The Conversation

Good night and good luck

2008-09-07T20:43:00.004-04:00

This is the 827th post on this blog, which I started four years ago. I've decided that it's going to go on hiatus for a while, simply because there are too many other demands on my time. That doesn't mean I'll no longer be wasting time on the Internet, and I may even post something occassionally on my other blog, Dead Tree Blog, which is dedicated to books. In fact, reading is one of the things I'd like to do more of, and when I started that blog, it was with the intention that I would drop this one.

I'm sure I'll check back in every once in a while, if only to offer my thoughts on the latest film I've seen, or one of my favorite TV shows. Otherwise, so long and thanks for indulging me.

Running scared

2008-09-04T21:31:00.002-04:00

Last night at the Republican National Convention, Sarah Palin gave a speech that came straight out of right-wing talk radio, and tonight the party is displaying pictures of military cemeteries on a giant video screen as Lindsey Graham claims that the Democrats in Congress voted to surrender in Iraq.

Man, the Republicans must really be terrified of what's going to happen in the fall. Either that, or they have finally run out of ideas.

Now that's change I can believe in

2008-08-31T19:49:00.001-04:00

Obama ain't bringing a knife to this gunfight:

I'm not sure if I like this Kool-Aid

2008-08-23T14:36:00.004-04:00

On the one hand, as some talking head noted this morning, Joe Biden, Barack Obama's recently selected running mate, can probably tell you how many homes he has without checking with his staff. He's spent 36 years in the Senate and though he won't be seen anytime soon standing in line for food stamps, he's of modest means compared to his Senate colleagues. That's significant when you consider how many elected officials manage to build a sizable fortune while serving in office. Biden's got integrity.

On the other hand, I've always regarded Biden as something of an arrogant windbag, and as Obama himself has correctly noted, experience doesn't always translate into good judgment, and Biden did not demonstrate the latter when, like Hillary Clinton, he gave George Bush his blank check for Iraq.

There's a third hand, which is that vice presidential nominees rarely if ever have much impact on the final outcome. They aren't difference makers. At best, they can boost your momentum, like Al Gore did for Bill Clinton in 1992, and at worst, they can kill it, the way Dan Quayle did for the first George Bush in 1988. (And what difference did that make in the end?) The days when a pick can truly blow up in your face, like Tom Eagleton did to George McGovern in 1972, are probably long gone. It's too hard to hide your skeletons anymore, and any presidential nominee nowadays that did such a poor job of vetting a VP pick doesn't deserve to get elected.

I heard one pollster this week say that Obama simply needed to pick someone who would make it through the first 72 hourrs without any problems, and so Biden, a rather known quantity, is a safe pick -- perhaps too safe, according to the AP's Ron Fournier:

He picked a 35-year veteran of the Senate - the ultimate insider - rather than a candidate from outside Washington, such as Govs. Tim Kaine of Virginia or Kathleen Sebelius of Kansas; or from outside his party, such as Sen. Chuck Hagel of Nebraska; or from outside the mostly white male club of vice presidential candidates. Hillary Rodham Clinton didn't even make his short list.

The picks say something profound about Obama: For all his self-confidence, the 47-year-old Illinois senator worried that he couldn't beat Republican John McCain without help from a seasoned politician willing to attack. The Biden selection is the next logistical step in an Obama campaign that has become more negative - a strategic decision that may be necessary but threatens to run counter to his image.

Let's face it -- Obama has already demonstrated that he doesn't want to be another noble Democratic loser, and if his brand has to take a hit in the process, so be it. John McCain certainly doesn't seem to be fretting too much over the damage his reputation as a maverick is taking as he tries to make nice with the same evangelicals he spurned in 2000. Something tells me Obama already has the votes sown up of those who want a new kind of politics -- at least those who want it on the left. Sure, he could have made a more daring pick, and I might have been happier if he had. But for far too many voters, Obama is risky enough.

Wasn't there a hobbit in that one?

2008-08-17T20:49:00.003-04:00

Michael Machosky writes a paean in Sunday's Trib to a particular genre of '80s movie he dubs "Goonie Movies" in honor of "The Goonies." Few of the films Machosky mention stand the test of time, but that's hot his point: They were good popcorn films, with broader appeal than today's focus-group driven blockbusters.

While we may not see another "Goonies" anytime soon (which I don't think is a bad thing), we have witnessed the rebirth of a film genre that reached full flower back in the '80s: The R-rated comedy. I'm not the first person to herald the return of this species, which lately includes "Wedding Crashers", "The 40 Year Old Virgin" and "Knocked Up." Examples from the '80s that come to mind: "Caddyshack" and "Trading Places."

Now, the '90s gave us "American Pie" and "Road Trip", (the latter technically came out in 2000), both very funny, but those films largely were aimed at the same demographic they portrayed -- high school and college students. Today, even an ostensible high school comedy like "Superbad" seems made for people who have let a few years lapse since their last keg stand.

Of course, even some of the most memorable films from the 1980s bear the cheesy hallmarks of the era, like the montage -- "Wall Street" and "Tootsie", two very different films, each featured a split-screen montage -- and the original song that sounded like it came straight out of AM radio. (Not to mention the synthesizer-driven score.) It was indeed a memorable decade -- though not necessarily for the right reasons.

Sorry, Wall Street Journal

2008-08-10T09:58:00.002-04:00

It turns out the estate tax isn't quite the villian it's made out to be in the Steelers' ownership dispute:

On the surface, the estate tax seems daunting -- 45 percent on all estates above $2 million in value. With the Rooneys' 80 percent share of the franchise being valued at $800 million or more on the open market, that would seem to make the family liable for hundreds of millions of dollars in tax liabilities.

In reality, though, few estates pay the full estate tax rate, and there is almost no evidence that any family-owned enterprises have had to dissolve or sell out because of the federal tax, said Ben Harris, a senior research associate at the Tax Policy Center in Washington, D.C., a joint operation of the Brookings Institution and Urban Institute.

The tax center estimates that 17,500 estates will pay about $23 billion in federal estate taxes this year, for an average payment of just $1.3 million. Even the wealthiest estates -- those worth more than $20 million -- will pay an average tax rate of about 22 percent, less than half the official rate, the center estimates.

"The destruction of family businesses is often used as a motivation for repealing the estate tax, but there is very little proof that many family businesses are devastated by the tax," said Samuel Donaldson, a law professor at the University of Washington and a nationally known expert on estate tax matters.

"There are very few ways to get around the tax entirely," he added, "but there are any number of ways to reduce the tax." (link)

Another third party candidate

2008-08-06T09:45:00.000-04:00

See more Paris Hilton videos at Funny or Die

Will the last person out of the suburbs please turn out the lights

2008-08-02T16:24:00.004-04:00

I'm not laughing. Really, I'm not:

Since real-estate tanked, many new planned communities across the country are half-empty, with for-sale signs outnumbering residents by a large margin.

Some of the projects abandoned by bankrupt developers are in places that were hotbeds of new housing construction: Southern California, Atlanta, Las Vegas, Phoenix. As of July, the percentage of vacant housing stock available for sale or rent stood at 4.8% nationally, the highest figure in at least 33 years, according to Zelman & Associates, a real-estate research firm.

Daily life in these developments seems a bit post-cataclysmic. Children play on elaborate but empty playgrounds. They walk their dogs past rows of shiny houses that have never been lived in. Voices echo up and down the block. Unfinished houses and vacant lots strewn with construction debris clutter the horizon. (link)

A modest proposal...

2008-07-15T19:36:00.005-04:00

...that we all stop frothing at the mouth over the cover of the latest The New Yorker. I'm with Jack Shafer on this one:

Calling on the press to protect the common man from the potential corruptions of satire is a strange, paternalistic assignment for any journalist to give his peers, but that appears to be what The New Yorker's detractors desire. I don't know whether to be crushed by that realization or elated by the notion that one of the most elite journals in the land has faith that Joe Sixpack can figure out a damned picture for himself.

Yes, I understand why some people are taking offense, and as an Obama supporter I certainly understand the danger the cartoon poses. Satire can be easily misinterpreted or taken at face value. My grandmother, I'm sorry to say, was one of the most bigoted people I've ever known (rest her soul), yet she loved "All in the Family." And I'm sure she wasn't the only one. That doesn't mean that Norman Lear or Carol O'Connor should have been pilloried for lampooning racism.

What I find depressing about this episode is that it reinforces the stereotype that liberals are humorless, politically correct scolds. Some have even gone as far as to call The New Yorker "gutless" for failing, on its cover, to criticize John McCain for benefitting from the ugly rumors being floated about Obama.

Come on. Few mainstream media outlets have been as aggressive in covering the Bush administration as The New Yorker. They don't have to prove their chops to anyone. Besides, the Internet echo chamber aside, if Obama needs to rely on a magazine whose readers probably already support him, then he's got problems.

"Wait -- which football team plays here?"

2008-07-10T21:48:00.003-04:00

John McCain told Jon Delano that the Pittsburgh Steelers helped him endure torture at the hands of his North Vietnamese captors:

"When I was first interrogated and really had to give some information because of the physical pressures that were on me, I named the starting lineup -- defensive line -- of the Pittsburgh Steelers as my squadron-mates!"

There's just one problem with that story:

...the Steelers aren't the team whose defensive line McCain named for his Vietnamese tormentors. The Green Bay Packers are. At least according to every previous time McCain has told this story. And the McCain campaign just told ABC News that the senator made a mistake -- it was, indeed, the Packers.

In McCain's best-selling 1999 memoir “Faith of My Fathers,” McCain writes:

“Once my condition had stabilized, my interrogators resumed their work. Demands for military information were accompanied by threats to terminate my medical treatment if I did not cooperate. Eventually, I gave them my ship’s name and squadron number, and confirmed that my target had been the power plant. Pressed for more useful information, I gave the names of the Green Bay Packers offensive line, and said they were members of my squadron. When asked to identify future targets, I simply recited the names of a number of North Vietnamese cities that had already been bombed.”

In 2005, A&E ran a movie version of "Faith of My Fathers."

And McCain discussed that precise clip on CNN.

The actor playing McCain, asked to name the men in his squadron, says: "Starr; Greg; McGee; Davis; Adderly; Brown; Ringo; Wood."

Cut back to real life. The CNN anchor asks McCain: "For those who don't know the story, were those NFL football players?"

"That was the starting lineup of the Green Bay Packers, the first Super Bowl champions, yes," McCain responded. But it's -- it was the best I could think of at the time."

The movie actually shows this act of defiance twice.

INTERROGATOR: The names of your squadron...
MCCAIN: Starr, Gregg...McGee, Davis...Adderley, Brown, Ringo, Wood.
INTERROGATOR: Ten points, McCain.
MCCAIN: Ray Nitschke, our C.O.

The Packers anecdote is not only a key part of the McCain biography, it's part of his argument against torture.

Explaining why he thinks torture can result in erroneous information, McCain wrote in Newsweek in 2005, "In my experience, abuse of prisoners often produces bad intelligence because under torture a person will say anything he thinks his captors want to hear--whether it is true or false--if he believes it will relieve his suffering. I was once physically coerced to provide my enemies with the names of the members of my flight squadron, information that had little if any value to my enemies as actionable intelligence. But I did not refuse, or repeat my insistence that I was required under the Geneva Conventions to provide my captors only with my name, rank and serial number. Instead, I gave them the names of the Green Bay Packers' offensive line, knowing that providing them false information was sufficient to suspend the abuse."

McCain's valor as a P.O.W. is beyond admirable, but this business of substituting the Steelers for the Packers is odd, though as I said, the McCain campaign says this was an honest mistake.

Yes, a mistake he just happened to make while he was in Pittsburgh, a town with a singular devotion to its football team and the second largest city in a critical swing state.

What? Nothing about Brookline?

2008-07-05T14:00:00.001-04:00

Our problems are solved: The New York Times digs Pittsburgh.

Not in his lifetime

2008-07-04T14:05:00.003-04:00

I'm sad that Jesse Helms is dead. Had he hung on for a few more months, he might have witnessed the election of the first black president -- and he would have gone to his grave realizing that much of his life's work had been for naught.

It's worth noting that a White House spokesman called Helms "a great public servant and true patriot" and Bob Dole called him a "good, decent human being." I understand that it's bad form to speak ill of the dead, but perhaps a more appropriate, yet tasteful statement, would have gone like this:

"We extend our sympathies to the family of Jesse Helms. We understand that Jesse did what he believed was right, but it is tragic that he wasted so much time, talent and energy toward dividing Americans, and to denying African-Americans the liberties guaranteed them under the U.S. Constitution. His death should not make us forget that much of what he stood for was wrong. "

A city at risk

2008-06-29T12:30:00.006-04:00

In a nice little column Sunday about Pittsburgh's Little Italy, Joseph Mistick declares, "With gas prices through the roof, the time for a return to the great American urban neighborhood may be here."

I certainly hope Miskick is correct. I've written (ranted) ad nauseum on this blog in favor of urban living and policies that promote walkable, sustainable communities. But there's a major obstacle standing in the way of this great urban renaissance, and the events of the past week in Pittsburgh have brought it into relief. Simply put, Pittsburgh -- and other cities which share its woes -- will continue to struggle with population loss and the resulting economic stagnation so long as it has what is perceived to be a failing school system.

That's certainly not an original observation on my part. The link between a community's livability and the quality of its public schools is quite well-established. Schools are a big part of the reason that people move to places like Mt. Lebanon and Upper St. Clair and Fox Chapel.

But absent from the public discourse about Pittsburgh's future is much evidence that people understand that the fate of the city and the fate of the school district are inextricably linked. The school district's troubles may have once been a symptom of Pittsburgh's economic decline. Now, cause and effect are reversing themselves, and the school district is dragging the city down with it. (That is not a comment on the two entities' respective governing bodies. In truth, the school district has been better managed than the city over the past two decades.)

If the numbers aren't enough to convince you, try talking to suburban parents. My wife belongs to a moms' group, and when another member finds out we live in the city, her first question to my wife is, "What are you going to do when it's time for your daughter to go to school?" As far as they are concerned, the city schools aren't even an option.

I don't know what the solution is. The first step is to acknowledge that this a crisis in the life of the city that must be dealt with, and soon. A lot of the people who got involved in the fight over Schenley High School understand this, and regardless of how you feel about the decision to close the school, it does provide what educators call a teachable moment. We have the opportunitiy to push the school system to the top of the public agenda. The energy that was expended to fight for this one school must be turned toward saving the entire system -- which means that some of the people who hurled insults at one another are going to have to work together from here on out.

We owe it to our children. And to our city.

Thanks, Supremes

2008-06-26T19:40:00.005-04:00

Boy, did the Supreme Court do Barack Obama a solid today. Never mind gay marriage amendments. Can you imagine the furor among conservatives had the court ruled 5-4 that the Second Amendment does not allow for individuals to own guns? They would have forgetten real quick whatever beef they have with John McCain as he fell all over himself promising to appoint gun-loving judges to the high court.

Besides, the court's ruling leaves plenty of wriggle room for sensible restrictions on gun ownership:

But the court held that the individual right to possess a gun “for traditionally lawful purposes, such as self-defense within the home” is not unlimited. “It is not a right to keep and carry any weapon whatsoever in any manner whatsoever and for whatever purpose,” Justice Scalia wrote.

The ruling does not mean, for instance, that laws against carrying concealed weapons are to be swept aside. Furthermore, Justice Scalia wrote, “The court’s opinion should not be taken to cast doubt on longstanding prohibitions on the possession of firearms by felons and the mentally ill, or laws forbidding the carrying of firearms in sensitive places such as schools and government buildings, or laws imposing conditions and qualifications on the commercial sale of arms.” (link)

In other words, the Second Amendment is no more absolute than any of our other constitutional protections, just about all of which have had some kind of Supreme Court-approved sanctions imposed on them throughout the history of the republic. Somehow, I doubt that little nuance will merit much attention by those who praise the wisdom of today's ruling.

One nation, under God

2008-06-21T09:05:00.005-04:00

The New York Times reports that conservative 527 groups are having trouble raising money to defame Barack Obama. The Times cites as an example a group dedicated to unmasking Obama as a Muslim:

The second spot highlights a Roman Catholic elementary school roster from Indonesia showing that Mr. Obama registered as a Muslim. The campaign said that the notation was probably made because Mr. Obama’s stepfather was nominally a Muslim but that the candidate had never been a Muslim. He is a committed Christian. (link)

I'd like to think I'm a pragmatist, so I understand that given the political climate in the U.S. since 2001, Obama has to quash the rumor that he is a Muslim. But wouldn't it be nice if instead he could engage his opponents in a debate over whether we really want to live in a nation in which a candidate for office, or any person, has to prove what his or her religion is, or isn't. Isn't a religious test contrary to just about everything we are supposed to stand for as Americans?

Some people would answer that question differently than I would. But I think the debate would do us all good.

"What's left to hope for?"

2008-06-11T20:49:00.003-04:00

I discuss the film "Children of Men" over at my other blog.

Don't stop believin'

2008-06-09T20:35:00.004-04:00

You thought I was obsessed with "The Sopranos"? I don't know when I'll have time to read this multi-part deconstruction of the final episode. (Which, after a second viewing, I've decided is one of the best series finales ever.)

Ha!

2008-05-31T15:10:00.003-04:00

Know anybody with a bad Christopher Walken impersonation?

"Nobody wants to pay twenty dollars to watch people living next to chemical waste! They can see that in New Jersey!"

2008-05-27T20:42:00.003-04:00

Several weeks ago I came upon this collection of cameos by film directors, which included the recently departed Sydney Pollack's appearance in his film "Tootsie." It's inaccurate to refer to Pollack's role as agent George Fields as a cameo -- it was an important supporting role, and he and star Dustin Hoffman shared some of the film's most memorable scenes.

Pollack began his career as an actor and as the director cameo item notes, he had as many acting credits as he did directing credits. Among his other memorable acting roles, in my opinion, was his turn in the under-appreciated "Changing Lanes" as the amoral father-in-law of Ben Affleck's character, and his role as a man struggling with a midlife crisis in Woody Allen's "Husbands and Wives." And let's not forget his appearance in the final season of "The Sopranos." (See my summation of that episode here.)

Rest in peace.

The dismal science, yes, but a science nonetheless

2008-05-02T19:22:00.003-04:00

Hillary Clinton has rightly calld out George W. Bush for making policy in disregard of scientific expertise. And yet:

When I asked Communications Director Howard Wolfson if the Clinton team could offer any intellectual ballast for the gas-tax vacation, given that so many policymakers had criticized it, he said, "The presidency requires leadership. … There are times when the president does something that the group of experts, quote unquote, does not agree with. Presidents get advice and then act, and that is what Senator Clinton is doing." Or, as George Bush used to put it: A leader leads. Even if off a cliff. (link)

Now that's what I call a politician

2008-04-29T19:05:00.003-04:00

It must be nice to be Hillary Clinton. She gets to tweak Barack Obama anew for the ongoing spectacle that is the Rev. Jeremiah Wright, while her supporter pushes him as a speaker to the National Press Club -- the very forum that has renewed the controversey over Obama's former pastor:

National Press Club president Sylvia Smith responded today to a Daily News article reporting that club member Barbara Reynolds, a Hillary Clinton supporter, organized yesterday’s breakfast talk with Dr. Jeremiah Wright Jr. Smith said by phone this morning that she still doesn’t know if Reynolds supports Clinton, and doesn’t care either way.

“Reverend Wright is newsworthy, period,” Smith said. But Wright wasn’t as newsworthy two years ago when Reynolds first pitched Barack Obama’s controversial pastor as a potential speaker for the press club, according to Smith. At that time, the speaker’s committee—of which Reynolds is now a part of, but wasn’t at the time—didn’t move forward with selecting Wright.

“He wasn’t newsworthy then in the broader context,” Smith said.

An ordained minister, Reynolds, teaches at Howard University School of Divinity, and knows Wright personally. So she was the ideal contact person for Wright when the controversy broke in mid-March. Smith said that Reynolds pitched Wright again as a speaker, and the speakers committee wanted him because he was far more newsworthy than two years earlier. Reynolds became the point person.

Clinton, meanwhile, agrees with the man she hopes to face in the fall election, John McCain, when it comes to his disasterous idea to suspend the federal gas tax:

Mrs. Clinton, of New York, has also taken varying stands on the issue of gas taxes. In her 2000 Senate campaign, she spoke against repealing the federal gasoline tax, calling it “one of those few taxes that New York actually gets more money from Washington than we send.”

Silver linings

2008-04-27T13:35:00.004-04:00

Frank Rich may be whistling past the graveyard, but there's a lot of merit methinks in his arguments that things aren't going great right now for presumptive Republican nominee John McCain. First of all, Rich notes, McCain's opponents in the Pennsylvania Republican primary Tuesday received 27 percent of the vote, even though McCain now has enough pledged delegates to win the nomination. (Ron Paul is a western Pennsylvania native, but he's drawn so little media coverage lately that I'm guessing that fact faded from voters' memories.)

To add to Rich's point, the broohaha in North Carolina over the state GOP's ads linking statewide Democratic candidates there to the Rev. Jeremiah Wright may be alienating some Republican voters from McCain, who has roundly criticized the ads. I listened to an NPR report (I think it was this one) in which North Carolina conservatives complained that they still haven't heard what they want to hear from McCain, a candidate distrusted by many conservatives. Given the flawed candidates McCain beat for the nomination, it's possible he still has to seal the deal with many Republican voters.

As Rich notes, McCain is also missing out on the grilling that the Democratic candidates are giving each other, which Rich seems to think will do less damage to Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton than the conventional wisdom holds. In fact, McCain has a bunch of problems, according to Rich:

Mr. McCain is not only burdened with the most despised president in his own 71-year lifetime, but he’s getting none of the seasoning that he, no less than the Democrats, needs to compete in the fall. Age is as much an issue as race and gender in this campaign. Mr. McCain will have to prove not merely that he can keep to the physical rigors of his schedule and fend off investigations of his ties to lobbyists and developers. He also must show he can think and speak fluently about the domestic issues that are gripping the country. Picture him debating either Democrat about health care, the mortgage crisis, stagnant middle-class wages, rice rationing at Costco. It’s not pretty.

Indeed.

I hope he heeds it

2008-04-27T10:16:00.001-04:00

Here is some good advice for Barack Obama.

The things you learn by reading the newspaper

2008-04-26T09:53:00.005-04:00

The Trib today has an article about Mayor Luke Ravenstahl's fears that community benefits agreements (CBA) like the one forged between the Penguins and Hill District residents will scare away developers if other neighborhoods push for CBAs.

"My belief is that it was a unique situation," Ravenstahl said Thursday. "It was the result of the prior experiences that they had with the Mellon Arena site that was developed, and the uprooting and dislodging and changing of a neighborhood without any consultation. That's why a community benefits agreement was ultimately reached and why we entered into the dialogue." (link)

The mayor may be correct that the situation in the Hill District is unique because of the historical baggage the construction of a new arena carries. But it's my belief that any time a developer is relying on the power of government to get their project done -- either through subsidies or the granting of exclusive development rights -- then neighbors deserve to have a say in how that development will unfold. If developers use their own money, and secure land or development rights on the open market, then, perhaps, they can tell neighbors to go pound sand. Otherwise, residents deserve a place at the table.

In other news, according to this story about new highway funding, the federal gasoline tax has remained at 18.4 cents since 1993. In constant dollars, that's about 13 cents. Adjusted for inflation, the tax would be 27 cents.

So what's my point? People who know me or who read this blog regularly (about three people) know that I'm an advocate of walkable, high-densiy development, and that government should be pushing people to conserve fuel, and not just throwing money at developing alternative sources of energy (though given the rapid development of ecomomies in places like India and China, both strategies are probably necessary.)

Therefore, I propose that the gasoline tax be adjusted for inflation at least every two to three years. Making gasoline even more expensive than it is now would encourage people to drive less, and also encourage more sustainable development. In the short term, it would also raise more revenues for road repairs, since short-term demand for gasoline is relatively inelastic. In the long-term, gas tax revenues would fall, but so would wear and tear on roads and bridges.