Monthly Archives: October 2009

Yep, the plaid shirt guy

Alexander78

Back on this post, I made a gratuitous name-dropping reference to covering Lamar Alexander back during his gubernatorial campaign in 1978, and Kathryn replied with a suitably unimpressed, “Plaid shirt guy. Swell.”

Indeed, as name-dropping goes, “Lamar” isn’t the same as “Elvis.” So it was a forgettable reference.

I only return to it because, coincidentally, I was going through even MORE files from my newspaper career just hours later, and ran across these two shots from that week I followed Alexander in 1978. I practically lived with the guy that whole time. I flew on his campaign plane with him (with my paper paying a pro rata share of the cost), went where he went, ate where he ate… I’d get about five or six hours away from him at night, and spent a couple of hours of that in my hotel room writing. We used to do stuff like that in those days — actually cover political campaigns.

This was a pretty exciting experience for me, my first exposure to statewide politics as a reporter. The following week, I was following his opponent, Jake Butcher, just as closely. We sort of tag-teamed the candidates in the last weeks of the election.

Anyway, the photo above, with Lamar’s tasteful plaid shirt clashing with a really ugly plaid sofa (be grateful it’s not in color) in the back room of a political headquarters in Nashville, captures a tense moment for the candidate. He had just been interrupted during this Nashville leg of his celebrated walk across the state by a reporter from the Tennessean with legal papers in hand. The legal papers — affidavits, I believe — had something to do with a business deal Alexander had been involved in. I want to say it had to do with ownership of some Ruby Tuesday restaurant franchises.

Anyway, somebody was alleging there was something irregular about it, and the candidate was being confronted with it. Big drama. This was his first look at the document, and there he sits with a suitably furrowed brow while we stare at him and wait for a reaction. One of us (guess who) is actually taking pictures of this potentially bad moment for Lamar Alexander. We were all about the next political scandal in those days, and Lamar had served in the Nixon White House, so he knew to take such things seriously, and soberly, and not complain about the pesky press.

But I will confess now to a bit of feeling bad for the guy at that moment. We weren’t supposed to feel that way, but I did. Even as I was dutifully taking the picture (if this is the end of his candidacy, I captured the moment!), I was sort of thinking it would be kind of nice if the guy had a moment to read this in privacy and compose his thoughts — if only so we could get actual facts from him instead of a gut reaction. But we didn’t allow him that.

Anyway, to balance that, here’s a happier moment below. It was taken on his campaign plane, as it was preparing for takeoff, early on the morning of Oct. 18, 1978 (going by the newspaper). The Yanks, as you see, had just won the World Series again. Check out Jimmy Carter and Moshe Dayan. The day was going well so far — no scandals yet — and was filled with possibilities.

I like the way the light works in the picture. I was a pretty fair photographer, for a reporter.

Sorry if I’m boring y’all. Don’t know why I’m taking y’all down memory lane. Oh yes, I do: This is my way of getting y’all to think, Ol’ Brad has been covering this politics stuff up close and personal for a long, LONG time, so maybe sometimes his reflections are based in experience and not just gut reactions.

Is it working?

Anyway, it’s certainly been a long time. Burl and I graduated from Radford High just seven years before this…

lamar78

The Stuff I Kept

Overboard

As I mentioned earlier, I’ve been rooting through the vast piles of stuff I brought home when I left The State, stuff I just didn’t have time to go through in those last couple of weeks, but just jammed into boxes and hauled down to the truck, night after night, right up until that last night when Robert and I went off for beers in 5 Points.

And I keep running across fun little things that I want to share, enough of them that I’ve decided to start a new feature on the blog: The Stuff I Kept.

Here’s a favorite comic strip I kept taped to the wall over my credenza.

This one doesn’t take much explanation. As one accustomed to being in a leadership position (I had been supervising other journalists since 1980), I just enjoyed this send-up of the leadership imperative of always appearing to know what to do. Not that I could get away with this dodge with the members of the editorial board; they were a good bit smarter than the pirates in Overboard. But there were times when I did say “All right, then, here’s what we’ll do…” just to make a decision and move things along. Someone had to. And it was good if the someone who had to didn’t take himself too seriously.

Or at least, it was important that he give the impression to his subordinates that he didn’t take himself too seriously, say, by putting little self-deprecating cartoons up on his wall. Oh, leadership is complex, and deep. Deep enough to need hip boots.

Chamber chief has really crossed the line now

The WSJ had an interesting piece about how Thomas Donohue, the president and chief executive of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, has been trying to climb to the top of the Obama “enemies list” (move over, FoxNews) lately with his adamant opposition to the administration’s positions on global warming, health care and bank oversight.

Some of his comments have been immoderate enough to alienate some prominent Chamber members, such as Apple, Nike and Duke Energy. And when you’re not progressive enough on climate change for Duke (Donohue’s Chamber has said of global warming that warmer temperatures could help by reducing deaths related to cold weather), you may have a problem.

But what really struck me was this:

Through a spokesman, Mr. Donohue declined to be interviewed for this article.

Whoa. I can see the POTUS wanting to cold-shoulder Fox, but the head of the Chamber of Commerce not wanting to talk to The Wall Street Journal? It may be time for the Chamber board to consider whether this is the right guy to be heading up their effort. When a business leader won’t talk to the Journal, something is amiss.

Oh, and about the “enemies list” thing — I was just using that as a way of bringing up my old friend Lamar Alexander, whom I covered in the 70s when he was a pup. I broke bread with him numerous times while traveling with his gubernatorial campaign. I even went out with him and some campaign staffers to a disco in a black neighborhood in Nashville, and witnessed the improbable spectacle of this Pat Boone near-clone taking the dance floor, which is one of the odder things I’ve seen in my career of covering politics. (Back in those days, we COVERED campaigns.)

Where did that come from? Oh… Kathryn gave me a hard time for name-dropping back on this thread, and I didn’t want to disappoint her.

40 years later, look how far we’ve co… DOH!

Stan Dubinsky shared this item about the first message to travel over the ARPANET, which would become the Internet — 40 years ago yesterday.

It was two letters: “lo.” It was supposed to “login,” but the system crashed after two letters. Oh, what a familiar feeling.

Do y’all realize that two weeks after this massive foul-up with Outlook, I still can’t send e-mail through that application? In fact, I can’t even call up my calendar or contacts on my laptop without being driven nuts by a dialogue box that pops up every few seconds asking me to log in to the server again.

This is very bad, because I depend on Outlook — particularly the interactivity between the e-mail and my contacts — to help me keep in contact with prospective employers and other nice people. I can send via Webmail, but by comparison that’s like trying to type from across the room with a 10-foot pole.

My usual technical adviser tried to help me but finally threw up his hands. I’ve tried uninstalling and reinstalling Outlook several times. No dice; the bug is still there. And has been, ever since that ill-fated mass mailing I attempted.

So while we’ve come a long way in 40 years (and thank you, Al Gore, for inventing it), in some ways it feels like we’re right back where we sta….

Getting it wrong, and right, in ‘State of Play’


Back on this post, we had a sidebar about the film “State of Play” — Kathryn mentioning that I really should see the original British series, and I will certainly put it in my Netflix queue. As it happens, though, I saw the American film over the weekend, and it was, mediocre.

I’m reminded of it again today because I went by to visit folks at The State, and ran into Sammy Fretwell, and told him I had thought  about him over the weekend. That’s because the one detail the filmmakers got right in Russell Crowe’s depiction of a reporter, aside from the fact that he worked on a ridiculously old PC, was his workspace. I would say “desk,” but this was the sort of workspace that has worked itself up into a fortress, with piles of papers, magazines, newspapers, files, publicity packets, all sorts of stuff in unsteady towers of material dating back 10 years and more, stacked on desk, credenza, nearby filing cabinets, and other items of furniture that can no longer be identified.

I saw that and thought, “Sammy!” (And I say this with all respect; Sammy’s a great newspaperman. He’s awesome. This just happens to be a common characteristic of great newspapermen.)

Beyond that, the screenplay was evidently NOT written by anyone who had ever worked at a newspaper. The characters just weren’t right. And they said ridiculous things that only non-journalists would ever say, such as “sell newspapers.” You know how people who want to criticize a paper for a story say the editors just ran it to “sell newspapers?” That’s always a dead giveaway of a clueless layman. I’ve never met a journalist who spoke or thought in terms of “selling newspapers.” Most journalists didn’t care if you stole it, as long as you read it. Selling was the concern of the business side folks (and a poor job they’ve done of it in recent years, huh?). Another real prize bit of dialogue, which you can hear on the above trailer: “The newspapers can slant this any which way they want to…” Who wrote this stuff?

The one really true bit was during the credits, when they show the Big Story that the movie was about going through the production process and onto the presses. They got that just right. I’m guessing that’s not a tribute to the knowledge of the writers. The producers probably just asked a newspaper to produce a page with this story on it, put it on the presses and run the presses. And THIS part got me. I haven’t really felt nostalgic about the lingering death of my industry, but this simple device of putting the camera on the actual physical processes sort of gave me a lump in the throat — the film coming out of the imagesetter, the plate being made, the plate being fitted onto the press… THAT was real.

But nothing else was. Not even the messy desk, as it turns out. When I mentioned it to Sammy, he said I was behind the times. He took me over to his little fortress in the corner, and it was NEAT. He had gotten permission to take three days off from covering the news and spent the time imposing order. It was freaky.

Sort of made me want to go back and make sure the imagesetters, platemakers and presses were still there…

bud rates everybody, 1 to 10

I was intrigued by this list that bud shared back on this post — so much so that I thought I’d promote it to its own post, as a conversation-starter:

I ranked a collection of organzitions from the ones I least respect (1) to the ones I most respect (10). Here’s the entire list. As it relates to this I am completely indifferent to the various illegal aliens issues. If we fund health care for illegals, ok by me. They’re humans with health needs too. And they probably contribute more to the well-being of society than most people.

I could live with or without funding of abortion. But if we don’t fund it then don’t fund it for anyone, including those who want an abortion in cases of rape.

As for the insurance industry I’d just as soon let them go under as keep them.

Nazis 1
Al Qaeda 1
Taliban 1
NAMBLA 1
Ku Klux Klan 1
Health Insurance Industry 2
Bush (Jr.) Administration 2
Soviet Communism 2
Hezbolah 2
Catholic Church 2
Conservative Talk Radio 2
Birthers 2
Pro-Lifers with exceptions 2
Creationist “Science” 2
Tea Baggers 3
FOX News 3
PLO 3
Southern Baptist Church 3
Republican Party 3
NRA 3
Slavery Reparation Movement 3
Isreal 4
Iran 4
“Mainstream” Media 4
Illegal aliens 5
US Military 5
Methodist Church 5
Global Warming Movement 5
Scientology 5
Libertarian Party 5
National Teachers Association 5
Pro-Lifers without exceptions 6
Obama Administration 6
Democratic Party 6
Liberal Talk Radio 6
Labor Unions 6
ACORN 7
Unitarian Church 7
Nudists 7
PETA 8
Peak Oil Movement 8
Vegetarians 8
Pro-Choicers 8
ACLU 8
Green Peace 9
Sierra Club 10
Audibon Society 10
SPCA 10
NORML 10

It’s an imperfect scale (should Nazis get a point at all? shouldn’t they be in the negatives?), but it’s an interesting exercise. It makes you think. (For instance, you might think at the end there, what’s bud been smoking?). So using the same list — no additions or subtractions — and the same rules, here’s my shot at it:

Nazis 0 (I just couldn’t give them a point; I don’t care what the rules are)
Al Qaeda 1
Taliban 1
Hezbolah 1
NAMBLA 1
Ku Klux Klan 1
Soviet Communism 2
PLO 2
Birthers 3
Tea Baggers 3
FOX News 3
Conservative Talk Radio 3
Liberal Talk Radio 3
Iran 3
Scientology 3
Libertarian Party 3
NORML 3
Nudists 3
“Mainstream” Media 4
Health Insurance Industry 4
Bush (Jr.) Administration 4
Creationist “Science” 4
Republican Party 4
NRA 4
Slavery Reparation Movement 4
National Teachers Association 4
Democratic Party 4
Labor Unions 4
ACORN 4
Unitarian Church 4
PETA 4
Pro-Choicers 4
ACLU 4
Greenpeace 4
Illegal aliens 5
Southern Baptist Church 5
Peak Oil Movement 5
Methodist Church 5
Catholic Church 6
Pro-Lifers with exceptions 6
Pro-Lifers without exceptions 6 (I didn’t really understand these categories)
Obama Administration 6
Vegetarians 6
Sierra Club 6
Audubon Society 6
Israel 7
Global Warming Movement 7
SPCA 7
US Military 9

So, do I really think that Iran and nudists are morally equal? Or that the U.S. military is by far the most wonderful thing in the world? No, I wasn’t really comparing them, but considering each on its own – negatives? Positives? Where does that leave me? The post-Vietnam military, which was in pretty bad shape, would have gotten a low score. But the military today as an institution, judged as to how well it does what it’s called on to do, is way up there.
Do I think the military is better than the Church? No. But when you say “Roman Catholic Church,” are you talking the Body of Christ, in which case 10-plus, or do you mean the troubled human institution that most of you, my readers, are thinking of? So I average out at 6.
And yes, while I still have a somewhat favorable view of the Obama administration, I do have a better impression of Israel.
Hey, as I said, it’s an imperfect system bud came up with, but I found it an interesting exercise.

Nice sunRISE today, too

sunrise

I was sort of proud of my sunset pictures from the last night of the fair, what with the fact that I didn’t even have a real camera with me. This morning, I was almost as impressed by the sunrise that I saw coming in towards town on Sunset Blvd. in West Columbia.

Not quite as colorful as the fair pics, and I was a little disappointed that the Blackberry didn’t quite capture the light exactly as I was seeing it, but I thought I’d share it anyway.

Good news for a change: Boeing picks SC

It’s been a long day and I’ve got to go get me some dinner (at 9:21 p.m.), but before I do I thought I’d give y’all a place to celebrate some good news, it’s been so long since we’ve had any here in SC:

Boeing Co. said Wednesday it will open a second assembly line for its long-delayed 787 jetliner in South Carolina, expanding beyond its longtime manufacturing base in Washington state.

The Chicago-based airplane maker said it chose North Charleston over Everett, Wash., because the location worked best as the company boosts production of the mid-size jet, designed to carry up to 250 passengers.

Boeing already operates a factory in North Charleston that makes 787 parts and owns a 50-percent stake in another plant there that also makes sections of the plane…

So, yea us!

And don’t you DARE let SC opt out of health care reform

Here’s the thing that really frosts me about this health care debate: One of the little bargaining chips offered by those milquetoast “liberals” who don’t have the guts to stand up for the public option (and seriously, a “liberal Democrat” who won’t stand up for single-payer or something equally sweeping is a waste of skin) is the idea of letting states “opt out.” For instance, from the WSJ story I mentioned earlier:

Mr. Reid announced his support Monday for a government-run health plan — the so-called public option — while adding an escape clause for states that don’t want to participate.

OK, so you’re going to subject me to all this hullabaloo — the townhall meetings, the “You lie!” nonsense, all of this — and in the end, even if you get the guts to institute the public option, you’re going to deny it to me and mine?

Think about it, folks: If only one state in the union opted out, which state do you think it would be? Hmmm, let’s see … could it be the one that fired on Fort Sumter? Could it be the one where the governor wanted to lie down in front of the truck delivering the stimulus? Could it be the home of Joe “You Lie” Wilson and the “We Don’t Care How You Did It Up North” bumper stickers? Could it be the state with the highest number of elected radical libertarians (on the Eastern Seaboard, anyway)?

As the former governor of the state that would probably be the second one to opt out used to say, “You betcha!”

And folks, that would just be too bitter a pill to swallow.

Without the ‘public option,’ forget it (and of COURSE we should pay for it)

This story in the WSJ today about health care reform causes me to make the following observations:

  • I’m glad Sen. Reid is talking about including a “public option,” because without that, you’re not accomplishing anything.
  • I’m really disappointed in my man Joe Lieberman, coming out against the public option.
  • Is everybody in Washington nuts? Joe opposes it because he says we shouldn’t have it without asking Americans to pay for it. Well, duh! Of course we have to pay for it! What lunatic would want a program we didn’t pay for?

That last one will tell you that I obviously haven’t been paying much attention to the “debate” in Washington lately. But at least now I can see why a reasonable person might oppose reform, if there are actually people proposing a public option without asking participants to pay for it.

Folks, I want to go on record, here and now, as being more than willing to pay for federal government health care. I am willing to pay up to the almost $600 a month I am personally currently paying for my COBRA. I’m thinking that if you require every household to pay that much (or even $500), you could have a real Cadillac system that would be FAR more efficient than what I’ve got now. And most importantly to me and I would think to most people, I couldn’t lose it. And I could take any job for which I’m qualified and which pays enough to pay mortgage, buy groceries and pay the light bill and such, rather than having to limit my options to something with a great health plan.

Lemme ‘splain to you the problem with the current situation, folks. It’s not the one out of seven who don’t have coverage; it’s the far greater number who currently have coverage through their employer, but live in constant threat of losing it, and who don’t DARE stimulate the economy by going out and starting a business or something because they can’t give up their coverage.  That’s the really big problem, far bigger than the problem of the uninsured.

If that’s what they’ve been talking about — a choice between a public plan that we don’t pay for, or no public plan — then I might have to join Doug Ross’ movement to just get rid of all the incumbents.

Doesn’t anybody up there have any sense?

Delleney’s approach on impeachment was most promising one

I remain unconvinced that impeachment proceedings against Mark Sanford would be worthwhile. As you know, I believe he should have resigned by now (if nothing else, thereby sparing us from Andre Bauer’s candidacy), but I hate to see the State House stroke the gov’s narcissism with another session all about him.

And I certainly thought it appropriate that lawmakers not try to wrestle the subject to the ground in a two-day special session.

All of that said, I was encouraged that Greg Delleney at least took the most promising approach in his impeachment resolution. He didn’t mess around with all of that dull stuff about airplane rides and such, but concentrated on the one most glaring instance of dereliction of duty — the week that the governor ran off to Argentina, the trip that started this whole mess rolling:

Whereas, Governor Mark Sanford was absent from the State of South Carolina and from the United States from Thursday, June 18, 2009, until Wednesday, June 24, 2009, while in or in route to and from Argentina for reasons unrelated to his gubernatorial responsibilities; and

Whereas, from Thursday, June 18, 2009, until at least on or about Monday, June 22, 2009, Governor Sanford was not in official communication with any person in the chain of command within the Office of Governor of the State of South Carolina; and

Whereas, the Lieutenant Governor was not aware of the Governor’s absence from the State and there was no established chain of command or protocol for the exercise of the executive authority of the State; and

Whereas, the Governor intentionally and clandestinely evaded South Carolina Law Enforcement Division agents assigned to secure his safety in order to effect his absence from the State; and

Whereas, the Governor directed members of his staff in a manner that caused them to deceive and mislead the public officials of the State of South Carolina as well as the public of the State of South Carolina as to the Governor’s whereabouts; and

Whereas, the purpose of the Governor’s absence from the State of South Carolina served no furtherance of his duties as Governor; and

Whereas, the Governor’s conduct in being absent brought extreme dishonor and shame to the Office of Governor of South Carolina and to the reputation of the State of South Carolina, and furthermore, has caused the Office of the Governor of South Carolina and the State of South Carolina to suffer ridicule resulting in extreme shame and disgrace; and

Whereas, the Governor’s conduct and actions under these circumstances constitute serious misconduct in office pursuant to and for the purposes of Article XV, Section 1, of the Constitution of this State. Now, therefore,

Be it resolved by the House of Representatives:

That pursuant to Article XV, Section 1, of the Constitution of South Carolina, 1895, the Governor of South Carolina, the Honorable Marshall C. Sanford, Jr., is impeached for serious misconduct in office.

Is that enough to warrant impeachment? Maybe not. But it certainly makes the case that this guy shouldn’t be governor, which is not quite the same thing, is it?

Delleney sounds (almost) like my kind of conservative

Not really knowing Greg Delleney, I took some interest in this mini-profile John O’Connor included in his story today:

Often quiet and funny, Delleney is a member of a loose-knit – and often low-brow – lawmaker lunch group, the House Bi-Partisan Eatin’ Caucus.

Prior to this year, Delleney was not among Sanford’s chief critics. “I agreed with him more than I disagreed with him.”

Chester County GOP chairwoman Sandra Stroman said she has known Delleney, who served in the Navy for three years, for 15 years.

“He’s generally a very quiet person,” she said. “He listens a lot.”

Though many South Carolinians are tired of hearing about Sanford, Stroman thinks Chester Republicans support Delleney.

“I don’t think it’s personal,” Stroman said. “Greg Delleney is a man who believes in right and wrong, and I think he comes down on the side of right every time.”

Delleney is among the strongest right-to-life supporters in the Legislature, typically introducing a new bill each year to limit access to abortions.

This year, Delleney successfully shepherded through the House a bill that requires a 24-hour wait before a woman can receive an abortion. He also scuttled a bill that would have provided dating violence counseling for teens by adding an amendment restricting the counseling to heterosexual couples.

Delleney has critics.

“I like Greg. He is very passionate about what he believes,” said state Rep. Gilda Cobb-Hunter, D-Orangeburg. “My problem is he is foisting his moral beliefs on public policy. I’m not surprised he’s pushing this, particularly when sex is involved.”

That makes him sound, in general terms, like the kind of conservative I like — as opposed to the Sanford hyperlibertarian type, or the type that gets extremely worked up over illegal immigration. I much prefer the Brownbacks and the Huckabees to the Sanfords and the DeMints.

Not that I would do everything he does. I don’t think I would have adding the hetero clause to the violence counseling thing. That’s the kind of making-an-issue-of-something-that-isn’t-an-issue stuff where social conservatives lose me (at least, that’s the impression I remember having at the time).

So he’s not exactly the kind of conservative I’d be were I to consent to being called a conservative (or a liberal, or any of those oversimplifications). I’m still more the John McCain type.

Actually, Rex faces TWO serious contenders

As I read this this morning:

Rex, the state superintendent of education, is known by more of those surveyed than the other Democrats running for governor. More than 60 percent recognized his name. Forty-one percent had a favorable impression of Rex. In contrast, a majority of those surveyed did not know the four other Democratic contenders — Columbia attorney Dwight Drake, state Sen. Robert Ford of Charleston, Charleston attorney Mullins McLeod and state Sen. Vincent Sheheen of Camden.

… I thought, No, there are not four other contenders. Really, there are two — Sheheen and Drake.

News stories can’t say that, because the reporters aren’t allowed to say that Robert Ford would never be a serious factor (and if you think otherwise, you apparently haven’t followed his career or listened to him), and Mullins McLeod, in spite of having an AWESOME South Carolina name and being the nephew of Walt McLeod (one of the coolest people in the Legislature), hasn’t caught on and seems increasingly unlikely to do so.

I could prove to be wrong about this, of course. McLeod could suddenly kick into gear, or Ford could start acting very unFordlike.  But if that happens, I’ll say the position has changed and include them. Right now, I wouldn’t be too concerned about them if I were one of the other three.

What IS that thing Boeing wants to build?

Stargate

Whoa. I had thought the plant we were trying to bring to South Carolina (a prospect which is looking better, given Boeing’s union troubles elsewhere) was for building airplanes.

But you know what this photo looks like to me? Yep, the Stargate, from the movie of that name starring Kurt Russell.

Now, that would certainly give South Carolina a leg up into high-tech manufacturing…

And yes, I realize it’s a cross-section of the fuselage of the 787. I’m just talking about what it looks like…

Sg1stargatefront

Any thoughts about the Legislature’s return?

It occurred to me that some of y’all might want a chance to comment on some actual news, instead of TV shows from the 70s or comic strips that never were.

Well, OK, but it’s pretty boring out there today.

The Legislature did come back today, and they’re going to make up for a stupid omission (and thanks for catching that, Mr. Spratt), and maybe talk about impeaching the governor (which I’m already tired of hearing about; I just want this guy gone, without another word said), and do some stuff for an ecodevo prospect that might be Boeing.

But I don’t have anything to say about those things yet. Do y’all?

Awaiting moderation (in more ways than one)

Just FYI, to give you a glimpse behind the scenes…

I agree with y’all that the blog has become a more lively and enjoyable forum since I started banning bad actors — or rather, since I started requiring that comments display a constructive engagement before I let them be published.

Since some of y’all are of a political persuasion that makes you want to know what’s done on your behalf — by the CIA, by Blackwater, or by me — I thought I’d give you an update on what you are NOT seeing on the blog.

Basically, I’ve banned Lee Muller, and “Mike Toreno” and “BillC.” But you probably knew that. Something you may not know is that all three have tried commenting under different names — Lee under his old pseudonym “SCNative,” “Mike” as “CarlsBoss,” and BillC as just “Bill.” I’ve shared with you some of the things Lee had to say as “SCNative,” back on this post.

Two other individuals have failed to make the cut: Someone called “enemy within” (who may actually be a spam program; I’m not sure), and just today, our old friend “Workin’ Tommy C.”

“Workin’ Tommy” tried to comment on this post, basically as an advocate for Angry White Maledom (excerpt: “Angry white men created the government as defined in the U.S. Constitution. Outraged men of principle MADE this country…”). And as a representative of that point of view, I almost approved him … but, remembering some of his behavior back on the old blog, decided to think about it. Then “Tommy” confirmed me in my caution by posting this follow-up:

My earlier comment is still awaiting moderation.

Can’t handle the truth, Warthen?

Anyway, that’s what’s happening beneath the surface.

Yours in civil discourse,

Brad

From the newsroom of The Status Quo

Status Quo1

Over the weekend, I was going through stacks and stacks of files I brought home when I left The State — mostly stuff I had squirreled away that most people would have thrown away as soon as it touched their desks. If you’ll allow me to mix animal metaphors, I am a notorious pack rat. This has sometimes made me useful to neater people, who will come to me and say, “Remember that memo about such-and-such back in the early 90s? You wouldn’t happen to…?” … and I’d put my hands on it within minutes.

Well, a lot of that stuff went into the trash over the last few days, but some of it I couldn’t part with. And some of it I couldn’t even bear to pack away in boxes. Such was the case with a Pendaflex folder labeled “Strip.”

No, not that kind of strip. A comic strip. The one that Robert Ariail and I brainstormed about at great length back in the mid-90s. It centered around a guy who was a sort of lobbyist-good-ol’-boy friend-of-all in a Southern state capital, a fairly harmless and ineffectual character who lived, improbably, in a boarding house. A small part of the strip centered around a fictional newspaper (and any resemblance to any newspaper, living or dead, is entirely coincidental) called The Status Quo. It was not a realistic newspaper, but a caricature composed of charming (to us) little idiosyncracies that were particularly Southern and fallible and Status Quo 5human.

It was that newspaper for which I invented the slogan, “All the News that Gives You Fits,” which this blog now bears. You can see at right a detail from the piece of paper upon which I first jotted that idea, back in either 1994 or 95.

Anyway, for your enjoyment you will find an actual strip that Robert sketched up (characters and dialogue suggested by me) above, and a sheet on which Robert tried to get a feel for the protagonist and other characters, below. Finally, at the bottom, you’ll find some additional sketches, including “Sol” and “Edgar” the two mice who lived in the State House and secretly wrote every bill that ever actually passed (our hero’s friendship with the mice was the key to his success as a lobbyist, such as it was).

We had spent an inordinate amount of time discussing these characters. The two in the strip above were the crusty old editor and the young reporter who, as the editor notes, was “not from around here.” She lived in the same boarding house as our “hero,” and was to be the straight woman for a lot of the comedy. (This is beginning to sound like a Lou Grant/Mary Tyler Moore relationship, and I suppose it owed something to that.)

As I wrote before, Robert’s syndicate turned down the strip and we never revived it, although I continued to have hopes for it, even Status Quo 4as newspaper comics pages dropped features right and left. I’d still like to come up with a way of doing it online, if I could talk Robert into it. At right you’ll see a memo Robert gave me to tell me about the syndicate’s thumbs-down. He drew it on a napkin: Our hero, with a tear running down his cheek, and a one-word message.

Weird, isn’t it — I have this little treasure trove of memorabilia about a comic strip that never was. A rare collection, indeed.

Status Quo2

status quo 3

Best meeting scene ever televised

Gene Garland, back during this discussion, mentioned the two wonderful BBC mini-series based on the first and third books in Le Carre’s Karla Trilogy.

Nothing better has ever been offered on the telly, in my view — with the possible exceptions of “Band of Brothers” and “The Sopranos.”

The amazing thing about them is that they are such good representations of books that are essentially about … meetings. Meetings and interviews. Sort of gives me hope that someone will see gripping drama in a story about an editorial page editor. (Guess I need to write the book first, though, huh?) All of the key action happens in meetings. By contrast, the middle book in the Trilogy — The Honourable Schoolboy — was all about action and exotic locales. Which is why the BBC didn’t do that one — too expensive. But it was also the most forgettable of the three. Smiley was in power in that one, whereas in the other two he was in exile, only the Circus couldn’t make do without him. (Perhaps you think, given my situation, I’m harboring fantasies of Oliver Lacon coming to my house one night and asking me to straighten out the newspaper, unofficially of course. Well, I’m not. But it’s an intriguing plot line…)

This could have fallen completely flat on the small screen, but it’s to the credit of all concerned that it positively glittered in the BBC version. And not just because of Alec Guinness as Smiley. The whole cast was fantastic.

For the best use of meeting dynamics ever on television, I invite you to watch the first two minutes and 8 seconds of the clip above, which in a beautifully understated manner, and only one very short line of dialogue, sketches the personae of the four major characters (other than Smiley). Entering the room on the clip are, respectively, the actors playing Toby Esterhase, Roy Bland, Percy Alleline and Bill Haydon. (As Control said, “There are three of them and Alleline,” the characters whose code names give the book its title.)

This is just so real. If you have, as I have, spent ridiculous amounts of time in meetings with a small group of people you knew almost as intimately as member of your own family, the little touches of how people establish their roles and characters in small ways will ring as true as anything you’ve ever seen. It feels, for me, exactly like the daily editorial board meeting, with each person wandering in in his own unique way and initiating wordless rituals that say so much.

Anyway, enjoy.

Graham, DeMint and the Angry White Guy Divide

Lindsey Graham, normally one of the most articulate members of the U.S. Senate, apparently misspoke when he said this, quoted today in The State:

“We’re not going to be the party of angry white guys.”

Obviously, he forgot the last two words, “… any more.”

Just joshing, Republican friends. While you may be the party of white guys, you haven’t all been angry, all of the time. Some are pretty ticked off nowadays, though, so much so that they’ll pay good money to hear one of their own shout insults at the other side.

The question the senator raises is, will the party continue to be that way in the future? And the debate over that has broken down on familiar lines. No, not racial lines. And not “statism vs. freedom,” as much as the Sanford wing would like to define the world that way.

The divide is one that I’ve struggled with myself a good bit over the years — whether to be right, or be effective.

Set aside for the moment the fact that Jim DeMint is wrong about many things. He believes he’s right — believes it with a great deal more certainty than you and I believe we’re right (you have to, to be such a committed ideologue) — and he believes in shaping his party so that it includes only those who are “right” as he sees the right. He said that about as clearly as it can be said here:

“I would rather have 30 Republicans in the Senate who really believe in principles of limited government, free markets, free people, than to have 60 that don’t have a set of beliefs,” DeMint told The (Washington) Examiner in a comment that has been widely quoted.

Sen. Graham, by contrast, would rather get some things done. That means working with, and supporting, people who don’t bow down to the same gods with the same ritual intensity. Work with Democrats (such as John Kerry) when that helps. Support Republicans (such as Bob Inglis) who are willing to think for themselves (even though they are sometimes wrong, as Inglis was on the Surge). And finally, bring in enough voters to make a majority rather than a minority.

And no matter what ideologues may claim sometimes about the ubiquity of their beliefs, you will never, ever have a majority if you only let in people who think exactly the way you do.

As for the “right vs. effective” dichotomy. I have written several times about my own struggles with that choice (which I don’t like being a choice any more than anyone else does; in a fairer world you could be both). And you’ll see if you follow that link that I’ve had a tendency to choose “right” when forced to choose. Part of that, though, was that that was what my former job was all about — determining the right answer to the best of your ability, and advocating it as strongly as you can. And I should also point out that my sense of rightness has been very different from Sen. DeMint’s. With me, it was about identifying the best answer on a specific issue under specific circumstances. You would never catch me falling into the absurd error of insisting a certain side or faction was by definition always right, by virtue of its ideological purity.

Similarly, Lindsey Graham has been willing to go down in flames trying to do the right thing — whether it’s comprehensive immigration reform, or the Surge, or reversing man-made climate change.

But for the sake of this discussion, the one raised in the piece in The State this morning, the contrast between the two senators breaks down pretty neatly along right-vs.-effective lines, with Sen. Graham on the pragmatic side, the one where not everyone has to be an angry white guy.