Turning the page on Vlad
Daniel Silva — author of “The Unlikely Spy,” “The Cellist,” “House of Spies” — and called our finest writer of best seller international spy stories:
“I can’t do note cards or legal pads. I need to write sentence by sentence. Each sentence informs the next, each scene informs the next. I study everything.
“Like Putinism. It’s just fascism. All fascist governments at some point get into conflict. That’s how history goes. Too many authoritarian fascist governments in the world at one time. I wrote about this in one of my novels. Naïve to think we’d get through this first half century without major conflict.
“People don’t realize the invasion with Poland started with a provocation of the Nazi stage. This is straight out of Hitler’s playbook. It’s the beginning of a rearrangement of the global order. He sees himself leader of the Slavic block.
“I have done a great deal of research and writing on Russia. With my negative opinion of Putin, I always feared something was coming. But I never thought it would be ethnic cleansing bordering on genocide.
“He will try to get all these countries under his thumb.”
Holding all the Kards
The Kardashians have kollected themselves on Hulu. James Corden’s company is exec-producing. No scripts, allegedly. A crate of rehearsals, maybe.
KK: “We’re told no sitcom can be written like stuff that happens in our family. Filming your life there’s no idea what’ll happen tomorrow. We’re very vocal. We wing it. If kids are involved there’s things we won’t share. But we film everything. Boundaries change so as producers we can always change our mind.”
For Season 1 they schlepped the world over. Drone cameras. Frequent flier miles. Fried onion rings dipped in mayonnaise actually got a close-up.
Even “SNL” is on the show. Even Pete Davidson’s behind — which apparently stores the energy of a kockroach — squeezes onto it. So if you’re locked at home ironing your husband’s drawers, what could be more exciting?
The gov shove
2008. Spitzer exits Albany’s executive mansion. Lt. Gov. David Paterson moves up. He needs a Lt. Gov to break any tie. Minus precedent for a sitting NY chief executive to appoint his own Lt. Governor, Paterson named Richard Ravitch. The NY Court of Appeals approved it.
Now, with Kathy Hochul’s Lt. Gov being a real bad boy, she needs a newie No. 2. And “due diligence” could mean more than consulting Sharpton.
Barking mad
Dog lovers are doggone upset with dog owner Caroline Kennedy.
There exists a Central Park patch, kept wild, where dogs on leash may play. This week, 6 p.m., unleashed two unleashed dogs. One brown, one white. One big, one less big. They raced around. They scrambled right by.
The owner? Caroline Kennedy. “Shame on her,” barked the animal lover who complained. “How dare she do this? We called out and she paid no attention. She thinks she’s so entitled.”
Eastern Europe, Putin. Central Park, Pooches. Can’t we all just play nice?
Definition of a politician: one who’s never been caught.
Only in this hemisphere, kids, only in this hemisphere.