically, socially - still holds. It's not, just, that we should think more about what we give than what we get... it's the idea that we should question this notion that we deserve all of what we're given. And I think the spirit of Thanksgiving is more than that - not the things we get for ourselves, but the gifts we are able to share with everyone. We owe such a debt to th people who came to this land and survived, and thrived, in the conditions we would never live through ourselves. And we avoid suffering when so many others do. Have a great day. More posting tomorrow.)

This Thanksgiving seems to have unleashed a particularly strong strain of sincere, slightly maudlin sentiments along the lines of "what I'm thankful for" meant, I think, to be a reminder that we have, you know, so much to hang onto in these tough times. You know... let's be thankful for family, our health, our great golden retriever, Barky... and on and on.

All due respect to Mom and Apple Pie, but I think no one should be allowed to get off so easy.

As nice as it is to step back and take a moment to be grateful for, you know, all we have, it's also, you know, not really what Thanksgiving is, as a national holiday. Thanksgiving is, really, a story of survival, about being thankful not for our individual good fortune, but for the power of a community to hang together through incredible adversity and manage something quite so basic as to live and see another year.

It's the kind of desperation that makes stuff like being thankful for that new Kindle we just got (Karen Tumulty, via twitter) seem a bit, well, shallow.

I don't want to seem sour or (too) churlish, but I feel like as a nation we really need to be shaken out of especially self interested, self satisfied complacencies just now. More than ever, it seems, we need a reminder that this isn't about just us, or our immediate circles of friends and family. And part of that, I think, is someone saying, enough with the "thanks for all I still have." Try and think about the people who don't.

This year, more people are unemployed than in the past 25 years (among black men, unemployment is the worst since the Great Depression). People are still losing their homes, their jobs, wondering how they will put food on the table and care for their kids. We are losing more people in Afghanistan than ever, with the likelihood of sending yet more troops there. This isn't about you, or me, or all that we have.

It's insidious, the way we have moved from seeing something as simple as a day to be reminded of the struggle that came with settling in a new land has become an easy, self-satisfied moment of personal gratification. So much of what we have lost - our sense of community, our sense of valuing not what we have, but what we give away to others - hasn't been taken from us... it's been set aside, made easy by celebrating ourselves first, and worrying about others less. And less. And less.

Today, my boss will spend her day working in a soup kitchen giving food to others, as she has for many years. I am humbled by the simplicity of the act, by the fact that she does it, by herself, just because she feels she should. It is the highlight of her day. Her act reminds me that I don't do nearly enough, and makes me wonder why I don't do more.

And yes, today I will be grateful to spend time with my nephews, to be with my family, to share in a wonderful meal. I'm thankful that we have survived another year, and have the chance to go on, and do more. But this isn't a day for cheap, easy sentiment; or to just eat without abandon. We've survived... but we won't survive a whole lot longer if we don't figure out how to think less about ourselves, think more about others, and do something for people who need help. Those are the values, and the America, I'd like to be thankful for. And proud of. And we're so not there... no thanks to me. Or to us.

We Have Nothing To Lose But Our... Er, Um... Those Things In Our Boobs!

Vive la revolucion, and all that... but I'm hard pressed to buy that massive protests and highly focused opposition to what is being called the "bo-Tax" on elective cosmetic medical procedures that's being used to fund parts of the Senate healthcare bill will amount to very much.

Conservatives have never met a tax they didn't like, so naturally they're prepared to stand up and fight for breast implants, collagen injections and liposuction... though, of course, they've often been the same people decrying Hollywood and the kind of fake, bought beauty represented by plastic surgery. Now it's all for one, all for implants.

Veronique de Rugy (I've always wanted to quote her name alone) makes the case today:

The Senate version of the health-care bill has a cosmetic tax. The idea is to make the rich (who are assumed to be the ones consuming plastic surgery) pay for the cost of the health-care reform. Wrong. First, according to Laurie Essig:

Cosmetic surgery is now primarily consumed not by the rich, but by the working and lower-middle classes, sometimes even by the poor. According to the American Society for Aesthetic Plastic Surgery (ASAPS), about 1/3 of cosmetic surgery is consumed by people who make less than $30,000 a year.  About 70% of it is consumed by people who make less than $60,000 a year. It is mostly women (90%) and mostly white, middle-aged women (80% and between 35-55 years old).

Plus, why tax a good that increases people's happiness permanently? According to Will Wilkinsonvery serious academic research), plastic surgery (breast implants in particular), unlike expensive cars, increases people's happiness in the long run. (and based on

Like a number of reports, de Rugy cites a new statistic from the ASAPS - an organization, one might point out, devoted to selling more people on more plastic surgery - that suggests that "ordinary, working class folks" will be hurt by a tax on cosmetic procedures. That's all well and good... but one can bet that they're lumping about as many things as possible (Botox injections and other in house treatments costs hundreds of dollars, while a major procedure like implants or lipo starts around $5,000) into a stat of dubious usefulness. People with $30,000 may be getting something - they may even, with loans and long term payment plans, be having major surgery - but the industry is driven, most clearly, chasing after high levels of disposable income. Or disposable life savings.

Conservatives ought to be careful about who and what they're planning to celebrate here; this new celebration of "The Wonderful World of Boob Jobs" relies heavily on self-interested propaganda and marketing materials that generally try to disguise notions of pain, discomfort, never mind massive expense in support of notions about "perfection" and certainly some level of unhealthy body image and societal expectation that ought to be rejected more than embraced. It's lovely to think of plastic surgeons are doing sainted work bringing happiness to ordinary ladies as simple as an extra cup size... but that's not the reality, and I suspect many conservative agitators know it quite well.

And no, I'm not some angry anti-surgery advocate either; the women I've known with implants do indeed seem quite happy and healthy, comfortable with the choices they've made, and pleased with the results. So too the people I've known who've had lipo, breast reductions, lifts... you name it. Cosmetic surgery - even the occasional Botox injection - is not what I'm opposed to. But I think we should always be clear about what we're talking about: dangerous, possibly life threatening procedures involving risky chemicals and substances that shoud, preferably, be avoided. We should always ask, when repeating promotional statements handed out by plastic surgeons, what kind of self-interest motivates the information, and maintain a healthy skepticism. And we can and should do more to question why personal happiness depends, so much, on such expensive, potentially dangerous, possibly mutilating, work.

If there's a reason to question the "Bo-Tax" it's probably more on common sense fiscal grounds: given that, as New Jersey has demonstrated (with the only cosmetic surgery tax in the nation), that the tax will probably bring in less revenue than forecast and succeed, as taxes do, in reducing a particular activity or behavior, does it make sense to count too heavily on the tax as a moneymaker? Will the tax drive wealthy patients overseas or over borders to have work done... and will we, in turn, be creating a new "surgery scandal" over the Mexican border? It's not that an elective medical practice tax will "hurt the middle class" - many people, clearly, will simply have to factor in the added cost - but it's that a tax aimed at a luxury behavior of the wealthy often fails because the rich have so many discretionary spending options: travel elsewhere, trumping up "medical necessity" (it's the return of "deviated septum" nose jobs!) and the like... will probably take much of the punch out of any anticipated revenue stream.

And, yes, hurt plastic surgeons. Given the recession, we were always bound to see - and have seen - a crisis in an overabundance of cosmetic specialization; that pain, surely, drives a lot of the fear among the plastic surgeons about how much more harm a tax will inflict. But like so much of our health care crisis, the real problem here stems from the needless surgeries, the high rates of specialiazation, and the attraction of a quick, easy buck over the health care people actually need. That conservatives would be more concerned about cleavage, well... that's just par for the course these days... isn't it?

Cheap, Chic... Not Chintzy And Cheating

I have been meaning, for months, to mention that my dear friend Jennifer has launched a blog of her own, Dinner With Friends. It is the blog she was surely meant to write, and for anyone looking to read about fashion and style and life in the city - with a definite point of view - I think she's doing a marvelous job of conveying it, while being absolutely herself (which, naturally, I find fabulous).

Too much of fashion blogging, we've both felt, is too generic, too focused on the "shop" and the "buy", and not enough on the style and the enjoyment of nice things. And by nice, I do not mean expensive... Jennifer is - even at her level - a woman on a budget and (relatively) modest means. She didn't always buy Lanvin, and even now, it's a luxury, not a given.

Jennifer's bible (actually, I think it may indeed be a religion), naturally, is Vogue, with Harper's Bazaar a close second - we both find W a little too pretentious and arty to be useful (to say nothing of its relentless Upper East Side insiderisms - and it's too big) - and we've liked nothing better than to spend hours taking apart the magazine's latest issue, and evaluate the fashion, the trends, the art of the photos and the practical questions of what to wear... which I freely admit, are more theoretical for me. For Jennifer, "what to wear" is a serious issue, and Vogue is not helpful if she can't find answers in it.

Which brings me to a post she wrote which developed partly out of a conversation we had about the recent efforts of Vogue to face up to the recession and what it means to a Vogue reader. With its relentless focus on high end style, Vogue struggles when the subject of budget is raised, or having to admit that "Skirt, $950, Christian Dior" is "skirt, unaffordable" for much of the readership. The usual compact between reader, magazine and designer is that high fashion, for many is a blueprint, and the actual article of clothing may be acquired elsewhere, for less. That's why Dior and Lanvin and such are featured in fashion spreads... while the multiple page ads in the magazine are for Macy*s and Banana Republic. Compromises must be made.

The City, In Repose

One of the pleasant side benefits of my travels - even now, in these lean economic moments - is time to myself, completely. I love to visit my friends... but I love best that time visiting them also means time to myself, usually exploring.

Baltimore by night is, like most urban landscapes, a different beast from the city by day; more different than others, I suspect, because the separations in and around the city are more pronounced. Other northeastern cities experienced "white flight," but for most the effect was reversed, in whole or at least in part, from about the eighties until probably just before the foreclosure crisis became pronounced.

For a variety of economic, social and probably political reasons, Baltimore's divides were, and are, more long lasting. Downtown is drivable and easy to park, and as much as there was commercial redevelopment (we pioneered rebuilding of the inner harbor areas and historic districts with Harborplace), the white suburbanites never really saw the city as more than an occasional destination for dinner or the arts. Or the place to commute to for work.

The net effect is that, on a late Sunday night... things get pretty deserted.

Baltimore is often perceived - and I usually share the notion - as the lesser sister of the northeast's big cities. Wherever you look - north to Philly, south to DC, or further to New York or Boston - Baltimore is easily overshadowed, outgunned (except, perhaps, in actual guns), overmatched. Yet, walking around last night, I was reminded how much affection I have for the place, how it served, fondly, as my training ground to living an urban gay existence.  Baltimore may be smaller, scrappier, but I realize, now, how it instilled a sense of working class practicality: it's a city of few illusions, and less about dreams than more about doing what needs to get done... which is good grounding for the airy dreamer I can be.

As much as I tried to escape my past - it's so very American - and where I came from, Baltimore, especially alone, at night, always welcomes me back - whether as the eager overconfident kid who needed life's lessons slapped into him, or the New York urban sophisticate who needed to remember where he came from, or lately, the prodigal son, returned home to where he will always find a place to be.

Baltimore by night is beautiful, artificial, calm and dangerous, all at once; It's where I learned to see, and appreciate, the concrete canyons; to appreciate the architecture of hundreds of years crashing upon one another, racing heedlessly towards the new. It's learning to live with, and love, all the things about the place I came from that made me who I am, the maddening things I wish our society could be... and the realities of what we are, and are not. In Baltimore, I am nothing if not a nice white kid from the burbs... and yet, nowhere do I see more clearly what it is to be part of the black minority.

From J's centrally located flat, the back window provides a stunning panoramic view of Baltimore, in all its glory, contradictions, and grit. Glowing at night, as cities do, lying in repose, awaiting to rise once more. And it will.

The Shaggy Goat... Er, Dog.

The Men Who Stare At Goats isn't great... but it's not awful, either. Lots of people have come down hard on the film as somehow not the success it could be, but I think the troubles it has - a meandering plot and a problematic tone of dark, deadpan humor - are also its strengths, and the reaction it generates will depend on one's patience and sense of humor.

Essentially a shaggy dog - or perhaps shaggy goat is more accurate - tale of military misadventure, The Men Who Stare At Goats tells the story of an "elite squad" of military men trained in mind-bending warfare techniques, who are brought down to the earth by the realities, if not the savagries, of war. This kind of sly, sardonic take is not new - Catch 22 and Dr. Strangelove have similar darkly bemused takes; and George Clooney, who serves as the main goat starer here, probably made his best turn at this in Three Kings.

The film starts with a reporter, played by Ewan McGregor meeting an odd, slightly demented ex-military guy who claims to be able to kill hamsters with his mind - and has the tape to prove it.  McGregor's charcter takes notes but never finishes the story... and eventually, with a failing marriage and a lack of purpose, traipses off to Iraq to cover the contracting scandal of the war and the waste of billions of dollars.

Instead of that story, by running into Clooney, he's drawn back into the story of the staring at animals, and the Army's secret project to develop a "psy-ops" team of super soldiers with highly developed mental skills, led by Jeff Bridges (doing his hippie, loony best). Eventually, the team is disbanded, the project falls apart, and far worse projects are discovered at a secret base in the desert.

The story itself unfolds amusingly enough in Peter Straughan's amusing script, bouncing between the modern Iraq war and the initial training sessions for the "psychic squad" which happened in the early eighties. Anyone who looks slightly askance at how the Army operates will probably find both humor and pathos in the "unorthodox" training methods, though the depiction of recent madness in Iraq doesn't really have as much impact as it could, or probably, should.

Clooney remains decidedly underrated as an actor; his commitment to the part and Gable-ish screen presence continue to pay off handsome rewards, even in modest surroundings like here. And Bridges still amazes me as one of those guys who can do anything - perhaps no one since Gene Hackman has shown quite the range of risak and success. McGregor is somewhat less successful mining the territory carved out these days by Greg Kinnear and Aaron Eckhart - clean cut, slightly off kilter, child-men who struggle to be the right kind of modern man. McGregor has every bit of the charm and looks for it, but he's capable of more and weirder, and he seems tamped down and boxed in. The effect is colorless, less than memorable... and may go a ways to explaining why The Men Who Stare At Goats entertains, but never quite comes together. To buy into the idea of its "Jedi Knight" fighting force as Army Rangers, you have to make the leap of believing in their special abilities and fly with them... and thanks to MacGregor, much of the proceedings feel earthbound, and never quite soar.

It would be easier, really, if The Men Who Stare At Goats were more porly executed, more sloppily performed, less able to connect the dots between the seventies "est culture" psychobabble and the Army training it allegedly produced. As it is, the film is a pleasant diversion, unlikely to change a mind about war that wasn't already convinced... and unlikely to kill a goat. Both, perhaps, are probably more than one should expect in a feature film.

Sarah Superstar

In all the breathless coverage of Sarah Palin's memoirs, I've been debating what to say. Like many I share a concern about her prospects, even the vague fascination with Palin's popularity on the right... but mostly, I find her a somewhat interesting, but irrelevant diversion. And little of the coverage of her seems to get at this.

It wasn't until I saw a clip of her with Sean Hannity that something crystallized for me: Palin is not seen, I don't think, for what she is. In reality, Palin is riding the wave of celebrity culture to her 15 minutes of major fame, and she's doing it by turning politics - perhaps the last bastion of "seriousness" - into the same kind of celebrity name driven gossip currently given to Hollywood and the music industry.

Seeing Palin as a serious politician, it seems to me, is the mistake. What she is, really, is famous for being famous. And by not seeing her book tour for what it is - a chance to consolidate her attention getting - conservatives are deluding themselves into making her vague political ambitions into a huge mess up, while liberals may wind up doing damage control from the needless energy of trying to stop her.