Political Faces

Warren Harding swept to the 1920 Republican nomination largely because an Ohio promoter thought "He looked like a President." He won by an unprecedented landslide, 60% of the popular vote.

Are we still voting by appearances? Anything worth chattering about?

On the Democratic presidential ticket the first Black First Lady in-waiting, Michelle Obama (44) has guts and glamour, indisputable professional credentials, and is incredibly smart. There's an unflattering high school photo in her past and she chemically straightens her hair. And they put her in flats so her 5'11" frame doesn't tower over Jill Biden (57). But that's about it.

Dr. Biden, also a very handsome woman, appears to be aging without any knifestyling. Her skin is weathered from outdoor running and she dyes her hair. But that's about it. Yawn.

If they both weren't such fabulous examples of vibrant womanhood, it'd be almost boring.

Obama (47) himself is remarkable for being within the 35% of adult Americans who are at a healthy weight. His ears stick out and he has a gleaming smile. Cartoonists and dentists across the land are celebrating.

Now Joe Biden (64) is a different matter.

Back when the West was won, hair transplants looked like they were accomplished with a pop riveter - the so-called 'doll's hair' look. Until the late 1980s, the best method of hair transplantation involved 'plugs' that each contained 15 to 30 hairs.

Sen. Biden's early career foray into arms and hair control has become a little less obvious over time, thanks to revision with updated transplant techniques and greying hair. Nor was he alone: plugged-in along with him were the late senators William Proxmire and Strom Thurmond.

The right-leaning blogosphere is roundly condemning the Vice Presidential candidate's "poor judgment" for undergoing "expensive cosmetic surgery" and deems it indicative of a character flaw, akin to dishonesty (which already plagues Biden): "a blatant sign of vanity above substance."

Would they feel the same way if it came out that Obama's white sparklers were veneers? After all, the ivories are all capped in Hollywood. (And tinsel town has it's share of balding beaus battling back, too. Rob Schneider, Ben Affleck, Matthew McConaughey, Brendan Fraser, and Tom Hanks have all been rumored to have had hair transplants.)

But now for the Republican half of the ticket. Ladies first.

Cindy McCain (54) has had a little thing for stolen prescription opioids, but is more widely criticized for being "plastic." You'll never find a photo of her with crowsfeet or wrinkled brow. But is it deeper than too much bleach and Botox? Her ears show no obvious signs of a traditional cut-and-pull facelift, but her face is tight, the neck is remarkably taut, and her jaw is free of jowling....something you just don't find in nature. Her face work is as carefully done as Hillary Clinton's. This photo shows those pearls are real.

Pro-life, pro-gun, pro-drilling, abstinence-only creationist, the undeniably beautiful Sarah Palin (44) has received a lot of attention for producing her fifth child virtually undetected. Scott Sloan appears to have the only footage from February showing the Alaskan governor just 8 weeks before she delivered a 6 lbs, 2 oz baby.

Here is her daughter attending the RNC this week in St. Paul, at 5 months pregnant. The photo-op was deliberate, as both John McCain and Sarah Palin greeted the couple-to-be at the MSP airport.

Medically, the timing is curious. Bristol Palin (17) conceived as a 16-year-old junior. Was it in defiance of her parents' prior decision to yank her from her boyfriend's high school midyear and take her home for some eight months? Or was it to finish something she started? There is one menstrual cycle gap between the two pregnancies.

The real significance of this for the Elephant and the presidential contest is thoughtfully discussed here. I predict conservative Christian voters will love this fertile family fable, for the same reasons they voted to sit down and have a beer with recovering alcoholic GWB.

"First Dude" Todd Palin is a good 'ol boy with nothing knifestyle-worthy. At most, his elopement with the someday VP candidate coincided with the conception of his first born, Track (can't tell for sure since the Bristol and Track's birthdates have been scrubbed.)

Presidential nominee John McCain's (72) war injuries and torture have left him with limited range of motion in his arms. (According to fellow POW cellmate Colonel Bud Day, McCain had 3 fractures in his right arm, a fractured right knee, dislocated left arm, bayoneted left leg– before his captors starved him and hung him by his arms). That and a loose zipper seem to be his main contribution to today's subject.

To hear more, tune in to hear Anne explore it all with Kevyn Burger on FM107.1 at 10am Thursday.

Plasticonomics & F. Scott Fitzgerald

Today we discuss the latest plastic surgery scandal: our credit is maxed!

A NYTimes reporter "using a script, made identical anonymous calls to the offices of 48 prominent plastic surgeons" this month, mystery-shopping all the A-list offices across the US, and found...business is down. The article dubed it "plasticonomics: the new economic reality of vanity."

About 90 percent of the doctors' offices offered consultation appointments in three weeks or less; about 94 percent offered surgery dates in June or July. Granted, plastic surgeons exaggerate much in the same way men do in locker rooms ("I'm bigger and I get more") – but this kind of accessibility means top flight knife wielders are seeing business drop off pretty dramatically.

F. Scott Fitzgerald famously wrote that the very rich "are different from you and me."* The Grey Lady thinks F. Scott got it wrong. The article cites a recent downturn in sales by retailers like Coach, Polo Ralph Lauren, and Tiffany's – but that's not where the very rich plunk down their Centurion Card; that's where the middle class shoppers ape the rich. It's the disposable income of the upper and middle-class that is disappearing. There's not much belt-tightening going on at Hermès, Chanel Haute Couture, and Van Cleef & Arpels.

If you're struggling to make the house payment the same week you've filled the gas tank, then yes, you're going to think twice about plunking down $7,000 for a browlift. You might opt for $500 worth of botox instead. As the economy has headed down, the number of non-surgical procedures has risen. But the number of cosmetic surgeries performed has never recovered to pre-9/11 levels. Data from the last six months of economic turn-down isn't yet available.

And that's why we love Hollywood. They are rich and they are different from you and me.

Two movies opened this week at the box office: "The Love Guru" and "Get Smart."

"Get Smart" has as it's premise that our aging Agent 99 has undergone extreme plastic surgery to reinvent herself as a 20-something ("and prettier, too"), all in the name of espionage. Casting Anne Hathaway (26) isn't much of a stretch. Steve Carell (45) is meant to be her peer.

I wonder why anyone in the screenwriters' guild thought that was fiction?

Well, perhaps they just couldn't find any 45 year-old actress who'd undergone surgery to look 20 years younger to play the part.

The 1960s originals were not an option. Don Adams (82) died in 2005 just four years short of his agent number. Barbara Feldon (76) is still kicking.

While Adams clearly had some unpleasant visits to the dermatologist in his later years, Feldon appears to have stayed out of the sun. Prior to promoting her 2002 "Living Alone and Loving It" she spent her book advance on a facelift and browlift with nice results. The teeth are a little much. She's continued to have work done but is beginning to look less like herself these days.



And the competition on screen number two? So far, Mike Meyer's rubber nose in "The Love Guru" is not making him any richer at the box office.

The rumor about Le Coq smuggling a schnauzer in his speedo? Not true– that's just careful positioning of Justin Timberlake's junk in a too small box. And co-star Jessica Alba (27) has not spent her vanity dollars on a pair of flotation devices, either. Come to think of it, Romany Malco may not look much like a hockey player, but what a swimmer's body!

Okay, I digress.

Back to economically-challenged you and me. What's a middle class girl to do? Pay off your credit cards! No, wait, I understand. To make your vanity dollars stretch the farthest consider the following economies:

• Don't buy OTC anti-aging products– shop the high-strength brands available only through physicians' offices and ask about satisfaction guarantees.
• Try Botox before surgery– in the right hands a modest investment will give you a chemical browlift and open up your eyes for 4-6 months.
• Buy packaged services, like lipodissolve for spot reduction or laser treatments for veins– you know exactly what you are spending and the results are great.

*from The Rich Boy, published 1926: "Let me tell you about the very rich. They are different from you and me. They possess and enjoy early, and it does something to them, makes them soft, where we are hard, cynical where we are trustful, in a way that, unless you were born rich, it is very difficult to understand."