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Vote For Justice
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Barack Obama's Bitter Half
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Letter To African-Americans
Mississippi Harbinger
West Virginia: Then And Now



SI Gets Semi-Naked
Tom Purcell 2/18/2008
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SI Gets Semi-Naked

By Tom Purcell

You've got to give the Sports Illustrated people points for being honest.

It's February, you see. In many parts of the country, it's bitter cold. The Super Bowl is over and baseball is yet to begin. We men don't know what to do with ourselves.

Our minds unoccupied, we lack direction. We dwell randomly on negative things -- our post-holiday flabbiness, old girlfriends who didn't work out and, for some, girlfriends who did.

But one thing -- the smile of a beautiful, scantily clad woman -- can make us forget our woes. SI has been helping us forget since it published its first swimsuit issue 44 years ago.

But this year it hit the mother lode.

The cover features Marisa Miller, a 29-year-old stunner who cut her teeth modeling for Victoria's Secret. As her curviness spills off the page, she gazes at us with angelic calm. She makes us feel like everything is going to be all right.

And maybe it is going to be all right.

Surely you know the origin of the swimsuit issue. The editors came up with the idea to boost magazine sales during the dead of winter.

It's been driving feminists batty from the start. They say it exploits women, and
it does. They say it is wrong for men to view women as mere objects, and it is. But what angers them most is that the cover models often go on to fame and fortune just because they are gorgeous.

Then they marry a multimillionaire, eventually divorce him, and live happily ever after on a considerable pile of dough.

The evolution of the swimsuit issue is also worth noting. The early issues were simple and mild. But in the late 1970s -- thank you, Cheryl Tiegs -- things really started heating up. The swimsuits got scantier and the models more beautiful.

That trend continued until the late 1990s, when something went terribly wrong. The 1998 issue, for instance, featured bony women with frowns on their faces. It had more feature stories than photos -- such as interviews with beautiful female meteorologists who were covered up with more clothing than a winter mannequin at Macy's.

But in the past few years, Sports Illustrated has been getting back to the basics. This year's issue can be summed up in two words: yow-sa!

It features 19 of the world's most glamorous supermodels pictured, says the press release, "in visually dynamic photo spreads, all set in unique and exotic locations from around the world."

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International Womens Day
By Simanca Osmani  - Cagle Cartoons, Brazil  * Posted 02/08/2008
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Tom Purcell 2006