Spelling Bee Champ's Farewell Tour

Barbra Streisand has updated the page of her website that lists her "statements."

Her February 28 post, "The Importance of Balanced Power in Congress," was littered with misspelled and misused words.

Adminstration
curruption
responsibilty
subpoening
(impeachment) preceedings
desperatly
warrented
ouside
dictatoriship
crediblity
Irag

Everyone makes mistakes. I don't have a habit of spell checking my posts. Sometimes, I catch errors later, and certainly some are never corrected.

That said, it's sweetly ironic that Streisand, this great intellectual, talks of the "arrogance of this C student" when referring to President Bush in her "statement."

What about the arrogance of a celebrity wanting to claim completely undeserved intellectual superiority over President Bush?

If she had the chance to do it all again, tell me, would she? Could she?

She did! Streisand cleaned up her post, after the errors were brought to her attention.

The words of washingtonpost.com Executive Editor Jim Brady seem appropriate here.

"We appreciate the speed and thoroughness with which our readers and media outlets surfaced these allegations. Despite the turn this has taken, we believe this event, among other things, testifies to the positive and powerful role that the Internet can play in the the practice of journalism."

He is referring to Ben Domenech and plagiarism.

Of course, Streisand wasn't plagiarizing, but I think it should be noted that the Internet played a "powerful and positive role" in bringing her failings to the surface and helping her to learn and grow in the practice of blogging.

Yesterday, the Associated Press reported that Streisand will be taking a break from her writings to go on ANOTHER farewell tour.

Although nothing has been finalized according to Dick Guttman, her publicist, "A tour is being explored."

Mr. Barbra Streisand (aka James Brolin) told Access Hollywood she is going back out on the road.

The AP story quotes Brolin, "It took her six months. She kept saying, 'No, no, no,' and now she is going to go out in November."

This verifies the March 21 story from the New York Post.

Apparently, a motivating factor for the 2006 version of the Streisand farewell tour is weight loss.

She needs to drop some pounds and setting the tour dates is the best way for her to achieve her diet goals.

I find performers that spend the latter stages of their careers caught in a perpetual farewell tour to be sort of pathetic, whether or not it involves a weight loss strategy.

Apparently, Streisand's concerts will be done "in the round." The Post reports that she'll get $2,000,000 for each of the twenty shows on the tour. Best seats will have a face value of $1,500.

$40,000,000!!! Retirement can be very lucrative.

Tickets for the best seats will have a face value of $1,500.

A mole for the Post said, "The big worry is, 'Can Barbra lose the extra 50 pounds she's put on?' She feels that confirming the dates is the only thing that will make her lose the weight."

You do have to admire Streisand's ingenuity for weight loss -- charge people $1,500 to attend your performances.

Streisand's previous farewell tour ended at Madison Square Garden in September of 2000. She did, however, come out of "retirement" in 2004 to sing at a fund-raiser for John Kerry.

I wonder if she was looking to drop some pounds that time. Most likely, her hatred for the President was the impetus then.

I think she has alienated some of her fans with her politics. It's too bad that Streisand is so shrill when she expresses her political beliefs. In spite of that, I still think that she was very convincing in her "Mother Focker" role in the very enjoyable Meet the Fockers.

It is definitely possible to put politics aside and appreciate an artist's merits. Streisand as "Mother Focker" proves that. In some cases, it may be quite difficult to do. Nonetheless, it can be done if one is good at compartmentalizing.

As far as Streisand's upcoming concert engagements go, "the big worry" may be Streisand's whopping extra 50 POUNDS, but the big question is: When will she schedule her next farewell tour?