Today's Stories

May 31 / June 1, 2008

Alexander Cockburn
The Worst is Yet to Come

May 30, 2008

Bassam Aramin
Here's the Truth You've Been Running From

Andrew Cockburn
Petraeus' Iran Obsession

Saul Landau
How We Got Into This Mess

Nikolas Kozloff
Meet South America's New Secessionists

Robert Sandels
Turning Back the Clock on Cuba

Dave Lindorff
Talk is Cheap

Martha Rosenberg
Raiding Big Meat; Arresting the Wrong People

Harvey Wasserman
Lieberman & McCain: Linking Internet Censorship and Atomic Reactor Terror

Doug Giebel
A Plague on Both Your Houses (of Congress)

Shaun Harkin
The Trial of the Raytheon 9

Website of the Day
The Once and Future Environmental Movement

May 29, 2008

Jeffrey St. Clair
Bill Clinton and the Rich Women

Nikolas Kozloff
Puerto Rico, Obama and the Politics of Race

Col. Dan Smith
Deceiving the Dead

Karl Grossman
The Most Lucrative Incentive for Nuclear Power in the History of the United States

William S. Lind
Inside the Washington Game

Robert Weissman
What to do About the Price of Oil

Dave Lindorff
Why Puerto Rico Won't Matter

David Macaray
A Union Fable

Chris Genovali
Fear and Loathing in the Northern Rockies

Laura Carlsen
Mexico's Battle Over Oil

Website of the Day
Support Antiwar.com

May 28, 2008

Wajahat Ali
The Libertarian Dark Horse: An Exclusive Interview with Ron Paul

Ralph Nader
What's Really Driving the High Price of Oil?

Brian McKenna
Why I Want to Teach Anthropology at the Army War College

Corporate Crime Reporter
Why Vincent Bugliosi Wants to Prosecute George W. Bush for Murder

Brian Cloughley
The Attack on Damadola

Eric Walberg
Opium for the Masses from Afghanistan

Michael Dickinson
Raytheon's Pain Ray: Coming to a Protest Near You

Ijaz Khan
Opening Windows in Pakistan

Website of the Day
Older Than America

May 27, 2008

Alexander Cockburn
In Her Mind She's Killed Before: the Plot to Assassinate Ralph Nader

Greg Kafoury
Is Obama Turning (Further) Right?

Jean Bricmont
Western Delusions

Tim Wise
Farrakhan is not the Problem

Ricardo Alarcón
Puerto Rico's Turn

Stephen Soldz
APA Supports Psychologist Engagement in Bush Regime Interrogations

Andy Worthington
The Guantánamo 16

Alan Singer
Vapid, Stupid and Insulting: Chuck Schumer Speaks to the Graduates

Richard Neville
Storm in an A-Cup

Susie Day
Gone with the W

May 26, 2008

Uri Avnery
The Syrian Option

Bill Quigley
War Immemorial Day

Col. Dan Smith
Retreating from Hell: a Different Memorial Day

Cindy Sheehan
Why Memorial Day is a Double-Whammy for Me

Marjorie Cohn
Hillary's Assassination Politics: Her Last Shot?

Fred Gardner
Does the VA Care?

Raymond J. Lawrence
Pain Pays: Getting Rich at NY Presbyterian Hospital

Harvey Wasserman
Mugging the Election System

Moncia Benderman
Truth Matters

David Rovics
In Praise of Utah Phillips

Website of the Day
Fox News Jokes About "Knocking Off" Osama and Obama

May 24 / 25, 2008

Alexander Cockburn
Death-Wish Hillary Primes Manchurian Candidate

Jeffrey St. Clair
Yellowstone: How Sununu Shrank the Ecosystem

Barbara Rose Johnston
Dam Legacies, Damned Futures

Nikolas Kozloff
U.S. Fourth Fleet in Venezuelan Waters

Adriana Kojeve
The Environment and the 2008 Elections

Robert Fantina
Justice Department's Revelations on Torture

Dave Lindorff
Bush's War on Children in Iraq

David Yearsley
The War on Kitsch

Nelson P. Valdés
The Buying of "Democracy" Agents in Cuba

Kathleen M. Barry
Celebrating Ethnic Cleansing

John Ross
Mexico's Narco Opera Reaches for High Point

Allison Kilkenny
Apathy Doesn't Live in Bronx

Fred Gardner
Orangeburg, 1968

Elizabeth Schulte
Can the Whole World be Fed?

Daniel Gross
Remembering the Wendy's Massacre: the Dangerous Side of Retail Work

Christopher Brauchli
The Search for a Token Right-winger

Richard Rhames
A Nation of Sheep

Daniel Cassidy
My Mother

Poets' Basement
Davies, Klipschutz and Willson

Website of the Weekend
Happy Birthday, Bob

May 23, 2008

Paul Craig Roberts
War Abroad, Poverty at Home

Alan Farago
The Radical Extremists of the Building Industry

Conn Hallinan
Ballots and Bullets: From Beirut to Bolivia

Mark Engler
The World After Bush

George Wuerthner
Cars and Cows: Living Large in America

Kamran Matin
The Kurds and American Neo-Imperialism

Sandy Boyer /
Shaun Harkin
The Long Incarceration of Pol Brennan

Robert Weitzel
A "Holey" Instrument of Peace in Iraq

Cindy Sheehan
An Uphill Battle

Liaquat Ali Khan
Pakistan's Futile Constitutional Amendment

Website of the Day
A Message from the Moral Compass of the McCain Campaign

May 22, 2008

Vijay Prashad
Racist Grammar

Joanne Mariner
A Military Commissions Cheat Sheet

Sharon Smith
60 Years of Apartheid

Jeff Birkenstein
Disaster Redux: Some Early Thoughts on the Earthquake in China

Brendan McQuade
From Obama to the PRTs in Iraq

Peter Morici
The Sorry State of the Banking Industry

Niranjan Ramakrishnan
Restoration Boulevard

Dave Zirin
What I Want to Ask Mary Tillman

Ron Jacobs
CPR for the Antiwar Movement

Stephen Lendman
Immoral Hazard

Website of the Day
Hagee: God Sent Hitler to Drive the Jews to Israel

May 21, 2008

Jeffrey St. Clair
The Gothic Politics of Hillary Clinton

Nikolas Kozloff
U.S. Military Bases in South America

Alan Farago
Miami, Cuba and the Presidential Campaign

Dave Lindorff
Big John and the Scary, Scary Iran Threat

David Model
Genocide in Iraq?

Eric Walberg
Afghanistan: Who is the Enemy?

Franklin Lamb
Lebanon Gets a President

Kenneth Couesbouc
Tax Against Tyranny

Website of the Day
Child Labor and War-Affected Children: a Photo Essay

May 20, 2008

Ralph Nader
A Trip Inside Google

Uri Avnery
With Friends Like These

Patrick Irelan
The Empire and the Fleet

Ray McGovern
Come Out, Admiral Fallon, Wherever You Are

David Macaray
The UAW Strike Against American Axle

Chris Genovali
Big Oil on the Water: Skating Around the Tanker Issue

Ibrahim Fawal
Birmingham, Israel and the Nakba

Christopher Ketcham
Let Us Now Praise Famous Suicides

Andy Worthington
Guantánamo Trial Delayed

Martha Rosenberg
Merck is a Repeat Offender

Website of the Day
Defend the Students Who Pied Tom Friedman

May 19, 2008

Saul Landau
Cuba Will Live

Paul Craig Roberts
The Metamorphosis of the Conservative Movement

Brian McKenna
Brotherly Love in Philly's Badlands

Patrick Cockburn
City of the Dead: Mosul on Lockdown

B. R. Gowani
The Central Problem Pakistan Needs to Tackle

Dr. Trudy Bond
Psychologists and Torture: If Not Now, When?

Cindy Sheehan
Whose War is It?

John Mohawk
The Warriors Who Turned to Peace

Remi Kanazi
When Free Speech Doesn't Come for Free

Robert Day
I Get a Horse

Website of the Day
Evolve or Die

May 17 / 18, 2008

Alexander Cockburn
The View from the Crusaders' Castle

Tim Wise
Testosterone is Not to Blame: Why Sexism isn't the Reason for Hillary's Loss

Andy Worthington
Gitmo Trials: Betrayal, Backsliding and Boycotts

Robert Fantina
The Double-Talk Express Derails

Karim Makdisi
In the Wake of the Doha Truce

Harry Browne
Only Ireland Can Vote on EU's Future

John Ross
Suicide by Taco? The Demise of Mexico's PRD

Dave Lindorff
Fear at the Pump

Robert Weissman
Pharmaceutical Payola

Laray Polk
Bush Family Appeasement

David Yearsley
Puritans in Seattle

Ron Jacobs
Riot Squads, Privatization and the National Front

Paul Quinnett
My Last Flight

Sam Bahour
Refugees are the Key

Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor
Poverty Wages

Dr. Susan Block
The Groom May Kiss the Groom

Kim Nicolini
Paranoid Park: Inside the Fractured Landscape of Male Adolescence

Jeremy Scahill
John Cusack's War

Jeffrey St. Clair
Booked Up

Poets' Basement
Dominguez, Gerard and Davies

May 16, 2008

Stephen Soldz
Involuntary Drugging of Detainees

Jonathan Cook
Police Attack Al-Nakba March

Paul Craig Roberts
Lies of Aggression

Christopher Brauchli
A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Pharmacy

James L. Secor
Olympic Torch China: the View from Shaoxing

Franklin Lamb
Did Hezbollah Thwart a Bush/Olmert Attack on Beirut?

Linn Washington, Jr.
The Price of Protecting Racist Cops

Dave Lindorff
What West Virginia Means

May 15, 2008

Stan Cox
Big Brother Close Up

Jeff Halper
Rethinking Israel After 60 Years

Greg Moses
Living for the Children of Palestine

John Ross
Why Mexican Justice is a Euphemism

Ron Jacobs
Go to Work, Go to Jail

Binoy Kampmark
Indian Jailbirds: the Case of Binayak Sen

Eve Spangler
We Should Not Celebrate Dispossession

Martha Rosenberg
Meat Wars with South Korea

Website of the Day
Idaho Wolf Killers

May 14, 2008

Ismael Hossein-Zadeh
Oil Wars

Reza Fiyouzat
Torture, a Bully's Creed

Felice Pace
California Water Politics: Of Dams and Water Buffaloes

Hamdan A. Yousuf / Dania S. Ahmed
A Generation Defined by War

Robert Weitzel
Hillary's "Final Solution" to the Persian Problem

Ralph Nader
You're Either with the American People or the Big Auto Bosses

Dave Lindorff
Hillary, McCain and the Stupid Vote

Missy Comley Beattie
White Heaven: Hillary's W. Virginia Idyll

Neve Gordon
Israel as a Site of Struggle

Dr. Susan Block
A Washington Witch Hanging

Website of the Day
Hillary's Downfall

May 13, 2008

David Rosen
Sexual Terrorism: the Sadistic Side of Bush's War on Terror

Alan Farago
Nuclear Florida: Beachfront Reactors in an Age of Rising Sea Levels?

Saul Landau
The Crisis at Home

Saree Makdisi
Forget the Two-State Solution

Paul Craig Roberts
How Empires Fall

Andy Worthington
Gitmo's Suicide Bomber

Brother Bede Vincent
The Problem with Rev. Wright--There are Too Few Like Him

Linda Mamoun
Marketing Ethnic Cleansing

David Macaray
The Myth That Won't Die

Website of the Day
Burning the Future: Coal in America

May 12, 2008

St. Clair / Frank
The Pentagon's Toxic Legacy

Ziga Vodovnik
Rebels Against Tyranny: an Interview with Howard Zinn on Anarchism

Gary Leupp
Why All of Our Efforts Won't Stop an Attack on Iran

Frankln Lamb
Choufeit's Bloody Pentacost

Suzanne Baroud
The Ambition of Hillary Clinton

Martha Rosenberg
Farmer Ernie's Chamber of Horrors

Dave Zirin
The Boss's Boycott

Carl Finamore
I Ain't Gonna Work No More

Peter Morici
Recession Watch

Richard Rhames
The Third Way to Nowhere

Website of the Day
The Untold Story of Black New Orleans

May 10 / 11, 2008

Alexander Cockburn
Real Clear Numbers: 101,000 Casualties a Year

Franklin Lamb
Hezbollah Eases Up and Beirut Opens Its Shutters

Ciara Gilmartin
A Surge in Iraqi Detainees

Diane Farsetta
Inside a Nuclear Industry Soirée

Kent Paterson
Mother's Day in Ciudad Juarez

Alan Farago
The Social Engineers

Rannie Amiri
Beirut on the Brink

Patrick Irelan
Bolivia, Morales and the Red Ponchos

Robert Fantina
The Lexicon Legacy of George W. Bush

Nikolas Kozloff
El Salvador 2009: Another Feather in the Cap of Chavez?

George Ciccariello-Maher
The Yumare Massacre, 22 Years On

David Yearsley
Bacharach at 80

Ron Jacobs
Rosa Luxemburg's Shock Doctrine

John Holt
Can Yellowstone Survive?

David Michael Green
It's So Over

Ben Terrall
Dealing Sleep

Kim Nicolini
The Best Film of the Bush Era?

Jeffrey St. Clair
Booked Up

Poets' Basement
Gibbons, Orloski, Frisella, Gladstone-Gelman

May 9, 2008

Franklin Lamb
A Wild Day in Beirut

Andy Worthington
The Afghans of Gitmo

Benjamin Dangl
Polarizing Bolivia

Mark A. Huddle
Remembering Mildred Loving, an Unsung Hero of the Civil Rights Movement

David Macaray
Hollywood Gives SAG the Brush Off

Dave Lindorff
Team Clinton: Going Down Ugly

C.G. Estabrook
The Way We Live Now

Matt Kosko
McCain, Clinton, Obama and the Wages of Lesser-Evilism

Robert Weissman
Big Business is not the Solution to Global Poverty

Michael Dickinson
Jailing the Joint

Website of the Day
The Role of Third Parties in the U.S.A.

May 8, 2008

Sharon Smith
Rockefeller Family Fables

Saul Landau
The NATO Axiom

Laura Carlsen
A Primer on Plan Mexico

Binoy Kampmark
Food Riots are Coming to the U.S.

Kenneth Couesbouc
China's Paper Feet

Liaquat Ali Khan
Pakistan's Constitutional Shenanigans

Franklin Lamb
Blindsided, Hezbollah Mulls Its Response

Sen. Russ Feingold
Government in Secret

George Wuerthner
The Problems with Conservation Easements

Richard W. Behan
A Brief Exposé of a Fraudulent War

Adam Federman
Marching for Sean Bell

Website of the Day
State of the Air

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Outnumbered, Outgunned and Displaced

"Sex and the City" Through a Man's Eyes

By WAJAHAT ALI

Driving to the “Sex and the City: The Movie” premiere, I felt like Morgan Spurlock, the director of “Super Size Me” who foolishly consumed fast food for 30 days; a man voluntarily condemning himself to masochistic pain for sake of a cultural experiment. Even before entering, the publicity coordinator, who knows me and the other frequent movie critics, said, “Dude, you’re like one of 6 guys in the entire movie theatre.”

“Fantastic,” I replied sarcastically. Upon entering the theatre and surveying the audience, I realized he was incorrect. I was one of the 21 men out of the 250 highly giddy and anxious women. The air brimmed with suffocating excitable estrogen. As a heterosexual dude, I felt outnumbered, outgunned, and  - like a midget on a NBA basketball court – displaced.

I was flabbergasted by what I witnessed: an entire audience of women representing every age, color, ethnicity and financial status behaving like 12 year old girls before a NSYNC concert. Some women dressed up like they were attending the opening of a San Francisco club – dressed to the nines and sporting “do me” heels. I overheard the following comments:  “I am prepared for awesomeness!” “I feel exquisite right now!” “Oh, my god! I can’t wait for my girls!”

It finally occurred to me that this was not any ordinary summer movie, nay; it was a cultural “E-vent” of epic proportions for many American women. When I expressed my amusement out loud at this spectacle and asked women why this was such a big deal, a woman besides me remarked, “Ok, remember when like that Stars Wars re-release or whatever happened a couple of years ago?”

“Uh, of course,” I replied.

“Well, this is like that for us…. but like times 1,000!”

“Easy, easy there. Times 1,000? I find that hard to believe.”

“Times 1,000!!”

When the HBO logo appeared and the movie started, the entire female audience burst into loud and approving applause. I wrote down this note: “The women literally shrieked during the opening!”

Unlike the loyalists, I had only a tangential acquaintance with these “girls.” Almost ten years ago, my freshman roommate and I decided to watch an episode to comprehend the appeal. While watching the show, my roomie’s eyes squinted in disbelief and his face contorted in disgust. He just didn’t understand. His exact words after seeing the show, if I recall correctly, were the following: “Who the hell wants to see old, horny women having sex with everyone like prostitutes?” Well, apparently millions and millions of people. Years later, I tried watching a season of the show on Netflix as a cultural experiment to identify its mass appeal with women worldwide.

One of my homies who was going through a rough separation independently decided to do the same to “understand modern day women” in light of his sudden break up. We both realized that the “Sex and the City” ladies are apparently beloved by the entire gamut of the female species: conservative women, religious Muslim women, progressive women, professional women, college women, high school women, single women, married women, divorced women, soon to be women, and every other women in between. My friend said he only lasted 4 episodes and shook his head in some way blaming “Sex and the City” for his spurned woman’s apparently newfound desire to “find her own voice” after he allegedly “suffocated her independence.”  The fictional depiction of professional, independent, sexually adventurous, materialistic, opinionated, and at times narcissistic and selfish women convinced him all 21st century ladies were transforming into doppelgangers of their respective “Sex and the City” avatars.

To be honest, my major question after seeing a season was how none of these women developed a litany of venereal diseases and unwanted pregnancies stemming from their endless series of sexual escapades. Upon reflection, I realize I was perhaps viewing the series from a literalist and “male-centric” point of view. After all, James Bond beds beautiful women in every movie and unless Q equipped Bond’s pants with some magic condom gadget, the 007 agent didn’t use any protection. Similarly, the men from HBO’s “Entourage,” the male equivalent of “Sex and the City,” sleep with the entire population of good looking women in L.A., yet they never bear the brunt of “real’ consequences. I never questioned their sexual health or responsibility perhaps because I knew these male figures were so rooted in fiction and fantasy.

However, the “Sex and the City” girls confound us men precisely due to the vehement love and loyalty their legions of female fans have for these purely fictional characters. Women become possessive and refer to them as “my girls.” It’s as if the line between reality and fiction is partially blurred precisely due to the female population’s collective empathy and recognition for their fictional “counterparts.” For example, I received an IM recently from a female friend who said the following:

“OMG! OMG! Guess what?”

“What?” I asked naturally anticipating some catastrophic and/or shockingly happy news.

“I’m CARRIE! Yay!”

“Um, no. You’re Ann. What the hell are you talking about?”

“No, no. Carrie from “Sex and the City.” I took the online Facebook quiz! And I’m her! OMG I knew I was her. It’s so true. We are so alike!”

[Imagine me staring at my computer screen thinking, “What the hell are you smoking, woman?”].

Even at the theatre, the lady next to me proudly exclaimed, “I’m Carrie! I mean I really am. Because I’m kind of quirky but also intelligent, you know?”

I think this is the female equivalent of men’s “Star Wars” game, which goes something like this:

“Dude, I’m like Han Solo!”

“Nah, man. You’re more of a Luke Skywalker.”

“Hey, screw you! I’m Han! Or at the very least Lando!”

“Nah, Lando is cool and he’s Black – and he’s Billy Dee “Colt 45” Williams. You’re kinda lame…like Luke Skywalker.”

“Whatever, your mother is Chewbacca.”

However, the male version of “ Who is my pop culture avatar?” is rooted with a conscious realization that we will never in any shape, way or form be our fictional counterparts. We wish we were James Bond, but we know we won’t bed beautiful Russian women, instead we’re grateful to get a woman who can tolerate having sex with us once in a while. We aspire to be Han knowing full well we’re more like Jar Jar and Chewie, largely irrelevant and excessively hairy. Thus, the “Sex and the City” phenomenon transcends the confines of “bubble gum” cotton candy fantasy and taps into some popular, universal female “recognition.” I hypothesize the show, although largely superficial and unrealistic according to this reviewer, depicted women in a raw and uncensored fashion; the way women are behind closed doors after shedding their societal demeanor of being “prim, proper and chaste.” It’s the female equivalent of “men just being men.”

It’s with this mentality, observation and [mis?]understanding, all of which could be completely incorrect due to my “patriarchal,” “misogynist-y,” cave man sensibilities, that I approached “Sex and City: The Movie.”

In fact, I have no idea how to even review this movie. No matter if I eviscerate it or critically analyze it, the show’s rabid fans will line up just like those “Star Wars” fan boys did nearly 10 years ago. For men, the movie is like being forced to watch the bastard child produced from the unholy threesome of The Lifetime Channel, Oxygen Channel, and The We Channel. The baby is then injected with a Steel Magnolias Red Bull Booster shot. The baby, by the way, walks in Manlo Blahnik high heel shoes [See, women, I did pay attention during the movie. Men, these are designer shoes that women would consider selling one of their family members into indentured servitude just so they could wear a pair for a day.] 

Also, the movie is two and half-hours – I repeat – two and half hours of nearly every single female stereotype and melodramatic device amped up to the extreme strung together with a flimsy, almost non existent plot. Again, the women in my audience loved every minute of it and perhaps would’ve lasted another hour.

The movie opens with a three-minute montage giving all of us “Sex and the City Virgins” a summary of each major character. Carrie, played by Sarah Jessica Parker, is the movie’s narrator who has finally settled down with her on again, off again boyfriend of 10 years, Mr Big. Samantha [Kim Cattrall] is the nearly 50, sexual cougar, who has moved to L.A. to manage her boy toy, TV star lover. Miranda [Cynthia Nixon] is the ambitious, intelligent, professional attorney who moved to lower class Brooklyn to raise a family. Charlotte [Kristen Davis] is happily married and adopted an adorable Asian American baby because she was unable to bear children of her own.

Carrie’s voice-over tells us that women move to New York for “Labels and Love,” expressing the convenient, modern day American marriage of materialism and emotional fulfillment. In fact, the entire movie revolves around the ladies’ near obsession with corporate merchandise, most notably shoes and purses, and their amusing, and at times nauseating, tribulations with “men.” The movie opens with Mr. Big casually proposing marriage to Carrie, who as you guessed it, readily agrees.

The first third of the movie moves with that snazzy, frivolous and superficial flair that made the pacing tolerable for a male viewer like myself. The planned marriage between Carrie and Mr. Big becomes Page 6 news and the entire town of New York buzzes about the union. During the wedding proceedings, Vogue magazine approaches Carrie as their focus for a  “Marriage at 40” piece thereby ushering a gratuitous 4 minute sequence where Carrie tries on designer wedding dresses. For several minutes, Carrie simply tries on different wedding gowns while naming their designers ultimately culminating with “Vivian Westwood,” which I assumed from the audience reaction is “kind of a big deal.” I sat there trying to figure out what the hell was happening and why I was watching Sarah Jessica Parker’s dress rehearsal, but judging from the women gasping and clapping at the various dresses I chalked it up to gender relativism. I simply tried to “empathize” by imaging how us guys view the Daily 10 highlights on Sportscenter or Rambo inventively, and single handedly I meant mention, decimating the entire Burmese Military at the end of his latest movie for 5 straight minutes.

For about six seconds the screen went black at our screening due to a small reel malfunction. I swear the women in the audience reacted as if their child had been kidnapped. The audio was fine, but I’m positive if the screen remained black for a few more seconds there would’ve been a near riot. I wrote this down in my notes: “The women erupted with gasps and fear.”

So, there’s a fancy wedding which is about to take place in the first half hour of a 2.5-hour movie. Do you think there’s going to be complications? I’ll let you figure it out. The other tales revolve around Samantha’s growing frustration with a sexless and passionless life in LA, Miranda’s faltering relationship with her man due to adultery, and Charlotte coping with a nice surprise.

Along the way, the ladies travel to Mexico to cheer up one of their depressed friends. They also drink lots of product placement Starbucks and intoxicating beverages, wear several high-end shoes, buy ridiculously expensive clothing, and check out fashion week in New York City. They also acquire some model minorities in the form of Jennifer Hudson, who represents the only color and middle class component of a very White and affluent narrative. Admirably, she brings charm to a secretarial “Bagger Vance” character whose job is to “organize” Carrie’s post breakup, faltering life. Thankfully, after fixing Carrie’s life, Hudson’s character also gets a reward in the form of a designer purse and romantic fulfillment. It’s amusing to me how a show that celebrates materialism, selfishness, class-ism, and Whiteness can have such a broad following. When looking for an apartment in a “low income” district, Miranda and her White nanny remark disapprovingly about the all-Asian neighbors. In fact, Miranda says, “Oh, look! One white person! Follow him” and, much to her relief, finds one White person living amongst the minorities. But, I digress.

Much of the movie’s run time unfortunately has the four charismatic ladies weeping and lamenting in traditional, melodramatic fashion about lost loves and romantic missteps. Sadly, the element of fun and freshness of the first half hour nearly disappears for an hour and a half only to return for the conclusion. Like I said, it was a parade of female stereotypes and clichés stitched together in episodic fashion but ably played by all the female leads. There’s no reason why a whimsical, comedy show, albeit with serious and romantic underpinnings, should be two and a half hours long. This was like Gone with the Wind of female movies in terms of length.

However, that being said, the audience couldn’t care less. All of the four leads have happy, fulfilling endings, which I won’t dare reveal in this review fearing the wrath of the XX populace. Furthermore, I appreciated how the end acknowledged that some of the characters have to actually grow up, face reality, and swallow their ego and selfishness in order to find love in a “relationship.” If indeed “Sex and the City” is a representation of post feminist feminists, then this male reviewer observed how similar their foibles are to the patriarchy they allegedly rebel against. Despite their professed independence, pride, ego-centricism and hedonism, the women were still unhappy and discontent without the acknowledgment of some form of a fulfilling male relationship. By playing to age-old stereotypes about female materialism and emotional hysteria, the film affirms the more things change, the more they seem to stay the same.

And, of course, the audience couldn’t care less. After crying nearly four or five times throughout the movie, the mostly female audience burst into rapturous applause during the credits. This male reviewer exhaled and survived, but left acknowledging and in some ways appreciating the sheer awesome cultural power of “Sex and the City.” Also, I learned that Oscar de la Renta is a fashion designer completely unrelated to boxer Oscar de la Hoya, and that Vera Wang is not a popular, Bay Area socialite [Every woman in the Bay has said that name countless times over the years], but is in fact an influential fashion designer. Also, I learned that women love shoes. They really love shoes – especially Manolo Blahnik. And, finally, I went to the movie with an open mind, sat throughout till the end, and learned a few things. This, ladies, should merit some props.

Wajahat Ali is Pakistani Muslim American who is neither a terrorist nor a saint. He is a playwright, essayist, humorist, and Attorney at Law, whose work, “The Domestic Crusaders” is the first major play about Muslim Americans living in a post 9-11 America. His blog is at http://goatmilk.wordpress.com/. He can be reached at wajahatmali@gmail.com 

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