the only review of Solaris you need to read

...Never mind that the supposedly deep examinations of the nature of memory, existence, the (im)permanence and fallibility of emotion and all the other shit that I've seen reviwers piling into this movie in their efforts to out-fawn one another (I think they just didn't understand this movie -- an unremarkably phenomenon since there is little or nothing to understand in it -- and wanted to avoid looking like all those reviewers who crabbily panned 2001: A Space Odyssey when it came out...) are covered in about three conversations that last all of about three minutes each and are laughably facile (to wit, the oft-cited discussion of the nature of god and self-awareness, which takes about thirty seconds and amounts to three sound bites exchanged back and forth by characters, only two of whom we even know...).

Never mind that the final third of the film has more to do with the movie Ghost than anything that Lem put in his story. It strays as far from the original as if they had set the entire thing in a Pawtucket, RI textile mill and made it a musical...

Huge spoiler alert, though. That thing they would want you not to tell your friends? It's in here. If you plan to see the movie no matter what, you probably shouldn't click.

Yeah, I think we should take it at face value too

What really strikes me is not only the original comment but Lott's unwillingness to take it back or even explain it. To the best of my knowledge his only response came in a terse two sentence statement from his flack Ron Bonjean:

Senator Lott's remarks were intended to pay tribute to a remarkable man who led a remarkable life. To read anything more into these comments is wrong.

Dare I hope that when Jonah Goldberg and Andy Sullivan line up against Trent Lott some kind of writing is on the wall?

How much you figure that haircut costs?

Because you know how self-promoting careerists annoy Howard Kurtz

...Suskind, you may have gathered, isn't the shy and retiring type. The Pulitzer Prize-winning reporter is alternately outraged and bemused by DiIulio's "deeply remorseful" apology for saying the Bush operation is long on politics and short on substance. The flap comes six months after the White House sort-of-but-not-really disputed some impolitic comments to Suskind by another Bush lieutenant, Chief of Staff Andrew Card.

All of which has given the fast-talking, self-promoting Suskind -- who gives speeches, does 90-minute shows in theaters, appears on television, is writing his second book and has his own Web site -- something new to promote...

also this snickersome vignette:

Columnist Robert Novak, who declined to talk to Suskind, wrote last week that several people interviewed for the Hughes profile "complained to me that he took no notes, did most of the talking and did not accurately reflect their views." Says Suskind, "I think Novak is in the hip pocket of this White House, period."

"That goes to his credibility," Novak responds, noting that he criticized Bush for appointing DiIulio and on many other issues. "I am a conservative, but I'm certainly not a Republican partisan."

It was just a joke

Yeah, everyone on the right is just outraged at old Trent.

In addition, workers in the Landrieu campaign cited what appeared to be unusually aggressive Republican efforts to dampen black turnout. They produced a flyer they said had been distributed in black public housing complexes in New Orleans, apparently designed to mislead black voters.

The flyer reads, in part: "Vote!!! Bad Weather? No problem!!! If the weather is uncomfortable on election day (Saturday December 7th) Remember you can wait and cast your ballot on Tuesday December 10th."

Keeping their priorities straight

Somehow CNN completely missed the incoming Senate Majority Leader mourning the end of segregation on camera, but they still fight the good battle on some fronts. Take this, for instance:

SERWER: Anyway, listen, viewers send us crazy stuff, they send us good stuff. A guy named Peter Cagle (ph) has sent us this dart board, Martha Stewart dart board.

CAFFERTY: All right. Not a bad looking picture.

SERWER: He's from Key West. Yes -- I don't know. I kind of think that you might want to find something else to do -- what about putting Saddam or bin Laden?

CAFFERTY: Turn that thing around here, and let's try it out.

SERWER: You want to try...

CAFFERTY: I got the darts.

SERWER: I'm not holding it near me. I'll hold it near Bill Hemmer.

CAFFERTY: Just hold it out right there. You ready.

SERWER: Go.

CAFFERTY: Wait -- missed her.

SERWER: Ow.

CAFFERTY: I get three shots. Closer. This is it, Martha...

SERWER: Not bad.

CAFFERTY: That was from a distance of 12 inches.

SERWER: That's not bad. I think, come on, let's have a bin Laden dart board, or Saddam dart board. Leave Martha I think, right? If you are going to file some charges, then we'll make a dart board.

CAFFERTY: All right. Fair enough. Thanks, Andy.

SERWER: All right. We'll see you later.

CAFFERTY: Andy Serwer, "Minding Your Business."

Those boys at Time Warner are just dripping with class, aren't they.

UNNATURAL Law

...In most of the states that still criminalize sodomy, it doesn't matter, legally, whether a couple engaging in behavior (A), above, consists of two men, two women, or one of each. That's how it was in Texas, too, until 1974. In that bell-bottomed year, the Texas Legislature made heterosexual sodomy legal, but it couldn't quite bring itself to do the same for gays. The result is that Texas is now one of only four states (the others being Kansas, Missouri, and Oklahoma) where it is a crime for gays to please each other in ways that are perfectly legal for straights. The panel that overturned the conviction saw this as discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation. The full state court disagreed. Rather, confirming what Anatole France called "the majestic egalitarianism of the law, which forbids the rich as well as the poor to sleep under bridges," the court pointed out that in Texas homosexuality is illegal for heterosexuals and homosexuals alike. No discrimination there...

Well, at least someone's learning

Senate Democratic leader Tom Daschle, D-South Dakota, said Monday that he believes Lott did not intend for his comments to be interpreted as racist.

"There are a lot of times when he and I go to the mike and would like to say things we meant to say differently, and I'm sure this is one of those cases for him as well," Daschle said.

Gore offered no criticism of Thurmond, saying the retiring senator has since "repudiated" those views. But he said Lott's remarks are "divisive" and fit the "definition of a racist comment."

"To say that the problems that we have in America today, some of them, stem from not electing a segregationist candidate for president ... is fundamentally racist," Gore said.

Asked if he believes Lott is a racist, Gore said, "Trent Lott made a statement that I think is a racist statement, yes. That's why I think he should withdraw those comments or I think the United States Senate should undertake a censure of those comments.

"It is not a small thing, Judy, for one of the half dozen most prominent political leaders in America to say that our problems are caused by integration and that we should have had a segregationist candidate. That is divisive and it is divisive along racial lines. That's the definition of a racist comment," Gore said.

further female bloggery

TL recommends

http://blogs.salon.com/0001399/
http://megan.scatterbrain.org/notmartha/
http://www.eatdrinkandbemarried.com/
http://www.loobylu.com/
http://www.thiswomanswork.com/
http://bysandandsea.com/
http://www.lifeuncommon.org/

gracious me.

Just so you know, far from being oblivious and inconsiderate, I was respecting Nitpicker's personal space parameters.

(It's a girlblog thing. You wouldn't understand).