The Similepedia Blog

Painting a Political Picture

2008-05-04T19:28:00.002-04:00

The lioness of Chappaqua is hot on the trail of the Chicago gazelle, eager to gnaw him to pieces, like a harrowing scene out of a George Stubbs painting. (Maureen Dowd in The NYT).

The Devils Made Him Do It

2008-04-23T09:17:00.003-04:00

“Sean Avery is like a case of jock rash. It’s there, it bothers you, and eventually you have to just play through it.” (The New Yorker quoting a retired NHL referee, Paul Stewart, on Avery's playoff antics.

A Different Sort of Buzz

2008-04-07T20:47:00.002-04:00

Reality Stars Are Dropping Like Flies! (TMZ.com).

In Surgery, Checking the Light Upstairs

2008-04-02T19:26:00.004-04:00

My surgery lasted nine hours, and for most of it I had to be awake, so that the doctors could test the connection, like asking somebody to go upstairs and see if the light in the bedroom comes back on while you fiddle with the circuit-breaker box in the basement.(Michael Kinsley in The New Yorker).

Frogs, Hymns & the Smell of Mud

2008-03-30T19:50:00.002-04:00

There are others, but tree frog croon is deep. Like the hymns we sang every morning at school. Or muffled voices rising from the kitchen. The wind through the crack in a pane. When I hear the peepers it's time to smell mud, to dig, to quit your tent. (A Walk Around the Lake blog).

Popcorn Done, Is This Race Over Yet?

2008-03-30T19:38:00.004-04:00

One Obama adviser moaned that the race was “beginning to feel like a hostage crisis” and would probably go on for another month to six weeks. And Obama said that the “God, when will this be over?” primary season was like “a good movie that lasted about a half an hour too long.” (Maureen Dowd in The New York Times).

And ...

Obama, like the preternaturally gifted young heroes in mythical tales, is still learning to channel his force.

The Spitzer Pile-Up

2008-03-11T20:13:00.004-04:00

The Eliot Spitzer case is one of those public train wrecks in which the clichés pile up like freight cars in a chain-reaction collision. “Follow the money … ” (It was an I.R.S. investigation of Governor Spitzer’s suspicious cash transfers that led to the prostitution ring.) “The cover-up is always worse than the crime … ” (It was the governor’s effort to hide the source, destination, and purpose of the money he was moving around that may be a more serious offense than violation of an antique white-slavery law.) “Pride goeth before a fall … ” (A man who dared to think he might one day be president is a national laughingstock instead). But the most apt cliché of all is the most karmic: “What goes around comes around.” (Todd Purdum in Vanity Fair).

The Wiki Metropolis: Leaves, Ancient Ruins & Some Hairy Caterpillars

2008-03-08T10:41:00.006-05:00

It's like some vast aerial city with people walking briskly to and fro on catwalks, carrying picnic baskets full of nutritious snacks. (Nicholson Baker in The New York Review of Books on Wikipedia, the subject a new book, "Wikipedia: The Missing Manual."

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It was like a giant community leaf-raking project in which everyone was called a groundskeeper.

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The fragments from original sources persist like those stony bits of classical buildings incorporated in a medieval wall.

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For researchers it's a place to look stuff up, [Brion] Vibber said, but for editors "it's almost more like an online game, in that it's a community where you hang out a bit, and do something that's a little bit of fun: you whack some trolls, you build some material, etcetera."

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On December 7, 2007, somebody altered the long article on bedbugs so that it read like a horror movie....

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If an article bristles with some quotes from external sources these may, like the bushy hairs on a caterpillar, make it harder to kill.

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When I managed to help save something I was quietly thrilled—I walked tall, like Henry Fonda in "Twelve Angry Men."

Obama's Mrs: Gladiator or Tin Man

2008-03-06T19:48:00.005-05:00

[Michelle] Obama works out like “a gladiator,” a friend has said. (Lauren Collins in The New Yorker).

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When people — they’re almost always shorter — ask her to pose for pictures, instead of bending her knees she leans at the waist, like the Tin Man.

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It assuages fears of difference — “We’re just like you” is the cumulative message of all the back-and-forth about the breath and the bread — and inoculates against jealousy, a smart bit of self-deprecation on the part of a young, gifted, attractive couple whose fortunes have risen quickly, like movie stars insisting that they were unpopular in high school.

Exercising the Body Politic

2008-02-23T10:30:00.002-05:00

The candidate who tried to present herself as inevitable has been out-maneuvered nearly every step of the way by a prodigy with a warm and brilliant smile who still seems as energetic as an athlete doing calisthenics before a big game. (Bob Herbert in The NYT.

Riding the Political Wave, While It Lasts

2008-02-14T20:17:00.002-05:00

Barack Obama has ridden these primaries like a skilled surfer, catching big emotional waves and riding them spectacularly, letting this new force carry him forward. Even the biggest waves, however, eventually break on the shore. (Daniel Henninger in The WSJ.

Foreign Policy With a French Flavor

2008-02-03T16:34:00.000-05:00

The foreign policy of France, like its cuisine, should be unmistakably, ineffably . . . French. (James Traub in The NYT Magazine.

Drive Through Candidates

2008-01-26T13:43:00.000-05:00

Florida is one of those places that makes participating in elections as easy as ordering a drive-thru hamburger. (Gail Collins in The NYT).

The Body Politic Weeps a Bit

2008-01-13T16:09:00.000-05:00

Let's look at the tears before they harden like resin into cliché. (Peggy Noonan in The WSJ).

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He [Barack Obama] plays down emotionalism in terms of his visage (not his words), keeps his guard up, wears dignity like a cloak.

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When he [Obama] appeared with Oprah in Des Moines, she vibrated at the podium like a puppy.

Beijing in Training: Getting Nowhere Fast

2007-12-29T11:05:00.000-05:00

Beijing is like an athlete trying to get into shape by walking on a treadmill yet eating double cheeseburgers at the same time. (Jim Yardley in The NYT).

Bugs, Baby Birds & 'Blood'

2007-12-26T11:23:00.000-05:00

Inside a deep, dark hole, a man pickaxes the hard-packed soil like a bug gnawing through dirt. (Manohla Dargis in The NYT writing about the film "There Will Be Blood").

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Poor, isolated, thirsting for water (they don’t have enough even to grow wheat), the dazed inhabitants gaze at the oilman like hungry baby birds.

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[Daniel] Day-Lewis’s outsize performance, with its footnote references to Huston and strange, contorted Kabuki-like grimaces, occasionally breaks the skin of the film’s surface like a dangerous undertow.

The Fishbowl That Is the Campaign

2007-12-22T19:35:00.000-05:00

Covering Mrs. Clinton in particular can feel like watching a candidate through thick aquarium glass — she sees you but can’t hear your questions no matter how hard you tap. (Jason Horowitz in The New York Observer).

The 'Sorry' State of Politics

2007-12-20T14:25:00.000-05:00

Indeed like salami, regret could be sliced thick or thin. (Daniel Henninger in The WSJ on the apology outbreak on the campaign trail).

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With the arrival of the Web, the merest off-script remark can race like wildfire from media shrub-top to media shrub-top, threatening to burn down one's campaign by morning.

Everybody Was Kung Fu Fighting ...

2007-12-14T15:57:00.000-05:00

Kung fu master Shi Dechao can swing his 22-pound "monk's spade," an ancient Chinese shovel, like a majorette twirling a baton. (The WSJ).

Extra Dessert, Inflight Films & Old Lady Flatulence

2007-12-10T09:19:00.000-05:00

Spend eight thousand dollars on a ticket and, if you want an extra thirteen cents’ worth of ice cream, all you have to do is ask. It’s like buying a golf cart and having a few tees thrown in, but it still works. (David Sedaris in The New Yorker).

And ...

I pulled my private screen from its hiding place in my armrest, and had just slipped on my headphones when the flight attendant came by. “Are you sure I can’t get you something to eat, Mr. . . . ?” She looked down at her clipboard and made a sound like she was gargling with stones.

And ...

For children, though, nothing beats a flatulent old lady. What made it all the crazier was that she wasn’t embarrassed by it — no more than our collie, Dutchess, was. Here it sounded like she was testing out a chainsaw, yet her face remained inexpressive and unchanging.

Cue the Breeze

2007-12-10T09:12:00.000-05:00

Michael Cera enters a scene like a soft breeze. (David Denby in The New Yorker on the new film "Juno."

Bon Mots From an Inexperienced JFK

2007-12-09T18:27:00.000-05:00

In 1960, the experience card was played by all comers against the young upstart senator from Massachusetts. In Iowa, L.B.J. went so far as to tell voters that they should vote for “a man with a little gray in his hair.” But experience, Kennedy would memorably counter, “is like taillights on a boat which illuminate where we have been when we should be focusing on where we should be going.” (Frank Rich in The NYT).

All's Not Quiet on This Northern Front

2007-12-02T12:14:00.000-05:00

“Politics is like trench warfare. Defense wins. We don’t have the political equivalent of a tank that lets you roll over the opposition. The question for Spitzer is, can he develop the tank?” (Nick Paumgarten in The New Yorker quoting Bruce Gyory about Eliot Spitzer's rocky first year at New York's governor).

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“Like Rip Van Winkle,” [Spitzer] pronounced, “New York has slept through much of the past decade while the rest of the world has passed us by.”

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Spitzer is fond of saying that politics is like a sporting contest: you go out, play hard, and shake hands when it’s over.

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"I told the Governor, ‘The Legislature is like your in-laws. You’re stuck with them.’"

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Every summer, [Joseph] Bruno, along with Senate colleagues and staffers, decamps to Saratoga, where he presides like a kind of feudal lord.

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After meeting with a gathering of Democratic assemblymen, whom he'd asked for another chance, [Spitzer] told me, “It’s like I am merely an object being moved, subject to poking, pushing, like an unknown in a science lab. Everyone’s trying to push at you, figure out ‘What is it?’ ”

Politics at the Groaning Table

2007-11-23T13:14:00.000-05:00

Running for president is like entering a competitive eating contest and a beauty pageant all at once. (Jodi Kantor in The NYT.

Mitt's Mrs. Doesn't Miss the Mark

2007-11-10T11:24:00.000-05:00

"My wife says," [Mitt Romney] explains, "that watching Washington is like watching two guys in a canoe on a fast-moving river headed to a waterfall and they're not paddling, they're just arguing. As they get closer to the waterfall, they'll finally start to paddle." (Brian M. Carney in today's WSJ).