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Camille Paglia and Joan Walsh

Two women whose writing I have a great deal of time for have published interesting articles this week.

Dr Paglia's essay begins with her thoughts on Hillary Clinton and the Obama campaign, before moving onto her latest infatuation. The latter comes in the form of Daniela Mercury, to many of whose recordings Paglia generously links. As background, some of the confidential memoranda from Senator Clinton's campaign have been leaked to Atlantic.com, presumably by Mark Penn or someone close to him so that he looks like less of an oaf.

Joan Walsh--an Obama 'frenemy' and long-time Hillary supporter, has also written a thoughtful piece on why talking to cancer survivors means that she now doesn't want to condemn John Edwards. I think what people get up to privately (and my own private life wouldn't please St Augustine, so I have an interest in writing this) is their own affair, but generally openness is a good thing so long as no one gets hurt.

Since everyone is piling into the centrist tort lawyer who tried to make himself a populist, it is heartening to read of how there might have been depth to his reaction to Elizabeth Edward's cancer that led him into sexual misadventure. Sex makes fools of us all, as Tommy Corcoran or Dean Acheson once said, anyway.

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