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Remora LI finds discussions of "saving" the Democratic party repellent and boring. Who cares? The DC press is, of course, in hyperdrive about the elections, but that is because politics is their industry. Still, we've been following the discussion between Robert Reich and Joe Klein at Slate , partly because these two are typical DC-kabuki types. The ritual entrances. The stereotypical phrases. The rigid decorum, the predictable plot. Without, we should say, plumbing any of the deep sources of kabuki's beauty -- the body's presence to itself as a drama of obstruction and annihilation, passion as a disruption on the surface of expression, etc. Klein, in particular, illustrates the convention of hypocrisy that makes political discourse, as it is practiced by the op ed set, so off-putting. This is how Klein starts out: "Some say move left. Some say move right. Both are right and both are wrong. If we're to have a vaguely interesting national de

Remora LI, having liberally annointed our back molars with a codeine, or benzocodeine, salve, would like to do a piece on today's big news story. Sorry, the consideration of time as a component of picturing will have to be postponed -- we aren't Boethius, nor were meant to be... Onto the big story, which as my readers will know by now, is the on-going collapse of National Century Financial Services. Oh, you thought it was the bread and circuses, or rather war games, thing going on in D.C.? No, today we have an excellent example of why the press can calmly talk about how the "wave of corporate scandals" has broken. That's because nobody wants to talk about it. Plus, no star is involved in this scandal. The story is in the biz section of the Times . "The rapid collapse of National Century Financial Enterprises Inc., a large provider of cash flow financing, is sending hundreds of health care companies and their affiliates scrambling to avoid big

Notice I am not going to be as regular in posting this week, due to a toothache. Actually, three of my back teeth are in death star mode, causing me to suffer the pangs of hell in regular cycles. Like after I eat. Alas, having no money, what is LI to do? Well, this morning we called up the Texas Dental Examiners, who referred us to Texans for Healthy Smiles, who referred us to a clinic that will supposedly process us through the dread labyrinth of paperwork so that we can actually get these teeth extracted. Whether this will work or not is hard to say. If it doesn't, we'll rob a store and give ourselves up, and enjoy the amenities of prison dentistry. Anything to get rid of these molesting molars. In the meantime, here's a thought from our friend, Tom. He sent us a little Moby Dick like medley of quotes, except not about the great fish. Here's the joke on the board above his office desk. "The physicist Carl Friedrich von Weizacker told Heideggar the story

Dope We know for certain that sight is one of the most rapid actions we can perform. In an instant we see an infinite number of forms, still we only take in thoroughly one object at a time. Supposing that you, Reader, were to glance rapidly at the whole of this written page, you would instantly perceive that it was covered with various letters; but you could not, in the time, recognise what the letters were, nor what they were meant to tell. Hence you would need to see them word by word, line by line to be able to understand the letters. -Leonardo da Vinci Seeking some calm from the excitements of this week � the injustice meted out to Winona! the latest report on the distribution of stock options during the 90s! und so weiter -- LI has been reading Leo Steinberg�s marvelous essay, Leonardo�s Incessant Last Supper. Steinberg is, as he calls it, a Leonardista. Among the splendors of the book are the photos he has taken, over the years, of the Last Supper. These photos record the