The Week - commentary on current events, politics - Column

-- British pop star George Michael has opinions about world affairs. To shshare those opinions with the rest of us, he has released a song titled "Shoot the Dog," with an accompanying music video. Highlights: George W. Bush tickling a Tony Blair-faced poodle on the White House lawn. The singer goosing Her Majesty the Queen. The singer riding a missile into Cherie Blair's bedroom, stripping to a leopard-skin thong, and proposing intimacy to her. The song's lyrics include the observation that: "There's somethin' 'bout that Bush that ain't right." Invited to explain himself, Mr. Michael offered the further observations that: "I consider the American government bullying," and "Americans are very reactionary right now." He blamed widespread criticism of himself and his silly opinions on "homophobia." (Mr. Michael has been open about his homosexuality since an unfortunate episode with a Los Angeles policeman in a public lavatory four years ago.) So: A star of the pop-music world is an infantile lefty with a dirty mind, who responds to mockery with victimological whining. File under: "Dog bites man."

-- Charlton Heston has been many things in his long career: a star; momore important, an actor of great power and tact, from the broad canvas of Ben-Hur, to the cameos of Kenneth Branagh's Hamlet or the remake of Planet of the Apes; a fine writer, as those who read his memoir, In the Arena, or his appreciation of Orson Welles, excerpted from it in National Review (Feb. 3, 1992), know; a man of principle, whether supporting civil rights in Selma or Washington, or the right to keep and bear arms at the NRA; and a friend of this magazine. Now he has stepped forward in a new and difficult part, announcing to the world and his fans that he has "symptoms . . . consistent with Alzheimer's." He asks for no sympathy, expresses gratitude for being an American, for interpreting great words, and for living not one life but many, and he closes his statement with the great actor's valedictory, Prospero's lines from The Tempest: "We are such stuff as dreams are made on, and our little life is rounded with a sleep." All true, for men as well as actors. While we live, we will not forget his talent, his devotion, and his grit.