Celebrity.
Harry Truman once remarked that he was amazed at the celebrity accorded the office of the president. He was right. People will wait in the blazing sun on a summer day - or in the rain or snow on a bone-chilling winter day, just to see the president's limosine whiz by.

One can almost understand that... the president is an enormously powerful man, selected for his job by tens of millions of American voters. What I cannot understand is the incredible devotion the American public shows to some shallow people. Like Paris Hilton. Google just announced that Paris Hilton is the most frequently posted name in a Google search! What? More people want information about Paris Hilton than any other person in the world? Talk about shallow? Why in the world are people so interested in Miss Hilton?

It doesn't stop there. The recent wall to wall coverage given what was called the "TomKat" wedding... Tom Cruise and some gal named Katie, I think. Do people really care about these people?

America is awash with physically attractive people who have learned how to stand in front of a camera (TV or movie camera) or on a stage, and pretend they are someone else. That is a wonderful talent, and for that I salute them. But it isn't enough that they are paid obscene amounts for practicing their craft. The public worships these people. Even to the point where they (the public) hangs on every word as the actors/actresses speak on some subject like America's foreign policy... about which they seem to know nothing.

I appreciated Arnold Schwartzenegger some years ago, after he had starred in a movie called "Kindergarten Cop". Someone started questioning him about the care and training of pre-school children. To his great credit, Arnold quickly informed them that he was an actor reading his lines for a movie and was not an expert on kindergartners.

Celebrity does not stop with big name movie stars. People go absolutely ga-ga over anyone on radio or TV. And, they will go to any end to get their own face flashed on TV, if for only a second. The other morning when my wife was flipping through the morning "news" programs on TV , I saw these huge crowds gathered on the streets outside the studio, waving like a bunch of idiots when the cameras panned across the crowd! One can imagine that they had previously notified all the folks back home that they were going to get up early, leave their comfy hotel room, and brave the elements to stand outside the studio for two hours during the morning show.... "please watch... I'll be waving a sign that says 'Hi, Mom & Dad'."

No wonder our critics abroad think we are all nuts.