What a mess.

Britney Spears, Lindsay Lohan, Paris Hilton, Nicole Richie: Put them together and what have you got? Multiple arrests, stints in jail, a messy divorce, several lawsuits, aborted rehab stays, public nudity, downright trashiness and little, if any, talent.

I haven’t really figured out why any of these girls are famous, especially Hilton and Richie, who cannot even claim to be actresses or singers. (Hilton’s embarrassing appearance in “House of Wax” does NOT count.) Spears had a couple catchy songs about a decade ago; Lohan was once a decent enough actress to land roles in films starring much better actors. Now they seem to be famous for their all-too-exposed anatomies. Hilton and Richie seem to be celebrities simply because they were born rich. No wonder these girls are so screwy.

I saw this morning that Richie was sentenced to four days in jail. I don’t know what for. I can’t keep track. Lohan’s in rehab again, I think. Hilton’s out of jail at the moment. Does anyone know where Britney is? Bet you $50 she’s not with her children.
A few years ago, I could feel a bit sorry for most of these girls, but they’re getting too old for this nonsense now. Plus, they’re becoming mothers! Once you have a baby, you are no longer the center of your universe. All your issues should take a backseat to the needs of your child. But I just don’t see that happening with these horribly self-absorbed girls. Nicole Richie is pregnant now. God help her child. I heard Britney’s ex-husband is suing for full custody of their kids. How terrible a mother do you have to be to make Kevin Federline look like a good parent?!

My main concern, though, is not for these trashy girls or even for their unfortunate children. I’m worried about what they’re doing to America’s young women. All their ridiculous behavior is teaching our girls that you can act like a stupid, drugged-out, skanky criminal and be rich and famous for it. That’s disgusting. How am I supposed to teach my daughter to be a strong, educated, whole person when she has all these idiots staring at her from every magazine, website and television?

The kindest thing we can do for Spears and her ilk and the smartest thing we can do for our daughters is to ignore these young Hollywood fools. Don’t buy a magazine that sports them on the cover, don’t go to websites that spin their stories, and turn the channel when they pop up on the TV. Maybe they’ll eventually learn that there are bad consequences for bad behavior and clean up their acts. In the meantime, I’ll just try to keep my daughter out of rehab, out of jail and out of court. If only these girls’ parents could do the same.

As I’ve mentioned before, I don’t go to a lot of movies. They’re too expensive. People are too annoying. It’s too hard to get a babysitter.

Still, some films are compelling enough to make me shell out a bunch of money, get a sitter and brave the jerk next to me talking throughout the movie. So far this summer, I’ve gone to three films, which is a lot for me. Here are my reviews if you’re interested.

1. Pirates of the Caribbean: At World’s End - As a former Disney cast member and devout Johnny Depp fan, it hurts me to say this film disappointed me. Great special effects and wonderful music, but the plot is downright silly. The first third of the film is fun, the second third is confusing, and the final third is a real downer. Whereas the previous two films were energizing, I walked out of this one almost depressed. My sister leaned over to me at one point and whispered, “Is it possible for a movie to ‘jump the shark?’” If it is possible, then this one did. Maybe my expectations were too high; I saw the midnight showing with my sister on opening week in May, and I’d planned to take my husband and son that weekend. They still haven’t seen it, and it’s July.

2. Ratatouille - My two-year-old daughter drove us nuts for a month, making us play the trailers over and over on the Internet. I thought this movie would be cute. It was much better than that. The animation is beautiful! I’ve been to Paris several times, and I would never have dreamed that animation could do it justice. Pixar’s rendering of the city was spot-on. Admittedly, I’m a Disney freak, a Francophile, and a gourmet, so the film probably had an unfair advantage with me. But it was engaging and lovely and kept my toddler and six-year-old son still for an hour and a half. Any movie that can do that has to be doing something right!

3. Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix - I’ve read all 6 books multiple times, so unless this movie sucked, I was going to like it. It did not suck, so I loved it. The special effects are fabulous. The film moves very quickly, and you get to see some parts of Hogwarts and some areas of Harry’s life that have heretofore been neglected. The sets are magnificent, especially the Ministry of Magic. The headquarters of the Order of the Phoenix is just what I expected, although I was disappointed that Sirius’s mother was left out. I will definitely see the film again. All that being said, though, I have to admit, of the 5 Harry Potter films, this is the only one where you could get lost if you haven’t read the book. If you’ve seen the other films, you’ll probably be alright, but you may want to consult your friends who’ve read the book just to clarify some things. It doesn’t stand on its own feet as steadily as the previous four. Still, it is exciting and gorgeous, and watching these characters grow up before our eyes is a treat. They are amazing kids, and they’re becoming great actors too. I’m taking my husband and son this weekend.

I’m not planning to see any other movies this summer unless my husband, a longtime Simpsons fan, really wants to see that one in the theater. The trailer for Disney’s “Enchanted” is hilarious, though. It comes out at Thanksgiving. November looks promising!

The other day, Senator John McCain was a guest on The Daily Show with Jon Stewart. The interview was remarkable for a couple reasons, not the least of which was the dynamic between Stewart and McCain. Although they disagree on most issues, they seem to have a genuine respect and admiration for each other’s work that shines through even when they’re having heated discussions.

For me, McCain is a problematic figure. I have admired him for years. When he was running for president, I probably would have voted for him. His recent support for the Iraq War, however, has left me scratching my head. I don’t seem to be the only one either.

One of the most telling moments of his Daily Show appearance occurred when Stewart challenged the Bush administration’s definition of “supporting our troops.” McCain said that he had talked to many soldiers who believe in the president and what they’re doing in Iraq. Even before the Stewart’s young audience started booing, I was frowning and shaking my head at the television. “What soldiers is he talking to?” I wondered.

I teach college, and many of my students are in the armed forces. Last semester, I had a total of 14 former and/or active military personnel IN ONE CLASS! This semester, I had two students who had to drop my class because they were called up for active duty - again. One of them brought me a newspaper article last week. He pointed to a headline that said Bush was going to veto Congress’s Iraq War budget/timeline bill. “How many votes does it take to override a veto?” he asked. “I really don’t want to go back over there.”

Evidently, Senator McCain isn’t hearing the same things from soldiers that I am. Is he lying? No, I don’t think so. He seems like a very good man. He is a decorated war veteran himself, a former POW. I cannot imagine any decent man with such horrific war experiences lying about his fellow soldiers’ feelings.

So last night, I was watching President Bush addressing soldiers at US Central Command Headquarters in Florida just a few hours before he was to veto the Congress bill. The military personnel were all standing around their Commander-in-Chief, smiling and shaking his hand. Then it hit me.

Catherine the Great.

According to legend, Russian empress Catherine the Great went on a tour of her country in the 18^th century. One of her favorite courtiers, Potemkin, ran ahead of Catherine’s entourage, “cleaning up” the rundown villages and even building facades over the more dilapidated buildings. When Catherine came through, she found scrubbed, smiling serfs and quaint, country cottages. She had no idea of the squalid misery in which her people lived because the people around her made sure she never saw it.

I believe something similar is happening to John McCain, George Bush, Condoleeza Rice, Dick Cheney and many other members of the conservative elite. Whenever these folks walk into a military installation, they get the Potemkin Village effect. All their advisors and peons have run ahead to make sure only the good little soldiers with their nodding heads and smiling faces get to meet the big honcho who has come to visit.

I’m not blaming the soldiers, of course. I’m as vehemently opposed to most of President Bush’s policies as anyone I know. If I got the change to meet him, though, would I walk up and start telling him everything he was doing to bring down our nation? Uh, no. First, I’d probably get a full-body tackle from any number of Secret Service agents. Second, I get star-struck and tongue-tied around the bass player for Duran Duran. Can you imagine how I’d get around the leader of the free world? Even if he is one of my least favorite people on the planet?

Plus, soldiers are immersed in military culture. To survive in combat, they have to be trained a certain way, and that includes following orders in the chain of command. If their commanding officer tells them to shut up and smile at the nice senator, that is what they have to do. If their Commander-in-Chief walks in, they are not going to tell him to drop dead unless they want an immediate ticket to a court martial.

So who is to blame for the misinformation, the misleading experiences being fed to our nation’s leaders about how our soldiers feel about the Iraq War? We certainly can’t blame our folks in uniform. We can’t really blame the leaders themselves. They can really only believe what they see and hear. Still, they are seeing and hearing what they want to see and hear. They have made their opinions so unquestionable as to make it impossible for anyone to tell them otherwise.

All in all, I wish Senator John McCain had been at my side yesterday. “How many votes does it take to override a veto?” And I always thought that U.S. government stuff I learned in high school would never really make much difference to me.

When I was a little girl, I saw a cartoon based on Rudyard Kipling’s Rikki-tikki-tavi, the mongoose hero of The Jungle Book who defeated evil cobras. I didn’t like the cartoon, primarily because the villainous snakes terrified me; therefore, I watched it only once. One line, however, has stuck with me for thirty years. One of the cobras hisses to the human child it is threatening, “If you move, I will strike. If you don’t move, I will strike.” Scary, even now.

Maybe it is especially scary now.

For the past six years, our political, military and even religious leaders have been using the threat of another 9/11-like terrorist attack to promote their decisions. If we don’t invade Iraq, we’ll be attacked. If we don’t pass the Patriot Act, we’ll be attacked. If we don’t allow our phone conversations to be monitored, we’ll be attacked. If we leave Iraq, we’ll be attacked. If we don’t ban gay marriage, we’ll be attacked.

Now, Rudy Giuliani, hero of 9/11, has warned us: if we elect a Democrat to the Presidency, we’ll be attacked.

Please forgive me for my profanity, but that is bullshit. (Sometimes the most appropriate word happens to be a profane one.)

Here is what I must say to anyone who gives me the line again: it doesn’t matter. It just doesn’t. Perhaps it sounds like a pessimistic thing to say. I certainly don’t like saying it, but I do believe it. Terrorists don’t care much about big-idea politics; I doubt many of them have any better understanding of the differences between Democrats and Republicans than President Bush has of the differences between Shi’ites and Sunnis. We can pass any law we want, or not pass it. We can monitor phone conversations or not. Leave Iraq or stay. Ban gay marriage or sponsor a cross-country gay pride parade. Doesn’t matter. Not at all.

These terrorists are like the horrifying snakes that gave me nightmares as a little girl. If they get the opportunity, they will strike. Period.

Most people don’t want to face the idea that there are things we cannot predict, cannot control, and cannot prevent. Most people want to cling to the idea that every thing that happens, happens for a reason; therefore, if we just make the right decisions, we can ensure that the right things happen. If you follow that impossible line of thinking, (as Voltaire did superbly in Candide – great book, you should check it out if you haven’t already!) then every baby whose father dies in the Iraq War, deserves to be fatherless. Every child born with cystic fibrosis deserves their pain. Every mother who loses a son or daughter to a drunk driver, deserves their tragedy. They made the wrong decisions.

These are hateful ideas. They necessitate the existence of an angry and unforgiving God who cruelly punishes every tiny transgression. They allow us to wallow in paranoia, fear and fury. They force us to walk on eggshells, second-guess our every move and sift through our own pasts to determine what we have done to deserve our fates.

Sadly, for most people, hate, fear, and anger come easy. The terrorists certainly know that. They feed on it.

Unlike President Bush, Dick Cheney, Rudy Giuliani and the many evangelicals running around screaming about terrorist threats and divine punishments, liberal Christians realize that God’s plan is unknowable. He doesn’t say, “Oh, Joe used my name in vain today; I’m going to give him cancer.” We also accept that true evil is not something we can prevent. It is; it always has been; it will be until the end.

So again, I say, it doesn’t matter. Stay in Iraq or get out. Elect a Democrat or a Republican or even an independent. It does not matter to the terrorists, folks. If we move, they will strike. If we don’t move, they will strike.

Human beings naturally want to make sense out of senseless things.

April 16, 2007 was a senseless day. It was a nightmare that unfolded so slowly, we didn’t realize how horrific it was until it was over. For me, I happened to notice a headline on Yahoo news in the morning: 1 dead and 1 wounded in Virginia Tech shooting. Sad, yes, but I kind of forgot about it as I got my son off to kindergarten and headed off to work. In the afternoon, as I was walking from the library to my classroom, I passed a TV surrounded by students watching CNN. The death toll was up to 21. I called my husband to find out what had happened. “Some crazy guy just started shooting people,” he said. By the time my class was over, 33 people had died.

My students weren’t talking about it much. They are busy getting ready for finals, and many of them hadn’t had time to look at the news all day. Now that the full magnitude of what happened has set in, though, people are subdued.

Since I work on a college campus, I can’t help but wonder: what if it had happened here? Would our police have reacted differently? Would they have closed the campus after the first two shootings in the morning? Would a gunman be able to trap students in a building and pick them off one by one? The truth is, this tragedy could probably have happened at all the universities I’ve known.

The campus where I currently teach is large and urban. If someone had shot a couple people in the dorms a quarter mile from the building where I teach, I doubt if our police would have closed the whole school down. There are a lot of buildings between the dorms and my classroom. Police would probably not have considered it necessary to lock down my building. I probably would not have considered it necessary.

Would a gunman have been able to trap students in my building? Sure. It’s six stories, three stairwells and one elevator. Each classroom has only one door as most classrooms do, and the upper story windows are unable to be opened. It wouldn’t take much to pick us off – just a gun and a lack of conscience.

And I’m sure my school has a loose cannon or two just waiting for their fuses to be lit. Once in a while, I hear scary stories from my colleagues about students who write disturbing papers or even threaten their professors or classmates. I have been lucky enough never to have such a student in my own class. Yet.

So now the investigations and the debates have begun. What set him off? Why did he wait two hours between the first shootings and the later ones? Why did he have the words “Ismail Ax” on his arm? Why didn’t the police lock down the campus? Why don’t we have tougher gun laws? How can we make schools safer? Why is the United States experiencing so many school shootings?

The very sad thing is that most of these questions just cannot be answered. Not in any useful way. We may be able to make some changes; we may be more aware, but it will probably be temporary.

This tragedy was senseless. That may be the hardest thing for us to come to terms with.