Below is a picture of Sarah Jessica Parker, a woman who is effervescent, smart, has had extraordinary professional success, and is legendarily stylish.
Parker arrives for the screening of Wu Xia in Cannes, May 14, 2011. [AP Photo]
Whether she is beautiful has always been a subject of much debate, because she does not conform perfectly to traditional definitions of beauty. It will not be debated in this space, because to debate it is to tacitly concede that there is some objective Beauty Standard, some platonic ideal of feminine beauty, and that conformity to that ideal is an issue of character.
What matters is not whether any of us find Sarah Jessica Parker beautiful; what matters is that, yet again,
Marie Claire has found her to be
not beautiful enough.
Just over a year ago, I wrote a piece about a Marie Claire cover featuring SJP in which her famously wrinkly hands were Photoshopped to look like babydoll hands stuck on the ends of the arms of a confident 45-year-old woman. Now she is on the cover of their September issue, and they've done the same damn thing to her again.
[Click to embiggen.]
Compare to the image at the top of this post, in which SJP's unretouched hand is visible as she blows a kiss to fans.
That Sarah Jessica Parker has a life rich with family and friends, and is a successful actress on stage and on screens small and large, a savvy businesswoman, and a well-respected arts advocate and philanthropist, isn't enough. She hasn't yet earned the right to be Who She Actually Is on the cover of Marie Claire, because Who She Actually Is isn't good enough if she's got WRINKLED HANDS at age 46.
I have wrinkled hands not terribly unlike SJP's. Marie Claire would evidently like me to be ashamed of them. Fuck that. I love my hands, and I love Sarah Jessica Parker's hands, too.
The real ones.
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By way of reminder: Comments that try to suss out what changes, exactly, were made, and even comments noting that, for example, the removal of laugh lines because they are ZOMG wrinkles actually robs a face of its character or humanity, are welcome. Discussions of how "she looks prettier/hotter/better in the candid picture" and associated commentary (which would certainly make me feel like shit if I were the person being discussed) are not. So please comment in keeping with the series' intent, implicit in which is the question: If no one can ever be beautiful enough, then to what end is the pursuit of an elusive perfection?
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House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi has promised that the House Democrats named to the committee prescribed by the debt ceiling plan and tasked with reducing the deficit by at least $1.2 trillion will oppose cuts to the social safety net:
"That is a priority for us," Pelosi said. "But let me say it is more than a priority - it is a value... it's an ethic for the American people. It is one that all of the members of our caucus share. So that I know that whoever's at that table will be someone who will fight to protect those benefits."
It is, of course, qualified good news, because
this country is going to hell in a handbasket Pelosi is willing to support cuts "to provider payments, waste and other Medicare spending," which, as I've
mentioned previously, can still affect Medicare beneficiaries when cutting payments to providers could leave them unable to find any providers willing to accept Medicare patients. Medicare's reimbursement schedule already routinely leaves providers underpaid, and rejections for Medicare patients have been steadily rising for more than a decade as a result.
And then there's this: "Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) will also appoint three members to the committee. And if even a single one of them is willing to cut into Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security benefits, then Pelosi's efforts won't really matter—the committee's report can be approved by a bare majority of its 12 members. But if Reid and Pelosi play this smart, they could create a sturdy firewall."
It is incredible and terrifying and infuriating to me that so few people, possibly as few as
one, will hold in their hands the power to protect or dismantle the social safety net.
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This is probably not the best way to head into an election season:
"Come on, got any other jokes?" cracked Representative Peter DeFazio, an Oregon Democrat, when asked if Obama bargained hard in negotiations with congressional Republicans [on the debt ceiling deal].
..."There was caving this time," said Representative Eliot Engel, a New York Democrat. "Why don't you think there would be caving next time?"
...Representative Jesse Jackson Jr., an Illinois Democrat who has a close relationship with Obama, said the president made "a profound mistake" in signaling to Republicans that programs for the elderly and the poor are on the table for cutting.
"It's clear to us we're going to have to go to the mat for those people -- as we have been doing -- by ourselves and not necessarily with the support of the administration," he said, referring to Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security recipients.
Jesse Jackson, Jr. does not just have "a close relationship with Obama"; he was the co-chair (and frequent
hit-man) of Obama's '08 presidential campaign. It is profoundly concerning to me as a progressive, and as a voter, when an ally and colleague of Obama's like Jackson is expressing reservations about the president's commitment to defending the social safety net (even taking into consideration the Jackson family's penchant for opportunism and grudgery). Jackson is hardly a one-man choir on this subject, unfortunately.
This Herbert Hoover horseshit has got to stop. I don't want a Republican in the White House—not in the "Obama's doing Bob Dole's presidency" way but in the "one of the scary-ass extremists running for the GOP ticket" way. And I fervently believe that the only way to prevent that is for Obama to move
left, not right.
If he keeps ceding ground to the Republicans, he can't complain when voters decide, "Well, hell, if he thinks Republican ideas are so fucking great, we might as well vote in a Republican." Our Democratic president needs to be
the alternative.
No one cast a vote for a centrist arbitrator.
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Greg Sargent—GOP winning the larger argument over government:
In recent days, the debt ceiling deal — which just passed the Senate and is about to be signed by the President — has sparked a fair amount of handwringing among liberals who worry that the fight shows the left has lost the larger argument over the proper role and scope of government in our society. Jared Bernstein and Kevin Drum have both argued that until liberals can make headway in that argument, the playing field in such fights will be dramatically tilted against them.
It's hard not to agree with these folks when you look at findings like this one from the internals of the new CNN poll... Sixty five percent approve of deal's spending cuts. But it gets worse. Of the 30 percent who disapprove, 13 percent think the cuts haven't gotten far enough, and only 15 percent think the cuts go too far. One sixth of Americans agree with the liberal argument about the deal. ... [I]t's hard to avoid the conclusion that the public is reflexively disposed to agree with the GOP's economic worldview, and is all-too-willing to blame government for our economic doldrums.
"We will only find success when a majority of Americans agrees with us that government is something worth fighting for," wrote Jared Bernstein. ... Liberals who still hope to shift the playing field have tons of work to do.
Cue
the Laverne & Shirley theme.
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We've done this one before, but not for over two years, so here it is again: What should be Shakesville's theme song?
I'll stick with my previous answer: My submission is the theme from Laverne & Shirley, a show I loved so much that, I shit you not, a childhood friend and I performed the theme for a school talent show when we were in third grade. And Mama Shakes even stitched an L (for Liss/Laverne) onto my blouse for the occasion!
There is nothing we won't try;
Never heard the word "impossible."
This time there's no stopping us—
We're gonna do it!
Which is more awesome, do you think? My sassy pose, or that orange and brown shag carpeting? I'm going to call it a draw.
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Stock market tumbles again despite avoidance of U.S. default:
The Dow Jones industrial average slumped more than 265 points Tuesday as mounting concerns about the fragility of the U.S. economy weighed heavily on Wall Street. It was the Dow's eighth straight daily loss, its worst string since the depths of the global financial crisis in 2008.
Though relieved at Washington's ability to forge an eleventh-hour debt-ceiling plan that averted a feared default, investors are spooked by the notion that the government cutbacks called for in the debt plan could further weaken an already torpid economy.
"Investors are looking past the budget situation and realizing this is an austerity plan," said Jack Ablin, chief investment officer of Harris Private Bank in Chicago. "We have an economy that's struggling to stay afloat and we don't have the ammunition to keep prodding it forward."
Emphasis mine.
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Naomi Wolf: America's Reactionary Feminists. In which she argues that feminism "is philosophically as much in harmony with conservative, and especially libertarian, values—and in some ways even more so."
Sure.
For your full debunking, go see Jos, who makes all the salient points about individual privileged feminism vs. collective intersectional feminism.
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"I'll make myself vulnerable if it saves someone's life because I know what I went through this summer helped save mine."—Miami Dolphins Wide Receiver Brandon Marshall, who is speaking out about being diagnosed with borderline personality disorder and getting treatment that has changed his life: "By no means am I all healed or fixed, but it's like a light bulb's been turned on in my dark room."
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So, about two years ago, I donated graphic design services to a very nice lady who was running for the city council. During the course of the campaign, I mentioned to this very nice lady who happens to have a very cute Boxer dog that it sure would be nifty if our town had a dog park. She agreed! And when she got elected, she proposed a dog park for the city, and the city approved it. Yay!
Obviously, I loooooooove the dog park to which we take Dudley and Zelda, but it is a half hour drive each way, for two dogs who combined have about 15 minutes of stamina. So it would be very nice to have a dog park closer to home.
Now, I'm not going to say that our little town in this lovely state with the terrible garbage governor is slow to get things done, ahem, but that dog park, which was going to be converted from an existing but unused baseball field to which water pipes were already run, was supposed to be finished last spring. Then last fall. Then this April. And it's still not done.
Mama Shakes heard from the very nice lady on the city council last month that it's now scheduled to be done this month.
A few minutes ago, I decided to call the Parks Department and see if it's finished yet. The woman to whom I spoke was very nice.
Me: Hi, I was wondering if you could tell me if the dog park at Bleepbloop Park is open yet.
Nice Woman: No, it's not open yet.:-(
Me: Oh, okay. Do you know when it's scheduled to open?
Nice Woman: Nooooooo???:-/???...!?
[long pause]
Me: Um, okay, well, I heard it was scheduled to open this month. Do you know if that's correct?
Nice Woman: I would hope it's going to be this month!:-)!!!
Me: [deep breath] Yep, me too. Anyway, I am looking at the city website right now—
[which, as an aside, is one glittering gif and a "Greensleeves" midi file away from a Geocities site created by Jukt Micronics]
—and I can't find any information—
[about ANYTHING!]
—on the dog park; is there someplace that I can go for updates so I don't have to keep driving over there heh heh or bothering you heh heh to see if it's open?
Nice Woman: You're probably better off just calling us…:-/
Me: Okay, thank you so much for your help, goodbye!
* * *
Mind you, there is an almost entirely fenced-in, rather large, and extremely beautiful park almost directly behind our house which would have made a perfect city dog park. Especially since the park is almost entirely disused by everyone but the addicts who do heroin there, one of whom recently died of an overdose in the Port-a-Potty inexplicably sat in the park. Oh, and also Iain and me and the very nice city council lady who also walks her very cute Boxer there.
But the city reportedly did not want to put a dog park in that park because addicts use it since it's basically a huge abandoned park and are you following this awesome logic of not reclaiming a neglected space because it's gotten scary in the void created by inattention?
Anyway. We still don't have a dog park.
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(TW: racism)
Guess what, everyone? Rep. Doug Lamborn (R-eally?) apologized, via a letter to the White House, for calling President Obama a "tar baby."
More guess what: It's a non-apology "apology" pile of garbage!
In an email, Lamborn spokeswoman Catherine Mortensen wrote, "Congressman Lamborn regrets any misunderstanding. He simply meant to refer to a sticky situation or quagmire.”
Oh, of course. He didn't mean it THAT way. Sure.
Monday evening, Lamborn's office sent a news release saying he had "sent a personal letter to President Barack Obama apologizing for using a term some find insensitive." The release said Lamborn is "confident that the President will accept his heartfelt apology."
How lovely. First, casually dismiss perfectly understandable outrage over use of a very racist term, because only "some" find it "insensitive." I'm sure they're in the minority, ahem. Then, essentially corner the President into accepting your apology, lest he look like a vindictive asshole. Oh, and let's have a little "who's the real victim here?" for good measure.
Ricker's comments were immediately dismissed as "cheap political shots" by Eli Bremer, chair of the El Paso County Republican Party. Bremer said Lamborn's statement was being taken out of context, and was not at all intended as a reference to Obama's skin color.
"It's disgraceful that anyone would try and insinuate that he was being racist," said Bremer. "I think there are people out there who believe it is a racist term, but what’s important is not how people construe it but how it’s intended. It’s really unfair to take something completely out of context and try to politically destroy them because of it."
Offended by Lamborn's statement? You only
think "tar baby" is a racist term, and you're being disgraceful. The
real victim here is Lamborn, because all of us hyper-sensitive meanies are calling him out on his description of a "sticky situation."
Shame on us, I guess.
(Tip of the energy dome to Liss. Bolds mine.)
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[Trigger warning for child sexual abuse; racism.]
It's not been a good few days for the Catholic Church.
Shaker InfamousQBert (who hat-tips Atheist at Large) emails the story of a child protection official, hired by the Catholic Church "to monitor church groups to ensure paedophiles did not gain access to children in the church's congregations," who has been caught with 4,000 images of child pornography on his home and work computers.
Despite having a vast child porn collection on his work computer, Christopher Jarvis, a former social worker, was only fired after the police began an investigation into his creation and distribution of the pornographic images, as the Church claims to have been unaware of his activities.
Meanwhile, Shaker Brunocerous forwards the story of a Catholic high school principal in the Bronx, whose student population is primarily Latin@ and Black, who has "published material with American Renaissance, a white supremacy group." Frank Borzellieri, who is now under investigation by the Archdiocese of New York, wrote, among other equally repellent ideas: "Even the most cursory glance at life in America reveals that diversity is a weakness, a hindrance and a terrible burden."
A diocese spokesperson has noted, in response to inquiries about Borzellieri's "interesting" views on race, "Any form of discrimination or bigotry is inconsistent with Catholic teaching."
Whooooooooooooooooooops! That's the same Catholic Church that hates gays and won't ordain women, right?
LOL FOREVER.
[Commenting Guidelines: Please take the time to make sure any criticisms are clearly directed at the Catholic Church leadership and not at "Catholics," many of whom are themselves critical of the failures of Church leadership.]
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LADYBUSINESS!
Something that you should know about me is that I love Retta. She is very funny, and this is a good interview with her!
And here are DC Comics' Dan DiDio and Jim Lee promising "exciting news about new projects with women creators in the coming months" in response to the criticisms at ComicCon about their lack of female creators. It's always reassuring when it takes a huge blow-up to get two dudes to say they'll address a wild gender imbalance, and even then they insist on naming virtually all the female creators and characters they support, as some sort of evidence of diversity, despite the fact that THEY CAN NAME THEM ALL BECAUSE THEY CONSTITUTE SUCH A SMALL AND EXCEPTIONAL PIECE OF THEIR BUSINESS.
Meanwhile, over at Fox News, their resident anti-birth control "expert," Family PAC Federal Vice President Sandy Rios, wonders: "We're $14 trillion in debt and now we're going to cover birth control, breast pumps, counseling for abuse? Are we going to do pedicures and manicures as well?" Totes the same!
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I would just like to take a moment to note the irony that members of Congress, who are at the best times reluctant to do something wise but unpopular for fear of losing their jobs, are now avoiding like its radioactive any legislation that would legitimately stand to create actual jobs or help unemployed people, because they don't want to lose THEIR jobs and have to try to make it out there beyond the Beltway where their own craven self-interest has created a bleak and hostile landscape of diminishing opportunities.
There are only so many openings at the lobbying firm of McGuire, Dickstein, & Thanks for Your Help Deregulating Those Pesky Consumer Protections.
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You can watch it live on C-SPAN here.
Discuss.
UPDATE: It passed, 74-26.
UPDATE 2: Obama is about to make a statement. You can watch live here.
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1.8 million: The potential number of jobs that will be lost in 2012 as a result of the debt ceiling agreement, according to the Economic Policy Institute.
In addition to the immediate cuts to spending, the debt ceiling agreement fails to continue two major policies which had been part of broad agreements in the past. The payroll tax holiday and extended unemployment insurance were passed last December along with the two-year extension of the Bush-era tax cuts; but are set to expire at the end of 2011. While Congress could still extend these policies between now and the end of the year, that scenario is looking much less likely today. (Any economic support subsequent to this deal would have to be offset by other tax increases or spending cuts in 2012 or a further increase in the debt ceiling, neither of which seems politically viable.)
...It should be noted that while the payroll holiday creates jobs, there are more effective ways to target tax policy to those most likely to spend the extra income, creating an even bigger bang-for-the-buck without some of the negative side-effects.
...If Congress fails to renew these existing programs or enact improved versions, we can expect slower growth, fewer jobs, and higher unemployment. Specifically, there could be 1.8 million fewer jobs and a 0.6 percentage point increase in the unemployment rate in 2012 as a result of abandoning current budget policies.
...Roughly one in three workers will be unemployed or underemployed in 2011 and there would be little progress on this front in 2012. This persistent high unemployment not only creates great economic distress for those families directly impacted but also undermines wage growth and continues the erosion of benefits of those still employed. Moreover, these high levels of unemployment make it more difficult to face our fiscal challenges over the long run.
And here's another number:
60% of respondents
in the latest CNN poll disapprove of the debt deal failing to include tax hikes for the wealthiest Americans and corporations. Whooooooops!
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