As 2015
began, I browsed the still-robust magazine rack of the Boulder Bookstore for
signs of the current Zeitgeist – the intellectual fashion of these times.
As fate would have it, the Zeitgeist experienced a tectonic shift last
week with the horrific events in Paris. The violent crimes visited on
humanity by four psychopaths who murdered gleefully in the name of Allah will
undoubtedly have altered the way we relate to the billboards of popular
culture. Our view of the world will have darkened a bit, opening the way for
disturbing new strains of nihilism in the arts. Fiction, painting, poetry and
theater – if not dance, which remains vibrant – are all about to descend
a few further steps into the chill of night. Let us consider herewith how
things were just before tidal darkness resumed its onslaught against the
printed word. A sampling of magazine covers from New Year’s Day, circa 2015:
Harper’s
Bazaar: Whatever else we may worry about in 2015, it
apparently will not be the year that Jennifer
Aniston goes over the hill. See for yourself.
Elle:
Nicole
Kidman, on the other hand, may be a worry. This is the first tarted up
picture we’ve seen of her where she didn’t look like her incomparably
gorgeous old self. And what’s with the platinum hair? A too-gay art director,
perhaps, with an axe to grind? Or did she simply pull a Renee Zellweger? You
be the judge.
Hipmania:
Only in post-feminism America could a magazine hope to entice readers with
this teaser: “Search no more: Your genderqueer paper doll is here.” If the
magazine world is about to have that silly grin wiped from its face, Hipmania
will undoubtedly be among the last to submit.
Esquire:
Struggling to find an audience ever since men stopped reading and women gave
up on them, “The Millennium at 15” cover features machismo comin’-at-you: Tatum
Channing in a business suit, accessorized with a pit bull rather than the
more traditional watch fob.
No Kardashians!
Nature:
The magazine’s choices for ‘persons of the year’ stand as serious
counterpoint to the increasingly dubious honor bestowed by Time, which, increasingly desperate to
seem relevant, would likely have had Kim Kardashian on its short list. You
may not recognize any of Nature’s
choices, but follow the links and you’ll see that frivolousness has yet to
overrun the world of science: Andrea
Accomazzo, Suzanne
Topalian, Radhikan Nagpal,
David Spergel, Sheik Umar Khan,
Masaya
Takahashi, Sjors
Scheres.
Car
and Driver: America’s
200 mph Sedans! Enjoy America’s final burst of speed while it
lasts, all you hellions! In the interest of saving pedestrians’ lives, U.S.
cities are moving toward a 25 mph speed limit that supposedly will apply even
to New York City cabbies.
Conde
Nast: The ubiquitous Taylor
Swift leads the A-list, of course, followed by sundry semi-worthies whose
agents evidently have been hard at work earning their 10 percent slice:
Jennifer Lopez, Michael Keaton (!), Rosamund Pike, Eddie Redmayne, Jimmy
Fallon, Lorde, Angelina Jolie (already passe now that Unbroken has flopped), Bradley Cooper,
Reese Witherspoon, Beyonce/JayZ. Conspicuously absent: Jennifer
Lawrence, who may have gotten more exposure last year than she’d hoped for.
Are YOU a Racist?
Mother
Jones: “Are
you racist?” this month’s cover has the self-righteous daring to ask.
Rest assured, we are told: “Science has the answer” (and you’re not going to
like it).
Atlantic
Monthly: “Why do the best soldiers in the world keep
losing? The tragic decline of the American military”. This story
had grown tiresome since the fall of Saigon, but it has since been made
relevant again by James
Fallows, a reporter of no mean gifts.
Forbes:
Bravo to Steve Forbes for restoring Michael Milken to the
pantheon of American heroes where he belongs! As the “Junk Bond King,” Milken
was railroaded by the SEC in 1989 for alleged securities violations but has
since repaid his debt to society a thousandfold. He is co-founder
of the Milken Family Foundation, chairman of the Milken
Institute, and founder of medical philanthropies funding research into melanoma,
cancer and other life-threatening diseases. Others celebrated on the
New Year’s cover include Walmart heiress Carrie Walton Penner, Blackstone CEO
Stephen Schwarzman and anti-Islamist activist Malala Yousafzai.
Phone-Company Bloodsport
Consumer
Reports: “At last, a phone plan you’ll
love”. Will 2015 will be the year, finally, that competition breaks out
among cell phone carriers? If ever bloodletting were to be enjoyed, the
spectacle of the phone companies going for each other’s throats promises to
be it.
The New Republic: “Some of my
saddest friends are rich,” proclaims the lead story. “Why extreme wealth is
bad for everyone.” Given the magazine’s soft-on-socialism
proclivities, you will already know that the author’s friends do not include
the grotesquely rich Clintons. The author is Michael Lewis, however,
and that’s why this
story is worth reading.
The
Economist: The New Year’s cover was deliberately
designed to provoke dark suspicions and to stir up loose talk about what the
Rothschilds et al. hold in store for us in 2015. Artistically, the style is
reminiscent of the Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely
Hearts Club Band album cover. To wade into the murky depths
of interpretation, click
here for ZeroHedge’s take.
