Monday, June 29, 2009

Michael Kinsley :

Here is a handy-dandy way to determine whether the failure to order some exam or treatment constitutes rationing: If the patient were the president, would he get it? If he'd get it and you wouldn't, it's rationing.

Works for me. ... 1:26 P.M.

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When in S.F. ... : Willie Brown's column is almost Caen-y! But doesn't this recent party he attended (at the home of a former Secretary of State) seem a) a bit decadent and b) embarrassing?

I went to an unbelievable dinner party at Charlotte and George Shultz's penthouse Monday night for retired Army Gen. Eric Shinseki, the new secretary of veterans affairs.

The party was a Stanlee Gatti tour de force, complete with fatigue-wearing servers, camouflage table cloths, extras dressed up as snipers and a full Marine color guard and band.

It was like being in Afghanistan.

All this for about a dozen guests. Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger was there with his wife, Maria Shriver. Gavin Newsom was there with Jennifer, and boy is she showing.

I was seated next to Arnold, and he seemed to be holding up pretty well, considering the nightmare going on up in Sacramento.

The dessert: a chocolate replica of the Joint Chiefs of Staff seal, surrounded with vanilla ice cream and the Golden Gate Bridge in chocolate on each side.

I think it's the "extras dressed up as snipers" that does it. ... [ via Lucianne ] 1:22 P.M.

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Fire, Ready, Aim: FIAT/Chrysler CEO Sergio Marchionne :

"This weekend we'll be choosing which Chrysler [factory] we'll be using to produce the Fiat 500 aimed at the US market ... We shall probably produce the full Alfa Romeo range.  ... We shall probably also be making the so-called crossover, the new 69, when the Alfa flagship comes out, but on a platform shared with Chrysler. The whole range will be re-designed."

He does seem decisive (contrast with GM management style, which Ross Perot famously described as "Ready, Aim, Aim, Aim."  I still say the whole thing flops. ... TTAC 's commenters are also less than fully supportive. ... 1:20 P.M.

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