The debates were, as predicted, infuriating. Senator Biden held it down (nay, killed it with his knowledge) and at times he and Gwen Ifill (and the viewers) seemed to be having an entirely different conversation than the cue-card-reading Palin. It was as though, for each answer, a trigger word scanned her brain’s memory card and spat out whatever related answer had said word in a sentence. Further, her folksy appeals to middle America were actually condescending, as though by talking like “a regular gal” she could distract us from the fact that she has no idea what she is talking about, no clue as to the scope of what the second highest office in the land actually entails and, apparently, no real respect for the nuts-and-bolts work of it. I also found her cutesy winking degrading, both to women–do we truly have to resort to flirting in the middle of the sole VP debate? –and to the importance of the position she, oh so ridiculously, finds herself in: debating one of the most accomplished and compelling Senators in office. Not to mention her disrespect when Biden became emotional discussing his wife and children. “I am afraid my son won’t come back from Iraq.” Response: “JOHN MCCAIN IS A MAVERICK!” Unbelievable.
That said, Biden was direct, concise and awesome on many, many points: his directness about global warming, his directness about gay marriage, his directness about Cheney being Darth Vader, his directness about the Iraq war and the economy. I trust this dude; he was extra-knowledgable about senate specifics and minutiae, but at no point did I feel like I was about to be led into a psychedelic mind-spiral of policy details. He just gets it. His approach contrasted with Palin’s platitudinous greeting cards of answers, with her insincerity and, eventually, with her anger; his greatness kept me from hurling a glass at Brendan’s tv screen. I did manage to make up a totally offensive new word to describe her, starting in the word that results from the anagram “See You Next Tuesday” and ending in the suffix “Zilla.”
Didn’t it seem as though, every time she looked into that camera and reassured the American people she was on our side, that she actually holds the utmost contempt for the American people? As though, if we do not elect her, she is going to, I don’t know, order one of her advisers to fire us all from our jobs? Pre-emptive vengeance is a terrible quality in a VP candidate.
You know who I feel for? Hillary Clinton. To watch Palin be “the woman” (ha) in this election and to see her fumble and degrade the opportunity so colossally must be murder.
You know who I lost EVEN MORE respect for? Geraldine Ferraro. She was up on the NBC post-debate talking about how great it will be when her granddaughters can watch this and see a woman do so well… as though she buys into the idea that “any woman will do.” If I ever have granddaughters I’m stashing any and all Palin-related materials in the off-limits pantry with the pornos and the “prescription” weed. This woman is not a role model just because she happened to possess the most politically strategic qualities to revitalize McCain’s limp ass. Ferraro’s comments further illustrate the generation gap between second-wave feminists and fourth-wave feminists, the one this primary process has made so apparent: we can’t really relate to you all, sorry. Visibility is important, but not if “the woman” is gonna be such a maje trainwreck, lowering the role-model standards and looking like a retardinous puppet on a national stage, I’d rather just watch a bunch of old haggardy dudes duke it out like usual.
SI SE PUEDE. YES WE CAN. Go to Barack Obama to see what there’s left to do–register voters in your family while you still can, canvass, etc. I’m going to Pennsylvania in a couple of weeks to help with the campaign. I expect it will be difficult but I feel like we have to do everything we can. We cannot afford otherwise. As Senator Biden said more than once last night, this is the most important election we will have ever voted in. The future of our country is at stake.

You were one of the best. We’ll miss you.

Debates last night: Obviously I thought Obama better informed, smarter. I despise McCain so much–his condescension, his outright lies, his inability to know who is running Pakistan, the fact that he cannot even pronounce Ahmadenijad’s name–I wanted to throw my beer at our television. But the utterly confounding moment, the one that was so hilariously ridiculous it broke my anger streak, was this:
Over all, Mr. McCain was more charming and more colloquial, but his speaking style was at times choppy. He described North Korea as the most “repressive and brutal regime probably on earth,” adding: “The average South Korean is three inches taller than the average North Korean. A huge gulag.”
Pardon my French senator but what the fuck are you talking about?!
I cannot live in this country if this country elects McCain. Was brainstorming places to go and think my best idea is to get a job as a music director on a cruise ship, so I can float adrift on the open seas, boundless, stateless. The problem with this idea, however, is my terrible motion sickness; I sometimes want to throw up in taxis and recently barfed in the movie theater bathroom after watching 30 minutes of the film Ballast, which seemed excellent but is shot using nine million rapidfire jumpcuts and a hand-held camera. So I’ll probably just end up hawking Fanta on the beach of Barcelona, or selling baguette in some tiny tourist town in France. I would go to Mexico but it’s too close, too tied to the US economic situation, and too fucked by NAFTA, not to mention scary as hell right now what with the copious violence bleeding over from the narcos and drug-runners into the middle class for…no reason but poverty.
However, tomorrow I’m going to a NYFF party for Voy a Explotar (I’m Going to Explode), the first film produced by the joint prod.company owned by Gael Garcia Bernal and Diego Luna, so maybe I will find some hot brilliant Mexican national to husband and take me away from this potential McCain-Palin nightmare. Not Gael, he’s fiiine but way too short for me. Holler if you’re 6′ and over papis! Let’s go half on a 3/4 Mexican baby!

I have a google alert set up for “Mayan Apocalypse” (obviously) and today it brought back a hilarious review of a SciFi channel show about the crystal skulls we need to bring together in order to prevent the Mayan Apocalypse. Further, this person’s tags are of my own heart. This story is filed under “Mayan Apocalypse Beach Party” and “Pyramidiots.”

Our contributing style editor Mobolaji Dawodu on the Sartorialist!
[He dresses like this every day, except when he is wearing a turtleneck and jeans from K-Mart, in which he looks preternaturally classy.]

Good bye to the towering hair hats she sculpted from her dreams.

Good bye to the pastel peony monsters she made barf red rose blood.

Good bye to the dancing lovers that bled out of her eyes.

This video was Japanese artist, director, designer, inventor, conceptualist, magician Nagi Noda’s final work. Two weeks ago, she died at the age of 35 from complications related to a surgery. I am sad we never met. This video features a magic pop-witch and a dancing cat dinner party. It is the best music video ever made.

I have a question to pose.
What is that irreversable action (or actions) that makes you realize you need to dead a friendship?
For me, this happens when said party does something that psychically, spiritually or ethically revolts me, i.e. narcotic drug addiction (sometimes), megalomania (usually), extreme-right social views (unless they are blood relations), and/or rawdog cheating (ew). I am really good at not being friends with people who transgress my probably-too-lenient boundaries. What about power-addiction? Major friendship-interfering vice and gluttony? Narcissism? Instances of disrespect piled one by one like so many princess-pea-mattresses? When do you cash it in and cut the leash?
Question B: Would you stop being friends with a someone who cornily chunked deuces and/or “ironic gang signs” in all their myspace photos?

I found this reading David Foster Wallace’s obit and it hit my gut.
The Department of Defense announced today the death of a soldier who was supporting Operation Enduring Freedom.
Pvt. Michael R. Dinterman, 18, of Littlestown, Pa., died Sept. 6 at Outpost Restrepo, Kunar Province, Afghanistan, of wounds suffered when he received enemy fire while on dismounted patrol. He was assigned to the 1st Battalion, 26th Infantry Regiment, 3rd Brigade Combat Team, 1st Infantry Division, Fort Hood, Texas.
Rest in peace, Pvt. Dinterman. Eighteen. Your life is worth more than this.
Photographs from the war by my friend and colleague Peter van Agtmael.

On Friday, Fashion (two) Week(s) was officially fini. S/S ’09. I missed most of it: was in Portland for the first week and work-crazed for the second, so I really only got to see the Betsey Johnson tent show, didn’t lament absenteeing the rest except for Baby Phat and the show we sponsored for Kesh, who is the raddest designer/DJ/MIA stylist ever. Get familiaroso homeys. Betsey was fun (thanks for the cupcake and pink cupcake thong, Bets) but some of it seemed uninspired, our girl recycling her own ideas which are now so ubiquitous to be rote, i.e. Pirate skull leggings. Really Bets? Really? But apart from her florals, which she always nails, three looks, I adored: a tie-dyed satin maillot with ruched sides; a semi-tie-dyed blue-green gown with satin sweetheart neckline, corset back and a skirt with millions of gathered pieces that resembled mermaid scales; and the white version of that gown which, sans dye, had the appearance of swan feathers. Otherwise the theme was crazy pirates, clowns and babies. Which was cute but also freaked me out. She played music from the “Sesame Street” OST and did her trad cartwheel at the end wearing a sequined Peter Pan outfit. She is like 50. MAD respect to that chica.
So while I was suspended in mid-week stress zone, Chioma and Erin went to Marc by Marc and came back saying they loved it and that “It was basically what you’d see in Teen Vogue.” Teen Vogue being, visually, graphically and fashion-ally, one of the three best fashion magazines in America (WORD UP TO JUSTIN KAY), obvs my interest was piqued.
I have kind of a problem with Marc Jacobs. I think he goes to cool indie/hipster spots in Brooklyn, copies what the youf are wearing, and then steals their outfits for his next season’s line but priced at like 300X what they were worth when they were worn by, say, a Cooper Union student watching Gang Gang Dance play at the Market Hotel. Actually, I know he does this. I think it is ridiculous and that, in a sense, he is an unabashed fashion carpetbagger. The only thing I truly like about his pieces is that he is unafraid to pair red with purple. I respect that. (And covet such things.) However, in his S/S 09 collection, I saw this look and immediately died:

I would wear the SHIT out of this if I had like, what, $4500 extra dollars in my non-essential slush fund. Not happening.
But seriously tho, if I had that kind of free-will clothing allowance I would be dropping it on Philip Lim’s textured and bedazzled shifts, or Rodarte’s knitting-project-gone-awry punky dresses with black bandeau bra tops beneath or, hell, a classic Herve Leger bandage dress, which I’ve been lusting after ever since the line was revived and Kerry Washington and Kim Kardashian started flaunting their banded shit on every red carpet (and uh, shitty LA mega club) like, two years ago. If you have a lot of disposable income, and have already donated money to worthy charities and have reached the capped amount of individual donations to the Obama campaign, I wear an L and prefer the classic grey shift or the gorg/glam lemony one the zzzzz-list actor Rachel Bilson is wearing in this photo. It will cost you approx $1500, which is slightly more than my rent. Spanx a million.

David Foster Wallace died by apparent hanging on Friday in his California home. He was discovered by his wife.
I developed my writing by reading sharp essayists in my late jr. high/high school years, marveling at their style and pressing myself to shape a strong personal narrative voice that was true to “how I talk,” rhythmic and at best inimitable. In this formative time no other writer influenced me like David Foster Wallace. I happened upon him by chance; at 16 I discovered a markdown first edition copy of his debut book of short stories, Girl With Curious Hair, at a Barnes and Noble. I think I bought it for four dollars. It enveloped me: I was so enamored with the weird freedom, the disturbing tone, the creepy social satire of the title story especially, the tale of a bigoted businessman on a date with Hollywood punks who dropped acid and went to a Keith Jarrett concert. In the music / skateboarding fanzine I published from ages 16-18, I signed my editor’s letter by the moniker Gimlet, the name of the free-spirit protagonist in the “Girl With Curious Hair.” I didn’t know it was a vodka drink; I thought it was an intense, free alter ego. (I guess, in a way, DFW also got me into alter egos.) My love for his refined work (the tennis essay, the amusement park essay, the short story about being on Jeopardy) so overshadowed anything else he wrote I neglected to read his hallowed 72-lb. opus, Infinite Jest, leaving me in the minority among most of my generation and anyone who has attended a liberal arts school since its publication. I’m not too concerned. I own it, I skimmed it and read some of the footnotes. After it was published, everyone wanted to do footnotes. He really was sculptural in his writing, wasn’t he? But I just wanted to read the shit out of his 10,000 word pieces. He was much better when his word count didn’t allow him to be verbose.
He co-wrote that bumbling stranger-in-a-strange land / academic hip-hop book Signifying Rappers (id est “we, ur-white folks clad in topsiders and preppy pleated Dockers, are en route to Dorchester to meet a gentleman by the name of Benzino”) and I read it and still I admired him.
Why did he end his own life?
Gimlet dreamed that if she did not see a concert last night she would become a type of liquid, therefore my friends Mr. Wonderful, Big, Gimlet and I went to see Keith Jarrett play a piano concert at the Irvine Concert Hall in Irvine last night….