Suzanne Fields from Creators Syndicate

Spectacle in Berlin for 07/18/2008

Fri, 18 Jul 2008 00:00:00 -0700

Barack Obama is a man in a hurry. He had barely quieted the criticism of his using the presidential seal with his name on it as a prop for his speeches before he suggested that he wanted to follow Ronald Reagan and Bill Clinton to Berlin to make a speech at the Brandenburg Gate. He got a lot of public reminders that Reagan and Clinton waited until they were sworn in to use the famous gate as ba ...

Updated: Fri Jul 18, 2008

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Distractions for Obama in Berlin for 07/25/2008

Fri, 25 Jul 2008 00:00:00 -0700

The Germans were ecstatic when Barack Obama landed in Berlin. They called him the "American Idol," a political superstar they expected to walk on the River Spree. He didn't walk on water, but he didn't disappoint. He promised to remake the world where everybody would love everybody.

"There is a sort of 'Obamamania' in Germany right now," says an aide in German Chancel ...

Updated: Fri Jul 25, 2008

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Tinseltown Transformations for 08/01/2008

Fri, 01 Aug 2008 00:00:00 -0700

"Hollywood conservative" is regarded in most places as an oxymoron, and in Hollywood a "conservative" is an alien from outer space. But a few aliens are prospering.

Jon Voight, who bought the left-wing politics of the 1970s — and won an Oscar for his portrayal of an angry and embittered paraplegic veteran of the Vietnam War (playing opposite Jane Fonda) — ...

Updated: Fri Aug 01, 2008

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Hardball and Hard Calls for 08/08/2008

Fri, 08 Aug 2008 00:00:00 -0700

Britney Spears, blah blah blah. Paris Hilton, blah blah blah. Faces of presidents on dollar bills, blah blah blah.

Every presidential campaign has its silly season, and we're in one now. This is hardly the first such season. When George Washington chose not to run for a third term, the political parties turned political debates into brawls. The most honorable of men traded in various for ...

Updated: Fri Aug 08, 2008

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Lessons From Literature for 08/15/2008

Fri, 15 Aug 2008 00:00:00 -0700

Like Dorian Gray, John Edwards had a painting of himself in the attic, absorbing all the wrinkles from a dissolute life, freeing him to campaign for the presidency fresh, perfectly coiffed and without a trace of a care on his brow.

Now we watch the man derided for his vanity as "the Breck girl" age before us, with puffs under his eyes, a strained expression about his mouth, the ...

Updated: Fri Aug 15, 2008

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The Lady Dithered for 08/22/2008

Fri, 22 Aug 2008 00:00:00 -0700

There's nothing mellow about Hillary Clinton. She's the greatest polarizer since Richard Nixon. Her defenders are fierce, her detractors ferocious. It's not because she's a woman that she's "the might have been" as Democrats gather this week for their convention in Denver, it's because of the kind of woman she is.

Golda Meir, Indira Ghandi, Margaret Thatcher and Angela Merkel n ...

Updated: Fri Aug 22, 2008

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Convention(al) Reflections for 08/29/2008

Fri, 29 Aug 2008 00:00:00 -0700

COROLLA, N.C. — It's hard to be a hero in America. John Kerry learned that the hard way. He returned from the war in Vietnam, decorated by his grateful country, and turned on the men he had left behind, accusing them of crimes and atrocities. Years later, after he "reported for duty" as the nominee of his party, he was "Swift-boated" by men with whom he had served. Tur ...

Updated: Fri Aug 29, 2008

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What Do Women Want Now? for 09/05/2008

Fri, 05 Sep 2008 00:00:00 -0700

Like none before it, this presidential campaign is redefining what it can mean to be a woman. That wizened Austrian doctor who famously asked, "What do women want?" finally concluded that he didn't have a clue. Freud understood, like men before and after him, that women were a mysterious mixture of the good, the bad and the beautiful.

A women was not so long ago measured in cat ...

Updated: Fri Sep 05, 2008

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The Sarah Palin Squeeze for 09/12/2008

Fri, 12 Sep 2008 00:00:00 -0700

The notabilities of the mainstream media are suffering acute PMS. That's Palin Motherhood Syndrome.

Instead of appreciating Sarah Palin as mother, experienced executive and smart politician, they're venting their rage at the multitasking mom. How could she hide her pregnancy for so many months? How dare she return to work as governor of Alaska three days after giving birth? How could she ...

Updated: Fri Sep 12, 2008

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A Face-Off for the Future for 09/19/2008

Fri, 19 Sep 2008 00:00:00 -0700

The National Organization for Women endorses the Obama-Biden ticket. NOW ought to change its name to WOW. Such stunning independence. A working woman with five children, the governor of a sovereign state, isn't a sufficient accomplishment. Who knew?

Actually, Sarah Palin is a triumph for the "third stage" of feminism. The first stage of the modern woman's movement saw the destr ...

Updated: Fri Sep 19, 2008

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The Pancake People for 09/26/2008

Fri, 26 Sep 2008 00:00:00 -0700

We have to forget about the end of history. It's the end of economic ideology as we know it that requires thinking outside the box. With conservatives cheering, or at least tolerating, big-government bailouts and more regulation of what was once the free market, and liberals conceding that this is no time to expand government-funded programs dear to their hearts, we're in a shake-up, not a melt ...

Updated: Fri Sep 26, 2008

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The Curtain on the Last Act for 10/03/2008

Fri, 03 Oct 2008 00:00:00 -0700

Newspaper accounts of past presidential campaigns nearly always reveal the singular moment when the public finally decided who should prevail on Election Day. A foolish remark, a speech not made, an inability to catch an unexpected swing in the public mood. It's often less that the winner fired the silver bullet than that the loser forgot to duck. Only the hindsight of the historian actually de ...

Updated: Fri Oct 03, 2008

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There's something about Sarah for 10/10/2008

Fri, 10 Oct 2008 00:00:00 -0700

Despite everything John McCain and Barack Obama can do, Sarah Palin continues to be the liveliest of the candidates, now starting the clubhouse turn and about to race down the homestretch.

There's only one more presidential debate to endure. By this time in a campaign, both presidential candidates are so programmed, their talking points so tested and trite if not necessarily true, that v ...

Updated: Fri Oct 10, 2008

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The Irrational Exuberance of November for 10/17/2008

Fri, 17 Oct 2008 00:00:00 -0700

"Throw the bums out!" That's one of the most familiar campaign cries in our history. It's even more effective than Herbert Hoover's slogan of "a chicken in every pot and a car in every garage" and stirs the blood like "Tippecanoe and Tyler, too" never could. Sometimes a little bum-throwing makes sense. Sometimes it doesn't.

In just over three weeks we'll ele ...

Updated: Fri Oct 17, 2008

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A Crowded Endorsement Game for 10/24/2008

Fri, 24 Oct 2008 00:00:00 -0700

Not so long ago when you wanted to make a personal endorsement of a candidate for office, even for president of the United States, the ritual was simple. You stuck a sticker on the back bumper of the family car or put up a cardboard sign in the front yard.

But that's not enough if you're a big-enough shot to get a little ink in the morning paper for your solemn announcement, or a mention ...

Updated: Fri Oct 24, 2008

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Bile, Rage and Sarah Palin for 10/31/2008

Fri, 31 Oct 2008 00:00:00 -0700

Yogi Berra famously observed that "you can see a lot by looking." I know exactly what the great New York Yankee meant. You can hear a lot by listening, too.

Over the homestretch of the presidential campaign, I've been spending a lot of time at a rehabilitation hospital with someone very close to me as she recovers from back surgery. Much of the conversation in this microcosm of ...

Updated: Fri Oct 31, 2008

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The Triumph of Hope for 11/07/2008

Fri, 07 Nov 2008 00:00:00 -0800

I voted, therefore I am. That's a fair updating of Descartes after a total immersion in politics over an endless presidential campaign. The campaign flattened and fragmented us into categories of gender, race and class. Candidates and their surrogates appealed to the limited ways most of us see ourselves. But at the end of the ordeal the fact of the victory of Barack Obama, if not necessarily h ...

Updated: Fri Nov 07, 2008

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From Victim to Victor in Black America for 11/14/2008

Fri, 14 Nov 2008 00:00:00 -0800

The presidential couples, Laura and George W. Bush and Michelle and Barack Obama, standing in front of the White House, looked buff and comely in their ease and smiles. The president and the president-elect in their dark suits and blue ties and Laura and Michelle in different shades of red suggested cordiality with dignity. (If one couple looked more tanned than the other, only a churl would ha ...

Updated: Fri Nov 14, 2008

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Lessons From the Vampire for 11/21/2008

Fri, 21 Nov 2008 00:00:00 -0800

He's handsome and dresses with care, and he's what Joe Biden might call "clean and articulate." Women love him. He's the new beau ideal of the popular culture. But we're not talking about Barack Obama.

Men hardly look to politics to find a heroic model to aspire to, nor do women go there seeking a man of elegance and eloquence to sweep them off their feet, having given up on th ...

Updated: Fri Nov 21, 2008

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Thanksgiving in Transition for 11/28/2008

Fri, 28 Nov 2008 00:00:00 -0800

We're in transition, in more ways than one, and we hold fast to our most traditional holiday season. For all of the recent books celebrating atheism, we still gathered together this week to ask the Lord's blessing: "He hastens and chastens, His will to make known."

Thanksgiving is uniquely American. More than any other holiday, it builds on history, from a time before we began ...

Updated: Fri Nov 28, 2008

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