Over there on Slate, Alan Dershowitz and Richard Posner are doing a week-long debate via e-mail over the Supreme Court decision on the Florida vote recount. It's kind of interesting if you want to see two smart men both avoiding candor and spinning the statutes according to their personal politics. I've never had much use for Posner, whose concept of law seems to be that whatever the conservatives are arguing is the only defensible position, but it's dismaying to see Dershowitz, whom I once respected, turn into the liberal equivalent. Yeah, he's kind of a media whore who never said no to a chance to be on camera but, pre-O.J., he was out there saying some important, gutsy things about freedom of religion and the evils of intolerance. One of the many ancillary tragedies of the whole Simpson mess is that, whenever Dershowitz appears anywhere and says those kinds of things in the future, a certain number of people are going to moan, "Oh, he was one of O.J.'s lawyers" and turn him off.
I have my fingers crossed that the accusations against Paula Poundstone (whatever they are) turn out to be unfounded and that this is determined soon, before the jokes and tabloids irreparably convict her. I still haven't heard enough evidence against Robert Blake to warrant the jokes Mr. Leno, for one, is doing…and neither have the police who, let's not forget, have yet to even make an arrest.
Well I felt really proud that I landed house seats to The Producers…in the eighth row, no less. Today, I got a call from Howard Morris, who has known Mel Brooks since they worked together on the old Your Show of Shows. He is just back from New York where Mel gave him seats in the third row. I am now properly humbled on the subject. (Howie loved it, by the way. He said, "It makes a thousand promises and delivers on every one." He is right.)