This opinion piece in the New York Times by Drew Westen (August 7, 2011) really stuck in my mind; I agree with him that storytelling was critical to Obama's election, and that most people are ruled in their hearts by narrative.  Since I really do believe this, his piece - and please read it! - makes me very, very, very sick and sad at the ( Read more... )

I find I cannot bear to listen to any clips from that Tea Party w/Palin. I have a visceral, near-panic response when I hear her voice now, which is unexpected; usually, even when I dislike a politician's stand or persona, I don't take it personally. Even when I was shouting, "I hate you, shuddup you moron!" at W., or shuddering at the gooey ( Read more... )

We finally watched MILK (as in "Harvey") this weekend. Very moving and well-done. It made me want to revisit - and share with you - this long & thoughtful post by libba_bray, written back in May 2009 after California's sad & terrible vote upholding Prop. 8. Libba begins:

I was raised by a gay father. My dad came of age in the 1940’s in the Deep South. ( Read more... )

Since I couldn't get the insert to play on my response to rosenhaus' comment in my last post, I'll print it up here:

On the Media
Find Out What It Means To Me
January 16, 2009
President Bush bid his final farewell to the White House press corps on Tuesday. “Through it all,” he told reporters gathered in the briefing room, “I have respected you.” Really? ( Read more... )

When GWBush won his second term, I wore black for a week - not in NYC, where this sort of thing is de rigeur, but in Cambridge, Mass., where earth tones predominate. And over the past 4 years I have often had the awful feeling that I was living in a ghastly alternate reality, where everything had gone wrong in the world, and particularly in my ( Read more... )

Yeah, I know, I had the same reaction when I walked into the snappy little boutique in the Marais (where I ended up buying a cute little shirt from the discreetly placed sales basket, and deliasherman bought a very elegant cardigan sweater): "Merde, Obama!"? Was this Frenchwoman telling me she thought my choice for candidate - as evinced by my now-famous ( Read more... )

In all last night's excitement over flicking shafts, rovings, hedgehogs and voles, you might have missed my link to Christopher Buckley's blog entry on"The Conservative Case for Obama." Buckley's good, of course, but what I find particularly illuminating and educational are the blog comment responses of other disillusioned Republicans -(  this one in particular: )

'Christopher Buckley, of all people, now endorses Obama. (And has resigned from The National Review after the furor resulting from this announcement.)

'Buckley's blog post, "The Conservative Case for Obama," makes interesting reading.' -- personal correspondence from Terri Windling, reprinted here with her permission

Half a year ago, inspired by arts cutbacks in Michigan, I posted a rant about giving money to the arts, and people replied with all sorts of enthusiasm & creativity ( Read more... )

Small Beer Press, Gavin Grant & Kelly Link's glorious enterprise - the publisher who brought you the stunning limited edition hardcover of The Privilege of the Sword - are having a
huge sale of all their books
- including TPOTS hc for a mere $17!! . . . the amazing new Geoff Ryman novel, formerly unavailable in the U.S.! . . . and Interfictions ( Read more... )