Kathie Lee Gifford lays an egg in the shape of a book

   Kathie Lee Gifford has a new book out. It’s called "Just When I Thought I’d Dropped My Last Egg" (2009, Ballantine Books) and is written in the guise of a humorous self-help book. It’s thin on advice, thinner on the laughs, and mostly about Kathie Lee.
   Gifford’s style, as anyone knows who ever watched her years ago on TV’s Live With Regis and Kathie Lee, is to say whatever is on her mind, counting on listeners not to take offense because everyone knows she means no harm.
    True to form, each chapter of this latest book reads like a stream-of-consciousness exercise. Apparently what was on her mind as she set pen to paper was her colonoscopy, her mansion on Long Island, her gray nasal hairs, her house in Colorado, her foot surgery, the celebrities she rubs shoulders with and her sagging breasts — in the spirit of this book, she calls them "flop bags." And, in keeping with the book’s general tone, her "gina."
   No doubt Gifford is a loving wife, supportive mother and devoted friend — but to read her description of a woman’s death scene in which the author makes herself the center of attention is decidedly off-putting.
   Toward the end of the book, Gifford writes: "There’s already enough meanness in the world, so why add to it? But kindness and fairness? They’re both in short supply."
   Yes, indeedy. Parts of "My Last Egg" might give one the idea that Gifford herself has a mean streak. She describes embarrassing incidents involving Beth Chapman, wife of Dog the Bounty Hunter, and former Miss America Phyllis George, to name just a couple. Somehow in this case, a tiny footnote saying about a skewered family, "They were absolutely delightful," doesn’t seem like just compensation.
  In case someone has managed not to know the troubles she’s seen, Gifford drags them out once again. There was the child labor sweatshop story, in which critics charged that her line of clothing for Wal-Mart was manufactured by children in virtual slavery in Honduras. She deserves great credit for using her celebrity to bring good out of what was certainly a media nightmare, even testifying before a congressional committee on the plight of child labor. Don’t worry, she gives herself credit, again and again and again.
   Then there’s husband Frank’s affair. Tabloids gleefully reported the former NFL star and TV commentator’s dalliance in a New York hotel room. To have to deal with a spouse’s infidelity in the glare of publicity has to be humiliating and hurtful beyond belief. At the time, the Giffords chose to deal with the affair publicly in several interviews, he dining on a banquet of humble pie and she getting her licks in, all the while saying she forgave him.
   Maybe. Years later, Kathie Lee Gifford drags out the scandal again, at least glancingly, in order to give us a lecture on forgiveness — that is to say, how forgiving she is. In bringing it up again, of course, she gets to whack him again. I have some advice for Gifford. Forgive him or forget him, but drop the subject. The statute of limitations has expired. What you are doing now is called torture. Another thing. He’s 78 years old, for heaven’s sake. Show a little mercy.
   For years, I quietly defended Gifford. One of my friends could get paid for her hilarious, biting commentaries about the infamous Christmas specials Gifford hosted on television. But I thought she stood for something positive and cheerful. I respected her faith background — she was raised in a conservative Christian family — and her evident kindness.
   This book, with its coarse, common and low-common-denominator appeal, serves to prove all those media types right who always said she was nothing more than a goody-goody hypocrite. I still hope they’re wrong. Gifford doesn’t look good rolling in the mud. She can do much better. Next book, I hope she does.
   This book causes more wincing than laughter, unfortunately, but that’s what happens when somebody lays an egg in the shape of a book.