Columnist vs. Columnist

First things first: One of my Decider blogs is up; here's a link. Feel free to comment if you feel so moved.

Second, I find this whole kerfuffle very interesting. This week, one of the advice columnists I read regularly (and, incidentally, one of my favorites; I don't think I've ever disagreed with her advice) wrote an open letter to another advice columnist. Here's the situation: Margo Howard is the daughter of Ann Landers (yes, THE Ann Landers). Amy Dickinson has apparently been making different appearances on television, and she's marketing herself as "the new Ann Landers." Howard is upset about this -- for good reason, I think; she states in the letter that Dickinson's bosses were warned once that using the particular phrase "the new Ann Landers" is close to copyright infringement, but for some reason, Dickinson et al. are ignoring that warning and continuing to blather on about it.

Howard's point is that if anyone is capable of being "the new Ann Landers," it's Howard -- but she doesn't think that anyone is capable. I can only imagine how she feels. I would be super pissed if someone went around labeling themselves "the new Paul Taufen" -- not that that's likely to happen. But for what it's worth, Margo, you have my back 100 percent.