Casey/Santorum/Remnick

I've got to call out my fellow Burgher zp at I Hate The New Yorker: why no comment on the Casey/Santorum article in the Nov. 14 issue? What'd you think? I know you prefer to focus on film, but I'm interested to hear your comments. And I've got to disagree with you about the Ashbery profile. Although I enjoyed it, I can't remember ever reading a profile of a poet that told me less about his poetry. I got the sense that MacFarquhar doesn't really understand Ashbery. No shame in that, of course. I sure don't. But for me he's like Jorie Graham: I don't know what the hell they're talking about, but it's nice to live in the disorientation for a while.

I just realized this week that I've now hit thirteen years of religiously reading the NEW YORKER. I can't tell whether that makes me depressingly old-fashioned, hopelessly middlebrow, or happily blessed with free time. It probably just means I've spent far too much time on buses, trains, airplanes, and Stairmasters over the last decade and a half.