"The Hit Charade: Lou Pearlman, Boy Bands, and the Biggest Ponzi Scheme in U.S. History," by Tyler Gray (HarperCollins, $24.95) ...more

January 4, 2009

Becoming a dissolute ad executive from another era takes persistence and attention to detail. It is not merely a matter of scoring an early '60s Kingsbridge suit by John Taylor Ltd. of Tarrytown ($110 at Cheap Jack's in midtown Manhattan) and a skinny Harry Rothman tie ($45). You can't just vacuum up Lucky Strikes. No, if you want to be a piece of serious collateral damage in the phenomenon that is AMC's "Mad Men," which just won an Emmy for best drama series, you've got to get the lingo down. To know your dolls from your sweethearts, I mean. ...more

October 5, 2008

I would like to thank Barack Obama and John McCain (despite the fact that my gratitude towards one will only extend the length of this column) for explaining to me what "American" means. ...more

July 23, 2008

On Monday, Vice President Dick Cheney said, "So we had Cheneys on both sides of the family - and we don't even live in West Virginia." His gratuitous insult raises again the question: What's the most scorned minority in America? ...more

June 6, 2008

Midshipmen Joy Dewey and Joshua Foxton hope to hear familiar epithets when they ask a group of new students at the U.S. Naval Academy to describe promiscuous men and women. ...more

November 18, 2007