Newsweek Cheat Sheet: Hillary’s War and 150 Women Who Shake the World
illary Clinton graces the cover of this week’s Newsweek, where 150 women are also profiled for their remarkable achievements around the world. Christopher Dickey looks at the world leaders who once helped Gaddafi. Robin Givhan reports from a front-row seat at the Dior show after Galliano’s exit. Plus, Kathleen Parker on born-again feminism and Harvey Weinstein reveals his favorite mistake.
Hillary Clinton graces the cover of this week’s Newsweek, where 150 women are also profiled for their remarkable achievements around the world. Christopher Dickey looks at the world leaders who once helped Gaddafi. Robin Givhan reports from a front-row seat at the Dior show after Galliano’s exit. Plus, Kathleen Parker on born-again feminism and Harvey Weinstein reveals his favorite mistake.
The Hillary Doctrine
Secretary of State Hillary Clinton may be President Obama’s trusted adviser, but she has also used her position of power to perfect her own lifelong role: advocate in chief for women worldwide. In just two years, Clinton has already out-traveled all of her predecessors at the State Department, and she has devoted much of that time to women’s issues. “This is a big deal for American values and for American foreign policy and our interests, but it is also a big deal for our security,” Clinton tells Newsweek. “Because where women are disempowered and dehumanized, you are more likely to see not just antidemocratic forces, but extremism that leads to security challenges for us.”
150 Women Who Shake the World
Hillary Clinton may be the world’s most powerful woman, but there’s plenty of love to spread around: In advance of Newsweek and The Daily Beast’s Women in the World Summit, which runs March 10 to 12, Newsweek looks at 150 remarkable women, from the world-famous—like Aung San Suu Kyi and Michelle Obama—to the lesser-known, like Iranian-born astronaut Anousheh Ansari and American doctor Amy Lehman, who is building a floating hospital on Africa’s Lake Tanganyika.
Can Buy Me Love: How Bush and Blair Rehabilitated Gaddafi
Muammar Gaddafi’s rapid downfall and violent backlash make it easy to forget just how cozy the West had grown with him. World leaders like George W. Bush, Tony Blair, and Nicolas Sarkozy made buddies with him in 2003 in order to gain access to Libya’s oil fields—a move that enriched Gaddafi and his family beyond their wildest dreams. Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi may have to hang his head the lowest: He welcomed Gaddafi on 11 state visits to Rome. Libya’s key contact with Western leaders was Musa Kusa who, unlike other Libyan leaders, has not had his assets frozen in recent weeks.
Galliano Gone
Still, the show must go on: Newsweek’s Robin Givhan reports from Dior’s show at Paris fashion week. The show, Givhan says, “remind[ed] everyone what fashion was before it became thick with theatricality and flamboyance. It was an acknowledgment of fashion as fine clothes. It was a repudiation of everything that Galliano represented.” The venerable fashion house handled the Galliano scandal “brilliantly,” and the collection “subtly shifted our attention and reframed the story.”
Born-Again Feminism
Kathleen Parker once angered feminists with her book Save the Males, but recently she has had a change of heart. "I’ve become a born-again feminist after decades of feeling that feminism had veered off course," she writes in Newsweek. It was the struggles of women in the Middle East that led Parker to reconsider her positions: "The struggle for free expression in cultures that condone sacrificing women to men’s honor gets the blood pumping again."
What's So Funny About Mormons?
Another reason to skip Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark: The Book of Mormon, the new musical from South Park creators Trey Parker and Matt Stone, opens March 24. It may just be Broadway's most obscene musical ever. It tells the story of two Mormon missionaries who go to Uganda, where the natives sing lyrics like "80 percent of us have AIDS" and "there are maggots in my scrotum." Still, it's not as mean as it may sound: “We may laugh at [Mormons’] silly beliefs,” Stone tells Newsweek. “but at the end of the day, we really liked them. We wanted it to be a feel-good musical."
Harvey Weinstein's Favorite Mistake
From the time he got caught smoking in an airplane bathroom to his failed attempt to take on Facebook, Harvey Weinstein says mistakes come easily to him. “You are no Kate Moss,” the flight attendant who caught him smoking said after Weinstein mentioned she does it all the time. His favorite mistake, however, happened just two years ago when he passed on the opportunity to turn The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo into a movie.