Madam, I’m Tomlin December 12, 2003February 24, 2017 Point of personal privilege: HAPPY 91st birthday, Lew! (Born 12/12/12!) HOW DISTANT SEEMS THE TWENTIETH CENTURY Clipped by the estimable Alan from the December 2 New York Times: Leonid S. Mayevsky, a Communist member of the current Parliament, publicly criticized the [Communist] party at a news conference last month, saying that 28 percent of its candidates were millionaires. “Is this the party of the people or of the millionaires?” he asked. He was promptly expelled from the party. REAGAN AND AIDS Gary Konecky: ‘From Reports from the Holocaust, the Making of an AIDS Activist by Larry Kramer, I learn that Reagan’s first speech on AIDS was April 27, 1987 (page 145). At the time of his speech, the AIDS epidemic was six years old and had killed 20,798 in the USA (page 150). Reagan admitted to not reading the report on AIDS that he asked Dr. Koop to prepare for him (page 152) and did not talk to his Surgeon General about AIDS (also page 152).’ Bob Price: ‘Actually, you are incorrect. Ronald Reagan set up a council to handle the AIDS crisis and said ‘AIDS is the #1 public health concern in this country’ in 1984. Compare Patty Davis’ description of his behavior in Time to that in the movie [that CBS pulled from the schedule and moved to Showtime].” TRANSFERRING VIDEOTAPES TO DVDS Bob Price: ‘Probably the easiest approach is to buy a DVD recorder, e.g. the Phillips DVDR75, and hook it up to your videotape recorder. This works very well, is easy, and I wish someone had told me this before I started out. For you see, I started out by trying to do it on my computer. I bought a TV card, a very large hard drive, and a DVD burner. With software, that cost about as much as the DVD recorder, and it’s much harder to do it that way.’ MADAM, I’M TOMLIN Steve Tomlin writes: ‘I know you’ve been waiting for it, so here’s my holiday palindrome (remember last year’s?), this time with an international flavor: Yay! Tet! Yay. ‘Okay, that was the simple and straightforward one. [Although please notice that even the exclamation marks work. – A.T.] Too easy? Here’s a more convoluted one: The Iranian cleric in charge of religious festivities when presented with the personal demands of the chosen entertainer and, further, upon the offering of inappropriate libations on this sacred occasion, declares: YANNI GETS AT NO DAM HARP! RAHMADON! TASTE GIN? NAY! ‘Alright, a bit of a stretch, and Rahmadon isn’t really the ‘Muslim Christmas’ (there’s an oxymoron for you) so it’s not strictly seasonal, and I spelled ‘damn’ wrong [I thought it was some kind of sheep harp – A.T.], and my spelling of Rahmadon can be debated, yadda, yadda. So go back to the first one. Or try your hand at it for Pete’s sake. Your readers have two weeks to do better.’ ☞ O, No.