"All the women of my generation, including Hillary Clinton, were wearing jeans in the 1960s. But where do you go from Woodstock?"

"How do you professionalize that look when those women start entering the work force? You professionalize it by wearing a feminized suit from Armani."

Said costume designer and historian Deborah Nadoolman Landis, quoted in "Giorgio Armani, Fashion’s Master of the Power Suit, Dies at 91/He created a male uniform whose feminized form won favor with women. An alliance with movie stars made his name all but synonymous with red-carpet dressing" (NYT).

Longtime readers of this blog may remember the time I bought an Armani suit. It was 2008, and I seriously believed it was going to be infinitely useful:

Here's the Giorgio Armani store on Rodeo Drive in Beverly Hills, where a lovely saleswoman sees that I admire that jacket trimmed with fur and feathers and says something to me — "It's fox" — that prompts me to ask a question about sizes and the long-nurtured desire for the perfect pantsuit.

I have — a thousand times — wished I'd bought the quirky jacket instead of what I'd thought would be so practical. I'd have worn the jacket a hundred times a year since then —1700 times — and I have worn the suit exactly... never. And that's the argument in favor of impulse buying. 

"Pamela Anderson and Liam Neeson had fans eating up their flirty press tour, but behind the scenes, it was all a PR 'bake-off'...."

TMZ reports, based on "sources with direct knowledge."

I had some trouble understanding the expression "bake-off," since there was no competition, only collusion, pretending to have found love together. But...

A big slice of the stunt involved Pamela claiming she was baking muffins and sourdough bread for Liam -- something he even played along with in interviews leading up to the premiere. It makes us now assume that was also part of the strategy ... pure role-play PR, not reality.

So some literal baking was involved, but there was no literal or figurative bake-off.

Actors promoting a movie are still acting. Why not act as if they'd fallen in love? 

If you go searching into the term "bake-off," you'll probably quickly arrive at something called the "First Lady Bake-Off." That's something that began in 1992, and it was an unwholesome alliance between the press — Family Circle Magazine — and the Clinton campaign. Wikipedia explains:

"[George Magazine's] purportedly post-partisan stance seemed to many people naïve."

"'Ultimately, you can’t have a political magazine that doesn’t have a politics,' Victor Navasky, then the publisher of The Nation, told The New York Times in an article headlined 'George Wins Readers, but Little Respect.' Arguably, the Bill Clinton-Monica Lewinsky scandal was the publication’s undoing. In the spring of 1998, when the independent counsel Ken Starr was deep in his investigation of the Clinton White House, George published a puffy cover story on the film 'Primary Colors,' an adaptation of the roman à clef about Mr. Clinton’s 1992 campaign. (For a brief while, America had its own Elena Ferrante in Joe Klein). The magazine further showed its hand when it referred to the under-fire president as the 'chief charmer.' When Mr. Kennedy and his staff tried to cover the imbroglio, they made choices that would now seem cringe, like publishing a write-around article about Ms. Lewinsky’s past accompanied by a full-page caricature of her biting into a hot dog."

From "The Lasting Appeal of John F. Kennedy Jr./A CNN documentary and an upcoming series by Ryan Murphy delve into the nation’s most famous son, who remains fixed in the 1990s" (NYT)(gift link, so you can see the whole story... and all the beefcake pix of the famously gawked-at boy).

Why is it so difficult to find that caricature of Monica Lewinsky biting into a hot dog?

Google gives me 2 pix of Obama stuffing something into his mouth and one of Reagan. This is the most obvious caricature idea for Lewinsky. You'd think dozens of lame efforts would show up in this search. And George Magazine published one. Where is it? Is Google caring for our presumed devotion to the beloved boy? I mean John John. Not that rogue Bill!

"The vocal group Boyz II Men performed at the wedding.... Dishes included truffle agnolotti, chilled English pea soup and an American Wagyu bavette and grilled prawns."

I'm reading "The Clintons and Kamala Harris Descend on a Hamptons Wedding of Liberal Royalty/The wedding of Huma Abedin, a longtime aide to Hillary Clinton, and Alex Soros, the scion of a liberal philanthropic dynasty, drew a rare concentration of wealth and power" (NYT).

Is it okay to be out of touch? I mean, truffle agnolotti in the summer? Or rather:

The festivities happened to coincide with an exceptionally chaotic weekend at home and abroad. Protesters gathered across the country to oppose President Trump even as he held an unusual military parade in Washington; a Minnesota lawmaker was assassinated in a new outburst of political violence; and attacks between Israel and Iran stoked fears of a wider Mideast conflagration.

Weddings, planned in advance, always "happen to coincide" with world events that pop up spontaneously.

Mr. Soros and Ms. Abedin announced their engagement last July. They initially planned to elope, Vogue reported on Saturday, but they changed their minds after an engagement party co-hosted by Mrs. Clinton in December, where attendees pressured the couple to hold a more traditional celebration. 

“I think she deserves it,” Mrs. Clinton told the magazine. “She deserves to have that kind of moment.”...

If only we could all have what Hillary Clinton thinks we deserve.

The moneyed scene was especially striking given the Democratic Party’s raging debate over how to improve its historically low standing with voters and win back working-class Americans, with whom it is widely seen as having lost touch....

Here's how I'd spin it: It was so out of touch it was in touch. They were in touch with their out of touchness. 

"Usha and J.D. made a memorable pair. The legal writer David Lat remembers attending a poker night with the couple in 2011..."

"... at the neo-Gothic home of [Amy] Chua and her husband, fellow Yale law professor Jed Rubenfeld.... At the time, Chua was mainly known for her book Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother, a gaily provocative paean to achievement-oriented parenting. Chua was a kind of den mother to certain student protégés, known on campus as 'Chua pets,' and J.D. was central among them. According to another former friend of the pair, Chua was not a fan of Usha. 'Probably because she didn’t engage in her bullshit,' the former friend said. 'You have to gossip and drink. J.D. loved that shit.' Usha did not. Lat happened to ride the Metro-North up from New York for the poker game with the soon-to-be Vances. He told his husband later that night that they’d reminded him of another famous Yale Law couple, Bill and Hillary Clinton. 'They had a kind of energy to them,' Lat said. 'They seemed very confident and successful. One thing that struck me as Hillary-esque was that Usha seemed to have more polish than J.D.'"

From "What Is Usha Vance Thinking? The veep candidate’s wife is the child of immigrants, a former Democrat, a highly skilled lawyer — and a total mystery" (NY Magazine).

You know, Hillary used to try to promote herself with drinks.

I see Kamala is using alcohol as a come-on to Hispanic voters: Trump wants to tax "your tequila, Modelos, and Coronas." 

I remember Hillary using beer:

"And, sadly, the press is still not able to cover Trump the way that they should. They careen from one outrage to the next...."

"What was outrageous three days ago is no longer on the front pages, even though it threatens the physical safety of so many people, particularly... immigrants that he and Vance have decided to demonize. And I don't understand why it's so difficult for the press to have a consistent narrative about how dangerous Trump is. The late, great journalist Harry Evans one time said that journalists should really try to achieve objectivity. And by that, he said, I mean, they should cover the object. Well, the object in this case is Donald Trump, his demagoguery, his danger to our country and the world, and stick with it.... The second thing, though, is that part of what Trump is counting on is for people to get desensitized. I mean, oh, my gosh, did you hear what he said yesterday? Did you hear who he attacked? Did you hear the viciousness? And it's just, like with a shrug, OK, fine we're moving on...."

From "Hillary Clinton: I Don't Get 'Why It's So Difficult For The Press To Have A Consistent Narrative About How Dangerous Trump Is'" (Real Clear Politics, with video from the Rachel Maddow show).

"His ideas on what he called the 'politics of meaning' (his goal, he said, was 'to build a society based on love and connection') were briefly embraced by Hillary Clinton..."

"... the newly installed first lady. 'We need a new politics of meaning,' Mrs. Clinton said in a speech in Austin, Texas, in 1993. 'We need a new ethos of individual responsibility and caring. We need a new definition of civil society which answers the unanswerable questions posed by both the market forces and the governmental ones, as to how we can have a society that fills us up again and makes us feel that we are part of something bigger than ourselves.' Just how much impact his ideas ultimately had on Mrs. Clinton is unclear; confronted by skepticism over the vagueness of his philosophy — a Baltimore Sun columnist called it 'psychobabble' — she soon dropped references to it, at least in public.... 'Unintentionally hilarious Big Brotherism is, in fact, a hallmark of Lerner’s ideas for implementing the politics of meaning,' the journalist Michael Kelly wrote in a 1993 profile of Hillary Clinton in The New York Times Magazine, citing Rabbi Lerner’s proposal that the Department of Labor order 'every workplace' to create a 'mission statement.'"

From "Michael Lerner, 81, Is Dead; Founder of a Combative Jewish Magazine/His publication, Tikkun, was a leading voice for left-wing American Jews. His ideas about “the politics of meaning” were embraced by Hillary Clinton" (NYT).

"Kamala Harris and Tim Walz were both born in 1964, the very last year of the Baby Boom."

"Yet many in that cohort feel no identification with baby boomers. But neither are they Gen Xers. They are people in-between. Perhaps in 2024, this status now enables public figures to be 'in between' in new ways, to wear their gender more lightly."

Those are the last few sentences of "Paying More Attention to His Appearance Than Hers/They’re the same age, but pundits and voters can’t stop talking about how much older Tim Walz looks than Kamala Harris. It’s not the only way her running mate seems to be absorbing some of the scrutiny usually heaped on female candidates" by Rhonda Garelick in the NYT.

That's from August 12th. I was looking for something else when I ran into that, and I got engrossed.

The idea of wearing one's gender lightly intrigues me.

What was I actually looking for? I was thinking about the time President Bill Clinton, running for reelection, wanted to use federal spending to incentivize public schools to require their students to wear uniforms.

My search terms — Clinton, school, and uniform — all came up in that Harris/Walz article:

... Hillary Clinton... came to prominence as first lady, as a “wife,” and was assailed for her hair and style, her presumed disrespect for “cookie baking” and for tolerating her husband’s transgressions.

... Elizabeth Warren, a former Harvard law professor, was called “a hectoring schoolmarm” for offering expert policy explanations, and advised to change her glasses and hair.

... Ms. Harris hews generally toward a sleek uniform of pantsuit, silk blouse, pearls and heels, which “suggest fashion without being too fashionable”...

"A campaign has been constructed around a mood, rather than the other way around. The mood is Obamacore..."

"... the outburst of brightness and positivity that took over pop culture upon the election of our first Black president in 2008, and that continued until the wheels fell off eight years later. This was the age of Glee, Taylor Swift’s 1989, and Hamilton, seemingly disparate art born out of the same impulse: the feeling of a new dawn, a generational shift, a national redemption.... ... Obamacore positioned itself as sensitive, non-threatening, and relatable. It was Aziz Ansari writing a book on modern dating alongside a Berkeley-trained sociologist, porn star James Deen talking about bacon, Louis C.K. playing a cop on Parks and Recreation.... The fandom that had sprung up around Obama’s presidential campaign expanded to embrace New York Times columnist Paul Krugman, justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, and later, Hillary Clinton. For a moment, bodies as hidebound as the Supreme Court and the papacy looked as if they might be rehabbed into vehicles for social justice.... This summer’s sudden reappearance of hope and positivity has spurred split reactions. Do you embrace your inner cringe, or try to tamp it down?... The optimistic case is that, against all odds, we seem to have heeded the lessons of Obamacore. Generation Z is willingly climbing the coconut tree."

Writes Nate Jones, in "That Feeling You Recognize? Obamacore. The 2008 election sparked a surge of positivity across pop culture. Now hindsight (and cringe) is setting in" (NY Magazine).

See also "100 Pieces of Pop Culture That Defined Obamacore/You know them when you see them — whether they were genius or, well, not," by Nate Jones (in NY Magazine). Just to select one:

Walz has the issue that tripped up Hillary Clinton in the 2008 primaries.

My son John just texted me this:

Here's the WaPo article, "Tim Walz is a bold, smart choice for Harris’s running mate/The Minnesota governor rightly argues that many progressive ideas are good and practical" by Perry Bacon Jr.

Did Bacon have a "Josh Shapiro is a bold, smart choice for Harris’s running mate" draft ready to go?

The Washington Post shines its sharp investigative journalism at Kamala Harris.

There's so little time left, but kudos to The Washington Post for hitting the ground running.

On the front page right now: "Kamala Harris’s cooking wisdom: 7 tips from her kitchen videos."

seriously you need to watch Kamala dice the hell out of an onion (w/new bonus laugh!) pic.twitter.com/1y0gtZHCCa

— Josh Josh (Coconomenon Era) (@Josh_____Josh) July 22, 2024

2 MORE THINGS:

1. It's interesting to see the use of a video clip that emphasizes Harris's Indian heritage so soon after Trump stirred the pot about Indian heritage possibly dominating Harris's self-identity.

2. Forefronting cooking in the presidential election reminds me of the classic "First Lady Bake-Off" that started in 1992 and pitted Hillary Clinton against Barbara Bush:

The competition was inspired by a political gaffe made by Hillary Clinton in 1992... In response to questions about her career and the Whitewater controversy, she stated that "I suppose I could have stayed home and baked cookies and had teas, but what I decided to do was to fulfill my profession, which I entered before my husband was in public life."...

Debbie Walsh, director of the Center for American Women and Politics at Rutgers University, said that Clinton's remarks "stepped outside the bounds of what was seen as the traditional role of first lady, potential first lady [...] the price she paid was being placed in the midst of a cookie bake-off."... According to media science professor Tammy R. Vigil, media coverage of the bake-off portrayed the women participating as adhering to traditional gender roles and published anecdotes about their domestic lives that contributed to this image.

And isn't it funny? 30 years later, traditional gender roles are still front-and-center in American politics. The Democratic Party candidate is, once again, a woman. Back in 2016, Bill Clinton competed in the (re-named) cookie contest. He won, too, just as Hillary had won in 1992 and 1996, and with the same recipe: "chocolate chip cookies." (Yes, I think we all know that recipe.) And the new female Democratic Party candidate isn't even using her husband to handle the cooking. She's dicing an onion, right there on camera for us. In 2024. I suppose she could have just fulfilled her profession, but what she decided to do was go on TV with Mindy Kaling and dice an onion. 

Biden and Trump make their pitch to Hispanic voters.

Biden:

Trump:

"To condemn him for saying they should ‘believe’ what the scene is trying to convey, seems like nonsense."

Vincent Gallo is one of my best friends so I have to say something here. I know him to be brilliant, kind, insightful, and in the case of film making specifically, a truly professional and serious artist. Even if you read the description of these complaints, to me it is clear he… https://t.co/td4ZlTnXFz

— Seán Ono Lennon (@seanonolennon) January 12, 2024

From the Rolling Stone article:

"My decades of experience in the region taught me that Palestinian and Israeli parents may say different prayers at worship but they share the same hopes for their kids—just like Americans, just like parents everywhere."

"That is why I am convinced Hamas must go.... Hamas does not speak for the Palestinian people...."

Writes Hillary Rodham Clinton, in "Hamas Must Go/The terror group has proved again and again that it will sabotage any efforts to forge a lasting peace" (The Atlantic).

Clinton begins with an account of her brokering a cease-fire between Israel and Hamas back in 2012, a cease-fire that Hamas violated in 2014. Now, she tells us: "Cease-fires freeze conflicts rather than resolve them.... Cease-fires can make it possible to pursue negotiations aimed at achieving a lasting peace, but only when the timing and balance of forces are right."

She wants change not only in Gaza, but also in Israel: "Going forward, Israel needs a new strategy and new leadership. Instead of the current ultra-right-wing government, it will need a government of national unity that’s rooted in the center of Israeli politics and can make the hard choices ahead...."

ADDED: The first 2 sentences are too rich not to quote: "One morning in November 2012, I knocked on the door of President Barack Obama’s suite in the Raffles Hotel in Phnom Penh, Cambodia, so early that he was barely out of bed. I had an urgent question that could not wait for the president to finish his morning coffee: Should we try to broker a cease-fire in Gaza?"

Can't he just sip his Raffles coffee?

AND: That last question references this: "At diner, Obama brushes off question on Hamas. Says, 'Why can’t I just eat my waffle?'"

Yes, Obama's famous "Why can’t I just eat my waffle?" was a reaction to a question about Hamas.

Hillary at her best — summarizing the Israeli/Palestinian conflict.

The best summary of the recent history and current situation you will get in under 10 minutes. https://t.co/g2LHtaxp2H

— Bari Weiss (@bariweiss) November 9, 2023

RFK Jr. ... and love.

Since when did it become expected that we hate our opponents? Maybe it's because politics has devolved into "lesser of two evils" voting where you vote for the candidate you hate the least.

— Robert F. Kennedy Jr (@RobertKennedyJr) November 3, 2023

Comedy, right? Creepy comedy, but comedy... right??

Hillary Clinton calls for Trump Supporters to be reeducated: "At some point maybe there needs to be a formal deprogramming of the cult members." pic.twitter.com/ao3foysSL4

— TheBlaze (@theblaze) October 6, 2023

"I am mindful of the critics — and I’m one of them — that we can be doing more and better in myriad areas."

"I’m mindful that as governor, I can’t do it all. But I’m also mindful that the buck stops here. And I’m ultimately going to be held to account."

 Said Gavin Newsom, quoted in "Why San Francisco is make or break for Gavin Newsom/Newsom has increasingly been moonlighting as a quasi-city executive of his hometown and approaching its woes as a litmus test for his success in Sacramento." (Politico).

Gaze upon the mindfulness:

That's a screenshot from the photo at Politico. I reduced the color saturation (a lot) and reversed the cast from garishly hot to cool:

Making it a crime not to censor.

Here's Jonathan Turley in "The Tower for Twitter? UK Minister Calls for Jailing Social Media Bosses Who Do Not Censor Speech":

[A]fter Musk decided to buy Twitter, Hillary Clinton called upon European countries to force social media companies to censor Americans. The European Union quickly responded by threatening Musk and other executives. Now, Technology and Science Secretary Michelle Donelan has announced plans to jail social media executives if they fail to censor so-called “harmful” content on their websites. The government, of course, will determine what is deemed too harmful for citizens to see or hear....

The bill focuses on "'all forms of expression which spread, incite, promote or justify hatred' based on various progressive characteristics, including transgenderism."