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    Volume CCXXXIII, Number 29        January, 2003              

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Apparently, many Americans are hungry for stories about a heroic president bravely leading his fellow countrymen into war. For those, consider a biography of Abraham Lincoln. For an uncritical quickie look at George Bush floundering around in the aftermath of September 2001, look no further than the hack politician's friend and amanuensis, Bob Woodward.

Rumor has it that many centuries and wives ago, Bob was a crusading independent-minded journalist. You'd never know it from the last 20 volumes he's churned out, each of which trades supposedly "inside" access to the powerful for uncritical acceptance of whatever story the spinmeister are pushing.

On the basis of Bob's "exclusive" access to objective observers like Dick Cheney or sycophants like Condoleezza Rice, Bob concludes: guess what? George Bush is serious, engaged leader working hard to save his beloved country.

What doesn't fit in this picture painted for Bob? How about Bush's yearlong effort to suppress an independent inquiry into our shocking lack of preparedness despite multiple warnings about al-Qaeda? Oh, but those warnings came from Democrats! Bob doesn't dilate too long on our shameful cut-and-run policy in Afghanistan, leaving most of the country at the mercy of a ragtag gang of cutthroats busily breeding tomorrow's terrorists. And you won't find Bob, hosed not too many years ago by the infamous William Casey, probing too deeply into the bureaucratic infighting between the FBI and the CIA that has reduced those agencies to utter impotence.

We know Bob loves quickies, but asking us to pay $28 for one of them is a bit rich. That easy, we're not.

Remember a few years the dust-up involving then-academic Jeff Masson and his misreading of the Freud Archives? Poor Jeff's work product was savaged by The New Yorker because (i) it was crackers and (ii) Masson had supposedly boinked over 1,000 women while a graduate student at Harvard, thereby exceeding the combined total of all other male graduate students in that time period by 997.

Ladies' man Masson then dropped from sight. Now, having rogered his way across his America, he's, uh, popped up in the Antipodes singing the praises of cats. They're cute, they're furry, they're fun to chomp– [How many times do I have to tell you we are not going there? – Ed.], and best of all, they really help you pick up girls.

 We're sure Jeff Masson has lots of other good things to say about the feline species, but – let's face facts – what lady could resist the charms of Jeff Masson bearing a cat? Even Dora would be hysterical.

Among the great cons of modern "thought" is that old whopper: you are what you eat. The key to health, happiness and well-being, so this nutty theory goes, lies in eating "gentle" foods, like tofu and turnips, not foods that have been slaughtered for your delectation, like a T-bone steak. After all, that violent warmonger Franklin Roosevelt loved a blood-rare roast beef, while his well-adjusted adversary was a strict vegetarian. We're referring of course to that Hitler fellow.

In fact, this food hysteria is the key to the health, happiness and well-being of publishing conglomerates attempting to pay off their debt while still shipping bucks to their Australian overlords. Today's effort combines a hack cookbook author and the insufferable (and none-too-healthy-looking) Andrew Weil.

 They're dishing up the usual eggplant and tofu substitutes for real beef and pork. Their bulemic readers won't be able to keep it down anyway, so what difference does it make?

By the way, take a look at vegetarians of your acquaintance. Do they look healthy to you? Or do they have the puffy, bovine look of those who eat vast quantities of straw? Real cows can digest forage. So leave the all-grain diet to them. And remember: for the price of this book, you ought to be able to buy a nice brisket.