The national fixation on breast size is holographic: the part reveals the whole. Figuratively, not literally. On one level, it is just business trend generation in order to arouse new product demand. The trend will last a while, then new trends will replace it.

On another level, the fixation is an example of the confusion of form with substance. We live in animal bodies, and we don't have control over the bodies we are given. There are forms that I find more beautiful than others, but the people I prefer to be around have internal beauty. I know that's a cliche, but it's true. I get away from people I don't like.

I lived in a co-op once where some people walked around naked, and worked at a holistic studies center where the sauna was something of an au-naturel hangout after a day's toil. The variety was an eye-opener, so to speak, and was a consciousness-altering experience. I was amazed at how many women had completely flat breasts. One only had scars.

With all our empire-building over the past few years, our propagandizing media have been making much of the treatment of women in Muslim countries, especially how they cover themselves so completely in order not to attract or arouse men. I look at it as an acknowledgement of the weakness and rapaciousness of men rather than the inferiority of women. It is an imperfect solution, but it puts everyone on an equal plane, making internal beauty more important.

Nudity actually has the same effect. When the body is demystified by external enhancements, it is just a body. Some are more attractive than others, but we are all equal with our clothes off. Breasts evolved for feeding babies. Belly buttons are remnants of birth. Sex organs are necessary for propagation of the species. The pelvic area is also where we eliminate waste, liquid and solid. Hair likely evolved for cushioning and warmth.

Given that we in the industrialized world are becoming increasingly removed from our animal natures and moving increasingly toward the surreal, we can expect such silliness as this article describes to continue, and likely to get sillier. Can we get any sillier than having George W. Bush as our president for eight years? Time will tell.

This article reveals something about politics that should be a lesson about life in general: the elusiveness of truth. One one level, Gerald Ford was the moderate to the "right-wingness" of Reagan, Rumsfeld, Cheney, and Bush II. On another level, he was the coverup meister, a member of the Warren Commission and pardoner of the omnicriminal Richard Nixon. On still another level he was the president who gave Suharto of Indonesia the go-ahead to massacre the people of East Timor.

And Nelson Rockefeller, who authorized the slaughter at Attica prison, was a moderate. Henry Kissinger, the carpet-bomber of North Vietnam, the coup sponsor of Pinochet in Chile, the participant in Operation Condor, is also a moderate. He accompanied Ford to Indonesia when the East Timor invasion was approved, and it was pretty obviously his advice that Ford followed.

I believe Mr. Blumenthal writes truthfully, but writing about politics necessarily involves relativity, and making categories in order to fit perspectives. The yogis refer to material reality as being covered by a sheath of "Maya," or illusion. On this level we cannot see through the sheath. Still, we should try. If we live as decent human beings, we are better able to minimize being tricked by illusion.

I get my health care at the VA, and it is always interesting to look at the literature in the waiting areas: Field & Stream, Outdoor Life, VFW, American Legion, DAV, NRA, and Sports Illustrated. I had an appointment this morning, and discovered a new offering, a Christian magazine, the name of which I forgot. It had a number of articles about voting, being saved, how Jesus is the son of God, and how lives have been changed by becoming Christians.

Two things stood out in the overall tone of the magazine: The make-believe character of fundamentalist evangelical Christianity, and the promotion of "stars" of Christian life. The entire universe is reconstructed to fit a cultish Christian model of reality. Statements about the progress from Adam and Eve to George Bush mix with stories about "leaders" and various know-it-alls who had this experience or that, and know more than you do.

Which brings up a question for me. It seems about time that someone, or maybe a lot of someones should challenge these people on theological grounds. You don't have to be an atheist to pick apart the fantasy land character of evangelical Christianity. The fundamental characteristic, to coin a phrase, of this movement is an artificial drama akin to "playing house," with cliche-driven dialogue that is a form of improvisational theater. Theater of the absurd, I might add.

I find atheists boring and obnoxious, mainly because they are so arrogant and ego-driven, as a whole. And ineffective and boring. Are we a species without imagination and creativity? The silliness, hysteria, and tribal nature of the Christian "right" should be easy to debunk and defuse, but somehow the movement is thriving.

There is a forgiving aspect to the failure to debunk. Whether it is our educational system, our pop-oriented culture, our addiction to zombifying entertainment, or poisons in the environment, the "American" public is a pretty dull-witted lot. Had an interesting conversation lately? Consider yourself lucky. Can you spell anything in plural without using an apostrophe? Can you spell anything more complex than two syllables? Consider yourself rare. If you happen to catch "Jaywalking" on the Tonight Show, generalize the people interviewed to the society as a whole and it's pretty easy to see why people are such fair game for easy, paranoid answers. They're stupid, ignorant louts. We're lucky we didn't do worse than Bush.