Author Archive | Cathy Seipp

The latest twist in Nipplegate is that CBS chief Les Moonves has been threatening to sue the FCC if it imposes fines against the network because of Janet Jackson’s infamous “wardrobe malfunction.” There’s a backstory here, though, which is that this came from a response to a question posed during the TV press tour last […]

I’m on CNBC’s Dennis Miller tonight. If they let me float a segment (that is, choose a topic), like they’ve let my friend Jill Stewart do — she’s also been on more than me, and gotten to hold the chimp, not that I’m competitive or anything — I’m going to talk about the ridiculous notion […]

As someone who believes your right to overeat ends where my airplane seat begins, I don’t think that Medicare’s decision last week to begin paying for obesity treatments is such a terrible example of nanny-state meddling. The thin already are forced to subsidize the fat anyway, via taxes and higher private insurance costs. Why not […]

My National Review column today is on Snopes, the indispensable urban legends debunker site. I became interested in urban legends several years ago, when for a while it seemed like that terrible tale of Richard Gere and the gerbil was all anyone was talking about. Gerbils aren’t actually in the habit of burrowing up the […]

The twice-yearly Television Critics Association press tour (where I’ve been since July 8, and will be until Friday) is easy to mock: the occasionally oddball reporters with their bizarre questions; the endless network spin about new shows, most of which will be quickly cancelled; the “Lord of the Flies” atmosphere. But I find the TCA […]

Associated Press had a story last week about a toy creator named Ken Hakuta (known as “Dr. Fad” to kids), whose Adopt-a-Vote campaign aims to give the underage set a real voice in this election: According to Hakuta… children and parents [could] enter into an agreement pledging that the parents will vote according to their […]

My 15-year-old daughter is off studying Russian at a language camp in Minnesota for a month. To which people generally ask incredulously: “Why Russian?” Last year, when she took French at Pasadena Community College, we got the same reaction: “Why French? Why not Spanish? Isn’t that more useful around here?” Well, no. What’s useful in […]

Eugene’s observation the other day that, contrary to current conventional p.c. wisdom, rape is a crime of sex as well as violence, reminded me of the last time I got into an argument about this. As Eugene pointed out, statistics show that rape is highest among girls and women in their late teens and early […]