Texas Congressman Blake Farenthold is alleged to have harassed his former communications director, Lauren Greene, in part by talking to her about a female lobbyist who had propositioned him for a threesome.
Have you seen Farenthold? It’s hard to believe any woman would proposition him at all, let alone for a threesome. But if she did, she wouldn’t have to look far for a third party. There’s enough of Farenthold to make two guys.
That might seem a low blow, but you know what, it’s a new day. And one of those signs of that new day is that Senate hopeful and mall exile Roy Moore lost to Doug Jones in Alabama’s special election Tuesday. ...
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Read MoreI once had a movie producer kiss me on the neck.
How’s that for an opening sentence? Pretty good, huh? Got your attention, right?
It was at the end of an interview when, shaking my hand goodbye, he suddenly lurched forward and kissed me on the neck. (It may have been more of a bite than a kiss, but I don’t actually remember and don’t want to overstate what was a pretty bizarre sendoff.)
Afterward, the embarrassed publicist apologized, concerned that I would be writing about this. But I was a young journalist and had, as a woman, been raised to soldier on. So I said, wrote and did nothing about this. And I hadn’t thought about it until Harvey Weinstein’s alleged sexual harassment of, well, just about every woman on the planet opened the floodgates of ew-ness. ...
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Read MoreI had hoped to be writing more about tennis with the US Open underway. I had hoped to be resting from my labors on Labor Day.
But as Eleanor Roosevelt said of World War II, “This is no ordinary time.” With challenges and crisis on the home front and abroad, the time demands we go within to reach out, that we roll up our sleeves intellectually, physically and spiritually and use pleasure as it was always meant to be used – as a dessert rather than a meal.
Perhaps, however, it is still possible for me to write about tennis while also writing about character. Both are subjects of a new book by James Blake...
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Read MoreSo one narcissist has decided to call another narcissist’s bluff.
Mess with the U.S., President Donald J. Trump told his North Korean counterpart Kim Jong-un from his Bedminster, N.J. bunker, er golf club, and the threats “will be met with fire and fury like the world has never seen….”
Ooh, did Steve Bannon – Mr. Apocalypse, Senor Armageddon – write those words for Trumpet? I’m sure Kim is quaking in his little boots. Whatever happened to the words of another famous, at times high-handed Republican, President Theodore Roosevelt, who adopted the West African proverb “Walk softly and carry a big stick”? ...
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Read MoreOne of the paradoxes of the Trump campaign and subsequent administration is a promise that may have the opposite effect of the one it intended.
When the president says he wants to “Make America Great Again” he means to return it to a time when manufacturing, mining and other white, male blue-collar jobs were king. The problem with that is that the rest of the world would also have to return to that time. ...
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Read MoreWhen he won the French Open last June – capping a long-held dream and holding all four Slams, the first man to do so in 47 years – the world was Novak Djokovic’s oyster.
That now seems like a long time ago. He won only one title, the Rogers Cup, during the second half of 2016 and lost his No. 1 ranking to Andy Murray. (Because he had won so many tournaments in 2015 and had to defend all those points under the ranking system, he actually lost points, nothing failing in tennis quite like success.)
At the Australian Open, he lost in the third round in a tournament that was won by the returning Roger Federer, who defeated Rafael Nadal. ...
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Read MoreWith all the viciousness in American politics right now, it’s a pleasure to take a break from it to focus on the Olympics, which begins Friday, and consider the searing questions of the moment, like why has swimmer Ryan Lochte dyed his hair ice-blue? So he’ll look like a merman? Except it makes him look old and flies in the face of his pronouncement that he’s matured. (Do mature people dye their hair blue?) Ryan, Ryan: We still love you.
Lochte and his great rival, Michael Phelps, will be taking one more plunge into the Olympics. Novak Djokovic – who just won his fourth Rogers Cup and 30th Masters title – will be there as well, having bounced back from his Wimbledon upset by Sam Querrey. Andy Murray – who’s shaping up to be his big rival once again, having taken Wimbledon – will also be there, while Rafael Nadal and his tender wrist are questionable.
One big name who won’t be there is Roger Federer, who’s taking the rest of the year off to heal various injuries. ...
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