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Someone has left a Star magazine on the bus in an act of charity or neglect--its cover tiled with photos of Jennifer, Brad, Jessica, Rihanna and her boyfriend, Chris Brown. All five are engaged in struggles with their vanity or their partners or both.

Ten minutes later I've learned nothing that you couldn't divine from the cover photos, except that Rihanna (or her stylist) has fantastic taste in nail design. A photograph of the singer in concert zooms in on her pinky nail, revealing an image of President Obama's face. A pinky-sized prez. I want one.

Or two. Michelle Obama would also look good on my pointer finger: a strong digit for a strong woman. The rest of the Obama family, kids plus puppy, could occupy the remaining fingers.

I wonder if the neighbourhood salons have picked up on this trend. If Rihanna can popularise leather glovelets and dominatrix footwear, presidential nails are not far behind. Our nails are among our most changeable features, without the mess of surgery or exercise. They're a good place to be expressive.

First stop is a salon on 96th and Amsterdam. Do they do custom acrylics? Yes. Obama nails? "No Obama," the manicurist says suspiciously, as though I've hit her up for a dime bag. No Obama, no problem. Next stop is Refined and Sparkling Nails on 106th and Broadway. Obama nails? "We've never done that," the manicurist says. A block away at Casablanca Nail I get the same response. Same at In & Out Nail, though they do suggest the American flag as an alternative.  read more »

My inauguration flu has finally faded (having paid my tribute in the cold). Every last port-a-potty has long been removed from the Mall. Still, I want to talk about the inaugural poem,
Elizabeth Alexander's "Praise Song for the Day". It is only now that I know what I think about it.

An inaugural poem is a curious thing. Our national character is rarely celebrated or defined by poets, and little of the American experience has been etched in verse lately. Our poet laureate, Kay Ryan, doesn't read at the start of a new congressional session. I bet few people even know who she is.

Poems are usually enjoyed in small gatherings, or beneath the fluorescent lights of a university library. We experience them personally, by and for ourselves. As Jim Fischer said in Salon:

When we read poetry to ourselves, the occasion of a great poem is an internal event, organizing the perceptions and determining the material. When that occasion is a point in time and place, the work is more likely to be...partial, responsible, contemporary, rarely timeless.

Poets rarely read at inaugurations. Elizabeth Alexander was only the fourth given the task of creating a work that speaks to America, a poem that reflects the national soul with images sharp and simple. I looked forward to it much like an over-anxious, hyper-conscious parent might anticipate a child's school play. Excited by America's new president and anxious to see poetry re-enter the national spotlight at the hands of someone so capable, I was tense with expectation.  read more »

It is quite a task to make your first book a lucid, pulsating study of not one but two huge figures, but Simon Reid-Henry pulls it off. He interleaves the lives of Fidel Castro and Che Guevara in a “dual biography”, as their paths gradually converge, culminating in the Cuban revolution of 1959, and then diverge. This is the story of a very human, and thus flawed, friendship.

The two men’s early lives are skilfully drawn, with playground anecdotes showing a precocious, impatient Che (heading a letter “already March of 1954”) and Castro impressing his mates with a stark letter to Franklin D. Roosevelt: “Send me a ten-dollar bill, American?” (The president did not reply.) This was always a more visceral meeting of minds than, say, Lenin and Trotsky, and the prose does it justice. By 1963, Che began to feel snubbed by his comrades and exasperated by Fidel’s sugar deal with Russia, seeing only a capitalist betrayal of the spirit of ’59. But Che’s execution in Bolivia in 1967 hit Castro hard: while refusing to speak openly about it, he admitted that Che haunted his dreams.

Subtly deploying his own extensive travel and recently declassified sources, Reid-Henry produces a taut history of two men who brought out the best in each other and came to embody the very notion of modern-day protest.

"Fidel & Che: A Revolutionary Friendship", Sceptre  read more »

It would hardly seem like he needs the help, but Slate magazine (together with a company called MixedInk) is giving us all the chance to write Barack Obama's Inaugural Address. In an experiment that must make James Surowiecki smile (and a certain 27-year-old grimace), readers are invited to "write, edit & remix each other's words--along with those of the past years' presidents--to create an inaugural that reflects your collective viewpoint." The top-rated version will then be published on January 20th--inauguration day--on Slate.

The idea seems to be to generate enthusiasm for some historic speechifying. It is an intriguing conceit for our first YouTube president--a new spin on "Yes we can", with the help of some nifty software. And it toys with some interesting ideas about authorship that have been percolating in the margins--that we all borrow and appropriate and take what's familiar and make it new. Indeed it is this very constant--and even subconscious--give and take that drives some of the finest art and culture, music and writing. Often this case is made in regards to intellectual property and copywrights, such as this elegant essay on the subject by Jonathan Lethem in Harper's.  read more »

A foreign policy lecture at London’s renowned international affairs hub, Chatham House, isn’t the sexiest way to spend an evening. But with Zbigniew Brzezinski as the invited guest speaker, the discussion was complex, enlightening and stunningly direct.

Brzezinksi was America's national security advisor to President Jimmy Carter from 1977 to 1981. Now he’s professor of foreign policy at Johns Hopkins University’s School of Advanced International Studies in Washington, DC, and a scholar at the Center for Strategic and International Studies. He’s a no-nonsense man with a slick haircut and a sly sense of humour. On this recent occasion, he sported an impressive double-breasted pinstripe suit.

It was interesting, as an American in London, to sit in a room full of professional Brits listening to a Polish-American talk about what’s going on in American’s minds when it comes to world politics. For an hour Brzezinski delivered his take on America’s view of the world in 2008, in light of Barack Obama's win. He lamented the fact that there isn't a politically unified Europe right now. He pushed for a renewed transanlantic dialogue and a worldwide coalition of partners committed to interdependence and global management (the guy sitting next to me responded by shifting in his seat and exhaling loudly, repeatedly). Also, America and Europe should be more engaged with China, Russia and Iran, and Afghanistan needs to be de-militarised.  read more »