Comments on: What would you do for $5 million a year? (Or, are you using that last shred of dignity, Chris?)

By: Ann Bartow

Ann Bartow — Tue, 22 Apr 2008 19:09:25 +0000

No worries! I can’t imagine trying to make conversation wit either Dowd or Matthews. I’d either fake illness and leave, or put in my iPod headphones :>)

By: Historiann

Historiann — Tue, 22 Apr 2008 17:20:50 +0000

The part about the first date behavior (and the supposed wonderfulness of Mr. X, and the supposed cluelessness and offensiveness of Dowd) was less relevant to me than just the “fly on the wall” reportage of that dreadful-sounding dinner party. (And I should have said earlier–I agree with your points about Norma Desmoned and Miss Havisham–at the very least, kind of O/T).

By: Ann Bartow

Ann Bartow — Tue, 22 Apr 2008 17:05:42 +0000

She has a bad track record on Gore, Kerry, Edwards, and Obama too. I’m not disputing her awfulness. I just think it’s at least possible she disliked X, and went out of her way to antagonize him, rather than it necessarily being the case that Dowd lacks feminine charm, grace and wiles, or whatever it was that the linked blogger was trying to say with the story.

By: Historiann

Historiann — Tue, 22 Apr 2008 16:57:05 +0000

When it comes to the Clintons, I don’t think Dowd has any self-control or self-determination!

By: Ann Bartow

Ann Bartow — Tue, 22 Apr 2008 16:32:28 +0000

Maureen Dowd is a terrible pundit, no question. But the linked post is pretty squicky too, for the same reasons I can’t stomach most Dowd columns. Comparing her to Miss Havisham and Norma Desmond, suggesting she is bitter because she never married, Sounds pretty Dowdy to me.

The linked blogger seems to think that if Dowd had acted more ladylike and hidden her actual personality she would have had a chance with the supposedly “Totally. Fucking. Amazing.” Mr. X. I think it’s possible Dowd hated Mr. X on sight, so she ramped up the sex talk just to freak him out.

By: Historiann

Historiann — Tue, 22 Apr 2008 14:59:13 +0000

Yes–but you have to admit that it’s pretty high-quality trash, no? I posted it mostly for the punchline about Matthews–who was invoked seemingly to dismiss the whole event without explanation, as though his presence were the icing on the cake of ridiculousness. (I will say that I was pretty skeptical about what a saint Mr. X was too.)

MoDo is freakishly obsessed with Bill Clinton’s sex life, which seems all of a piece with her own personal/non-marital history. (I’m betting that most married people weren’t so shocked or surprised that Bill Clinton was steppin’ out on his wife. It’s only unmarried people who idealize marriage and seem so offended by the many different ways in which marriage can work for people.)

By: Ann Bartow

Ann Bartow — Tue, 22 Apr 2008 14:41:02 +0000

Oh, and the part where the author of the post writes of “Mr. X” that “…he loathes gossip. If you try to dish the dirt, it’s pretty clear he’s not comfortable with that kind of conversation” and ” X. is clearly not comfortable with gossip…” strike me as a little curious, because if that is the case, how did the post’s author come to hear the story? And did she obtain X’s permission to spread it all over the Internets? Blech. Hypocrisy, much?

By: Ann Bartow

Ann Bartow — Tue, 22 Apr 2008 07:11:30 +0000

Re: Update the First: I dislike Maureen Dowd as much as any reasonable, thinking person, but comparing her to Norma Desmond and discussing her dating history in detail, and then criticizing her for being obsessed with Clinton’s sex life? Feh.

By: Tiffany

Tiffany — Sun, 20 Apr 2008 04:32:55 +0000

Too funny!

By: Indyanna

Indyanna — Sat, 19 Apr 2008 15:18:37 +0000

I think Dunne keeled over during a quite dinner in their Manhattan apartment while they were getting ready to watch Hardball, or maybe sparring about whether to do that or go to a Knicks game. There was a little bit of misogyny going on down at the Garden in those years too, I’ve heard, so it might have been a tough call.

Update on The Crowd and Pa. Politics: Team Obama is crowing about how 30,000 people stormed the bluegrass at Independence Mall in Philly last night for a pre-vote peptalk. That approximates the normal Saturday afternoon lines waiting to ride the historic horsedrawn carriages, but in any case it’s at best a 2% turnout in a population of c. 1.5 million people in the city. The latest figure here in West is that 3,400 people jammed the fieldhouse in a town of 15,000 (double that when the U is in session). That comes out to maybe 11%. So it may be the Whiskey Rebels are getting ready to clock the Latte Sippers. Or maybe not, we’ll see. With all of these closed factories and mines, it could also be that the word spread that “Solutions for America LLC” was taking parttime applications for a new calling center.