An excuse to tell my Lauren Bacall story. Thanks rexnobus.
I was a somewhat sickly child, and much of my early youth was spent home watching Ed Murphy's Hollywood Matinee. (Ed was a local broadcaster who showed old movies in the afternoon.) When I was about 11 years old, I fell in love with Lauren Bacall --one of the Bogey pictures, I forget which. I didn't know why, being 11 years old, but I did.
Fast-forward 20 years. A co-worker of mine, a preppy trusts-and-estates lawyer, had a spare ticket to some political fundraiser, so I went with him. As we're nursing our drinks, I spot Lauren Bacall across the room. "Jeffrey," I said, "that's Lauren Bacall." "Yes, it is," he said. "I roomed with her son at boarding school. Why don't I introduce you?""
He dragged me over. I was close to paralyzed. She smiled. "Jeffrey, how good to see you again." He asked after her son, whose name I forget, learned that he was fine, and then introduced me. I stared and stammered. She smiled at me and then gave Jeffrey a look that said: "I see you're still doing charitable work with the mentally disabled."
I saw her a few years later at another function, and was determined to make my way over and make a better impression, but she was leaving and I never got the chance.
What struck me at the time was how low-rent and reckless this all was. Bill Clinton was a charming, powerful man who had had a long run of consensual sex with lots of women. (Some said it wasn't consensual. Let's leave them aside for now.) One can object to this, particularly in a married man, but it is probably only the first circle of Hell, and in this fallen world we wouldn't seriously try to hound a man out of public office for it -- at least if he wasn't a sanctimonious hypocrite about it. He was the f*****g President of the United States. He could have had consensual sex with beautiful, accomplished women he could have bragged about to his buddies in the golf club locker room, but who would have known how (and when) to keep their mouths shut. For all we know, he did.
Monica Lewinsky? I believe her when she says, in effect, that he used his power to charm rather than to coerce -- again, first circle of Hell stuff -- but WTF did Clinton choose such a target? What did it say about him that he didn't hold off and go for bigger game? He had to have an intern?
You would probably know better than I. When it comes to these things, I'm hopeless. I've answered a few calls on the road, but I wouldn't make any even if I knew how.
By some magic I don't understand, I get phone calls through my car's sound system. All I have to do is press an icon, listen, and talk. I'm sure there's a way to make calls, too, but I haven't figured it out and prefer not to do it anyway.
I yield to no one in my belief in the ignorance of the American public, but surveys like this don't tell us much. As you say, respondents may not know what rights the First Amendment protects, but they have a tolerably good idea, if somewhat muddled, about what rights they have and that they are somehow protected by the Constitution. Chapter and verse, and the straightening out of some misconceptions, is for the professionals. And surely they know that there is a President, and a Congress, and a Supreme Court, and they probably know there are other federal courts as well. Maybe they think the alphabet agencies are a fourth branch of government, which is technically incorrect but not an unreasonable thing to think. Even the professionals sometimes think they kinda-sorta are, so I can't get down on lay folk who reify a metaphor.
I'm quite certain that the public's actual ignorance, accurately determined, would be appalling, but I can't get the vapors based on what surveys like this show.
Exactly. If the people who are already there could buy enough good stuff, however you define "good stuff," it wouldn't be the place it is. Lending money to a true Hamiltonian to make stuff other true Hamiltonians can't afford to buy -- unless they prefer fancy cupcakes to rent or healthcare -- isn't a business model that works. I'm not sure lending money to true Hamiltonians to make stuff true Hamiltonians already can afford to buy moves the ball closer to the goal either.
I'm waiting to see if vast numbers of noisy people who have no reason even to have an opinion will fill up the internet and the cable talk shows with overheated blather about this.
Hillary won the national popular vote by about what most folks predicted. She lost the election because of under 80,000 votes concentrated in three states. With those kinds of numbers, it's child's play to prove that anything you want to fasten on to was why she lost.
Teams didn't come out before 2009. Teams weren't forbidden to come out for any particular reason, they just didn't. There was no significance to that then, just the way things were done.They began coming out in 2009 precisely because the owners wanted to make a political show. If they went back to the pre-political practice, some would see it as pro-Trump only because that's how they would want to see it. Screw them.
Can anyone identify any political issue, other than representation, on which large states, as such, lean one way and small states, as such, lean another? On what issue would NY, Pa, Mass. & Virginia be on one side and Connecticut, Delaware, North Carolina, and South Carolina be on the other?
About a decade ago, my wife and I (both NYC residents) were vacationing in Maine. We had stopped overnight in Portland -- which we found to be a nice, friendly, but still somewhat sophisticated city -- to break up the trip and stopped in Rockland to get supplies. When we told the cashier we had just driven up from Portland, her eyes went wide and she said she would be afraid to go there. Two years ago, we were staying in Rockland, and I read an op-ed in the local paper by an ex-cop who explained that he felt the need to carry a gun all the time because of the dangers of Rockland. True, there are some dicey areas -- hell, even an out-of-towner can locate the meth labs after a few days -- but come on.
Until 2009, stadiums played the national anthem before the players took the field. Let's go back to that. Make everyone happy. Or at least less unhappy.
If Kaepernick were a better player than he is, he'd have a job. If he were a worse player than he is, there wouldn't be any question why he doesn't have a job.
Oddly enough, I long thought, to the limited extent that I thought about it all, that Trump was Jewish. He was a NYC real-estate developer (look at the names of the serious ones that really are what Trump pretended to be) and embodied many of the deplorable characteristics often attributed to Jews by anti-Semites.
OK, let's have a contest and find a non-sexist synonym for the phenomenon now described as "clutching pearls." Because it is a phenomenon and it needs a name.
On “Bill Clinton: Time for a Reckoning”
An excuse to tell my Lauren Bacall story. Thanks rexnobus.
I was a somewhat sickly child, and much of my early youth was spent home watching Ed Murphy's Hollywood Matinee. (Ed was a local broadcaster who showed old movies in the afternoon.) When I was about 11 years old, I fell in love with Lauren Bacall --one of the Bogey pictures, I forget which. I didn't know why, being 11 years old, but I did.
Fast-forward 20 years. A co-worker of mine, a preppy trusts-and-estates lawyer, had a spare ticket to some political fundraiser, so I went with him. As we're nursing our drinks, I spot Lauren Bacall across the room. "Jeffrey," I said, "that's Lauren Bacall." "Yes, it is," he said. "I roomed with her son at boarding school. Why don't I introduce you?""
He dragged me over. I was close to paralyzed. She smiled. "Jeffrey, how good to see you again." He asked after her son, whose name I forget, learned that he was fine, and then introduced me. I stared and stammered. She smiled at me and then gave Jeffrey a look that said: "I see you're still doing charitable work with the mentally disabled."
I saw her a few years later at another function, and was determined to make my way over and make a better impression, but she was leaving and I never got the chance.
"
What struck me at the time was how low-rent and reckless this all was. Bill Clinton was a charming, powerful man who had had a long run of consensual sex with lots of women. (Some said it wasn't consensual. Let's leave them aside for now.) One can object to this, particularly in a married man, but it is probably only the first circle of Hell, and in this fallen world we wouldn't seriously try to hound a man out of public office for it -- at least if he wasn't a sanctimonious hypocrite about it. He was the f*****g President of the United States. He could have had consensual sex with beautiful, accomplished women he could have bragged about to his buddies in the golf club locker room, but who would have known how (and when) to keep their mouths shut. For all we know, he did.
Monica Lewinsky? I believe her when she says, in effect, that he used his power to charm rather than to coerce -- again, first circle of Hell stuff -- but WTF did Clinton choose such a target? What did it say about him that he didn't hold off and go for bigger game? He had to have an intern?
On “Twilight in the Kingdom of Pariahs and Predators”
I am finally of an age where older woman fantasies don't make much sense.
On “The Christian Industrial Complex Shields Its Own”
Thanks for doing this so we don't have to.
On “Linky Friday: Housing the World”
1. Yes. The allegations of victimhood might not be true.
2. Because they're often not.
3. Yes.
On “Risk Management and the Road”
You would probably know better than I. When it comes to these things, I'm hopeless. I've answered a few calls on the road, but I wouldn't make any even if I knew how.
"
By some magic I don't understand, I get phone calls through my car's sound system. All I have to do is press an icon, listen, and talk. I'm sure there's a way to make calls, too, but I haven't figured it out and prefer not to do it anyway.
On “Plausible Misconceptions”
No I didn't. You did the heavy lifting fleshing out what was wrong. I merely summarized it.
"
I yield to no one in my belief in the ignorance of the American public, but surveys like this don't tell us much. As you say, respondents may not know what rights the First Amendment protects, but they have a tolerably good idea, if somewhat muddled, about what rights they have and that they are somehow protected by the Constitution. Chapter and verse, and the straightening out of some misconceptions, is for the professionals. And surely they know that there is a President, and a Congress, and a Supreme Court, and they probably know there are other federal courts as well. Maybe they think the alphabet agencies are a fourth branch of government, which is technically incorrect but not an unreasonable thing to think. Even the professionals sometimes think they kinda-sorta are, so I can't get down on lay folk who reify a metaphor.
I'm quite certain that the public's actual ignorance, accurately determined, would be appalling, but I can't get the vapors based on what surveys like this show.
On “The End of Gentrification as we Know It”
Exactly. If the people who are already there could buy enough good stuff, however you define "good stuff," it wouldn't be the place it is. Lending money to a true Hamiltonian to make stuff other true Hamiltonians can't afford to buy -- unless they prefer fancy cupcakes to rent or healthcare -- isn't a business model that works. I'm not sure lending money to true Hamiltonians to make stuff true Hamiltonians already can afford to buy moves the ball closer to the goal either.
On “A New Day for Scouting”
I'm waiting to see if vast numbers of noisy people who have no reason even to have an opinion will fill up the internet and the cable talk shows with overheated blather about this.
On “Alabama Pulls Back the Curtain”
Size matters.
On “Hillary Clinton Settles Her Accounts”
Hillary won the national popular vote by about what most folks predicted. She lost the election because of under 80,000 votes concentrated in three states. With those kinds of numbers, it's child's play to prove that anything you want to fasten on to was why she lost.
On “Usurping the White Saviour”
I'd really like to see a Frederick Douglass biopic. He's an example of somebody who's done an amazing job and is being recognized more and more.
On “Demonstrating Against Trump by Demonstrating Against America: What could go wrong?”
There may be a reason you thought it necessary to point out the obvious, but I'm not sure I see it.
"
Americans aren’t blind. That’s why they voted like they did.
If the Democrats are the real racists, how come the racists vote Republican?
"
Teams didn't come out before 2009. Teams weren't forbidden to come out for any particular reason, they just didn't. There was no significance to that then, just the way things were done.They began coming out in 2009 precisely because the owners wanted to make a political show. If they went back to the pre-political practice, some would see it as pro-Trump only because that's how they would want to see it. Screw them.
On “The Politics of Everything”
Can anyone identify any political issue, other than representation, on which large states, as such, lean one way and small states, as such, lean another? On what issue would NY, Pa, Mass. & Virginia be on one side and Connecticut, Delaware, North Carolina, and South Carolina be on the other?
On “Hillary Clinton Settles Her Accounts”
About a decade ago, my wife and I (both NYC residents) were vacationing in Maine. We had stopped overnight in Portland -- which we found to be a nice, friendly, but still somewhat sophisticated city -- to break up the trip and stopped in Rockland to get supplies. When we told the cashier we had just driven up from Portland, her eyes went wide and she said she would be afraid to go there. Two years ago, we were staying in Rockland, and I read an op-ed in the local paper by an ex-cop who explained that he felt the need to carry a gun all the time because of the dangers of Rockland. True, there are some dicey areas -- hell, even an out-of-towner can locate the meth labs after a few days -- but come on.
On “Demonstrating Against Trump by Demonstrating Against America: What could go wrong?”
Until 2009, stadiums played the national anthem before the players took the field. Let's go back to that. Make everyone happy. Or at least less unhappy.
"
If Kaepernick were a better player than he is, he'd have a job. If he were a worse player than he is, there wouldn't be any question why he doesn't have a job.
"
You seem to know more about Trump’s inner beliefs than he does. I find that unlikely.
It's far from obvious that Trump has any understanding of his own inner beliefs.
"
Oddly enough, I long thought, to the limited extent that I thought about it all, that Trump was Jewish. He was a NYC real-estate developer (look at the names of the serious ones that really are what Trump pretended to be) and embodied many of the deplorable characteristics often attributed to Jews by anti-Semites.
On “The Politics of Everything”
OK, let's have a contest and find a non-sexist synonym for the phenomenon now described as "clutching pearls." Because it is a phenomenon and it needs a name.
"
Anything that starts by asking the reader to think seriously about some emanation from Ross Douthat is bound to end badly.
*Comment archive for non-registered commenters assembled by email address as provided.