All over the place

What do Galliano and Sheen, DSK and the I-P conflict, have in common? OMG Jews. That's about all I got out of Stanley Fish's latest. I mean, I always appreciate it when an academic study of representations of Jews and gender in literature reaches a broader audience, and will now have to check out Matthew Biberman's book, so there was that going for it... but otherwise?

-The piece is very much about, here are some tangentially connected thoughts, don't they make you think? There's not really any argument. Is Fish saying anti-Semitism's worse than it once was? That Jews are more powerful than ever before? That time is one, Jewish power and anti-Semitism unchanging facts across place and age?

-Or maybe it's more of a, hey, anti-Semites say Jews are rich and powerful, why, Jews are rich and powerful... just saying.

-We learn of "67 percent of Reform Jewish households in the United States making more than $75,000 a year; only 31 percent of all households hit the same mark." Is this the relevant comparison? Not Reform Jews and whichever demographic of Protestants is equivalent on the one hand, Jews and Christians generally on the other?

-Yes, yes, there are some overlapping key words - "Affaire," "French," "Jewish," and "conspiracy," but DSK=/=Dreyfus. DSK at best did a whole lot like what he was accused of, but might be innocent of the precise crime in question. Dreyfus was a fairly straightforward scapegoat. And, other than Jews concerned with whether there is a Jewish angle, no one in America thinks of DSK as a Jew. He is, like BHL, zee French.

-We have the following quote, in parentheses: "'You can insult any ethnic group and get away with it, except for the Jews.'" Who, exactly, is saying/thinking this? Fish?

-"Those who offer the criticism can never quite be sure that their distaste for Israel’s actions with respect to the Palestinians is entirely innocent of the influence of centuries of vilification." Just... just... what? Obviously, if you've decided I-P is the only issue of any significance in the world, and that Israel=the unequivocal villain, if you're incapable of differentiating between Jews and Israelis, Israelis and the Israeli government... But obviously if you're criticizing something specific (say, Bibi not being all that cooperative with Obama), you're not doing anything remotely sinister.

-What a crap title! I know, I know, these are typically chosen by editors, perhaps even for articles that are really blog posts, but seriously. What exactly does Galliano hurling anti-Semitic epithets at someone who isn't even Jewish have to do with "the Jews"? Was the point to bring charmers like this out of the woodwork? (Also the well-meaning-ish-but-staggeringly-ignorant.)

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Are those stand-mixer things useful, and if so, for what? I didn't think we'd have much use (beyond latkes, that is) for the hand-me-down food processor we got a while back from my parents, but it's now how I make pizza dough, making it the most useful thing ever.

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-Essie "nice is nice" is, well, nice. Lavender-lilac, but not too chalky, as white-based nail polishes often are. Also nice is Laura Mercier Sheer Lip Color in "baby lips." Also Korres mango butter lipstick in "frost pink." I still have some leftover/pent-up primping impulse stemming from my pre-wedding sense that I should care more about such matters, culminating in the frizziest weather imaginable, as well as my hair's decision to turn blond in the front every spring, something I understand women pay for but that does not suit my coloring. Lip and nail color, this can be controlled.