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Curb your political enthusiasm

A few weeks ago, I started to feel sorry for her. Oh Christ, let her win already...Who cares...It's not worth it. There's not that much difference between them. She can have it. Anything to avoid watching her descend into madness. So I switched. I started rooting for her. It wasn't that hard. Compromise comes easy to me. I was on board.

Only one person could blog like that. It's Larry David on Hillary.

Now, David isn't the most assiduous blogger. He has posted four times in three years. But he makes up for it in quality.

His earlier note from a liberal insomniac is a work of comic brilliance.

He has been lured back to his PC by Hillary's 3am ad. He doesn't like Hillary much:

There have been times in this campaign when she seemed so unhinged that I worried she'd actually kill herself if she lost. Every day, she reminds me more and more of Adele H., who also had an obsession that drove her insane.

And he doesn't want her on the phone:

I watched, transfixed, as she took the 3 a.m. call...and I was afraid...very afraid. Suddenly, I realized the last thing this country needs is that woman anywhere near a phone. I don't care if it's 3 a.m. or 10 p.m. or any other time. I don't want her talking to Putin, I don't want her talking to Kim Jong II, I don't want her talking to my nephew.

Who's the most concerned celebrity?

Some look at this Will.i.am video and think genius. Others see a bunch of celebrities acting a tad self-importantly. We suspect Jon Stewart might fall into the second category. Here's why:

Can a nude Alicia Silverstone persuade you to give up meat?

PETA certainly hope so. Today Chris Ayres writes about this guilt-inducing ad and the carnivorous response. Check out both videos below.

An overweight security guard or Alicia Silverstone?  Round one just may go to the vegetarians.

Alice Fishburn

Another thing you wouldn't see on the BBC

American journalists are revolting. First, MSNBC's Mika Brzezinski refused to report Paris Hilton's release from jail. Now, CNN's Jack Cafferty has refused to report Lindsay Lohan's recent run-in with the police.

Why does the Shilpa Shetty incident spring to mind?

Murad Ahmed

Hilton shatters the God delusion

This amusing Paris Hilton story, reminds me of the very good joke I heard last week on Radio 4:

Richard Dawkins and Chritopher Hitchens must be feeling pretty stupid. They say they can't discover any evidence of God, then Paris Hilton goes to jail and finds him within 24 hours.

The ageing effect of politics

Just a little experiment. Everyone's been commenting on how much the last decade has aged Tony Blair and Gordon Brown. But is this standard for men of their age? Or is it their tough jobs and the cares of office?

So here's some pictures to help make a comparison. First we have Tony Blair, born in 1953 and his contemporaries Peter Mandelson, Griff Rhys-Jones and Graeme Souness. On the left are these four gentlemen in 1997 and on the right we see them today.

Then we have our new Prime Minister, born in 1951, the same year as saw the birth of Sir Bob Geldof, Kevin Keegan and Anthony Worral Thompson.

I'd say that it seems like you age a lot in a decade and not that much more if you go into politics.

Tony Blair

Peter Mandelson

Griff Rhys-Jones

Graeme Souness

Gordon Brown

Sir Bob Geldof

Kevin Keegan

Anthony Worrall Thompson

One rule for Paris Hilton

Paris Hilton's amazing release from jail produced this response from the authorities:

Steve Whitmore of the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department said: "After extensive consultation with medical personnel, it was decided this reassignment should be done."

The Simple Life star would be "confined to her home", must wear an ankle bracelet and would not be allowed out for parties or social functions, he told reporters.

The socialite was in a special unit reserved for high-profile inmates

No details of the medical problem could be given for "privacy reasons", he said, but insisted she had received no special treatment.

He obviously thinks that the fact that it was not special treatment and that everyone is treated like that, makes it better. Can't he see that it makes the incident worse?

Anti-semites - the joke's on you

Iain Dale did not enjoy Borat, and for a creditable reason:

Some of the slapstick moments were worth a titter but the jewish scenes were a disgrace. There is enough anti-semitism in the world at the moment without providing the excuse for more. I do realise it is meant to be a comedy, but it really wasn't funny. Discuss.

Creditable, as I say, but not a view I share.

There has been a debate about this among Jews, with the US anti-defamation league attacking Sacha Baron Cohen. But I think (admittedly unscientifically, I haven't got a poll to hand) that the vast majority share my view. Borat is a vicious satire on anti-semitism.

I think East Europeans might have cause to be upset, but most Jews are laughing. Admittedly a little uncomfortably, since Borat's views are too close to those truly held by others for complete comfort, but laughing nevertheless.

Dawkins on Gorbachev

Does Richard Dawkins really regard the fall of the Communist leader Mikhail Gorbachev as regrettable?

Yes, I am afraid he does.

How Britain has become a better place

This morning's Times obituary of John Inman finished with this:

For the past 30 years, Inman lived in a mews house near the canal in Little Venice, West London, despite a fire in 2004. After a lifetime of living in hotel bedrooms, he enjoyed leading a life of quiet, domestic routine.

Inman was a private man who did not like talking about his sexuality, but in 2005 he entered into a civil partnership with his partner of 35 years, Ron Lynch.

But just eight years ago, Inman still felt it necessary to say this.

(UPDATE: For more, read Matthew Parris's excellent piece published this saturday)

Don't forget Young Mr Grace

John Inman's death is obviously sad. But I am afraid I can't just sit here and take all this stuff about Mr Humphries being the central character in Are You being Served?

The most important character, without doubt, was Young Mr Grace (Old Mr Grace doesn't get out much these days.)

Think about how many bosses's speeches you have either heard or given which are just variants of his immortal line:

You're all doing very well

What do politicians and rock stars have in common?

Brian Eno is an important man, of course he is. He programmed the synthesizers on Roxy Music's Do The Strand, for instance.

This morning on the Today programme he explained why people are more likely to trust his view on, say, the future of the nuclear deterrent than they would the view of a politician:

People listen to pop stars and other celebrities because they really don't trust politicians to tell them anything other than their party line. You know, in general, that's true. If you listen to debate programmes like Any Questions you could almost predict to the word what every single politician is going to say, because you know what their party's line is.

This is actually a rather good description of one of the main reasons why people have lost faith in politicians. But it was rather irritating to hear it come from a rock musician.

Is there any group of individuals with more predictable political views than rock musicians? Eno was speaking on the occasion of the launch of his campaign against Trident. How unexpected does he think that is?

The party line among musicians is stronger than that of any political party. Atomic Kitten's Liz McClarnon gave a neat summary of it in her reason for opposing the Iraq War:

There's enough trouble already, what with cancer and everything else

I'm still waiting for a centre right rock star with neo-con sympathies.

An ordinary councillor

Iain Dale claims that Preston of the Ordinary Boys is intending to run as a Tory council candidate. Iain expresses the hope that the star will be judicious in his public statements.

When asked last year by the Times whether it was time for the Prime Minister to go, Mr Preston responded:

Personally, I would be happy with Gordon Brown stepping in now, it’s time for an overhaul.

He added:

Public opinion counts for a lot, and Blair’s not been good with that recently, has he? With him saying “God was on my side over Iraq” — that was such a Bushism — and the recent money for peerage scandals. He’s been in power now for ten years, which is too long, like some f***ing banana republic or something.

Judicious enough for you, Iain?

Camille Paglia on Anna Nicole Smith

How can you not warm to a woman who described Gwyneth Paltrow as:

a preening, pampered princess who's been foisted on the public by a bicoastal media cabal

Well, my favourite self-described "bisexual feminist egomaniac" (for it is Camille Paglia) is back in the blogosphere. She returns to Salon with a monthly column for her thoughts/meanderings. She can be hit and miss, but when she's good she's very good on pop culture.

Here's her take on Anna Nicole Smith:

The real problem was that the broad, Technicolor comedic films in which Smith might have thrived are no longer made - except in Bollywood. The declining, glamorous studio system that created Monroe and her imitator Mansfield is long gone. Smith had genuine talent but no place to put it. Oddly, with her aimless hejira over, she has attained permanent star status in the pictorial dynasty of doomed blond sex symbols. We're sure to go mad with the dogged omnipresence of her story, but Anna Nicole is here to stay.

Robbie Millen

Big Brother Breaking News: Has everybody gone nuts?

Has everyone gone mad? Have we totally lost the plot?

Big Brother is just the most boring, stupid, trivial, non-event. It is as interesting as watching CCTV pictures of people buying yoghurt in Tesco.

Yesterday, two women had an argument about a stock cube. This was Breaking News on Sky. The Prime Minister commented. Gordon Brown read out a statement.

Keith Vaz has put down an early day motion. Hasn't he got anything better to do? If he's got time on his hands he could spend it answering the remaining questions about his business affairs put to him by the Parliamentary standards watchdog. It is not surprising that he'd rather talk about light entertainment.

Everyone in Big Brother is being paid to be there. Everyone who goes on it knows the score. There are no victims.

Now get back to work.

Why I admire Victoria Beckham

I like the Beckhams. This is an eloquent description of everything that's right about Posh.

Paris Hilton keeps us sane

Britain has Jade Goody, Tara Palmer-Tomkinson, Lady Victoria Hervey and a legion of other famous-for-being-famous celebrities, but none of them even begins to rival in terms of unfathomable mega-stardom what America offers. Yes, the United States has given Paris Hilton to a grateful world.

The City Journal, a seriously clever think-tank quarterly, has a superb piece by Kay Hymowitz on Ms Hilton, the Trash Princess and why Americans (and let's face it the rest of the world too) love to hate "the most powerful snark magnet in history". Hymowitz says:

She has become a synonym for American materialism, bad manners, greed, "like" and "whatever" Valley Girl inarticulateness, parochialism, arrogance, promiscuity, antifeminism, exposed roots and navels, entitlement, cell-phone addiction, anorexia and bulimia, predilection for gas-guzzling private transportation, pornified womanhood, exhibitionism, narcissism — you name it.

Hymowitz suggests, amongst other things, that we love to hate Paris Hilton because she refuses to "observe the rules of trust-fund decorum" and has become "a caricature who allows us to mock the undeserving and decadent rich." Hymowitz also argues that Paris has:

this isn't just metaphorical - sold her soul... She deliberately and programmatically offered herself up to us as an "It," a being without an inner life, a personality whose only value is to be seen and known by all. She is, in other words, the total incarnation of postmodern identity, the individual who has disappeared completely — and happily — into her image.

I wonder whether all this is a bit high falutin? Maybe, just maybe, the people who watch her programmes, buy her products and listen to her records actually like her. And that the commentators who despise her simply despise the rest of popular culture too. Nonetheless, Hymowitz's pay-off is very punchy and stylish:

Paris Hilton may be a composite of contemporary American sins, but hating Paris Hilton is another thing entirely. It’s a sign of lingering cultural sanity.

So should America and the rest despair at the existence of Paris Hilton? Or should we just say, in true Paris-style, whatever?

Robbie Millen

Timing is everything

I certainly picked a great moment for my defence of celebrity remuneration.

German footballers, Pop Idol and superstar wages

I share with my new chum Chris Dillow an interest in superstar wages. The efficiency, or otherwise, and the moral value, or otherwise, of paying footballers and other superstars vast wages just keeps coming up in debate.

So I'm interested in two papers that Mr Dillow links to (his posts are here and here). They are both from the University of Zurich, the first dealing with German footballers' salaries, the second with the remuneration of celebrities who have appeared on the Pop Idol television show.

Dillow is interested in them because the papers are an attempt to shed light on the competing theory of celebrity - that of Sherwin Rosen and that of Moshe Adler. And the suggestion seems to be that the second paper corroborates the findings of the first. I think it's more subtle than that, and more interesting.

I'll explain briefly.

Rosen's superstar pay theory is, roughly, that a large number of people want to pay a small amount each to see only a very few big stars. Those stars are the most talented individuals and identifiable as such. They then collect big salaries.

Adler sees things differently. He thinks it is hard to differentiate between the talent, say of Madonna and Rod Stewart. What happens, as much through luck as anything else, is that certain people become famous because people begin to talk about them to others. The value of a star is largely their shared place in the national dialogue (less pompously put, it's in our ability to gossip about them). The market value of a star may not then relate much to their talent.

The Zurich academics study these competing models of stardom and conclude that Adler is right. It seems from the data that things other than footballing talent determine the market value of German footballers.

Then comes their Pop Idol paper.

Here the authors conclude that media companies have begun to create their own celebrities, with no talent at all. These celebrities are just as good as the talented stars at generating market value, but not as good at keeping the money.

The celebrities, you see, have to bargain for their share of the value created, and they don't do that well. Media barons like Simon Fuller and Simon Cowell tie them into contracts before they even appear on the show. Thus, by the time they become stars, it is the media companies not them who are exploiting most of the market value.

So Alder wins? Not so fast.

The second paper seems to me not to corroborate the first but to qualify it. Yes, it is possible for relatively less talented celebrities to be valued as highly by the market as real, properly talented, stars. What they can't do so easily, as the Pop Idol study suggests, is capture the value for themselves. The big money goes to the media companies.

What's the reason for this? It's because the media companies, not the celebrities, are the real stars.

So, while Adler appears to suggest that talentless people are being paid superstar wages, it's really not as simple as that. The talented, brilliant, creative people like Fuller, Cowell and John De Mol are being paid the superstar wages.

Dillow suggests that the papers from Zurich show that superstar wages are not efficient.  I don't think they do show this.