Between W-2s and 1040s

Someone I knew once said, upon closing on a condo, that she could not wrap her mind around having completed such an adult rite, as she still felt she was 17. Myself 18, I nonetheless knew exactly what she was talking about. While closing on anything seemed far off for me, college, the supposed transition between adolescence and adulthood, was right around the corner.

About six years later, I can say that I still have not shook that feeling my co-worker expressed then, that of being a young person pretending to do older people things, like buying furniture, putting money in a retirement account, and filing taxes. Filing taxes in particular gets at the crux of what I fear about adulthood: building an ever-more complex life. After all, this year, I really did not have many tax forms to deal with and much income to report. Woe to the day when I have to itemize deductions and report dependents, when I have to buy a file cabinet for my papers because my simple sectioned folder no longer suffices.

I think these thoughts too about other adult things. Buying a home, for instance, seems to catapult a person into a sea of forms called notes, titles, and deeds and a series of calculations about what to insure and for how much. I feel the more I have to insure, the more I will have sunken into adulthood, which in this modern world, seems to mean owning things and having stakes in things, in some ways, being less mobile. Right now, owning a bed seems a drag on me, what will I do when I own a whole house? How will I be able to pack it all, should I choose to move? Will I be able to get away with not having to consult the terms I have signed onto on a contract, as I have with my filed away lease on my apartment, or will I have to bone up on contract terminology in order to haggle with this or that person about his or that problem? Yeah, I think too far ahead for my own good, though it seems as if some of us are inching that way already, those who are buying condos or getting engaged, for instance.

I'm in no hurry to accumulate stuff, to own, to be settled. I figure that time will come, but still, in this first year out of college, such considerations suddenly don't seem so remote. That doesn't mean they need be impending.

Soporific Sex Magazines

I've been meaning to write about an article that appeared in the New York Times Magazine which looks at the appearance of sex magazines at elite universities. I had a hard time believing that the subject was timely--such magazines have been notedby the media many times before. Moreover, the author, Alexandra Jacobs, seems to attribute a false ingenuity to the young sex magazine publishers. On the contrary, the magazines emanating from students at top universities like Harvard ("H-Bomb"), Vassar ("Squirm"), Columbia ("Outlet"), and University of Chicago ("Vita Excolatur") are emblematic of the larger cultural cult around being frank about sex. Straightforwardness about sex can be useful in a high school sex education class but becomes a bore when it masks as a source for entertainment or enlightenment, as it does in these pretentious periodicals.

Such magazines follow a larger trend, and in this sense, the college students putting them out are among the last to have boarded the bandwagon. This is why what they're doing is neither revaltory nor original but rather symptomatic of their inculcation from the entertainment media. My generation matriculated in an age where such inane mantras as "sex sells" became media gospel, begetting an ubiquity of sexual images and articles. Surely then, sex magazines at college are not original, as the coverage given to them would suggest, nor often are they very interesting.

In fact, sex columns and magazines are not necessarily interesting at all. While there are some subjects whose surface blandness belies their depth, sex to me seems the exact opposite: it is a subject that is initially salacious but quickly loses steam, probably because, when you get right down to it, there isn't really that much to write about. Think of all of the giggling high school students who greet sex ed with mocking anticipation at the beginning of the semester, only to yawn through human anatomy quizzes and contraception lectures a few weeks later. Some of the most popular subjects taken up by sex writers--sexual positions, sex toys, and porn--are those most lacking in actual breadth and depth. It's no wonder that so many sex columns devolve into cliches, with the predictably spicy writing styles of their authors overtaking the substance of the column, such as this explication of aphrodisiacs in the Northwestern student-published NU Comment.

Why then is the media breathlessly heralding the arrival of these magazines? According to the Boston Globe piece:

The public fascination with H Bomb clearly stems from the sense that there's not much of a place for sex at Harvard.

According to the NY Times Mag piece:

Considering that a smorgasbord of Internet porn is but a mouse click away for most college students, there’s something valiant, even quaint, about the attempt to organize and consider sex in a printed magazine.

That's a stretch. Such obsequious coverage of these magazines is evidence to me that Ivy Leagues truly do function as brand names. If a shoddy sex magazine has the word "Harvard" or "Columbia" on it, it suddenly becomes an inquisitive forum for reflection, even if its articles on the likes of the value of condom use at best serve the function of a sex education class.

I actually found myself agreeing with the National Review about the worthiness of such student endeavors:

Now, it’s one thing to engage in a bit of naughty publishing (on the university dime, at least) but quite another to do so and pretend that it’s something high-brow. You’ve read Ulysses? Maurice? Tropic of Cancer? Well, clearly now it’s time for something with saucy pictures! Pornographic modeling, once thought to be the exclusive realm of would-be actresses, sexual abuse victims, drug addicts, and other exploitable populations has clearly found a new pasture for flesh, with Ivies offering extracurricular careers (and funding!) to anyone interested in getting a head start in the sexual entertainment industry.

How to read a book

In today's Salon, Tom Lutz writes about a rash of new books that examine how one should read a novel. These books are united by their authors' distaste for academe, for the college English departments that have built a jargon-laden, "ism"-oriented discourse that perverts the true value of reading literature. Lutz does not tolerate this analysis. He remains skeptical of the "new criticism" approach which the authors of the how-to books embrace. Founded in the 1940s (though surely not wholly original), new criticism focuses on the "close read" of a text and eschews consultation of extra-textual sources--particularly biography--to analyze literature. Lutz criticizes the writers of the how-to books for clinging steadfastly to the dogmas of new criticism in order to bolster their literary authority against the academic critics.

Lutz is certainly right that it is difficult to prescribe a method in which to read and not always interesting to read the prescriptions. The insistences of the how-to writers that a good reader engages only "the text itself" is also dubious. Like many theories about the irreducible, new criticism is initially alluring but is based on some false premises, namely, the idea that a text can be distilled to "the words on a page" and nothing more. Every reader comes to a book with different experiences and therefore will extract different things from the book regardless of the fact that the words themselves are the same. What's different is the person interpreting the words. An attempt to enforce a uniform reading of literature is precisely the wrong way to broaden and enhance literary discourse and enrichment.

On the other hand, the methods of new criticism do have much to offer. In my own experience, I gained much more as a reader using close read methods like analysis of metaphor, attention to diction (word choice) and syntax (sentence structure), discernment of tone, etc. than I did reading literary criticism. Close reading requires that the student actually support claims with text-based evidence, which forces him to go beyond the vague suppositions that are often thrown around when discussing literature. Comfort in supporting one's claims with evidence is eternally valuable and should be central to the teaching of English, a discipline which its students unfortunately often struggle to find useful, even though at its best, it upholds the valuable skill of strong communication. Use of the techniques of new criticism to read promote the development of this skill and need not be shunted off, especially if they are only to be replaced by Marxist, Freudian, or feminist critiques.

One last thing that Lutz scolds the how-to-read folks for: bemoaning the "glut" of books published. One writer, John Sutherland complains of the "world in which millions of books are dumped in the marketplace at once," which like Lutz, I hardly think a problem. Isn't the easy availability of books an encouraging sign of a literate culture? Would Sutherland be happy with the opposite, a world in which few books were published? Is it even possible for any society to so refine its manuscripts so that only the great books are published, as he seems to desire? I am comfortable with an argument that the publishing industry overhypes a small selection of books and simultaneously neglects some great literature, but that does not mean that fewer books should be published. Anyone who criticizes a book glut should himself question whether he need publish yet another how-to-read a book tract.

Oprah and a Lottery Culture

Peter Birkenhead at Salon has an excellent article today about Oprah's enthusiastic campaign on behalf of a self-help book called The Secret, by Australian talk show host Rhonda Byrne. According to Birkenhead, The Secret is social darwinism preached with a treacly, new age spin. It espouses such wisdom as this: "The only reason any person does not have enough money is because they are blocking money from coming to them with their thoughts." As Birkenhead says, Oprah's endorsement of this book calls into question her newest philanthropy project, the opening of an all girls school called the Leadership Academy in South Africa:

On the special, Oprah talked far more about what the school would do for the girls' self-esteem and material lives than what it would do for their intellects -- sometimes sounding as if she was reading directly from "The Secret." And in discussing what she was looking for in prospective students, she didn't talk about finding the next Eleanor Roosevelt or Sally Ride or Jane Smiley. Instead she used "Entertainment Tonight" language like "It Girl" to describe her ideal candidate. She praised the girls for their spirit, for how much they "shined" and "glowed," but never for their ideas or insights. Oprah puts a lot of energy and money into aesthetics -- on her show, in her magazine, at her school. The publishers of "The Secret" have learned well from their sponsor and are just as visually savvy.

Shouldn't we be grateful that Oprah is doing good, one might retort, what does it matter how she chooses to do it? The problem with Oprah's brand of altruism is two-pronged: it's fundamentally narcissitic, and it knows only lavishness--it is never applied in moderation. Oprah's shows are all about Oprah and her reactions. We need to find her jokes hilarious, think her life story a model, and sit in wait until she reveals who she's supporting for president. We need to awe at her beneficence as she showers her audience with big ticket gifts like cars and homes. I am compelled at this point to think of the Jewish scholar Maimonedes' eight levels of tzedakah, of giving, where the lowest levels are those where the recipient and giver both know each other's identities. Oprah never rises above the lowest levels. She requires that her beneficence be broadcast, that her identity be known to the beneficiary, that her imprint of luxury be made upon all that she gives.

As Birkenhead points out, her philantrhopy is unfailingly television-savvy:

Oprah's TV special about the Leadership Academy, essentially an hour long infomercial, was just as well-coiffed and "visuals"-heavy. In fact, when Oprah was choosing her students, her important criteria must have included their television interview skills. On-camera interviews with the girls were the centerpiece of the special, but as one spunky, telegenic candidate after another
beamed her smile at the camera, I couldn't help wondering how Joyce Carol Oates or Gertrude Stein or Madame Curie would have fared -- would they have "shined"
and "glowed," or more likely talked in non-sound-bite-friendly paragraphs and maybe even, God forbid, the sometimes "dark" tones of authentic people, and been
rejected. Sadly, the girls themselves (and who can blame them, desperate 12-year-olds trying to flatter their potential benefactor) parroted banal Oprah-isms, like "I want to be the best me I can be," and "Be a leader not a follower" and "Don't blend in, blend out," with smiley gusto.

This form of beneficence, in which the benefactor TV personality acts as savior to the destitute is lottery-style philanthropy. One must hope to win the attention of an Oprah to have his story aired on television and his life changed by a TV crew. "Extreme Makeover: Home Edition," hosted by Trading Spaces' Ty Pennington is another television show that promotes the hosts' altruism and a win-the-lottery approach to life by lavishing a Sharper Image store's worth of the newest in home entertainment upon the homeowner. It seems that Oprah and Ty Pennington cannot bestow anything less than the best (or biggest) upon their beneficiary. As Birkenhead puts it:

One of Oprah's signature gimmicks has been giving stuff away to her audience ("giving" here means announcing the passing of stuff from corporate sponsors to audience members), most notably in a popular segment called "My Favorite Things." These bits have revealed an Oprah who truly revels in consumer culture, and who can seem astonishingly oblivious to the way most people live and what they can afford. She seems to celebrate every event and milestone with extravagant stuff, indeed to not know how to celebrate without it.

While one person or 350 young woman have won the lottery by winning Ty's or Oprah's fleeting interest, one wonders whether such abundance of resources could be spread out more evenly. While it's better that "Extreme Makeover" focus its energies on refurbishing a park hit by Hurricane Katrina and a soup kitchen hit by Hurricane Wilma than on revamping the home of a well-healed yuppy, it is worrisome that one has to hope for the attentions of a television show or else remain forgotten. After all, "Extreme Makeover"'s crew cannot possibly rehab all of the destitute areas of the country, every New Orleans or Appalachia or South Bronx, especially if it feels the need to include plasma televisions and Sub-zero refrigerators in each home. Nor can Oprah be expected to educate millions of children in Africa. In a society where people look to "Extreme Makeover" to do what this government cannot do, one has to hope to be one of the chosen few.

Cantankerous Conservatives

The collective groan that conservatives let out towards the roster of GOP presidential candidates at the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) evidences how truly indulged these people are. According to the Washington Post, none of the top three contenders--Rudolph Giuliani, John McCain, and Mitt Romney--appealed to the rank-and-file and the establishment members of the conservative movement. It seems that none of them are "conservative" enough for CPAC. Instead, CPAC attendees are lining up behind one-isssue extremists, as in the case of a college sophomore from Michigan quoted in the article who is supporting anti-immigrant zealot Tom Tancredo of Colorado. That conservatives cannot even get behind more mainstream candidates Giuliani and Romney, who are themselves conservative, shows how much they have been indulged by the right-wing Bush administration. While Democrats in recent elections have increasingly coalesced behind the "most electable" primary candidate, loyal Republicans have backed the most dogmatic contender.

The best result that could come of conservative obstinacy is that Republicans fracture themselves, with the conservative base driving them to nominate an extreme candidate who cannot win in a general election. More likely, in my opinion is that the party will coalesce behind John McCain--or maybe Mitt Romney--whose conservative loyalties the right-wing will continue to exact. (McCain has already shown himself willing to abandon his past statements against this wing, such as his attempt to submerge his previously-expressed opinion that Jerry Falwell is an "agent of intolerance" by speaking at Falwell's own Liberty University). Right now, McCain wants to have it both ways: he wants to be a maverick and be the Conservatives' candidate. However, if the media does its job and the Democratic opposition does their's McCain's true colors as a political opportunist will be exposed.

Glen Greenwald makes a great point over at Salon on just how blatantly hypocritical are Republicans and members of the media who point to diffuse blog commenters as representative of liberal anger and hate and ignore the bile of blatant bigot Ann Coulter, who is a prominent fixture at CPAC. In a speech made there this past Friday, she called John Edwards a "faggot" and last year at the same event directed slurs at Arabs. As Greenwald says, the media has held Democrats responsible for anyone that makes an off-color remark on a blog while summarily ignoring the hatred and bigotry expressed by the Republican party's top brass:

But that's all fine. There are much more important topics to discuss -- like the anonymous commenters at Huffington Post and the bad words said by the bloggers hired for low-level positions by the Edwards campaign. Those are matters of the gravest importance meriting the most solemn condemnation and righteous outrage from all decent people. Those HuffPost commenters have uttered terrible thoughts, and that shows the anger, venom and hatred on the left, among liberals. It is cause for great alarm -- and for headlines.

But the single most prestigious political event for conservatives of the year is a place where conservatives go to hear Democrats called faggots, Arabs called ragheads, and Supreme Court justices labeled as deserving of murder -- not by anonymous, unidentifiable blog commenters, but by one of their most popular featured speakers.

As Greenwald says, the sanctimony of conservatives against liberal bloggers is disingenuous at best if they continue to give a pass to the fulminations of their own:

This is why I wrote so extensively about the Edwards blogger "scandal" and the Cheney comments "scandal." The people feigning upset over those matters are either active participants in, or passive aiders and abetters of, a political movement that, at its very core -- not at its fringes -- knowingly and continuously embraces the most wretched and obvious bigotry and bloodthirsty authoritarianism. They love Ann Coulter -- and therefore continue to make her a venerated part of their political events -- because she provides an outlet, a venting ground, for the twisted psychological impulses and truly hateful face that drives the entire pro-Bush, right-wing spectacle.

As Greenwald says, Coulter "is the face of what the hard-core Republican Party has become."

Bard pun, continued

My favorite co-worker Ben-jammin'* (just kidding, other co-workers) is doing my work for me. No, not my real work but my blog work. He has spotted a pun related to D.C.'s Shakespeare Fest. Here it is, care of the Washington Post:


"The Shakespeare in Washington festival kicks off six months of no-holds bard. "

I think every editor must love articles about Shakespeare, because they are so easy to title. The bard lends itself to endless puns, none of them very good but all easily-conjured when they need to be, which for editors is probably in the wee hours. I haven't yet been to any Shakespeare in Washington events, which I feel kind of bad about, and I half suspect that I will not end up going to any of the events, either. First of all, I don't really know what Shakespeare play I want to see--my favorites of those I have read are King Lear and Love's Labour's Lost--but I don't have a burning desire to see either. I don't particularly want to see a Shakespeare play that I haven't read, because I usually feel I don't understand the play on just a cold viewing. I've also decided that since Shakespeare Fest is six-months long, surely I will be able to make it to at least one event. Because of its long duration, though, I have not made the effort to actually participate, comfortable with the fact that six months seems like a long time in my world, until suddenly it's June and I'm walking to work dripping with sweat and noticing that the last Shakespeare Fest event happened the night before.

*Benjammin' is not my original nickname for Ben. It is actually trademarked to Jake.

Ellen Degeneres is dreadful and other Oscar observations

Some Oscar hosts get panned for not fitting in with the event. David Letterman, Chris Rock, and Jon Stewart come to mind. Last night's performance by Ellen Degeneres was so painful because she tried so hard to fit in, hamming it up with out and out bad jokes about the attendees and silly and desperate self-deprecation. In fact, she was at times just plain awkward. When she made a crack about the diversity of the award show's attendees, it felt as if Joe Biden were up on stage. The subsequent shot of a baffled-looking Steve Carrell said it all. A few other thoughts I had about last night's show:

• Boy do I wish Al Gore had made an announcement to run for the presidency. The stunt with Leonardo DiCaprio was pretty clever, but it would have been a real Oscar moment if a candidate announcement had been made.
• What is Jessica Biel doing at these awards? She was on "Seventh Heaven" like five years ago, right? Does that qualify one to present an Oscar? And she was in The Illusionist. Isn't that a poor man's Prestige?
• Jennifer Hudson's and Martin Scorcese's acceptances were surprisingly touching. Both seemed genuinely humbled by receiving the award which evidences once again that people in Hollywood put a lot of stock into the Oscar, even though a look back at past winners shows some stunning wins and some ridiculous oversights. Take the year 1976 when Rocky--definitely a good movie--won over Taxi Driver and Network--two great movies. If I were a perennial Oscar loser, I would comfort myself by reviewing the unremarkable group of winners of Oscar's recent past, like Best Actress Gwyneth Paltrow in 1998 and Best Picture Forest Gump in 1994. The Academy is not very discerning, often perferring the heart-rending to the subtle and themselves swayed by politics as much as by a good performance.
• Speaking of Martin Scorcese, don't Hollywood actors realize how disingenuous they sound when they lavish praise on a film impresario? By the end of the night, I'd lost count of how many times someone involved in The Departed said what they wouldn't do to work with Martin Scorcese. Scorcese's a fine director, but I think I heard someone offer to give away one of their lungs to work in a movie with him. Just once I'd like to hear someone say in public what I'm sure is said quietly at many an after party: "he hasn't made a good movie in years, and he's a jerk to work with."
• A green Academy Awards ceremony with fuel efficient limos is the height of absurdity. Can an event so prodigious and decadent really be conservationist in spirit? Okay, maybe the lights are dimmed a little and the stretch Hummers are gone, but really, the Oscars. When Hollywood actors start lobbying for mass transit in L.A. (and using it themselves!) I'll be a little more convinced.

Goodreads.com

Thanks to an inadvertent invite, I am now on Goodreads.com, a website that combines social networking with book reviewing. You can put up your own reviews of books, list books you are currently reading and those you want to read, and access your friends' reviews of books. It is a nice design, very easy to use, and definitely right up my alley. I am also reminded of the difficulty of reviewing books I have not read for awhile. I definitely have held some books as favorites that I have not read in years, so trying to express why I love(d) those books takes some serious jogging of the memory.

Can't we all just get along?

It didn't take me long to be inspired to blog about something again. All it took was another netroots vs. centrist Democrat flamewar. In yesterday's Post, there's a front page article about the ongoing argument between well-known Democratic net activists like Markos Moulitsas of Daily Kos and the group Working for Us against Ellen Tauscher, a Democratic Rep. from California. I am not surprised that Tauscher is slightly put off by this campaign, because it has deliberately called her out as a centrist appeaser, but I can't blame them for doing so. After all, one thing I am constantly amazed at--amazed as in, I want to bang my head against a wall and yell Doh! a million times--is how frickin' quickly the Democrats will cede their battle even if they haven't nearly lost it. The majority of the country seems to be against a troop increase in Iraq, and no one save the very rich are satisfied with our current health care policy and economic situation, and yet the Democrats feel like they have to temper their every move with assurances that they won't move too far to the left. No one cares, guys! Just get stuff done, fercryinoutloud. I know it's hard. We have a media that wants the presidential election to happen tomorrow--not gonna lie, I wouldn't mind if it did--and the Republican party clearly wants to get nothing done unless it benefits rich people who are trying to pass their full estate along to their children, but in spite of this people want to see some results from Washington. No one benefits from the rhetoric of self-defeat except for Republicans, whose interests are very narrow. So please, Ellen Tauscher and the like, don't create a straw man "far left" to bolster yourself. It seems self-serving and disingenuous, and it helps no one.

A hodgepodge

Lately, I have been wanting in subjects to blog about for various reasons, and because I cannot think of anything coherent to discuss but am smarting about a few things, I'll just jump around.

I finally finished Adam Langer's The Washington Story. It has nothing to do with Washington State or Washington, D.C., (I get enough of D.C. from living here and have little desire to read a novel set here at the moment). Rather, it is set during the time that Harold Washington was mayor of Chicago, from 1982 until 1987. I went back and forth on my opinion of this book throughout it. It is definitely one of the more personal books I've read, considering that the main character worked on her high school newspaper, is a young liberal-minded person, is reform Jewish, and lives in Rogers Park, a neighborhood in Chicago. While I never lived in Rogers Park, it is the nearest Chicago neighborhood to where I did grow up, and I know it fairly well. Other parts of Chicago play a role in the book too, particularly the near South side, which was apparently just beginning to become the fashionable neighborhood it is today in the late 80s.

The Washington Story became a little too zany at times, working off the impulse that many writers seem to have of linking all of a story's characters and their fates with one another. (Maybe such a tendency should be called the Crash syndrome, after the gimmicky Oscar-winner of last year, not to say The Washington Story was inspired by that glib movie). Nonetheless, I found the writing genuine and the sense of transience that Langer conveys about human desires and dreams to ring very true. Now that I'm through with it though, I need a new novel and hopefully one that is at least as compelling. Any suggestions?

In other news, my co-worker's blog has been put on the map by none other than the Food Network's Hungry Detective, a cop named Chris Cognac who sniffs around American cities for hearty meals. The Gourmet Piggy rips into the Food Network and in the process becomes the target of Cognac. Cognac's comments are unintentionally some of the most hilarious things ever ("I have a hot cuban wife and 2 kids that love me, so there..."). I love how the web connects people so easily--could this hilarity ever have ensued without the glorious "series of tubes" we (er..Ted Stevens) call the Internet?

Movie Review: Being There

Do you ever know after the first few minutes that a movie you're watching is going to be one of your all time favorites? That's how I felt as I watched a mysterious but respectable looking man relaxed in a musty parlor of a traditional home, mesmerized by the images on a television, his origins and position in society initially an enigma. Peter Sellars is exceptional in his studied turn as this odd figure, soon revealed as Chance the gardener, a.k.a. Chauncey Gardner, in Hal Ashby's Being There. You will not believe that this man so inhabited the role of the fatuous Inspector Jacques Clouseau sixteen years earlier in the bubbly sixties comedy The Pink Panther.

I implore you not to read on if you are planning on seeing this film, because as with any good movie, the less you know going into it the better. Being There takes place in late 1970s Washington, D.C., which is comprised of two very distinct worlds: the gritty world (seen briefly) of the natural inhabitants of the city and the insular world of its well-off power brokers. Chance, who the audience is early on made to understand as a slow-witted gardener, bridges both of these worlds unwittingly and unintentionally, but the two social sets have very different interpretations of Chance. The more educated set is no more--and in fact less--perceptive as to this unlikely character's true nature. This becomes clear when Chance happens upon a prominent, ailing business man (Melvyn Douglas) and his socialite wife (Shirly MacLaine), who see metaphor in the fortuitous gardener's literal observations about the seasons, and thus feel they have unearthed a wise visionary and a sensual thinker, respectively. In Chance's pleasant interactions with these and other illuminati, including the President of the United States, we are presented a class of navel-gazers, people who see only what they want to. As a result, Chance becomes an natural conduit for their self-validation.

Yet, Chance is hardly written off. Being There is actually a tale of a fool more virtuous than any supposed wise man. Peter Sellars appears truly at peace in this role, so that Chance's simplicity radiates as a redemptive force in a complex, fallen world. As a reviewer on IMDB put it, Chance's inner tranquility is sought out by those who one would expect to be most aloof from such sincerity and such calm. Thus, Being There suggests that everyone, particuarly those with the most the world has to offer, longs for a simpler time, which is why Chance's uncomplicatedness is so alluring to the high ups. When he literally walks on water, Chance's iconically beatific existence has been cemented, as has Being There's place as a fascinating film.

D.C. Drivers, get a grip

I have several gripes against the ethos of Washington D.C. and the rest of the "inside the beltway" territory, and underlying a lot of them is the prevailing Type A attitude of the people who live here. The Type A attitude is on display all the time: when commuters sprint to catch their Metro train during rush hour even though another one is two minutes behind it (running into fellow commuters in the process), when subway riders won't move to the center of the train car to make room for those behind them because they want to be close to the door, when people regard social functions as nothing more than an opportunity to "network," and worst and most fatally of all, when drivers disregard pedestrians merely because they are in a hurry.

I don't know if the bus driver who struck and killed two women who had the right of way at the intersection of 7th and Pennsylvania on Wednesday night was in a hurry, but the driving in this city is so abominable, so aggressive, so careless of pedestrians, so selfish, that this tragedy is not as surprising as it should be. Even today, two days later, as I crossed that same intersection, cars were still racing down Pennsylvania to make the light, broaching the tenuous transition between the yellow and red bulb with reckless nonchalance. Why drivers here are so wound-up is beyond me, because I think they would be happier people if they weren't, but D.C. police need to crack down on the insanity of offensive driving.

A House of Cards Market

It's been unnerving to read about the recent troubles in the housing market, because it seems to conform in some respects to other bubbles we've seen and yet it is unlikely--just as with those other bubbles--that our society will derive any longterm lessons from these troubles. The housing market is beset by twin problems: less demand resulting in depreciating property values and inability on the part of homeowners, especially homeowners with bad credit histories and/or unsavory home loans, to pay down their mortgages. As with so many overheated markets of the past, the housing market, which I recall analysts declaring a solid investment a few years ago, has overextended itself. For this, Wall Street deserves a good amount of blame, as investment banks encouraged a market of loans for people with bad or "subprime" credit. These loans were often complex and ill-fitting for their holders. The problems of the subprime market seems to be gettng a good deal of attention in the business press but less attention in the general press, that is less attention as it relates to the average consumer.

This is a severe oversight, because many people are defaulting on their mortgages and facing foreclosures on their homes. Reporting on the economy tends to focus too much on the performance of stock indexes and too little on the economic well-being of most people. It also tends to only fleetingly acknowledge how the market impacts most people. In the case of a housing market, it looks like another new fad on Wall Street has proven dysfunctional and illusory as a steady investment. At a time when caution and some aversity to risk are undervalued--as seen in the (perhaps soon to end) overabundance of credit--it is a needed (though probably unlikely) change for bankers and analysts to think cautiously and realistically rather than impetuously and riskily about the nature of a good investment.

Music and Lyrics, but no plot

I confess, I saw Music and Lyrics, starring Hugh Grant and Drew Barrymore. Do not admonish me too much: I did not have to pay for it at least, as it was being screened in advance of the release date for free. (I think it is officially released on Valentine's Day, conveniently enough). Only my time and incredulity at the sheer badness of Hollywood scriptwriting were spent. I saw the movie in part because my memory of enjoying Hugh Grant had eclipsed my ability to detect that the movie itself looked pretty bad. However, it did not take too long into the film to grasp this. The plot is silly, one-dimensional, and poorly-developed, though probably because there is not much of a plot to develop. 'So?' you say, 'it's a romantic comedy, it doesn't need a strong plot.' I object. Any good movie has a plot that holds up, and there are romantic comedies that are good movies. Still, a strong plot is hard to achieve, and often, romantic comedies feel they can ignore plot considerations like consistency and development in favor of shoveling feel-goodness and sugary "wit" at the audience.

Particularly disappointing was Hugh Grant's role as the washed up 80s pop singer and resident wag. As has been pointed out often enough, Grant has two characters: the stammering, clever nice guy of his earlier movies and the cad of his later ones. Sometimes the latter role has bits of the former role in it, as in About a Boy, Six Weeks Notice, and Music and Lyrics. (Yes, I've seen too many Hugh Grant movies). In the latter two movies, the stammering cad has morphed a little into a resigned but delighted sell-out whose authenticity is only wrought out of him when he meets and consummates a relationship with an earthy, hippy-ish girl. The wardrobe of Barrymore's character symbolized the true extent of her hippy authenticity, however: apparently bohemian but clearly off the rack of Urban Outfitters.

The two meet at the perfect time: Grant needs to write a song for the most successful pop star of the moment, Cora Corman, and Barrymore, who appears at his apartment to substitute for his normal plant-waterer (yes, I'm not making that up), happens to be a wordsmith, happens to reveal this talent, and happens to be persuaded by Grant's character to write a song with him. The song is everything you would expect of a two-day endeavor, but it is asserted to the audience at every turn that it is a worthy number that will be bastardized by Cora Corman. The problem is, it's a terrible song. Just as last year's Stranger than Fiction averred that the book written by Emma Thompson's character which frames the film is poised to be a masterpiece, absent any evidence that there is anything remarkable about it, so too does Music and Lyrics assert something that isn't true, but rather only expedient for the plot.

And how about that plot? By about forty-five minutes into the film, Grant and Barrymore have already written their song. The movie still needs at least a half an hour more, so it is dragged out with a couple of "twists" (they're asked to write another verse of the song, Cora Corman turns the song into a weird sitar-and-belly-dancing act). A subplot involving Barrymore's character and a college professor with whom she had an affair and soon after became a muse for an unflattering piece of fiction based on their relationship adds to the mess. And of course, Drew Barrymore is very sweet, large eyes and all. In fact, her eyes are so large, they will swallow you. The best thing about Music and Lyrics is the take-off of a 1980s music video, and that comes at the way beginning, so, if you choose to blow money on this one, prepare for the movie to get progressively worse.

Ben Stein Congratulates Himself

Recently, conservative commentator Ben Stein--perhaps most famous as the host of "Win Ben Stein's Money," and for countless "Celebrity Jeopardy" apperances, as well as stints with the government--penned an article about capitalsim, whose conclusion I agree with, but whose substance is completely disturbing in its unaware self-congratulation. My very wise and clever father offers an excellent take on Stein's "The Hard Rain that's Falling on Capitalism". First, here are excerpts of the article:

A FEW evenings ago, my wife and I were standing in the kitchen of our home in Rancho Mirage, Calif., feeding our voracious hounds, when a song came on the radio. It goes, “If only you believe in miracles, baby, so would I...”

Suddenly a flood of thoughts came into my head. I put on my swim trunks, and even though it was 42 degreesoutside, I got into my superheated pool and swam, looking up at the stars, and this is what I thought:

My whole life is a miracle so far. I live in glorious houses — tar-paper shacks by hedge fund standards, but plenty for me. I have a great American-made car. Above all, I have the most wonderful wife and the handsomest son on the planet.

My parents had a great, super life. They went from obscurity and lower-middle-class status in the Great Depression to fame and fortune in the postwar period. Their good fate was attributable mostly to their genius and hard work, but also to two culprits usually criticized in the media: President Richard M. Nixon, who made my father famous and powerful, and variable annuities, which made him and my mom well-to-do.

Thanks to Nixon’s appointing Pop as chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers and to TIAA-CREF selling Mom and Pop those annuities, their latter decades were happy and comfy. (In the interest of full disclosure, I am the honorary spokesman for the National Retirement Planning Coalition, one of whose many sponsors is the National Association for Variable Annuities.)

All of the miracles of our lives are because of America and our ancestors’ lucky, brilliant decision to move here from the desperation of Eastern Europe. All of it is thanks to the brave men and women who fought and died and bled on World War II battlefields like Anzio and Tarawa to keep us free, and to the
framers of the Constitution.

But it’s also thanks to capitalism. I realized this as I swam back and forth in my pool looking up at the stars and the contrails. Under capitalism, my grandparents, my parents and I could be paid the value of what we produced.

Their (our) income and position in life were (are) a function of what value we could add, not of the status of poor stateless Jews that we would have been in Europe.

Capitalism values people as individuals according to contract, as we lawyers and economists learn, not according to the status of our birth. This in itself is a miracle.

This miracle has been vibrant in the lives of hundreds of millions of Americans who have gone from nothing to something, thanks to the dynamics of capitalism. They have seen their pay rise and they have been able to convert their sweat and toil and creativity into capital by saving and investing in the stock market and becoming capitalists themselves — myself. [...]

But, as I swam and watched the private jets’ lights as they glided right above my head into Palm Springs International Airport, I had a chilling thought: in capitalism, the most fundamental building block is trust. [...]

When I see what the top dogs at all too many corporations are now doing to that trust, I feel queasy. Outrageous— yes, obscene — pay. Greedy backdating of stock options, which in my opinion is straight-up theft. Managers buying assets from their trustors, the stockholders, at pennies on the dollar, then forestalling competing bids with lockups and insane breakup fees. [...]

Empires come and go. Economic systems come and go. There is no heavenly guarantee that capitalism will last forever as we know it. [...]

If that trust disappears — if the system is no longer a system for the ordinary citizen but only for the tough guys— how much longer can the miracle last?

Now, here's Ronald Meyer's take:

Since I have time, I thought I'd write my editorial thoughts on the attached op-ed, sitting duck though it be.

Fresh from overindulging on munchies and California wine with his wife, Uncle Tzvi* Ben Stein counts his blessing while lapping his pool. The pool is heated, so he can indulge himself at the expense of atmospheric CO2 levels, though it is 42 degrees in his yard. His house in Rancho Mirage is a tar-paper shack compared to the houses of those whose taste matters. It seems that Ben's wife let him into the pool too soon after eating, because he isn't getting enough perfusion to the old noggin as he experiences rapture in the pool.

Not only is Uncle Tzvi's life a miracle, but so were his parents', thanks to Nixon having made Dad chairman of the council of economic advisers and thanks to the TIAA-CREF variable annuities that his parents had no choice but to buy as academics.

There are so many miracles, especially capitalism, which "paid [his forbears] the value of what they produced." Further miracle, "capitalism values people as individuals according to contract... not according to the status of our birth."

But Ben cramps up as he realizes that Capitalism™--the board game is not fun to play when others at the table are cheaters, such as those greedy CEO's.

As Ben seems to be suffering an attack of Republiopia (the ability to see only one side of an argument, and an in ill-informed side at that), here are a few mental status queries to test if Ben's frontal lobes can compensate for his defective visual cortex.

1. Could you turn down the heat on the outdoor pool, Ben, and swim at the local J? That should provide a few carbon credits to offset those cranked out by your Caddy.

2. That sagacious President who set your Dad up as chairman--could his and his vice-president's tax evasion violations have helped to set a bad example for later government and corporate leaders? Hmmmm? How about his Dick's disregard for any rules: could they have been bad for our political culture?

3. OK, so capitalism esteemed all of those Jewish immigrants. What was it that allowed only small numbers of them to enter large swaths of institutions of higher education or corporations because of Jewish quotas? And why did all of those silly lady garment workers and other unionists not at the time see how fairly valued they were? Perhaps the thermostat on their backyard pools was set too low, and their brains had frozen.

4. What percentage of Americans are lucky enough to be able to participate in TIAA-CREF, Uncle Tzvi, and how many are stuck with what they thought were their corporate pensions that the capitalists have devalued or stolen by declaring bankruptcy? How many are thankful that your capitalists' boob--er I mean boy--George was not able to convert the social security benefits into a capitalist's high-fee feeding frenzy?

5. Say, Ben, TIAA-CREF beneficiaries pay pretty low fees and their investments follow the performance of market indexes. Why are so many Americans fooled or forced into buying worse performance for much higher fees from the likes of anarchists such as Merrill-Lynch, Smith-Barney, Dreyfuss, etc? Oops, did I say "anarchists?" I guess they are actually capitalists, aren't they?

6. Finally, Ben, how many laps can you go with your head so far up your butt? Now that is a miracle.
_________________________
* An Uncle
Tzvi is a Jewish Uncle Tom.

I Love this Guy

I have recently begun to avidly follow the column of Salon's Cary Tennis. Tennis has been in the job for awhile, but I think the tone and subjects of the column topics seem more relevant to me now that I have been catapulted out of college and into the so-called real world, where choices are not prescribed or easy. Tennis's column is a veritable display of the human condition: it features people who have pursued their dream and people who haven't, people who have been crushed by over-ambition and those who have been crushed by ennui. What it impacts upon me is that old saying that the grass always appears greener on the other side, a thought that actually can become somewhat freeing if one's life has been monopolized by investing so much in a future, in getting to that other side.

Tennis's effectiveness comes in his authenticity. He acknowledges that he hasn't figured it all out and lacks the condescension that is common among career advice givers which makes him far superior to the Ask Amys and Dr. Phils of this world. His writers tend to be very thoughtful people as well: what many among them seem to be looking for is someone who can reason with them--perhaps dispel as irrational their worst fears--without looking down upon them. He tends not to give straight advice but rather to expound on the writer's quandry with a mix of life experience and general reflectiveness. In yesterday's column, he responded to a creative writing student who, in pursuing her dream, had become fundamentally discouraged of her writing abilities and of her old definition of success. This is where Tennis's column becomes therapy--though hopefully not schadenfreude--for me: in seeing that others are also reckoning with past decisions and trying to make new ones and are feeling a little shaky and unsatisfied all the while. In all of this, it is so valuable that Tennis does not blithely and reliably say "follow your dream" on the one hand or "don't risk it" on the other, that he does not proffer a right answer. Instead, he talks about his experience. His answer to the paralyzed MFA student:

Thank you for writing. I am glad you are going to finish the program. No matter what you decide to do later, it is good to finish the program and get your degree.

I went to graduate school in creative writing as an egotistical person. I was concerned with whether people thought I was brilliant.

This brilliance was a brittle thing, a bright, cold shell I had made in junior high to wear to school and around town like a gown of dazzling and invisible power to keep predators at bay; it was a fast-thinking thing, a mean, clever thing, a way to stay aloft and aloof. I took it with me when I left home. I used it to not learn anything.

But you get older and defeat forces you to learn things you didn't think you needed to know, or didn't want to learn or didn't think were important, or thought were beneath you.

Here is the big main thing I learned: My writing is not here to support me. I am here to support my writing.

How it came about was I endured some failure as a writer trying to make money as a writer, and had to work at other things for five years. During that time I wrote but not for money. I wrote on the subway, alone, in a notebook, sitting by myself in the crowd. I wrote to save myself.

It turned out that writing to save myself was the best way to write. Here is why, I think: Our writing is the voice of a person who is innocent, powerless and in need of protection; our writing is the voice of a person who needs to be heard as he or she really is. It is deep stuff is what I mean. And shocking as it is to say, the person who is writing this -- the person I am today -- is the kind of person toward whom I once would have leveled pitiless scorn.

Restoring Urban Authenticity or Reincarnating Classism?

High-class Parisians don’t want to come to the Champs-Élysées [...] It’s not prestigious; it’s not pleasant. The people who come are very common, very ordinary, very cheap. They come for a kebab sandwich and a five-euro T-shirt.

--Serge Ghnassia, owner of the fur shop Milady

If nothing else, the French are honest. The Times has an interesting if predictable article about a backlash embodied by the remark of this shop owner against the Champs-Élysées, the crowded boulevard between the Arc de Triomphe and Place de la Concorde in one of Paris's toniest districts. Like Chicago's Michigan Avenue or London's Oxford Street, Champs-Élysées attracts the rabble of tourists and commoners with its megastores and fast food restaurants, not to mention its central location to many Paris sites.

I can definitely get behind Paris's efforts to change the composition of the famous avenue, especially because its astronomic rents are only affordable to international chains; however, I don't think the more regarded Rue du Faubourg St.-Honoré nearby merits high praise, as our blunt fur shop owner seems to suggest. After all, that smaller street is also mobbed on weekends, though its ridiculously decadent shops are only accessible to the richest of the rich (or those who are willing to go into massive debt for a thousand dollar handbag). So I guess what I'm trying to say is that, while Champs-Élysées is somewhat unpleasant nowadays and while it would be nice to see many more establishments unique to Paris on the boulevard, it will be no more special if it is dotted with high end boutiques--most of them chains as well. Developed societies need to get past this discourse that pits mass consumer goods against the high end, because it reeks of class snobbery and condescension and it avoids aspects of reality.

Underlying some of that resentment is that groups of young people descend on the Champs-Élysées from the working-class immigrant suburbs on weekend nights. The police keep a close watch on them, monitoring their moves.

But some old-timers praise the avenue as a sort of democratic — and free — tourist destination for the underprivileged. “The kids coming from the suburbs are coming from the suburbs to look, to see, to escape the places where they live,” [theater owner Jean-Jacques] Mr. Schpoliansky said. “We are a multiethnic country, and that reality is reflected on our street.”

Instead, the focus should be on preserving the charm and uniqueness of our cities while still constructively addressing the fact that globalization brings apparent benefits like lower priced goods, benefits that cannot be dismissed with a wave of the hand by mocking upper-class interests. To some extent, Champs-Élysées has done this better than its counterparts in other cities, what with the tree-lined street; wide, pedestrian friendly walks, and upkeep of the historic buildings that house its stores.

Mediocrity's Poster Child

I always kind of mentally roll my eyes when someone suggests that there should be an option on a ballot to vote for none of the listed candidates, but when the friendly driver of the Vamoose bus I took from New York back to D.C. last night gave us riders a choice of four movies to watch on the second leg of the trip, I saw where voting no confidence can seem to be the only way. Indeed, as we boarded the bus after a rest stop in Delaware, we were offered the following non-options:

• Big Mama's House 2
• National Lampoon's Vegas Vacation
• Just Friends
• Rush Hour 2

I wanted to laugh out loud or maybe cry at the wasted two hours I was about to endure. I voted for Just Friends, because it was the only movie of which I hadn't heard. Big mistake. First of all, as their names were flashed on screen, I realized I didn't know any of the actors, which is fine if a movie is trying to aspire to something but a really bad sign if it is merely aiming to be a romantic comedy. If a bunch of D-list actors are involved, you have yourself a D-list romantic comedy. I take that back: I recognized one name. Amy Smart. I somehow know who she is: I had seen her in that bad TV movie series "The Seventies" several years back as well as the movie Rat Race, which John rightly proclaims as having the worst movie ending of all time. The name of the lead man--Ryan Reynolds--was not particularly familiar to me though. Ryan Reynolds, Ryan Reynolds...sounds like I've heard the name perhaps but not instantly recognizable. Yeah, this movie's going to be bad, I thought.

Indeed, the opening scene presents an overweight man (fat suit, of course) sitting in a house in New Jersey in 1995. Fat suits never bode well for anything, especially comedy. The scene was kind of funny though because the heavy man, who turns out to be a high school senior about to profess his love to his best friend, is singing along to the song "I Swear" by All-4-One. I think my own memories of an overnight camp counselor who used to play "I Swear" every night right before our cabin went to bed made me laugh in recognition and appreication of this sad portrayal of being a teen in the 90s. It was all downhill from there, however, with the predictable effort at winning the viewer's sympathy through portraying the mean treatment of our fat protagonist at the hands of others paradoxically coupled with the script's own derision of him (he eats a lot, he is too sensitive, he cries, etc.). Heavy man then vows he will get revenge on all of the people who laughed at him in high school by being very successful. Okay, fine, that's a good enough story, even if it's been done a lot.

Ten years later, he is a Hollywood agent who can get any girl he wants. Fat suit gone, I recognize this man to be Ryan Reynolds, and I now realize I do know who Ryan Reynolds is. He's one of those people who you've seen in a few movies but is easily forgettable, and for good reason. Indeed, I feel a pang of longing for an earlier time when I could not put the name Ryan Reynolds to a face. There's nothing distinctive or interesting about him. He's not attractive, he's not a good actor, and, this lead part in Just Friends is probably the best role he's capable of. He was in "Two Guys, a Girl, and a Pizza Place." He's a poor man's Paul Walker. [I later recalled that he had a small part in the movie Dick, which I do enjoy, though no thanks to Ryan Reynolds (his part could have been played by a lot of people).] Here are a few actors I equate with Ryan Reynolds, in terms of sheer badness: Jerry O'Connell, Matthew Lawrence, and Seann William Scott. Here's a guy whose biggest aspiration is probably to be in a sequel to Old School. Ryan Reynolds is the Nickelback of movies.

As good as I thought the Vamoose bus ride was, I just have to wonder why they have such an awful stock of movies (the movie that was shown first was RV). And yet, I must also say, there is something elegant about the mediocrity personified by Ryan Reynolds, because if you ever want to illustrate the thorough unremarkable, uninspired, forgettable nature of something, just say two words: Ryan Reynolds.

The Politico, a review

I subjected D.C.'s newest periodical to a harsh criticism a couple of weeks ago, though I heldout the possibility that my scorn was undeserved. Don't worry, it pretty much wasn't. The Politico is the typical, out-of-touch, superfluous D.C. rag that I've become used to. Why we need another one, I don't know, but The Politco's columns include a representative sampling of all of the usual pundit pet causes and analyses: wouldn't it be great to see a bipartisan presidential ticket in '08? (never going to happen, shouldn't happen, and Joe Lieberman and John McCain is hardly bipartisan), a fruitless debate between some guy from the CATO Institute and someone else about whether the West is becoming more libertarian or more liberal, and a fluff piece about 2008 potential candidates' websites.

Politico isn't a lost cause. If nothing else, their inside Congress reporting is useful, because it brings up practical considerations about members of Congress that aren't often raised. An article about the aged Congress ,which looks at the variety of age-related health problems of our elected officials, raises the question of whether a person with chronic health issues can adequately serve:

[S]uggestions that an enfeebled senator consider retirement haven't been broached, even considering the distressing example of the late Sen. Strom Thurmond, R-S.C., who spent the final year of his term, at age 100, in and out of Walter Reed Army Medical Center here.

Politico's coverage of lobbyists is also useful, because, as much as we might like to forget it, they are an integral and yet relatively little-publicized part of the policy process. The local beat is the natural terrain of a magazine like Politico, and it should stick to that rather than engage in the type of useless speculation that permeates like oxygen throughout this city.

Are Americans ready for a black or woman president?

This is a question that is raised whenever the presidential candidacy of Barack Obama or Hillary Clinton is reported or discussed. I don't think it leads to an especially useful conversation, or at least, not in its current incarnations. This is because the conversation can be very speculative. It is often asserted that Americans harbor too much latent racism to elect a black, and a little less often, that Americans hold too rigid a definition of gender roles to elect a woman. My sense has always been that Americans today would elect a black or a woman because we are accustomed to them/us in most facets of our society, but I am by no means an authority on public opinion. I don't think many people are authorities, which is why I wonder whether this conversation can be useful. After all, if we decide that Americans, most of whom none of us know, are not ready for a non-white, non-male president, then we implicitly discourage the Obama or Clinton candidacies because "the time is not right." Even though we are ready for a black or a woman, they are not.

However, historical change, and especially change in favor of inclusiveness, must be pushed. Rosa Parks did not wait until the time seemed right to sit in the front of a segregated bus, and black students didn't wait until the time was right to enroll in U. of Mississippi. Neither Clinton nor Obama face the institutionalized discrimination of these earlier cases. Why then should we try to hinder their candidacies with unfounded speculations about what Americans are ready for? The best thing anyone who hopes that America is ready for a black or a woman or anyone of any race, religion, or ethnicity can do is to take that person as a candidate first and forgo the sheer speculation that often comes with attempting to diagnose our country's level of prejudice.