St. Lucie News Tribune from Fort Pierce, Florida • 9

The Tribune Thursday June 21 2001 A9 MsMIMM tsh OTP jOi yfiT4! Clothing catalogue selling absence of clothes Abercrombie Fitch offers shoppers William Buckley I tend to lose my cell phone and so noticed a display ad for khaki pants with a compartment just below the right knee that is perfect for keeping electronic equipment and that led me to Abercrombie Fitch I waited at the counter for my cargo (I) pants and looked down on the summer catalog featuring the usual handsome young man on the cover But my attention was drawn to the subscription card alongside: subscribe: Fill out this card and head to the nearest store with a valid photo With a valid ID? I found that odd and asked the young man behind the counter probably 19 years old why IDs were required for subscribers to an Abercrombie Fitch catalog and he said uh kind of porny I walked away with it and meditate the reaches of the sexualization of our culture Abercrombie Fitch was for time immemorial a sports-equipment and men's clothing store I cherish the story recorded in The New Yorker generations ago of the gardener on Long Island who yearned to buy an barometer finally saving up the money to do so He took it back to his little house on the south shore tapped it a few times Impatiently and stormed back to Manhattan on the next train complaining that it was defective its needle stuck at the mark Abercrombie returned his money and the plaintiff returned to Islip to find that his house had been blown away needle pointed surely at the hurricane of 1938 and presumably its managers feel sure that the way to sell their current brand of clothing is to flaunt the modern dress This presents a difficulty inasmuch as clothiers live and die from the sale of clothes But the current catalog goes far in suggesting that young men and women are better off wearing no clothes which leaves the catalog reader wondering what it is that will make money from Perhaps its catalog which of course is best advertised by the fiction that one really needs in order to purchase it an ID establishing that the purchaser is 18 years old Now this review skirts fuddy-duddy-ism on the other hand to be entirely blase about what is up to would be dumb acquiescence in its hypocrisy is engaged in yet further expansion of advertising along the line pioneered by Calvin Klein which is torso-oriented The following page gives us a jaunty blonde clutching her hair wet from the ocean she just emerged from If she is wearing anything it would be below her pelvic joint Above it which is all the viewer can see there are no clothes Next is a two-page spread in which six young men are shown above the navel and one woman One spots a shoulder strap on the girl which may be a bathing suit though it is not descried by the camera But lo she does wear a watch band sheltering the nudity The men wear nothing A few pages on a young man wears tennis shoes (unlaced) and a towel over his head At his waist a camera' A few pages on the young man is entirely naked leaning slightly over one knee Across the page art six narcissistic photos of his windblown face in differing exposures On to another young man entirely naked one knee (the windward knee) held up He is reposing on the deck of a sailboat his back resting on an unfurled main The very next page gives us a girl wearing a T-shirt on which one can actually make out the name of our hosts is discernible and then something on the order of "Open Beauty That shirt tapers off at the lady's waist Below the waist there is nothing at all except of course her naked body A few pages later the young man is naked again on the boat but wearing a drenched jacket that reaches only as far as his waist A few pages later we have five beautiful blondes in full summer wear draped about a Byronic young man evidently lost in the poetry of his reflections a loose towel over his crotch And so on Speaking of nakedness there was never a pitch more naked than the non-display of its products in deference to sheer biological exhibitionism The last part of the book actually depicts clothes of one kind or another but the reader getting that far is hotly indignant: What are all those shirts and shorts and pants doing interrupting my view of the naked kids! I mean I showed you my ID I William Buckley Jr is a columnist for Universal Press Syndicate at nmeisuexpresscom and in the case of Abercrombie aimed more at the pulchritude of the male than the female form Very odd in a men's clothing store The catalog is introduced by a 150-word essay under the title Pleasure A definition ensues: psy-' choanalysis the tendency or drive to achieve pleasure and avoid pain as the chief motivating force in And then an amplification: being our favorite time of the year and all worked extra hard to bring you our best issue yet by letting the pleasure principle be our guide through the hottest Taking on the Bush brothers Philip Gailey EAGLE PRESERVES panpa preserves anp coyote PRESERVES Florida Gov Jeb Bush recently announced that he will seek a second term and most Republicans expected the White House where George Bush occupies the Oval Office to deftly use its prestige and power to boost the re-election effort or at least take care not to harm it After all Jeb Bush took a heavy political hit for his brother in last presidential election debacle But Florida Republicans are beginning to wonder about the competence of the political advisers who apparently still understand politics in the Sunshine State The governor says he intends to run his own campaign stand on his own record and let his brother tend to his presidential business Democrats however have other plans For them next election is about political payback If they have the political scalp settle for his younger It promises to be the most widely watched heavily financed state campaign since Hillary Ginton decided to run for the US Senate in New York At this stage it's hard to gauge whether brother Dubya will prove to be a plus or a minus for the governor In a front-page story the New York Times last week reported that Florida Republicans are furious over the way the White House handled the latest trip to Florida a big photo-op in the Everglades National Park designed to burnish his environmental credentials The complaint is that the White House in a clumsy attempt to project an image of bipartisanship ignored Republican lawmakers who for years had championed restoration of the Everglades and instead shared the spotlight with the two Democratic senators Bob Graham accountable for what his brother is doing in Washington Democrats will be making a political mistake by inviting the Bush-haters from around the nation to pile on The challenge for Democrats will not be fundraising oi1 turning out their voters It will be coming up with a candidate who can beat Bush whose approval rating is still well above 50 percent Some attractive candidates are exploring the race among them Pete Peterson a former congressman and US ambassador to Vietnam Thmpa lawyer Bill McBride managing partner of Holland Knight and US Rep Jim Davis of Tampa Also considering the race are Lois Frankel the Democratic leader in the Florida House and former US Attorney General Janet Rena In a primary contest with no run-off election the outcome is hard to predict The candidate with the largest plurality vote would take the Democratic nomination Recent polls suggest name recognition could give her the advantage in a crowded field This is not good news for Democrats who fear that controversial record as attorney general including her refusal to authorize an independent investigation of the Ginton-Gore fundraising abuses would become an issue in the campaign It would give Republicans an opening to introduce Bill Ginton into the campaign which is the last thing we need not convinced Jeb Bush is as vulnerable as the Democrats think he is But I do think he could be in for a tougher re-election battle than anyone could have imagined before last November And so far his big brother helping Philip Gailey is editor of editorials of the St Petersburg Times and Bill Nelson and with US Rep Peter Deutsch one of the harshest critics These Democrats used the occasion to castigate the president for proposing oil drilling in the Gulf of Mexico which could be a killer issue in Jeb re-election bid The Bush administration in Washington may yet have the good sense to lift that weight from Jeb political neck But if Democrats have their way Jeb Bush will not only have to defend his own record as governor but his record as president on everything from Social Security and Medicare reform to high energy prices and the environment Democrats plan to nationalize race making it a referendum on last November's presidential election and using it to raise big money outside Florida I'm sure they can count on the maximum contribution from Barbra Streisand who try to conceal her loathing for the Bush brothers That would be unfortunate for Floridians deserve a campaign centered on issues that matter to them not to the Hollywood and Washington elite The race should focus on Jeb Bush and his record That record should provide Democratic challenger plenty of political ammunition his replacement of affirmative-action programs his A education plan his abolition of the state Board of Regents his inadequate funding of public schools and the state university system his assault on the state civil service and his environmental policies Jeb Bush has a lot to answer for without trying to hold him gnmmyxoai No way to run government Dale McFeatters The war room of the Ginton White House would have been proud Even though the senior White House staff was in Europe with the president the junior staff back home was quick to react to a perceived affront to the Bush administration The day after a think tank the Presidential Appointee Initiative held a briefing to muse on the glacial process of nominating and confirming the almost 500 top officials needed to staff an administration the White House was out with a rebuttal Even though the think tank was not criticizing President Bush in fact it singled out his personnel director Gay Johnson for praise the White House wanted to establish that this president was competitive with his three immediate predecessors in submitting names to the Senate The response ignores a key point: All four records are dismal Six months into his administration George Bush has only 26 percent of the people in place he needs to run it As of last week Secretary of The federal budget process is? ongoing the agencies even now are at work on their fiscal 2003 budgets and critical to govern- ment President Bush for- mer secretary of state Lawrence Eagleburger believes the slug" gish appointments process is because' the American people are not getJ! ting the government they voted for In the absence of direction from political appointees he said' the career civil servants will keep on doing what been doing Assume the former govern- ment officials are right about tak-' ing two years to get full control of an agency and its agenda means that because of institution- al momentum the budget remember the first two years of the Bush administration are largely the Ginton administration extended for another two years There has to be and indeed there is a better way to run aj government Dale McFeatters is a column rust for Scripps Howard News Ser- vice at mcfeattersdshnscom Doonesbury Interior Gale Norton was alone at Interior awaiting her 16 presi-dentially appointed deputies Health and Human Services Secretary Tbmmy Thompson has five of 19 and if he has hqlf of those 19 by Labor Day he will count himself And it goes on to one decree or another across the administration The nomination and confirmation process is inefficient and unfair The appointees are in limbo should they quit their jobs look for a house in Washington? until the Senate acts Before their confirmations appointees are prohibited by law and custom from visiting their new agencies sitting in on meetings in short dding anything concrete to prepare themselves for their new jobs There are cumbersome and overly elaborate disclosures and ethical and security safeguards But this too is process and conceals a more significant issue of governance one that Bush may not fully appreciate till this fall when he tries to act long term Locally grown food is treat for those who love eating Last winter strawberries from California were the size of apricots They looked great bulging from their baskets but were tasteless The agricultural scientists at the University of California at Davis had done it again They had pro duced a fruit for Industry that survives being shipped looks terrific and is not good to eat Andy Rooney my mind settled as it so often does on food That part of the state has a relatively short growing season but the Hudson Valley and parts north produce some of the best fruits and vegetables in the world Last weekend was the beginning of the strawberry season It reminded me again of how good locally grown food is compared with the food shipped in 12 months a year from parts of the country where seldom a frost and the growing season is endless Last winter strawberries from California were the size of apricots They looked great bulging from their baskets but were tasteless The agricultural scientists at the University of California at Davis had done it again They had produced a fruit for industry that survives being shipped looks terrific and is not good to eat Many years ago these researchers came up with a tomato that grew in dearly defined quarters so it was closer to being square than round This made it possible for shippers to fit more in a box These were the kind of tomatoes bad If I had all the money wasted my search for a ripe melon recoup what lost in the stock market this" year One problem is that cantaloupes contrary to what expect do nob ripen and improve once beeiu picked Honeydew melons do improve Occasionally I try a crenshaw casaba' or Persian melon (Most of them originat- ed in Iran Persia 2500 years all more expensive than cantaloupes but I have any better luck with them than with cantaloupes One of them tastes like cucumber and I always forget which one it is looking forward to a summer with- out the mediocre fruit and vegetables from out of state There will be great corn squash tomatoes strawberries raspber-1 ries and melons For a brief six weeks the proclama-1 tion tacked to the tree in front of the local roadside stand will read HOMEGROWN! 1 I Andy Rooney is a columnist for Thbune Media Services at tmstribunecom I Humans have to put food in their mouths and digest it in order to provide the body with the nutrients it needs to survive One of the sensible things humans have done is turn this necessity into entertainment It would be dull if we provided our body what it needs with pills or fed ourselves through tubes and needles We have a good time eating Except for the food nuts who live any longer than anyone else people are more concerned with how food tastes than whether giving thm all the nutrients and vitamins they need Most of us are happy eating but there are also people who are happiest preparing food We all know the good and the bad cooks in the family We encourage the good ones with effusive praise and try to keep the bad ones out of the kitchen until time to clean up Every good cook has some bad days but the bad cooks never have a good one My mind often turns to the subject for a column the day before I have to write it Yesterday I was in upstate New York and cooks put in salads to make them look good Never mind that they have no taste In a grocery store an incurable optimist There are mistakes I make repeatedly in my life and one of them is being unable to resist buying what looks like a good melon There are four or five varieties in most stores now cantaloupe honeydew casaba Persian crenshaw Spanish I had half a dozen disappointments with cantaloupe from Southern Colorado last winter so when the store advertised FLORIDA MELONS! I thought they were telling me something I took one home It was ripe but tasted like wet white bread like to give a melon farmer in Southern Colorado a ripe melon grown near our home by a farming family named Hand These Hand melons are what cantaloupes were meant to taste like Many former Presidents had a box shipped to TheWhite House.