The Wall...The Wall...The Wall of Woe

Yes...and woe is us if this is the 'solution' to the Palestinian-Israeli conflict.
Chomsky comes out swinging in a New York Times Op-Ed... hard to disagree...wall were never the answer and never kept out the danger. Just an illusion of security with no peace.

Sex and the City - The End

So it goes...another iconic show ends as its herione walks 'into the sunset' down the streets of her beloved New York engulfed by the crowds on our busy sidewalks to a new phase in her life...so it goes...
What is interesting to me, one who really didn't follow Sex and the City AT ALL until the basically the last season (when I gorged on it 'On Demand' in back to back viewings in night after night in a row and got my absolute fill), what is interesting is the process in which at the beginning, I really got what all the hype was about and then I didn't get it and then I got it again.

In the first part when I got it, I could see that this was an extremely intelligent, somewhat dreamy, partly realistic narrative about independent and very 90's professional women and life in Manhattan, where the real family are your friends and your source of constant energy is the life of the City around you, it's people and the potential for excitement and the new (both experiential, intellectual, sensual and personal). This, SATC did very well in conveying.
In the part that I didn't get it, I could not go beyond the formulaic structure of the show, it's repetetive nature and the fact that nothing much really happened for 5 1/2 seasons. But then, I thought to myself, well maybe that is also a part of being a single person in NYC at a certain point in one's life: time kinda does stand still...though in reality it doesn't and the shock that it doesn't is one which blows you over when you wake up from the NY illusion that it does.
In the part that I got it again....and this was in the end of my fast forward through the six seasons...it seemed that the writers kind of got that feeling too. Suddenly time stopped standing still for Carrie Bradshaw, for Samantha Jones, Miranda and Charlotte. It seemed that they all reached that point in life when the just the thrill of 'Sex' and 'The City' is not enough to cover up the needs and the mortality that we all must face up to, come to terms with and do the best to make the best of and move on.
So it goes.

Arnold Schwarzenegger on Meet the Press

Arnold was on Meet the Press this morning in an interview with Tim Russert.
To be honest, as someone who was a knee jerk opposer to the idea that Arnold should be Governor, I have to say that I was pleasantly surprised by his wit, his intelligence and his focus. All taken together, it seemed that he has the potential to be a very formidable poitical force in the country going forward. I didn't pay too much attention to the substance of the interview, as I didn't feel that was the point...but one can say that it was a very confident and (dare I say, inspiring) performance. Arnold in 2008? I wouldn't bet against it.

Ground Zero Part X

A new and interesting article by Paul Goldberger in The New Yorker on the architectural process at Ground Zero.