Well, I'm in a relationship. He loves me. Hmmm. And that's all I will say about that.

I haven't written anything, of any sort, in months, and it's strange how this blank space is so intimidating at the moment. I've had thoughts, of course, but just haven't had the impulse to transpose them to written form. I'm not sure if that's a good or a bad thing, given my history of compulsive writing. But enough neurotic ramblings (yes, even I tire of it).

A shout-out to Joe's political blog. He's one of my best friends, and obviously, a much, much better political writer and thinker than I could ever hope to be.

Despite not being his biggest fan (amongst college friends, I'm rather notorious for writing a letter in which I envisioned castrating him), I've been pretty impressed with Clinton's interviews for his autobiography, specifically on Larry King and on NPR's Fresh Air with Terry Gross. I had forgotten how incredibly smart he is, and how very human he is. I expected Slick Willie ambiguities and evasions to questions, but he's been very honest and thoughtful about his mistakes, and stated his opinions strongly and unequivocally. I was really glad that he mentioned that one of his biggest regrets was not taking action about the genocide in Rwanda, and that he seemed haunted by it. After seeing the terrific documentary "The Last Just Man" about the genocide, and reading and listening to interviews with General Romeo Dallaire, I was horrified that such an unspeakable tragedy could happen on his watch (although I know that hindsight is always 20/20). Despite not being much of a constitutional scholar myself (for shame, I know), I found his thoughts about the Constitution pretty fascinating. Perhaps it will give me the push I need to learn more about the cogs and wheels of our government. I also really enjoyed how he shared his knowledge about the personal demons of past presidents, particularly Lincoln's deep depression, of which I was completely unaware. While I don't agree with everything Clinton did as president, and I still am disgusted by the Monica Lewinsky scandal (although I found the Republicans' response to it, and the ridiculously expensive investigation, even more disgusting), I like him much more now. But then, maybe it's easier to appreciate the humanity of presidents after they've left office and are able to speak more frankly.

SigOth wanted to see a western last night, and we checked out a wacky Paul Newman western called The Life and Times of Judge Roy Bean. It's unlike anything I've ever seen...kind of a series of strange hallucinations taking place in the Wild West. The Sesame Street-esque scene of Judge Roy Bean and his obsequious Mexican girlfriend bathing a bear (yep) in a river, with an impossibly cheezy folksy song playing in the background, in the midst of a series of hangings and gunfights, was almost too much for me. But anyway, what struck me was the use of a very Caucasian/white actress, Victoria Principal (on the left), to play the Mexican girlfriend character of Maria Elena. There are a bunch of other examples of Caucasian or white actors who play non-white characters...There was that evil mulatto character from D.W. Griffith's The Birth of a Nation who threatened the virginal Southern belle by asking her for a kiss, prompting her to jump off a cliff to escape him and preserve her purity...the actor was obviously Caucasian, with some shoe polish or some nonsense smeared unevenly over his face. There was the white actress (Luise Rainer) who played the dutiful Chinese wife O-Lan in the film adaptation of Pearl Buck's The Good Earth, and actually won a Best Actress Oscar in 1937. And probably a zillion more examples exist in movies I haven't yet seen. In any case, this no longer appears to be accepted practice, at least in a blatant way. There are still some inexact character/actor ethnicity matches, such as Lucy Liu, a Chinese-American actress, playing Japanese characters, Jennifer Lopez playing an Italian-American in that crappy wedding planner movie, or Lou Diamond Phillips playing everything non-white under the sun. I'm not sure if I feel strongly about matching character/actor ethnicities. It could be troublesome particularly for actors of minority ethnicities to be limited to only playing characters who share their specific ethnicities, because obviously non-white roles aren't exactly abundant in Hollywood. I could see why actors of minority races would raise a fuss if a Caucasian actor were cast in non-Caucasian roles, because non-Caucasian actors have a hard enough time finding roles to play...and I imagine that many directors care about "authenticiy," whatever that means. As a biracial person though who often passes for other races without even being aware of it, I don't see race as existing in rigid, discrete categories, and sometimes there are examples of race drag (there must be a better term) which can be really interesting. One particularly striking example in recent memory was the black actor Jeffrey Wright's performance as the Latino badguy in the recently remade Shaft movie with Samuel L. Jackson. It was such a strange and unpredictable and charismatic performance. I don't recall if anyone raised a fuss back then about a black guy lightening his skin with cosmetics and playing a Latino character, but it did make me think about how good acting could transcend the biological race of the actor. After all, with actors and actresses changing their body weights and hair color and facial hair and faces with prosthetic noses, can they also not change their skin color and ethnic background, or is that taboo, if it's done in a respectful manner (not like the mocking blackface of old)? But then, to go back to the Victoria Principal in The Life and times of Judge Roy Bean, her performance was very much a stereotype: meek, submissive, halting poor English (as opposed to Jeffrey Wright's performance, which transcended stereotype in my opinion). And perhaps I'm overly sensitive, but I fear that she was chosen to portray the character because of her Caucasian facial features, which were consistent with conventional standards of beauty at the time (although they attempted to make her look more "ethnic" by giving her a tan, black hair, and heavy eyebrows). Would audiences have believed that Paul Newman willingly fucked her if she didn't have a slender nose and high cheekbones but instead had a genuine ethnically Latina face?

Geez, this sounds like a Bitch magazine article. Apologies.