Amy Ephron

If I were running for Vice-President, what would I wear?  In light of Sarah Palin’s recent clothing expenditures ($150,000 and counting), it occurred to me to wonder if I were running for Vice-President, what would I wear? I’m a Brentwood Mom. Jeans? Sweats? No, probably not.

But Sarah Palin’s put herself out there as a one-woman beauty pageant.  I’ve never seen her wear the same thing twice.  By the way, there’s nothing wrong with wearing the same thing twice.  Same jacket, different skirt, same jacket, different top.  By the way, t-shirts look perfectly fine under a fancy jacket.  Could someone teach this girl to accessorize? 

Newsflash:  no one ever sees your feet, mostly you’re standing behind a podium. 

Fashion tip:  cranberry goes with almost everything.  One pair of cranberry heels, one pair of black heels, one pair of beige heels, a couple of pairs of boots, on a particularly long day – wear flats.

We’d walked past it a couple of times, a simple storefront set back from the street with a small porch, a glimpse of tables inside, unassuming.  The Key Lime Cafe.  Full at lunch-time, we assumed it was a Maryland version of a diner.  We never even ventured up on to the porch....

We walked across the road to Big Al’s Fish Store the first day for lunch and had a fried clam sandwich, we had fancy hotel food at the Perry Cabin and so much soft-shelled crab that Alan spent an afternoon in bed.

We’d moved my son into his dorms at George Washington University in D.C. three days before and driven to Chesapeake Bay to the small town of St. Michael’s, Maryland (birthplace of Frederick Douglass) for a few days of rest. It was hot and we were tired and the plantation style Inn at Perry Cabin was a lovely place to rest. (In fact, the Inn at Perry Cabin is built on the original plantation where Frederick Douglass was born until he was wrenched away from his grandmother at a very early age and put into service at the Covey Plantation down the road, aptly named Mount Misery which, curiously, or not so curiously, Donald Rumsfeld now owns.)  We took a morning boat-ride.  We sat on the lawn and stared at the water.  We walked along the dock.  We walked along the dusty road.  We walked through the flower fields and corn fields. 

Without a qualm, or a thought to the people’s lives he was affecting, Governor Schwarzenegger signed an order yesterday to reduce government employees salaries to the minimum wage of $6.55 an hour, (which could affect 200,000 people) because of the budget stalemate.  Luckily, State Controller John Chiang, who writes the checks, is refusing to comply with the payroll cuts.  (I think Chiang and Nancy Pelosi should get Government Employee of the Month award!)   

But am I the only person who remembers this Arnold Schwarzenegger campaign mantra, “I understand business.  I will make the economy and budget of California work.”

Then, why doesn’t he institute tax credits for the movie business and bring business back to California?  The movie business, that funny business that was so lucrative and employed so many people. And that is supposed to be a business he does understand.  

Checks and balances.  Have you ever thought about how amazing those two words are?   In the simplest sense, writing checks and figuring out how much money you have left after you’ve written them.  In the larger sense, if something is depleted or out of whack, something comes along to reestablish order.

Which brings me to AANWR....

On the northern edge of our continent, stretching from the peaks of the Brooks Range across a vast expanse of tundra to the Beaufort Sea, lies Alaska's Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. An American Serengeti, the Arctic Refuge continues to pulse with million-year-old ecological rhythms. It is the greatest living reminder that conserving nature in its wild state is a core American value.
                    (National Resources Defense Council)