in the spirit of disseminating info (well, liberal info)... i'm linking some other blogs that i've come across recently and have started reading every day:

josh marshall (my favorite)
roger simon (who apparently shares with me a fear of ever deviating from the movable type template)
brian montopoli
political aims
matt yglesias
atrios

anyway...so some of you out there (i mean the 2 people who actually read this -hi dad and grandpa!) maybe are wondering of late when exactly this blog transformed itself from a photolog of italy with superlatively witty captions into some sort of attempt at a foray into media/culture/political watch (with the occasional description of a drunken party thrown in). and i bet those who are wondering are also saying, please give me some more photos of the duomo and roman fire-throwers, those were way better than this crap.

with which i might agree. but, sadly, there is no more red-tiled duomo; there is no more fire-thrower to watch while wandering around rome tipsy on chianti late one evening; there is no more italy. i mean, there is still italy. it hasn't been annihilated by the swiss. yet. but i'm not there anymore, and unless you want photos of my badly slipcovered couches or my architecturally uninspiring office building in d.c., you're going to have to put up with words and thoughts instead.

for me, the question more to address is: why does catherine give a fuck about media/culture/politics all of a sudden? this is the girl who used to think howard dean made sausage, who thought kofi annan was the name of cough syrup, who couldn't figure out a map of africa to save her life. (well, i still can't, actually. i'm working on the geography part.) sure, i could tell you the name of every single male celebrity gywneth paltrow has ever slept with, but when it came to current affairs and world politics, i was a big time no-know loser. i was up there with bush at the beginning of his administration. well, i pretty much still am, but like i said about the geography, i'm working on it.

i guess there's no one pat answer, though i still ask myself that question a lot. why do i care when i never cared before? and i guess my first reason is: i SHOULD. and for some reason, i realized that lately. i know i sound like my third grade teacher, but: knowledge is power. seriously. why not take advantage of the billions of media outlets out there to learn something about how the country is run, how it might be run, who's best to do the job, and about various conspiracies put forth by the bush administration. why not? no reason except apathy, which is pretty inexcusable. and i think this apathy is characteristic of most of the people my age. obviously. that's not a groundbreaking statement. but. i mean, i'm not underestimating any of my friends, but i like to consider myself a relatively intelligent person, and if there are lots of relatively intelligent people out there who are as uninformed as i've been, then that's bad news.

second reason: turns out, it's FUN. really! politics is fun. but i should have figured that out long ago. like i told tommy, i just decided to apply my obsession with the world of celebrities and entertainment to the world of politics, and it's working. i mean, i guess politicians are basically celebrities, except they actually matter once in a while.

third reason: i would like to sound smart at cocktail parties.

ANYWAY (anyway is probably the most oft-repeated word in here), i am majorly slacking in the work arena, so i should get back to that before the day is done.

Some Fear Women Lack Facts About Mammograms

this article is good, because the debate about mammograms is important, and i fully believe that women should be availed of all the information, both positive and negative, about the test before blindly undergoing it (hello hormone replacement therapy). i mean, i appreciate the info, though at this point i've been advised numerous times to get mammograms starting at 30 or 35 cos of my mom, which i will do, unless something better comes up in the next six years.

however, the article, at the same time, is completely depressing! these health care experts (at least those who don't believe mammograms help save lives) don't really offer up any other options for people who want to reduce their risk of breast cancer or advise some sort of method for early detection. i mean, if you're not going to advocate mammograms, in fact if you're going to loudly denounce them, at least advocate something else!! the way they talk makes the case sound completely hopeless. at least recommend self-exams. self-exams aren't even mentioned once in the entire piece. BLAH. this article is a case of damned if you do, damned if you don't. i really would like to be able to rely on doctors to come up with something better than that, especially when early detection can so severely reduce the rate of death due to the disease. come on, science. how about it?