"Inevitably tacky, gauche and ugly"

Washington Post syndicated columnist Richard Cohen pays appropriate homage to tattoos -- and, along the way, other societal travesties:



How can anyone who knows how fickle fashion is, how times change, how their own tastes have "improved," decorate their body in a way that's nearly permanent?



The Oracle has never understood why anyone would so disfigure perfectly good skin. In one instance familiar to The Oracle, a tattoo mars that which otherwise might be close to perfection.