POLITICS – Page 14 – Don't Gel Too Soon

Maureen Dowd, Michael Wolff, The New York Times and Notoriety

I have been a fan and follower of Michael Wolff for years. Read his stuff in the bubble and afterwards. Even read Burn Rate, his lively, funny and very interesting history of the rise and fall of his Web company. So I get his email every day, with links to his Newser columns. They're usually fine, when I have time to read them. Today though, he's outdone himself so I wanted to be sure you knew. The piece is called "Maureen Dowd is All in Your Head"

Given what Wolff writes about The Dread Plagiarism Incident, I'm not offering any of my own perspectives here. I just wanted to take note of this very interesting discussion of journalist celebrity, aspirational followers and the New York Times in general. Here's a sample:

Here’s my question: Why are boring people so interested in her? Ever since she began her column in the mid-nineties it has been de rigueur among people who, relatively speaking, have no opinions about anything
to have very firm opinions about Dowd. Among a great swatch of uninteresting people she is the officially sanctioned, government-approved lightening rod.

The role Dowd has played is striking. Even in the context of being declared tiresome, she evokes a pretty acid response from a pretty touch cookie. Interesting, no?

Playing With the Big Boys: Bruce Springsteen’s New Drummer and the Rest of Us

Does the young drummer in this photo look familiar? He's definitely not Bruce's long-time drummer The Mighty Max Weinberg. He is, however, a Weinberg, Max's son Jay.. I learned about this from my own son, who IM'd

"Did you know that Max Weinberg's son is now the drummer for the E Street Band? It's a great story – little coverage. Seriously – he is 18 and no one has picked up that an ageless band now has an 18-year-old on drums."

He's right. It's a wonderful story, for many reasons. Just because it is, first of all. But also because all parents love it when their kids go into the family business; at least I think they do. That's not all, though. To be fair, Jay is only going to tour with them when his dad has to stay in LA to help launch the new Conan O'Brien Tonight Show. Even so, there's something lovely about Bruce calling and inviting him to join the band. Anyone who's ever watched a sound check or read about Bruce knows he's got high standards; this was NOT a sentimental decision. Jay can play the drums.

So why do I love this? A demonstration of that kind of trust by a national legend close to three times his age is pretty impressive. The idea of two generations on stage together as peers is an example of something that's been important to me for years: alliances across generations in all manner of venues.

I've been writing both here and on SVMoms about the tensions between Boomers and Millennials. There is a growing stress between us. Just a month ago I heard a young political social media genius – a serious one – mock the Boomers who claimed they helped to end the Vietnam War. "Dead soldiers ended the war, not you guys." he said with determination. Permutations of that attitude abound; although perhaps less so in families where parenting was respectful and strong and included a history of those times and a modest explanation of what we were trying to do.

President Obama, whose attitudes and capabilities I admire, tends to imply that it's time to ditch, at the least, a lot of the rhetoric and style of that time. I don't disagree. All that I want is for those of us in my generation and the younger people whose core values we share to be free to travel across the boundaries of style and execution to be allies and friends rather than adversaries. That kind of sharing emerges from respect in both directions, from engaging younger people more as peers than acoytes. That's what the Obama campaign did, and look what happened.

I've been fortunate, because of my relationship with my sons, because I've worked in the Internet world for ten years — so much with younger people, and because I am part of a community full of young families, to be able to do the same. But the divisions are growing for many of us, and they're sad.

So when Bruce, who has so often spoken for so many, crosses two-thirds of his life to, at 60+, add an 18-year-old drummer to his band, it's an example and a message for which I am grateful. No one who knows his music would ever think he would add a drummer to send a message; he takes his music, and his fans, too seriously for that. He is, however, reminding us all that, 18 or 80 – talent, music, dreams, ideas, faith or fun, the walls need not be so high. Whether it's campaigning for a candidate, working for women's rights, writing a poem, cooking a meal, building a house, growing tomatoes or making music, we are all pooer for the walls we build, and richer for the gifts we share.

Farewell to Eden Lipson, A Great Mother, Editor and Friend

There were so many of us in 1968, joined to battle the Vietnam War by helping Eugene McCarthy run for president. We lost the Senator several years ago, and Eli Segal, one of the best, soon after. Today I learned of the loss of another of the dear ones, Eden Ross Lipson. She died this morning of pancreatic cancer. You can see from this photo that she was a woman who relished life and laughter. Her greatest joys: her husband and her kids.

Although we shared a history from the campaign, we also shared some great lunches and adventures in Manhattan, where she had dozens of friends who loved and respected her. Principled and kind, she was a joy and support to so many.

In her work as Children’s Book Editor of the New York Times Book Review, Eden produced what is still the classic work on children’s literature. I knew her as she wrote the first edition; it was a real labor of love. Her understanding of kids, of books and of writing and purpose made her an ideal guide for anxious parents and savvy librarians alike.

Her generosity went far beyond the love of children that made her such a great advocate for the joy they would find in their books. It was she who gave me my first review assignment and it led to an entire side career as a book reviewer that lasted for years. She was a tough and smart editor, too.

I remember my review of one of my favorites: Jane Yolen’s The Devil’s Arithmetic. A time-travel Holocaust story, it is a beautiful book. I submitted a very positive review. Soon after, Eden called. In a tone slipping between amused and professional, she reminded me that not all parents were as open as I was, and that I needed to add some kind of caution to parents who were more protective about at what age their kids were exposed to tough information. She was right, of course. I began an embarrassed apology. Her response: if people didn’t need editors she wouldn’t have a job! I fixed the piece and it ran. Later, it was Eden who connected me with the editor who published my first book. She did it, as she did all things, with no expectation of reciprocal benefit. These sorts of things are typical of the warmth and kindness she showed to everyone who knew her.

Life is strange. Eden was someone I knew, respected and cared about. I lost touch with her, as with so many others, when we moved to Los Angeles. My life then just didn’t allow for working to stay connected; there were hard things happening and they made it difficult to think outside the immediate circumstances of my life. And so I’m doubly sad as I struggle to write about a woman with such a mind, and a spirit, and a heart.

I’m comforted to know, though, that she had friends and family around her, supportive and caring, in her last days. That’s no surprise; it’s what she offered so many others.

Live Blog of Education Secretary Arne Duncan at Brookings Institutution

Norman Lear Reminds Us Why We Love Music (and Why We’re Right)

Leave it to Norman Lear, founder and early funder of People for the American Way and creator of All in the Family and Maude, two of the most successful sitcoms in American television history, to produce the remarkable Playing for Change. Musicians – street musicians, from all over the world, recorded and filmed separately and combined into a multi-national, multi-ethnic concert, recorded (with high-tech equipment) on city street corners and the red dirt of townships, Congo, New Orleans and right in front of the White House.
The message, as Lear freely admits "sounds like claptrap" but somehow it can't help but sink in: music, the universal language, reminds us how much we have in common across the barriers that separate nation and race, faith and gender. It won't change anything by itself, certainly, but it's a lovely reminder of what could be.

Support for Obama Among Jewish (and Other) Religious Voters is High

Wow. One of my twitter feeds just posted this link: Jews Unwavering in Support for Obama. It's a Jerusalem Post story but citing a Gallup poll, reputable and usually more conservative than other top-level pollsters.

Here are the numbers:

Approval through Obama's first 100 days in office

79% of Jews voted for Obama

79% of Jews

85% of Muslims
73% of nonreligious
96% of liberal Jews

77% of “moderate” Jews

45% of conservative Jews w/exactly 45% disapproving

CHRISTIANS:

67% of Catholics favored Obama

58% of Protestants

45% of Mormons

And here's Gallup's graphic of the entire breakdown:

Definitely interesting.

RERUN – A GREAT REPUBLICAN: Farewell to Jack Kemp, a Fine Gentleman

This good looking guy, football star of the early 60’s, is Jack Kemp – congressman, vice-presidential and presidential candidate and a fine man. He died of cancer Saturday at 73, universally respected and, by many, loved. If you read this blog you know that I’m anything but a conservative, so this isn’t a political meditation; it’s an appreciation of a good guy.

When I think of Kemp, whom I met several times during his various campaigns, I see the same picture. It’s Inauguration Weekend for the first George Bush, and there’s a huge youth rally at the National Armory in Washington. I’m there for the Today Show, filming the teenagers practically hanging from the rafters, excited and waiting for the speakers to show up.

There are lots of them, holding forth in various ways about the new administration and all it would do. Finally, Kemp, the soon-to-be Secretary of HUD, Housing and Urban Development, arrived, and gave a sweet, unpretentious talk. Then, football hero that he was, he knew how to handle this young and happy crowd. Producing a football, he drew his arm back, ball in hand, and threw the ball far into the crowd, to enormous applause. It was wonderful.

After his years in the Bush Administration, he continued to act on his values: the need for extra opportunity for those held behind, and for justice. In the years of fierce immigration battles in the 90’s, he opposed California’s cruel anti-immigration Proposition 187, jeopardizing his own political future, and took strong positions on the concept of opportunity for those whose futures seemed bleak. Kemp was an economic conservative and all that that entailed, and also a caring, committed American. He proved it’s possible to be both. I’ve always admired him, and I wanted to say so, and wish him Godspeed. The is a portion of a (long) letter to his (17) grandchildren shortly after the 2008 election:

My first thought last week upon learning that a 47-year-old African-American Democrat had won the presidency was, “Is this a great country or not?”

You may have expected your grandfather to be disappointed that his friend John McCain lost (and I was), but there’s a difference between disappointment over a lost election and the historical perspective of a monumental event in the life of our nation.

Let me explain. First of all, the election was free, fair and transformational, in terms of our democracy and given the history of race relations in our nation.

What do I mean?

Just think, a little over 40 years ago, blacks in America had trouble even voting in our country, much less thinking about running for the highest office in the land.

A little over 40 years ago, in some parts of America, blacks couldn’t eat, sleep or even get a drink of water using facilities available to everyone else in the public sphere.

We are celebrating, this year, the 40th anniversary of our Fair Housing Laws, which helped put an end to the blatant racism and prejudice against blacks in rental housing and homeownership opportunities.

As an old professional football quarterback, in my days there were no black coaches, no black quarterbacks, and certainly no blacks in the front offices of football and other professional sports. For the record, there were great black quarterbacks and coaches — they just weren’t given the opportunity to showcase their talent. And pro-football (and America) was the worse off for it.

I remember quarterbacking the old San Diego Chargers and playing for the AFL championship in Houston. My father sat on the 50-yard line, while my co-captain’s father, who happened to be black, had to sit in a small, roped-off section of the end zone. Today, we can’t imagine the NFL without the amazing contributions of blacks at every level of this great enterprise.

I could go on and on, but just imagine that in the face of all these indignities and deprivations, Dr. Martin Luther King could say 44 years ago, “I have an abiding faith in America and an audacious faith in mankind.” He described his vision for America, even as he and his people were being denied their God-given human rights guaranteed under our Constitution.

You see, real leadership is not just seeing the realities of what we are temporarily faced with, but seeing the possibilities and potential that can be realized by lifting up peoples’ vision of what they can be.

When President-elect Obama quoted Abraham Lincoln on the night of his election, he was acknowledging the transcendent qualities of vision and leadership that are always present, but often overlooked and neglected by pettiness, partisanship and petulance. . . .

My advice for you all is to understand that unity for our nation doesn’t require uniformity or unanimity; it does require putting the good of our people ahead of what’s good for mere political or personal advantage.

Kemp was a fierce economic conservative. AND a true believer in the promise of our country. There is no Republican candidate who offers that kind of moral, ethical and political leadership today. We could really use him.

The End of the Berlin Wall: Twenty Years Ago

This is the Brandenburg Gate in the center of Berlin. The first time I saw it, in 1974, there was a wall built right through it.

Here's a photo of it then, from the Hotel Adlon website. The hotel stood, from 1907 to 1945, when it was decimated by a fire, just to the left of the Gate. It was the stopping place for world leaders and socialites and was rebuilt shortly after the Wall fell.

Because Berlin has such a dramatic history, it was always exciting to be there — maybe more so while the wall remained.

I remember especially coming through Checkpoint Charlie (that's it on the left) on a dark fall day (Americans were allowed to visit for the day after going through this scary border station and having cars and packages searched) and, as we approached the Gate, seeing an old man standing, looking over into the West. In his hands, clasped behind his back, was a rosary. Not so popular in communist East Berlin. I recall thinking immediately "Oh. His daughter is getting married in the West today and he can't go, and he's standing there, thinking about her, praying for her." Berlin in those times lent itself to imagining such things. The drama was palpable.

The first time we went to Berlin after the wall fell, I remember, it was pouring. Oblivious to the weather, we walked back and forth beneath the lovely arches in the now-open gate, kind of giddy at what it meant to the people of Berlin and all those who care about freedom and, I guess, redemption. For despite what happened in Berlin during the war (and we've studied it extensively and spoken both with survivors and those involved in the rebuilding of the Jewish community) the Wall caused immeasurable suffering and was a diabolical slash through the heart of the city and every one of its people.

I've written about Berlin before: from its playgrounds to its grim Communist years. We go there often. It seems to pull us back, its intellectual energy and re-emerging Jewish community irresistible. Once, when we'd taken our kids there while the Wall remained, one son, around 5, bought a stuffed wool pig and told everyone he "got it out of jail."

Here's one last photo – of two buildings: one redone and the other still old and rickety, in the very cool neighborhood of Prenzlauer Berg, which is in the old "East Berlin" and now, last I heard, had the highest childbirth rate in Germany and was home to artists, writers, musicians and fashionably cool people who don't have to work. What you see stands for it all: the struggle to renew, still only partly complete.

The First Hundred Days and the Opposition Has Been Busy (Boy Are We Glad to See Senator Spector Over Here!)

Happy 100th day to the president. It's probably the toughest presidency on record, given the scope of challenges he faces: depression, disintegrating infrastructure, inadequate schools and devastated health care system and now, a plague (well sort of.) But you know all that. What you may not have noticed is that all those Republicans despite their "What? Who? Me?" have been very busy making things harder. I have to thank the great Nerdette, always ahead of the pack, for pointing out the evidence, below.

Online Politics Conference Part 2: Lots of Interesting People

The Online Politics Conference is over and the basic coverage has been excellent. Since I’m late writing these (see yesterday’s post for why) I’m wandering through the two days reflecting on what I saw and heard – so join me.
Here are some of the great personalities who were part of the Politics Online Conference earlier this week. The woman you see here, Debra Bowen, is the Secretary of State of California. She’s also a savvy Facebook and Twitter user and completely accessible. She speaks plain English about policy, politics and just about everything else, including the changes she hopes to make in California in online electoral reform. Later, she showed up at a panel on the youth vote in jeans, her hair pulled back, no ceremony, no nothing. Keep an eye on her – she’s got a lovely future I think.

This is Jeremy Bird, Harvard Divinity Grad and Deputy Director of Organizing for America – the successor to the Obama online campaign. Shrewd, funny and knowledgeable, he echoed something we heard from all the Obama people at the conference: integrate online into every aspect and every major meeting of the campaign. They need to be a seamless part of the team, not stuck in the basement. Keep everyone in the loop and they take ownership. “I”f you don’t know what it’s like on the ground, you will fail.”

These two guys, Larry Irving and Mike McCurry, were part of a broadband panel. Irving ran NTIA in the Clinton Administration; McCurry, of course, was Bill Clinton’s White House Press Secretary and left with his integrity intact. “Broadband and access to broadband is an indispensable tool for every American” says McCurry. The panel basically made a case for broadband as a tool for health care, education, economic advancement and more. It’s not just cool to get Hulu, it’s critical to our growth, the panelists maintain. It can also save considerable money, particularly in health care, by making the best experts available, remotely, to any doctor anywhere.

Things weren’t all nuts and bolts though. One panel, probably, along with a riveting exploration of the youth vote, was my favorite. It’s title: The Visual Frontier: How the Arts, Pop Culture and Business Innovates the Way We Consume and Use Information. So whose eyes are those to the left? They belong to Josh Klein, a “hacker” and wise man of technology. He and the others in this panel have a combination of wisdom, originality and articulateness that made this panel a real pleasure.

Probably the other really intellectually exciting panel was How Are We Changing Because of What We Do Online? Its star: Judith Donath of the wonderful MIT Media Lab. Here’s a bit of what she said:

The information world is making many things no longer ephemeral the way they once were. We used to be a country of constant reinvention (You could move to the west, change your name, and start over.) We’d move around, and if finished college more than five years ago, we lost our old friends and reinvented ourselves. Now that’s coming to an end. Things written on Usenet years ago comes back to haunt us.

Now our online identity is our most long term and long lasting in the world we are building around us. All that we’ve clicked on is retained somewhere along with shopping records and more. What do we do with the vast amount of the past trailing us around, and how does it affect how we see politicians and each other?

So. Plenty to think about from this gifted and influential group – politicians and “big thinkers” alike.