100 Days

There's a lot being written about the first 100 days of Trump's presidency; for right now I'm going to share what political scientist/Bloomberg blogger Jonathan Bernstein thinks, from a post written on April 28:

Presidents have had worse weeks than the one ending Donald Trump's first 100 days in office, but most of the examples I can think of include resignation and worse. So far this week (and he still has one more day!) Trump has retreated or been defeated on his Mexico wall, on NAFTA, on sanctuary cities, and on health care reform. The administration went through something like three positions on North Korea. Trump rolled out a tax reform "plan" that not only has been ridiculed from all sides, but is also basically dead on arrival; Trump's one-page of bullet points is vague enough that any Congressional product may resemble it, but he's not likely to be a significant player in shaping what House and Senate Republicans choose to do. 

Beyond that, Trump gave a series of interviews which mostly served to furnish up new humiliations for him, whether it was complaining to Reuters about how unexpectedly hard the job was or obsessing to AP about cable TV news. Other 100-days profiles featured White House staff and Trump friends basically saying the president is ... a moron? “If you’re an adviser to him, your job is to help him at the margins,” said one Trump confidante. “To talk him out of doing crazy things.”

A toddler? Advisers have tried to curtail Trump’s idle hours, hoping to prevent him from watching cable news or calling old friends and then tweeting about it. That only works during the workday, though—Trump’s evenings and weekends have remained largely his own.

Also this week, investigations on the Trump-Russia scandal continued with new revelations about former National Security Advisor Michael Flynn, and a misfire by Ivanka Trump (rapidly walked back) reminded everyone of Trump's other big scandal involving conflicts of interest, nepotism, emoluments, and more.

I suspect I'm missing a few more.  The good news? It's always possible Trump could at least somewhat turn it around. He could hire a real chief of staff empowered to clean up the White House. He could start doing the work he's supposed to be doing -- learning about policy and process. Yes, he does have some potential assets to build on if he is capable of doing so. For that matter, he could still divest his holdings and put an end to what is basically a lawless presidency. 

Realistically, however? What's happening is exactly what anyone with any sense knew what would happen if he became president -- indeed, I agree with Ross Douthat that we've been relatively lucky that it hasn't been worse. We can hope he'll improve as he goes along, but there's really no sign of it so far, and no realistic reason to expect it. (Read the entire post here.) 

America's Least Favorite Airline

photo credit: barrons.com

The good news? It's not United.

The bad news? This is how the headline writer at cnn.com/Money framed the story: "America's least favorite airline (hint: it's not United)"

Clearly United's still got some work to do, and that's before we even heard about the dead rabbit. (The story posted yesterday.) Read it here.

Which airline is America's least favorite, at least according to this report? Spirit.

Bachelorettes With Babies

Wednesday afternoon update: In perusing the coverage of Chris Soules's accident and arrest, I just learned something interesting -- he was asked to go on Bachelor In Paradise, twice. In an interview with ET from last month, he says he said no last year and and doesn't know what to do this year. (Note that this was before the accident. Presumably ABC will rescind the invitation, and Chris couldn't travel to Mexico even if he wanted to, because he has had to surrender his passport.)

I admit I was surprised to hear that someone who has already achieved the highest level of fame and success in Bachelor Nation by starring in his own season would be invited to Paradise, but as I think about it, Chris is still single so perhaps it makes some sense. On the other hand, as I've been saying here for a while, I think the dynamic on BIP this year will be noticeably different. After Nick's redemptive star-making turn last summer, it won't just be about getting more Instagram followers and possibly getting TV-engaged to someone. I assume that everyone who hits the beach this time will be treating the whole thing as an audition to be the next Bach or Bach'ette. Especially the men, who will have the Fall, 2017 shooting schedule of the next Bachelor season firmly in their sights, frantically trying to "pull a Nick" and star in their own season.

And here's a little Bachelor trivia. As best as I can remember only two franchise participants have gotten engaged twice on Bach shows: Emily Maynard, who "won" Brad Womack's second season and got engaged to him, then starred in her own season and got engaged to Jef Holm, and Josh Murray, who "won" Andi's season with an engagement then got engaged to Amanda Stanton last summer on BIP. If things were different and Chris could get engaged on BIP this summer, he would be the third. Emily is now married but Josh, after a nasty break-up with Amanda Stanton, is single. Will he go to Paradise this summer? It wouldn't surprise me.

Speaking of former Bachelorettes, can you name all of them? There are 12, starting with Trista:

1. 2003 Trista Rehn
2. 2004 Meredith Phillips
3. 2005 Jen Schefft
4. 2008 Deanna Pappas
5. 2009 Jillian Harris
6. 2010 Ali Fedotowsky
7. 2011 Ashley Hebert
8. 2012 Emily Maynard
9. 2013 Desiree Hartsock
10. 2014 Andi Dorfman
11. 2015 Kaitlyn Bristowe
12. 2016 JoJo Fletcher

As mentioned below, Trista, Ashley and Desiree are married to the men who won their season. Kaitlyn and JoJo are both still engaged to their winners. Meredith, Jen, Deanna, Ali and Emily are married to non-Bachelor partners and Jillian is engaged to a non-Bachelor man. Andi is single.

Finally, Bach fans, the start of Rachel's season is just 3 1/2 weeks away. According to Reality Steve, the show has just completed filming hometown dates, with the "from four to three" rose ceremony scheduled for tomorrow night.

Original post:
Issue dated May 8, 2017: Bachelorettes With Babies


Oh, the irony. There's currently a huge story in Bachelor Nation, starting yesterday, but it happened too late to be included in this week's issue. In a weird, coincidental bit of cosmically strange timing, however, the distaff side of Bachelor Nation is front and center on the new cover. (Erin Moran and the Teacher and the Teen were on my Guessing Game list.) Thoughts:

Former Bachelor Chris Soules's arrest is the big news, and depending on what happens between now and next Monday, when the new issue closes, I'm assuming his story will be on the cover, maybe not the main story but probably as a sidebar.

The six ex-Bachelorettes featured on this week's cover (Deanna/2008, Jillian/2009, Ali/2010, Ashley/2011, Emily/2012, and Desiree/2013,) represent the "pre-Instagram" era of The Bachelor/ette. They're all on Insta now, ranging from Deanna with 83,700 followers to Jillian with 656,000, but the whole "go on reality TV, shill stuff on Instagram" dynamic hadn't quite exploded when their seasons aired. And for what it's worth, two of the six, Ashley and Desiree, are actually married to the men they got engaged to on the show.

In one of my Blogging The Bach posts about Nick's season, I mentioned that ABC had been featuring former Bachelorettes on Good Morning America; now here's another big mainstream media hit for the franchise. Is all this publicity laying the groundwork for Rachel's barrier-busting season? Almost certainly. Are ex-Bach'ettes Andi/2014, Kaitlyn/2015 and JoJo/2016 a little annoyed this morning? Almost certainly. All three of them are working hard to maintain and monetize their social media influence; it can't be fun to wake up and see six of their older predecessors smiling in the spotlight of a People cover story.  

Finally, Chris Soules's "leaving the scene of a fatal accident" story is a huge black eye for the Bachelor franchise, not to mention a huge distraction from the "happily ever after" People cover story and the excitement surrounding Rachel and her season. Is ABC volcanically pissed off at Soules for his "not such a nice guy after all" turn in the spotlight? Count on it.

The Downside Of Fame

I've said many times that the main reason people go on all the various Bachelor shows is to get famous, and for many of them it works. Now 2015 Bachelor Chris Soules is experiencing the downside of that fame. He's been arrested for leaving the scene of a fatal accident and the story is being covered everywhere, from People.com and ETOnline to USA Today, Time, Variety and even the NY Times. People also dug up information about previous incidents, including "possession of alcohol while under age, speeding and driving under the influence." (Read it here.)

There's no way to know how this will all turn out, but my guess is that for today at least, ex-Bachelor Chris is wishing he was a lot less famous.

The Guessing Game

Tuesday morning update: Elton John's illness could be a story, although news about it may have broken too late for this week's issue.

Original post:
What will be on the cover of People magazine this week? My guesses:

Serena Williams: Pregnant
Elizabeth Thomas: Teenager abducted by her high school teacher, now home with her family
Erin Moran: Dead Celebrity
William, Kate and Harry: Speaking out about mental health
Queen Elizabeth: Going strong at age 91
Alisyn Camerota: A toxic work culture at Fox News
Airline Rage: An incident on an American Airlines plane, soon after the United incident. The same attorney is representing both passengers
Sheryl Sandberg: Promoting a new book
Aaron Hernandez: Suicide in jail, had a secret life
Richard Simmons: Releases a message to his fans
Barack Obama: His first public appearance

Creepy

photo credit: Evan Agnostini/Getty Images

This picture, showing Ivanka, Donald and Melania at the Met Gala in 2004, is from an article at Vanity Fair titled "Inside The Trump Marriage: Melania's Burden." The article is intriguing; this picture is just plain creepy. Read the article here.

Still Thinking About Julia

Monday afternoon update: Julia's Favorite Products are now featured in a story at people.com (read it here.)

A miracle cream called "Absolue Precious Cells," shown above, is one of Julia's faves, and the article notes that you can buy it at bloomingdales.com for $188. It's not shown in the picture but I went to the Bloomies website and the package above contains 1.7 ounces of product. By comparison, the "just the basics" Neutrogena moisturizer I'm currently using comes in a 4-ounce package and costs $10.99, or $2.75 per ounce.

How much do the Precious Cells cost per ounce? $110.58, and even though she can probably afford it, I'm guessing Julia gets hers direct from Lancome, gratis.

Original post:

photo credit: celebrityscentsation.com

As I said in my Most Beautiful post, it's way past time for People magazine, and everyone else, to stop ranking women by their looks. That hasn't happened, of course, and I admit I've been pondering why, exactly, People selected Julia Roberts as the so-called World's Most Beautiful Women this year. She doesn't have a movie coming out, she hasn't written a memoir, she's not having a baby or getting divorced. There's no hook.

Then yesterday I had the chance to read the actual magazine, and the first thing I saw, before I even got to the table of contents, was a full-size, two-page ad for Lancome perfume, featuring guess who? (That's the ad, above,)

Then I turned to the article about Julia, and this is how it starts:

Just look at her and the answer may be obvious--but it's still a good question. Why is Julia Roberts the World's Most Beautiful Woman? At 49, the Lancome ambassador is a testament to the power of good genes, healthy living and restraint from cosmetic enhancement.

Finally, on the next page, a sidebar story titled Julia's Favorite Products and guess what? Two of the four products shown are by Lancome.

The reason Julia's on the cover? Money. In other words, the whole thing is a commercial for Lancome.

A Thousand Words

Six different administrations.

Note: creator asked that I not tag them in this tweet. pic.twitter.com/Z85zrbpPth

— Yashar (@yashar) April 21, 2017

Ode To Jared

You're Jared Kushner and you learn that you've been selected as one of Time magazine's 100 Most Influential people. That has to feel good.

You're Jared Kushner and you learn that no less than Henry Kissinger is writing the laudatory paragraphs that will accompany your picture. That has to feel good.

You're Jared Kushner and this is what Kissinger writes about you:

hilariously lukewarm writeup by Kissinger on Jared Kushner for the TIME 100 pic.twitter.com/mZyrMjIqGW

— Katherine Krueger (@kath_krueger) April 20, 2017

You're Jared Kushner and that has to feel really, really bad.

Late afternoon update: From Vox.com, five things of note in Kissinger's Ode to Jared:

1. The entire thing is the most lukewarm of lukewarm praise, about as generic and uninspired as it comes. One academic I follow on Twitter called it “the letter of recommendation you never want an advisor to send,” which sounds about right.
2. It may have been legitimately hard for Kissinger to say much more about someone who has no formal qualifications in foreign policy or experience in government and is now occupying arguably the most important policy role in the White House. Kissinger can’t be more specific because Kushner doesn’t really have any specific accomplishments in government to point to, other than marrying astutely.
3. In private life, contra Kissinger, Kushner doesn’t have a lot of successes. His tenure as head of the New York Observer was disastrous, his family real estate company’s flagship skyscraper has low occupancy rates and a serious debt problem, and it’s been credibly reported that his dad bought his place at Harvard with a $2.5 million donation.
4. It’s doubly biting because Kissinger is famous in Washington for his ability to flatter people in power in order to gain influence over public policy. If this is the best that America’s foremost master of diplomatic compliments can do — well, that’s pretty embarrassing for Kushner.
5. That last bit, about “flying close to the sun,” is particularly delicious. It’s a reference to the Greek fable of Icarus — son of the famous inventor Daedalus, who built a pair of wings held together with wax. Icarus used his father’s invention to fly too close to the sun, which melted the wax and caused poor Icarus to plummet to his death. It’s a morality tale about hubris, the arrogant belief in your own ability to accomplish more than you can. Kissinger’s phrasing heavily implies that, in this case, Kushner is Icarus.

Most Beautiful: Julia Roberts

Thursday night update: As I explained below, I was curious about how many "Most Beautiful" covers Julia Roberts actually has. In the week leading up to the big reveal yesterday, People.com posted a slideshow with all the past Most Beautiful covers, except for 2010. I was curious about that, so I sent a Twitter message to a People writer:

@misskph Most Beautiful cover archive at https://t.co/7d7FidX6YU doesn't include 2010 issue. Can you post/tweet that cover?

— Kimberly Hanes (@WritingTheWorld) April 20, 2017

I didn't really expect the reporter to respond, but she did:

@WritingTheWorld Unfortunately we can't because of photo rights issues (the cover focus was Sandra Bullock's new baby, not the Most Beautiful Woman), sorry!

— Kate Hogan Berger (@misskph) April 20, 2017

That gave me enough information to go to Google Images and type in "People magazine 2010 Sandra Bullock adopts" and Voila! The missing 2010 cover, with Sandra Bullock as the main story, and Julia Roberts in what I call a "topline tease," naming her the Most Beautiful. Social Media to the rescue, mystery solved. Here's the cover:



Original post:
Issue dated May 1, 2017: Julia Roberts


It's Julia Roberts again, for either the fourth or fifth time. In my Guessing Game post I said she had been the cover choice three previous times, based on the 1991, 2000 and 2005 covers (shown below.) Then, in the teaser article now posted at people.com, they're calling the new cover her fifth:

It’s been 26 years since Julia Roberts was first on the cover of PEOPLE’s World’s Most Beautiful issue, and she’s still our favorite pretty woman. 

The stunning star is, for a record fifth time, the Most Beautiful Woman in the World – though she can hardly believe it. “I am very flattered,” she tells PEOPLE’s editor-in-chief Jess Cagle in this week’s cover story.

Apparently they're including the 2014 cover, where Lupita Nyong'o is the big picture, with Julia (and Jennifer Lawrence and Juliana Margolies) in smaller pictures on the side.

Whatever. My response to all this: Yuck. Rating and ranking women based on their looks is ridiculous and offensive, and claiming that a 49-year-old woman is staying "Forever Young" is just plain stupid. I'd love to see People get away from the whole "Most Beautiful" thing, and for that matter, "Sexiest Man" and "Half Their Size" can go too.

In July, 2013, in a post titled "Dumbed Down and Sexed Up," I compared People's cover stories from 1975 and 2011. Here's what I found, and it's still depressingly true:

People magazine was never the New Yorker, as I used to say, but they used to at least try for some substance some of the time. To put it another way, the stories were mostly about the celebrities' work, not who they're married to or getting divorced from, not how they look in a bikini, and not when their baby is due. These days it's mostly weddings, babies, divorces, crime stories and people who are famous for being on (Reality) television. (Read the entire post here, and note that the online archive isn't online any more.) 

1991


2000


2005


2014

The Guessing Game

People'a annual "Most Beautiful" issue comes out this week, so the big guess is, who will editors designate as the world's most beautiful woman? In the lead-up to the big reveal, they've been counting down seven women who "made the list," which tells us that Oprah, Carrie Underwood, Mandy Moore, Viola Davis, Emma Watson, Teraji P. Henson and Chrissy Metz will *not* be the main cover girl. Who will? I have no idea and not very many good guesses. Beyonce (pregnant with twins,) Meghan Markle (dating Harry) and Gabrielle Union (a memoir coming out) are my best guesses. Caitlyn Jenner also has a book coming out and a 2nd interview with Diane Sawyer this Friday night. Does People have the nerve to go there? Probably not. Another possibility is Melania or Ivanka Trump but People might not want to go there, either.

The new cover will be online Wednesday morning. In the meantime, you know I like lists, so here's a cool list of past Most Beautiful cover picks, and yes, occasionally it's been a man. They've also tweaked the headline over the years.

From 1990 through 2001, the headline read "The 50 Most Beautiful People in the World," starting with Michelle Pfeiffer:
 

1990 Michelle Pfeiffer
1991 Julia Roberts
1992 Jodie Foster
1993 Cindy Crawfod
1994 Meg Ryan
1995 Courtney Cox
1996 Mel Gibson
1997 Tom Cruise
1998 Leonaro DiCaprio
1999 Michelle Pfeiffer
2000 Julia Roberts
2001 Catherine Zeta-Jones

From 2002 through 2005 the headline read simply "50 Most Beautiful People" (except for Nicole's cover, which has a *The*)

2002 Nicole Kidman
2003 Halle Berry
2004 Jennifer Aniston
2005 Julia Roberts

For 2006 through 2009, People went double-or-nothing, with headlines that said "100 Most Beautiful"


2006 Angelina Jolie
2007 Drew Barrymore
2008 Kate Hudson
2009 Christina Applegate

For Jennifer, Beyonce and Gwyneth, People went all out with "World's Most Beautiful Woman"


2011 Jennifer Lopez
2012 Beyonce
2013 Gwyneth Paltrow

For Lupita in 2014 it was back to "50 Most Beautiful"


Then for Sandra and Jennifer in 2015 and 2016, it was back to 'World's Most Beautiful Woman""


2015 Sandra Bullock
2016 Jennifer Aniston

To do a little demographic sorting, three men (Mel Gibson, Tom Cruise and Leonardo DiCaprio) have gotten the cover gig, and Gibson and Cruise have also been called the Sexiest Man Alive. Cindy Crawford was on a "Sexiest Couple" cover with her first husband, Richard Gere. Julia Roberts has three "Beautiful" covers and Michelle Pfeiffer and Jennifer Aniston have two. Three of the women have been married or engaged to Brad Pitt (Paltrow, Aniston and Jolie.) Three of the women (Halle Berry, Beyonce and Lupita Nyong'o) are black, and one, Jodie Foster, is gay.

Who gets the cover this year? We'll know tomorrow. You can see all the Most Beautiful covers here.

This Day In History, 1956: Grace Kelly Marries A Prince

Photo credit: Getty

As the world wonders if Prince Harry will marry Meghan Markle, a look back at another royal wedding in which an American actress married a prince.

The Easter Egg Roll

Like I said a few posts ago, not kid-friendly.

photo credit: Brejdaj Smialowski/AFP Getty Images

Original post:
Past:

Easter Bunny and Secret Service agent, 2015.

A post shared by Pete Souza (@petesouza) on Apr 16, 2017 at 5:51am PDT

Bunny ears, 2014. C'mon admit it, you knew this one was coming.

A post shared by Pete Souza (@petesouza) on Apr 17, 2017 at 6:09am PDT

And present? The first Trump administration Egg Roll is underway. When I see photos I'll post them here.

This Day In History, 1970: Apollo 13 Returns Safely

I've been in a bit of a 60s-retro-astro-space-race place recently, at least in my head. First I watched Hidden Figures, the great movie about black female mathematicians at NASA during the Gemini program. That got me thinking about ABC's fun miniseries about the other women of the times, the Astronaut Wives Club, and Eureka! The whole show is online at abc.com so I watched that too. Finally, to round things out with some Tom Hanks, Kevin Bacon and Gary Sinese, I watched Apollo 13. I probably won't be seen today in a psychedelic miniskirt and bouffant hair, but no promises.

Anyway it was 47 years ago today that Apollo 13 returned safely to earth.

Mission Control celebrating Apollo 13 splashdown today in 1970 https://t.co/fEeFC4f0uu pic.twitter.com/oJTLFIFiSL

— pourmecoffee (@pourmecoffee) April 17, 2017

 

Copy Cats

photo credit: David J. Phillip/AP

Will the "drag the passenger off the plane" incident inspire other customers to try and create a problem on a United flight? Create some kind of a disturbance, get themselves kicked off the plane, plug into social media and hope for Twitter outrage and a big settlement? Looks like it. Here's the headline currently at people.com, about an incident that took place Saturday afternoon:

Utah Couple Claims They Were Kicked Off United Airlines Flight on the Way to Their Wedding (read it here)

Of course if you try something like this you're at the mercy of headline writers, and over at NPR it's no big deal:

Bridal Couple Removed From United Airlines Flight Without Incident
(read it here)

This Day In History, 1912: Titanic Sinks

photo credit: natgeotv.com


photo credit express.co.uk


photo credit: nationalgeographic.com

North Korea: Messing With Their Heads?

Was the big bomb the U.S. just dropped on Afghanistan really a message to North Korea? Josh Marshall at Talking Points Memo thinks it's possible:

We are currently in a tense brinksmanship with North Korea. If we did get into a military confrontation with North Korea, a big part of that would almost certainly be destroying heavily, heavily fortified facilities tied to the nuclear weapons and ballistic missile programs. I’m not a military expert. I don’t know the precise mix of primary blast versus concussion wave, the technical issues with destroying a nuclear weapons facility with the potential to spread nuclear contaminants, how deep the blast goes in fortified underground facilities, whether it’s good at destroying deep, reinforced bunkers rather than tunnels created by low tech paramilitaries, etc. etc. But I have a very hard time believing the decision to use this weapon was not in some way influenced by the desire to send a signal or play a bit of psychological warfare with the North Koreans. The technical issues don’t necessarily matter. If you want to rattle the North Koreans it can work anyway. They don’t know all the technical realities, limitations or how risky a game we might be willing to play. It may be enough to send the signal that Trump doesn’t operate by the rules of his predecessors. Maybe I’m wrong. But it’s a helluva coincidence. (Read the article here.)

Don't Blow It, Melania

"Until you've lived through a White House Easter Egg Hunt, you don't know what hell is."
--Merrie Spaeth, an aide to Nancy Reagan in the White House. (And prior to that, the star of one of my fave movies, The World Of Henry Orient.)









Is the Trump White House going to blow their first Easter Egg Roll? Possibly. The New York Times has an only slightly tongue-in-cheek article about how preparations for the big event are behind schedule, in an article titled "The Latest Test for the White House? Pulling Off Its Easter Egg Roll":

Could this White House, plagued by slow hiring and lacking an on-site first lady, manage to pull off the largest, most elaborate and most heavily scrutinized public event of the year?

“It’s the single most high-profile event that takes place at the White House each year, and the White House and the first lady are judged on how well they put it on,” said Melinda Bates, who organized eight years of Easter Egg Rolls as director of the White House Visitors Office under President Bill Clinton. “I’m really concerned for the Trump people, because they have failed to fill some really vital posts, and this thing is all hands on deck.”  (Read the article here.)  

This administration isn't known for its professionalism and competence. Pictures of crying kids and our decidedly non-kid-friendly POTUS will only add to the perception of rampant doofusness. The event is Monday.