Mikhail Gorbachev, the former General Secretary of the Soviet Union’s Communist Party, is now shilling for Louis Vuitton. Some years ago, the one-time world leader took flak for appearing in an ad for Pizza Hut (though Domino’s would have made more Cold War sense), but at least that was an innocuous product for the People, unlike Louis Vuitton bags, which are ugly status symbols favored by the most emptily materialisitc of the elite. And to see Gorbachev and satchel photographed by Annie Lebovitz near what looks like the Berlin Wall—well, it almost makes Izzy feel wistful for the bad old days.