debating debacle

In advance of tonight's earth-shattering Presidential debate - I do feel that the fate of the planet hangs in the balance, but then I am a drama queen - I have come to a sorry conclusion about Obama's last performance. I think we were witnessing, not fatigue or lack of oxygen, but a tantrum. I think he had dismissed Romney as a fool far behind in the polls, and resented taking time from his busy life as Leader of the Free World to have to endure this debate. Obama barely showed up because he didn't want to be there and didn't think it mattered. He didn't care.

I hate to be biblical, but talk about "Pride cometh before a fall." Talk about hubris, and a learning curve. We'll see tonight how much he has learned. Nerve-wracking. I watched a superb edition of Steve Paikin's "The Agenda" last night, (a program that is, actually, always superb), with various pundits from the U.S., China and Canada talking about the place of the U.S. in the world today. The woman in Washington said that Obama had proved to be such a hawk that there wasn't much difference between him and Romney on the substance of many issues, just a difference of style. Pretty harsh, but - Obama has not been the overwhelming force for love, peace and good we fantasized about. I know, look what he was up against - slavering human hyenas with an entire TV channel as a megaphone. Still. A certain disappointment, perhaps inevitable when I remember the euphoria of those first days.

No question, however, that he's a million times better than the alternative. GO OBAMA. The pundits last night concluded, to a man - and woman - that almost every leader in the world is praying for an Obama victory, with the exception of a handful of countries, most of all, of course, Israel.

Talk about ironic and sad.

Now full of antibiotics, I am better. Not hugely better, but better, on my way up. It is such a waste of time and energy, being sick - I'm lucky it doesn't happen very often. TOUCHWOOD TOUCHWOOD TOUCHWOOD. When my beloved friend Sarah Torchinsky was diagnosed with multiple myeloma in her eighties, she refused to talk about it. Until the day she died, on my birthday in 2009, she never complained or discussed her illness, at least to me. And I mewl about a bit of a flu. Well, there was something up there about a drama queen.

Speaking of which, a friend wrote from B.C. He is adapting the movie "Whatever happened to Baby Jane?" for the stage, featuring the divine Nicola Cavendish in the Bette Davis part, and wondered if I'd be interested in the other role. He wrote:

Wheelchair work and a cooked parrot for din-din? I hope this does not insult you, but you are a dead ringer for Joan Crawford...

That's a new one. Imagine! And I was such a nasty mother, too.

Swinging my coat hanger, I had, regretfully, to decline.