FLY ON THE WALL
Badass political theorist Michael Sandel was spotted heading into Border Café with his family on Saturday, sporting a raincoat in place of his usual jacket-and-tie getup. Wait—so he doesn’t sleep in Sanders? . . . Not one, but two cars spun out of control at the same spot on Soldiers Field Road across the Charles early Sunday morning. Brake squeals and sirens interrupted the usual three a.m. sounds of vomiting fratguys and awkward “goodnights”... After several pundits floated her name as a potential Supreme Court nominee, Harvard Law School Dean Elena Kagan ditched her new $1.4 million Cambridge condo last weekend for a pre-election trip to the nation’s capital, suspiciously close to the Rehnquist estate. Antonin Scalia is already having wet dreams.
—Michael M. Grynbaum and Zachary M. Seward
ELECTION 2004
Gadfly would comment on the outcome of Tuesday’s presidential election, but—ummmmm—we started drinking way before the polls closed. Is it over yet? One thing we know for sure: Law School alum Barack Obama became just the fifth black senator in U.S. history—or, as Alan Keyes ’72 would have it, the fourth and three-fifths.
—MMG and ZMS
DEAN KIRBY: CLEARLY STONED
With the metaphorical prowess of a bio concentrator in a creative writing course, Dean of the Faculty William C. Kirby channeled his Eastern spirits at the 2004 Harvard College Fund Assembly: “Confucius asked, ‘How does one govern a family?’—or, by extension, a university? And his answer was this, ‘You govern a family’—or a university—‘as if you would cook a small fish; that is, very gently indeed.’ Here, I fear, I must break with Confucius. Sometimes we need to turn up the heat. Sometimes we need to flip that fish, make sure it lands properly on the other side. Harvard has no better ambassador, no better thinker, no stronger leader and maybe no better cook. Join in me in welcoming the president of Harvard, President Larry Summers.”
—MMG, ZMSWELLESLEY: LOTS OF BUSH
Spotted: five or six members of “Wellesley Women for W,” on line at Toscanini’s in the Square. Looking more dyed-roots than grassroots, the heavily made-up pols placed their orders for hot vanillas by the score—Republicans don’t need caffeine, and coffee is so blue-state these days. The young ladies were clad in matching tennis polos, and though they were served, they failed to return any sort of tip to the baristas—perhaps put off by their “alternative” appearance. Besides, there are so many spare dimes trickling down from W’s tax cuts, right? No? As more normatively Cantabrigian patrons began to realize who these ladies were, grumbles and mutters reached their virgin ears, and the belles for Bush decided to get back on the Fuck Truck, fast.
—Sarah M. Seltzer and Simon W. Vozick-Levinson
ELLEN SNUBBED
Ellen Degeners, who was voted “Funniest Person in America” back in 1982, confused top Harvard brass last week when she announced—and her publicist appeared to confirm—that she would be the University’s honored guest and speaker at Commencement exercises this June. Of course, like Anne Heche at the Emmys, it turns out Ellen won’t be getting anywhere near the stage, having instead been tapped for the slightly-less prestigious Class Day oration at the Law School. Gadfly thinks Harvard is making a terrible mistake, and a side-by-side comparison with last year’s Commencement speaker, Kofi Annan, bears out our case... Kofi Annan Ellen DeGeneres
Claim to Fame UN Sec. General Gay
Main Achievement Nobel Peace Prize Daytime Emmy
Failed Endeavors Stopping Iraq war Mr. Wrong
Favorite Tasks Finding WMD Finding Nemo
Predecessor B. Boutros-Ghali Rosie O’Donnell
Pet Peeve AIDS Lesbians who turn out
to be straight
—MMG and ZMS
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