Anthony Weiner and Huma Abedin’s Post-Scandal Playbook
The disgraced congressman and his wife, Hillary Clinton’s chief of staff, attempt to piece together their lives and careers after “that fateful tweet”:
“But nearly everyone who cares about Weiner says that pugilistic political persona long ago bled into his personal life and made him ‘hard to take,’ as his brother Jason puts it. ‘I wouldn’t stand for other people saying this about him, but there was definitely a douchiness about him that I just don’t really see anymore.’ His family agrees that the post-scandal Weiner, the diaper-changing Weiner, is far more likable. ‘No one has been harder on him than he has been on himself,’ Jason says. ‘I find that refreshing, because he was always — in his political career, and it was sort of overflowing into his personal life — this completely decisive, “this is the right thing because this is what I’m doing.” It’s like this circular reasoning that was kind of hubristic. He doesn’t have that anymore. The irony is that it could make him a better politician.'”
Adele: One and Only
The newly minted Grammy winner’s lows and highs—from throat surgery and heartbreak to the biggest-selling album of last year:
“Every singer knows the List: citrus, vinegar, mint, dairy, spicy or fried foods, fizzy drinks, caffeine, cigarettes, and alcohol. These are the vocal cords’ enemies. And when one has a five-octave contralto as dynamic, award-winning, moneymaking, and record-breaking as Adele Laurie Blue Adkins does, one figures out how to avoid these things. Some require less effort than others. Mint? Vinegar? Feh. Cigarettes? Not so easy. Over the few days that I spend around Adele, I see her sneak a fag here and there. No one is perfect. But alcohol? For a once hard-drinking South London pub girl who has admitted that she has written some of her best songs after a few belts, I would have thought this might present something of a challenge. Not so much, it turns out. Adele hasn’t had a drink since last June.”
Bold Type: Tina Brown
I suddenly notice that Brown, who moments ago was rushing to get dressed to head back to her office, has buttoned her blouse crookedly. When I point it out, she says, “Oh, dear,” and then unbuttons and rebuttons it right in front of me. “I’m the kind of person who hits REPLY ALL when it’s really private and meant for one person. That’s the worst thing. I recently did that and wrote an e-mail to someone I work with, and I said, ‘Oh, my God, he’s such a sleazeball, we really have to keep our distance.’ And I sent it to the guy I was talking about! And he wrote back, ‘I think you will have no trouble keeping your distance from me.’ ”
Joan Rivers Always Knew She Was Funny
It’s the rest of the world that sometimes forgot. “Expect nothing and you won’t be disappointed. This is the mantra of the pessimist and the persecuted alike, the preemptive strike of those who tend to paint the picture a little blacker than it is. And then there is Joan Rivers, the orneriest creature ever to darken Hollywood’s door. She once told me that her husband, Edgar Rosenberg, who killed himself in 1987, lived by the heartwarming motto ‘Fuck them over before they fuck you over first.'”
She’s Got Game
From nuclear proliferation to genocide in Darfur, Ambassador to the U.N. Susan Rice has more than a few balls to juggle.