Notebook
By Kathleen Adams, Harriet Barovick, Ginia Bellafante, Daniel S. Levy, Lina Lofaro, Jodie Morse, Michele Orecklin, Flora Tartakovsky
WINNERS & LOSERS
[WINNERS]
AL GORE Janet Reno declines to appoint an independent counsel. Time to make calls about cash for 2000?
SUSAN MCDOUGAL Not guilty of bilking the Mehtas. Opportunity to get the good suit dry-cleaned before next case
RICKY WILLIAMS Texas Longhorn breaks 22-year-old football record for rushing. Hurry on, Heisman
[& LOSERS]
AUGUSTO PINOCHET UGARTE Looks like he picked the wrong hospital. Brits decide torture isn't something covered by immunity
ROSS PEROT Hulk Hogan is running for President in 2000. That's going to really splinter the crazy vote
DENNIS RODMAN He was drunk when he married Carmen Electra? And what did she have, cataracts?
DOES MOURNING BECOME ELECTRA?
You probably think the all-too-brief union between Dennis Rodman and Carmen Electra is funny. But might the affair really be a Sophoclean tragedy? Consider the eerie similarities to the play Electra, circa 413 B.C.
ELECTRA
--Given her name by her mother and father, the King
--With brother Orestes, advised by important oracle, Apollo
--Distraught over the death of her father, moodily declines an invitation to a party for the maidens of her village
--Elevates herself from menial worker to triumphant, vindicated heroine
CARMEN ELECTRA
--Given her first name by the Artist Formerly Known as Prince
--Advised by important publicist, Cindy Guagenti
--Distraught over being in Salt Lake City for a basketball game, moodily declares Utah "boring"
--Elevates herself from Playboy model to B-list actress
DIPLOMACY FOR DUMMIES
Seven years of protests and threats have yet to yield positive results in dealings with the Tyrant of the Tigris. Time to bring in the secret weapon: Dr. Spock and Co.
SADDAM'S BEHAVIOR
Arguing. Saddam complains U.N. sanctions are too harsh.
"Some children get into a pattern of turning every request into a debate...Instead of trying to one-up the child with a better argument, the parent simply walks away." (Wimpy Parents: From Toddler to Teen--How NOT to Raise a Brat)
Aggressive language. Saddam says too many U.N. weapons inspectors are American.
"Some children use aggression to gain attention...Though you might find his words upsetting, you will confuse him if you respond by getting angry...A child wants to be stopped from doing harm." (Your Child: What Every Parent Needs to Know)
Tantrums. Saddam expels inspectors.
"If a child discovers that he can consistently override adult power, he will come to understand that he can get his way by bullying...Victory may feel sweet at the moment, but a child who feels too powerful can also feel anxious that the grownups...are actually afraid of him." (Your Child: What Every Parent Needs to Know)
THE U.S. RESPONSE
Threats. "General Henry H. Shelton...said the proposed strike was 'still a valid operational plan.'" (New York Times, 11/17/98)
"Avoid threats as much as possible. They tend to weaken discipline...In a sense, a threat is a dare--it admits that the child may disobey. It should impress him more to be firmly told [what to do] if he knows from experience that his parents mean what they say." (From Dr. Spock's Baby and Child Care)
Punishment. U.N. imposes sanctions.
"After you've set your rules and boundaries, but your children make the decision not to follow them, it's the time for punishment...Make the punishment memorable. Make the punishment appropriate to the crime...This is not a test you can afford to fail." (Parenting for Dummies)
United Action. "...it was clear that the substance of talks was leaking immediately to the Iraqis." (New York Times, 11/18/98)
"There will be times when you and your mate disagree on how to handle certain situations...If you're inconsistent with these rules, your child will be confused, decide not to listen to either one of you, or--worse yet--play you both off of each other." (Parenting for Dummies)
REEL MEN
JOE SCHMO He seems to be getting a lot of work in films these days. His oeuvre...
MOVIE MEET JOE BLACK MIGHTY JOE YOUNG MY NAME IS JOE ACTOR Brad Pitt special effects Peter Mullan JOE IS death incarnate 15-ft. gorilla soccer coach QUIRK eats peanut butter likes lullabies is Scottish GETS GIRL? yes yes no GRADE below-average Joe average Joe above-average Joe
POET'S CORNER
NEXT: HITLER'S HAIKUS Looking for something for that hard-to-please war criminal on your list? A new collection of ethnic-cleanser Radovan Karadzic's poetry is coming out soon. It's available only in Greece, but here's a taste of his work, from his 1970 poem Sarajevo.
I hear that misfortune truly marches like an insect And when time nears Crushed will be the insect, like the singer Crushed by silence transforming him to sound I know that all this foretells mourning What is being prepared in the garage by that black metal?
--Reported by Anthee Carassava/Athens
KREMLINOLOGY
AND STALIN HAS THE FLU Official statements that the hospitalized Boris Yeltsin is merely susceptible to colds hark back to a bygone era:
FEBRUARY 1985: The Kremlin assures a CNN reporter that President Konstantin Chernenko's five-week absence is attributable to a winter vacation. A month later, he dies.
JANUARY 1984: The Kremlin says Yuri Andropov, absent from public view for more than 120 days, is feeling better after suffering from "a cold." One month later, he dies.
APRIL 1982: Kremlin officials attribute a four-week absence by Soviet leader Leonid Brezhnev to a "routine winter vacation." Within the year, he dies.
HIGH STYLE
NARCO CHIC Fashion is nothing if not aspirational. Slip on a black shift dress--look like Audrey Hepburn! Or don a shirt with images of AK-47s and feel like a Latin American drug trafficker! This is the fantasy being played out by clean-cut men in Mexico who are making popular a dope-inspired high style. After all, it's not a crime to wear a loud shirt in public.
NUMBERS
90 Percentage of the domestic oil-refining market that Standard Oil controlled in 1911 prior to being broken up by the government for antitrust violations
14 Percentage of the domestic market that Exxon and Mobil would control after their proposed merger, creating the largest oil company in the world
$1.05 Average U.S. price of a gallon of gas
$1.36 Average price of a gallon of gas in 1973--calculated in 1998 dollars--just prior to the oil embargo
$4.76 Cost of a gallon of Evian water
1.3 billion Number of people worldwide without access to clean water
16.8 Average number of years Americans go to school or college, up from 16.3 years in 1990
11 U.S. ranking for average number of years of schooling compared to other countries (Australia is No. 1)
1 U.S. ranking in 1990
Sources: Los Angeles Times, Consultative Group of International Agricultural Research, Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development, New York Times
60 SECOND SYMPOSIUM
DON'T BRING ME DOWN Destruction seems to be a natural human impulse. We asked our panel of architects which buildings they wish were still around:
Philip Johnson, designer of the Glass House, New Canaan, Conn.: "Let us resurrect my four favorite people places: in New York, Pennsylvania Station; in Paris, Les Halles; in London, the Crystal Palace; in Tokyo, Frank Lloyd Wright's Imperial Hotel. I knew them well and continue to mourn their demolition."
Rafael Moneo, Pritzker Prize winner and architect for the new extension to Houston's Museum of Fine Arts: "The Library at Alexandria [in Egypt]. I very much would like to see how people in those years understood what an active public space should be."
Maya Lin, sculptor, furniture designer and architect of Washington's Vietnam Veterans Memorial: "Pennsylvania Station in New York City, which I only know from photographs but which remains to me one of the great architectural losses of our time."
With reporting by Anthee Carassava/Athens