American Idol or American Idiot?

As everyone with access to electricity now knows, Anna Nicole Smith died yesterday because of something having to do with drugs, it seems. Why not an overdose? I don't think any official reports say so yet, but would anyone be surprised? Not to say that it would have been intentional, but it could have been. The possible reasons have been piling up - the death of her son, postpartum depression, the several lawsuits she was involved in at the time of her death, and just generally irresponsible drug use. Considering all this, was anyone else not surprised that she's dead?

Because I sincerely doubt her death will remain any large mystery for much longer, let's move on to the more pressing question: Why do people care so much? A friend of mine commented that on the Today show they spent more time on Anna Nicole, even though nothing is really known about her death yet, than they did on the casualties in Iraq - by the way, that same day there were two car bombings in Iraq that killed at least 27 people and wounded dozens more,
according to CNN. Not to mention the 13 suspected insurgents killed later that day. Nor should we get carried away and talk about all the other bodies that were undoubtedly found unresponsive in their hotel rooms, homes, or in the streets that day. Is Anna Nicole more important than all these people?

The short answer, is "DUH." It's celebrity culture, need anything else be said? Tough, I'm going to anyway. Anna Nicole was a high school dropout, white trash by most standards (or least my standards), who married a fry cook at age 17 and worked hard as a stripper for years before sending in pictures to Playboy and hitting it big. Naturally, she dumped the hubby, and found an elderly Texas oil billionaire to marry. Her inheritance, dubiously earned after 14 months of marriage, was still a court matter when she died. Then she dropped out of the spotlight for a few years, gained weight, got a reality show, lost weight (thank you recently discredited TrimSpa), lost her son, got remarried, gave birth to a daughter, and died.

She's this country's Princess Di. If America's aristocrats are our seedy celebrities, a comparison often made, then Anna Nicole was our own "rags to riches to tragic death" story. The main difference, a friend suggested, is that people liked Princess Di. Is that really true though? After talking to various coworkers about Smith's death, I have to conclude that people liked her too! Maybe not for her charity work or kind heart, but for some reason or another - which, I confess, completely eludes me - people really liked her.

Was she just an endearing clown or truly someone people identified with? I remember when the Anna Nicole show started, she was a complete joke. People watched just to make fun because she was constantly doped up and completely idiotic. Remember this Anna Nicole?


Was she the American people's cute, down syndrome afflicted, little cousin? Or was she just an astoundingly silly sorority girl that men wanted to use and then discard, and women could feel superior to? I don't know. Like I said, the whole thing eludes me.

You really have to look on the bright side, though, to get through these times of national tragedy. At least now her daughter has a chance at a normal life...assuming her paternity suit gets wrapped up quickly and cleanly.