A Message of Unity

I was slow to warm to Barack Obama, but my support seems to rise with each day, building toward a fervor. Every day the attacks come and every day he is prepared with a reasonable, thoughtful response. A response that displays a fierce intelligence combined with compassion and common sense.

Read the speech he gave today on race. All of it. Not only is it brilliantly written, he shows his tremendous ability to invite all Americans to hope for something better than the divisive politics of Karl Rove and Hillary Clinton.

Here it is, in its entirety:

"We the people, in order to form a more perfect union."

Two hundred and twenty one years ago, in a hall that still stands across the street, a group of men gathered and, with these simple words, launched America's improbable experiment in democracy. Farmers and scholars; statesmen and patriots who had traveled across an ocean to escape tyranny and persecution finally made real their declaration of independence at a Philadelphia convention that lasted through the spring of 1787.

The document they produced was eventually signed but ultimately unfinished. It was stained by this nation's original sin of slavery, a question that divided the colonies and brought the convention to a stalemate until the founders chose to allow the slave trade to continue for at least twenty more years, and to leave any final resolution to future generations.
Of course, the answer to the slavery question was already embedded within our Constitution - a Constitution that had at is very core the ideal of equal citizenship under the law; a Constitution that promised its people liberty, and justice, and a union that could be and should be perfected over time.

And yet words on a parchment would not be enough to deliver slaves from bondage, or provide men and women of every color and creed their full rights and obligations as citizens of the United States. What would be needed were Americans in successive generations who were willing to do their part - through protests and struggle, on the streets and in the courts, through a civil war and civil disobedience and always at great risk - to narrow that gap between the promise of our ideals and the reality of their time.

This was one of the tasks we set forth at the beginning of this campaign - to continue the long march of those who came before us, a march for a more just, more equal, more free, more caring and more prosperous America. I chose to run for the presidency at this moment in history because I believe deeply that we cannot solve the challenges of our time unless we solve them together - unless we perfect our union by understanding that we may have different stories, but we hold common hopes; that we may not look the same and we may not have come from the same place, but we all want to move in the same direction - towards a better future for of children and our grandchildren.

This belief comes from my unyielding faith in the decency and generosity of the American people. But it also comes from my own American story.

I am the son of a black man from Kenya and a white woman from Kansas. I was raised with the help of a white grandfather who survived a Depression to serve in Patton's Army during World War II and a white grandmother who worked on a bomber assembly line at Fort Leavenworth while he was overseas. I've gone to some of the best schools in America and lived in one of the world's poorest nations. I am married to a black American who carries within her the blood of slaves and slaveowners - an inheritance we pass on to our two precious daughters. I have brothers, sisters, nieces, nephews, uncles and cousins, of every race and every hue, scattered across three continents, and for as long as I live, I will never forget that in no other country on Earth is my story even possible.

It's a story that hasn't made me the most conventional candidate. But it is a story that has seared into my genetic makeup the idea that this nation is more than the sum of its parts - that out of many, we are truly one.

Throughout the first year of this campaign, against all predictions to the contrary, we saw how hungry the American people were for this message of unity. Despite the temptation to view my candidacy through a purely racial lens, we won commanding victories in states with some of the whitest populations in the country. In South Carolina, where the Confederate Flag still flies, we built a powerful coalition of African Americans and white Americans.

This is not to say that race has not been an issue in the campaign. At various stages in the campaign, some commentators have deemed me either "too black" or "not black enough." We saw racial tensions bubble to the surface during the week before the South Carolina primary. The press has scoured every exit poll for the latest evidence of racial polarization, not just in terms of white and black, but black and brown as well.

And yet, it has only been in the last couple of weeks that the discussion of race in this campaign has taken a particularly divisive turn.

On one end of the spectrum, we've heard the implication that my candidacy is somehow an exercise in affirmative action; that it's based solely on the desire of wide-eyed liberals to purchase racial reconciliation on the cheap. On the other end, we've heard my former pastor, Reverend Jeremiah Wright, use incendiary language to express views that have the potential not only to widen the racial divide, but views that denigrate both the greatness and the goodness of our nation; that rightly offend white and black alike.

I have already condemned, in unequivocal terms, the statements of Reverend Wright that have caused such controversy. For some, nagging questions remain. Did I know him to be an occasionally fierce critic of American domestic and foreign policy? Of course. Did I ever hear him make remarks that could be considered controversial while I sat in church? Yes. Did I strongly disagree with many of his political views? Absolutely - just as I'm sure many of you have heard remarks from your pastors, priests, or rabbis with which you strongly disagreed.

But the remarks that have caused this recent firestorm weren't simply controversial. They weren't simply a religious leader's effort to speak out against perceived injustice. Instead, they expressed a profoundly distorted view of this country - a view that sees white racism as endemic, and that elevates what is wrong with America above all that we know is right with America; a view that sees the conflicts in the Middle East as rooted primarily in the actions of stalwart allies like Israel, instead of emanating from the perverse and hateful ideologies of radical Islam.

As such, Reverend Wright's comments were not only wrong but divisive, divisive at a time when we need unity; racially charged at a time when we need to come together to solve a set of monumental problems - two wars, a terrorist threat, a falling economy, a chronic health care crisis and potentially devastating climate change; problems that are neither black or white or Latino or Asian, but rather problems that confront us all.

Given my background, my politics, and my professed values and ideals, there will no doubt be those for whom my statements of condemnation are not enough. Why associate myself with Reverend Wright in the first place, they may ask? Why not join another church? And I confess that if all that I knew of Reverend Wright were the snippets of those sermons that have run in an endless loop on the television and You Tube, or if Trinity United Church of Christ conformed to the caricatures being peddled by some commentators, there is no doubt that I would react in much the same way.

But the truth is, that isn't all that I know of the man. The man I met more than twenty years ago is a man who helped introduce me to my Christian faith, a man who spoke to me about our obligations to love one another; to care for the sick and lift up the poor. He is a man who served his country as a U.S. Marine; who has studied and lectured at some of the finest universities and seminaries in the country, and who for over thirty years led a church that serves the community by doing God's work here on Earth - by housing the homeless, ministering to the needy, providing day care services and scholarships and prison ministries, and reaching out to those suffering from HIV/AIDS.

In my first book, Dreams From My Father, I described the experience of my first service at Trinity:
"People began to shout, to rise from their seats and clap and cry out, a forceful wind carrying the reverend's voice up into the rafters....And in that single note - hope! - I heard something else; at the foot of that cross, inside the thousands of churches across the city, I imagined the stories of ordinary black people merging with the stories of David and Goliath, Moses and Pharaoh, the Christians in the lion's den, Ezekiel's field of dry bones. Those stories - of survival, and freedom, and hope - became our story, my story; the blood that had spilled was our blood, the tears our tears; until this black church, on this bright day, seemed once more a vessel carrying the story of a people into future generations and into a larger world. Our trials and triumphs became at once unique and universal, black and more than black; in chronicling our journey, the stories and songs gave us a means to reclaim memories that we didn't need to feel shame about...memories that all people might study and cherish - and with which we could start to rebuild."

That has been my experience at Trinity. Like other predominantly black churches across the country, Trinity embodies the black community in its entirety - the doctor and the welfare mom, the model student and the former gang-banger. Like other black churches, Trinity's services are full of raucous laughter and sometimes bawdy humor. They are full of dancing, clapping, screaming and shouting that may seem jarring to the untrained ear. The church contains in full the kindness and cruelty, the fierce intelligence and the shocking ignorance, the struggles and successes, the love and yes, the bitterness and bias that make up the black experience in America.

And this helps explain, perhaps, my relationship with Reverend Wright. As imperfect as he may be, he has been like family to me. He strengthened my faith, officiated my wedding, and baptized my children. Not once in my conversations with him have I heard him talk about any ethnic group in derogatory terms, or treat whites with whom he interacted with anything but courtesy and respect. He contains within him the contradictions - the good and the bad - of the community that he has served diligently for so many years.

I can no more disown him than I can disown the black community. I can no more disown him than I can my white grandmother - a woman who helped raise me, a woman who sacrificed again and again for me, a woman who loves me as much as she loves anything in this world, but a woman who once confessed her fear of black men who passed by her on the street, and who on more than one occasion has uttered racial or ethnic stereotypes that made me cringe.

These people are a part of me. And they are a part of America, this country that I love.

Some will see this as an attempt to justify or excuse comments that are simply inexcusable. I can assure you it is not. I suppose the politically safe thing would be to move on from this episode and just hope that it fades into the woodwork. We can dismiss Reverend Wright as a crank or a demagogue, just as some have dismissed Geraldine Ferraro, in the aftermath of her recent statements, as harboring some deep-seated racial bias.

But race is an issue that I believe this nation cannot afford to ignore right now. We would be making the same mistake that Reverend Wright made in his offending sermons about America - to simplify and stereotype and amplify the negative to the point that it distorts reality.

The fact is that the comments that have been made and the issues that have surfaced over the last few weeks reflect the complexities of race in this country that we've never really worked through - a part of our union that we have yet to perfect. And if we walk away now, if we simply retreat into our respective corners, we will never be able to come together and solve challenges like health care, or education, or the need to find good jobs for every American.

Understanding this reality requires a reminder of how we arrived at this point. As William Faulkner once wrote, "The past isn't dead and buried. In fact, it isn't even past." We do not need to recite here the history of racial injustice in this country. But we do need to remind ourselves that so many of the disparities that exist in the African-American community today can be directly traced to inequalities passed on from an earlier generation that suffered under the brutal legacy of slavery and Jim Crow.

Segregated schools were, and are, inferior schools; we still haven't fixed them, fifty years after Brown v. Board of Education, and the inferior education they provided, then and now, helps explain the pervasive achievement gap between today's black and white students.

Legalized discrimination - where blacks were prevented, often through violence, from owning property, or loans were not granted to African-American business owners, or black homeowners could not access FHA mortgages, or blacks were excluded from unions, or the police force, or fire departments - meant that black families could not amass any meaningful wealth to bequeath to future generations. That history helps explain the wealth and income gap between black and white, and the concentrated pockets of poverty that persists in so many of today's urban and rural communities.

A lack of economic opportunity among black men, and the shame and frustration that came from not being able to provide for one's family, contributed to the erosion of black families - a problem that welfare policies for many years may have worsened. And the lack of basic services in so many urban black neighborhoods - parks for kids to play in, police walking the beat, regular garbage pick-up and building code enforcement - all helped create a cycle of violence, blight and neglect that continue to haunt us.

This is the reality in which Reverend Wright and other African-Americans of his generation grew up. They came of age in the late fifties and early sixties, a time when segregation was still the law of the land and opportunity was systematically constricted. What's remarkable is not how many failed in the face of discrimination, but rather how many men and women overcame the odds; how many were able to make a way out of no way for those like me who would come after them.

But for all those who scratched and clawed their way to get a piece of the American Dream, there were many who didn't make it - those who were ultimately defeated, in one way or another, by discrimination. That legacy of defeat was passed on to future generations - those young men and increasingly young women who we see standing on street corners or languishing in our prisons, without hope or prospects for the future. Even for those blacks who did make it, questions of race, and racism, continue to define their worldview in fundamental ways. For the men and women of Reverend Wright's generation, the memories of humiliation and doubt and fear have not gone away; nor has the anger and the bitterness of those years. That anger may not get expressed in public, in front of white co-workers or white friends. But it does find voice in the barbershop or around the kitchen table. At times, that anger is exploited by politicians, to gin up votes along racial lines, or to make up for a politician's own failings.

And occasionally it finds voice in the church on Sunday morning, in the pulpit and in the pews. The fact that so many people are surprised to hear that anger in some of Reverend Wright's sermons simply reminds us of the old truism that the most segregated hour in American life occurs on Sunday morning. That anger is not always productive; indeed, all too often it distracts attention from solving real problems; it keeps us from squarely facing our own complicity in our condition, and prevents the African-American community from forging the alliances it needs to bring about real change. But the anger is real; it is powerful; and to simply wish it away, to condemn it without understanding its roots, only serves to widen the chasm of misunderstanding that exists between the races.

In fact, a similar anger exists within segments of the white community. Most working- and middle-class white Americans don't feel that they have been particularly privileged by their race. Their experience is the immigrant experience - as far as they're concerned, no one's handed them anything, they've built it from scratch. They've worked hard all their lives, many times only to see their jobs shipped overseas or their pension dumped after a lifetime of labor. They are anxious about their futures, and feel their dreams slipping away; in an era of stagnant wages and global competition, opportunity comes to be seen as a zero sum game, in which your dreams come at my expense. So when they are told to bus their children to a school across town; when they hear that an African American is getting an advantage in landing a good job or a spot in a good college because of an injustice that they themselves never committed; when they're told that their fears about crime in urban neighborhoods are somehow prejudiced, resentment builds over time.

Like the anger within the black community, these resentments aren't always expressed in polite company. But they have helped shape the political landscape for at least a generation. Anger over welfare and affirmative action helped forge the Reagan Coalition. Politicians routinely exploited fears of crime for their own electoral ends. Talk show hosts and conservative commentators built entire careers unmasking bogus claims of racism while dismissing legitimate discussions of racial injustice and inequality as mere political correctness or reverse racism.

Just as black anger often proved counterproductive, so have these white resentments distracted attention from the real culprits of the middle class squeeze - a corporate culture rife with inside dealing, questionable accounting practices, and short-term greed; a Washington dominated by lobbyists and special interests; economic policies that favor the few over the many. And yet, to wish away the resentments of white Americans, to label them as misguided or even racist, without recognizing they are grounded in legitimate concerns - this too widens the racial divide, and blocks the path to understanding.

This is where we are right now. It's a racial stalemate we've been stuck in for years. Contrary to the claims of some of my critics, black and white, I have never been so naïve as to believe that we can get beyond our racial divisions in a single election cycle, or with a single candidacy - particularly a candidacy as imperfect as my own.

But I have asserted a firm conviction - a conviction rooted in my faith in God and my faith in the American people - that working together we can move beyond some of our old racial wounds, and that in fact we have no choice is we are to continue on the path of a more perfect union.

For the African-American community, that path means embracing the burdens of our past without becoming victims of our past. It means continuing to insist on a full measure of justice in every aspect of American life. But it also means binding our particular grievances - for better health care, and better schools, and better jobs - to the larger aspirations of all Americans -- the white woman struggling to break the glass ceiling, the white man whose been laid off, the immigrant trying to feed his family. And it means taking full responsibility for own lives - by demanding more from our fathers, and spending more time with our children, and reading to them, and teaching them that while they may face challenges and discrimination in their own lives, they must never succumb to despair or cynicism; they must always believe that they can write their own destiny.
Ironically, this quintessentially American - and yes, conservative - notion of self-help found frequent expression in Reverend Wright's sermons. But what my former pastor too often failed to understand is that embarking on a program of self-help also requires a belief that society can change.

The profound mistake of Reverend Wright's sermons is not that he spoke about racism in our society. It's that he spoke as if our society was static; as if no progress has been made; as if this country - a country that has made it possible for one of his own members to run for the highest office in the land and build a coalition of white and black; Latino and Asian, rich and poor, young and old -- is still irrevocably bound to a tragic past. But what we know -- what we have seen - is that America can change. That is true genius of this nation. What we have already achieved gives us hope - the audacity to hope - for what we can and must achieve tomorrow.

In the white community, the path to a more perfect union means acknowledging that what ails the African-American community does not just exist in the minds of black people; that the legacy of discrimination - and current incidents of discrimination, while less overt than in the past - are real and must be addressed. Not just with words, but with deeds - by investing in our schools and our communities; by enforcing our civil rights laws and ensuring fairness in our criminal justice system; by providing this generation with ladders of opportunity that were unavailable for previous generations. It requires all Americans to realize that your dreams do not have to come at the expense of my dreams; that investing in the health, welfare, and education of black and brown and white children will ultimately help all of America prosper.

In the end, then, what is called for is nothing more, and nothing less, than what all the world's great religions demand - that we do unto others as we would have them do unto us. Let us be our brother's keeper, Scripture tells us. Let us be our sister's keeper. Let us find that common stake we all have in one another, and let our politics reflect that spirit as well.

For we have a choice in this country. We can accept a politics that breeds division, and conflict, and cynicism. We can tackle race only as spectacle - as we did in the OJ trial - or in the wake of tragedy, as we did in the aftermath of Katrina - or as fodder for the nightly news. We can play Reverend Wright's sermons on every channel, every day and talk about them from now until the election, and make the only question in this campaign whether or not the American people think that I somehow believe or sympathize with his most offensive words. We can pounce on some gaffe by a Hillary supporter as evidence that she's playing the race card, or we can speculate on whether white men will all flock to John McCain in the general election regardless of his policies.

We can do that.

But if we do, I can tell you that in the next election, we'll be talking about some other distraction. And then another one. And then another one. And nothing will change.

That is one option. Or, at this moment, in this election, we can come together and say, "Not this time." This time we want to talk about the crumbling schools that are stealing the future of black children and white children and Asian children and Hispanic children and Native American children. This time we want to reject the cynicism that tells us that these kids can't learn; that those kids who don't look like us are somebody else's problem. The children of America are not those kids, they are our kids, and we will not let them fall behind in a 21st century economy. Not this time.

This time we want to talk about how the lines in the Emergency Room are filled with whites and blacks and Hispanics who do not have health care; who don't have the power on their own to overcome the special interests in Washington, but who can take them on if we do it together.

This time we want to talk about the shuttered mills that once provided a decent life for men and women of every race, and the homes for sale that once belonged to Americans from every religion, every region, every walk of life. This time we want to talk about the fact that the real problem is not that someone who doesn't look like you might take your job; it's that the corporation you work for will ship it overseas for nothing more than a profit.

This time we want to talk about the men and women of every color and creed who serve together, and fight together, and bleed together under the same proud flag. We want to talk about how to bring them home from a war that never should've been authorized and never should've been waged, and we want to talk about how we'll show our patriotism by caring for them, and their families, and giving them the benefits they have earned.

I would not be running for President if I didn't believe with all my heart that this is what the vast majority of Americans want for this country. This union may never be perfect, but generation after generation has shown that it can always be perfected. And today, whenever I find myself feeling doubtful or cynical about this possibility, what gives me the most hope is the next generation - the young people whose attitudes and beliefs and openness to change have already made history in this election.
There is one story in particularly that I'd like to leave you with today - a story I told when I had the great honor of speaking on Dr. King's birthday at his home church, Ebenezer Baptist, in Atlanta.

There is a young, twenty-three year old white woman named Ashley Baia who organized for our campaign in Florence, South Carolina. She had been working to organize a mostly African-American community since the beginning of this campaign, and one day she was at a roundtable discussion where everyone went around telling their story and why they were there.
And Ashley said that when she was nine years old, her mother got cancer. And because she had to miss days of work, she was let go and lost her health care. They had to file for bankruptcy, and that's when Ashley decided that she had to do something to help her mom.

She knew that food was one of their most expensive costs, and so Ashley convinced her mother that what she really liked and really wanted to eat more than anything else was mustard and relish sandwiches. Because that was the cheapest way to eat.
She did this for a year until her mom got better, and she told everyone at the roundtable that the reason she joined our campaign was so that she could help the millions of other children in the country who want and need to help their parents too.

Now Ashley might have made a different choice. Perhaps somebody told her along the way that the source of her mother's problems were blacks who were on welfare and too lazy to work, or Hispanics who were coming into the country illegally. But she didn't. She sought out allies in her fight against injustice.

Anyway, Ashley finishes her story and then goes around the room and asks everyone else why they're supporting the campaign. They all have different stories and reasons. Many bring up a specific issue. And finally they come to this elderly black man who's been sitting there quietly the entire time. And Ashley asks him why he's there. And he does not bring up a specific issue. He does not say health care or the economy. He does not say education or the war. He does not say that he was there because of Barack Obama. He simply says to everyone in the room, "I am here because of Ashley."

"I'm here because of Ashley." By itself, that single moment of recognition between that young white girl and that old black man is not enough. It is not enough to give health care to the sick, or jobs to the jobless, or education to our children. But it is where we start. It is where our union grows stronger. And as so many generations have come to realize over the course of the two-hundred and twenty one years since a band of patriots signed that document in Philadelphia, that is where the perfection begins.

On Hiatus

For the first time in many years, I'm heading for an "off the grid" vacation. Not only will voice and data networks be either unavailable or prohibitively expensive where I'm going, my computer will be in the shop to have some necessary maintenance performed.

Expect a return of the Feast around St. Patrick's Day.

The Rebranding of America

One of my primary reasons for supporting Barack Obama is that I believe his election would do more to heal the wounds in America's global image than anything else we ca do right now. To show that world that even after the clear folly of re-electing W (the world might have forgiven us for voting for him once, but twice?), we finally have learned our lesson. If we can elect a mixed race man named Barack Hussein Obama, we go a long way toward showing the world that we can be a true global citizen and use our immense power for leadership, not for bullying.

An article in Salon says something similar. Money quote: "In Europe, and in Asia, Latin America and Africa as well, the perception is that an Obama presidency represents the potential for catharsis after nearly a decade of frustration with the U.S. "Our brand has been hammered recently, but beneath the anger, there's this underlying hope among people around the world that we can do better," says Patricia Martin. "And we can. We reinvent ourselves. It's what we're known for: We've had more comebacks than Frank Sinatra. I think that's why you have people in every country eating up every little turn in this election's story. This election, the whole world is watching."

Justices, are you watching?

On Tuesday, the Justices of the California Supreme Court will hear arguments in the case that will determine if denying same-sex couples equal civil marriage rights violates the equal protection clause of the state constitution.

When faced with a similar case, the New Jersey Supreme Court ruled there had to be equality in terms of unions, but left it up to the legislature to decide whether it would be called "marriage" or something else. Given the current political climate, what do you suppose they chose? Right. Only in Massachusetts, where the Supreme Court there mandated that only marriage would do, has a state instituted full marriage rights for same-sex couples. Things seem to be going fine in the Bay State. Thousands have been performed and locusts, floods or other plagues have yet to befall the commonwealth.

Things are not quite the same in New Jersey. It seems trying to create a separate but equal institution is turning out less well than many had hoped. Apparently, the word "marriage" has a lot more heft behind it than the legislators thought it might.

Last year in this space I posted a bit stating that the California Supreme Court was asking the lawyers in the same-sex marriage case here to chime in on just how important the word "marriage" is to equality.

From the New Jersey experience, the answer seems clear: very. At least if we want equality now. If the state wants to wait a while longer before truly delivering equal protection under the law, though (and to give themselves some political cover), they might weasel out here, too.

Let's hope for the best.

Sleeping with Frank

You may not get to lay down your head in Fallingwater, but if you've ever dreamed of living in a Frank Lloyd Wright house, here is your chance.

The Hubris of Huckabee and His Ilk

As Mike Huckabee slips further out of touch (but a little deeper into the hearts of Christianists around the country), I got to thinking about the source of his appeal -- by which I mean the rhetoric upon which he calls in an attempt to persuade of his calling. His pitch, in other words, not his likeability -- which, I have to say, seems pretty solid.

The problem with Huck and his followers is their insistence that they have found an Eternal Truth. Transformative and unchanging. While I say bully for them if they feel this way, but please keep your nose out of my opinion of what constitutes Eternal Truth.

Just because you choose to believe something is true doesn't make it true. Just because a lot of other people are convinced something is true doesn't make it true. The Muslims have no tangible evidence of Allah's existence, nor do the Jews have any proof that Yahweh really is G*d. Christians have the exact same amount of evidence for God's existence as the folks who offer the Flying Spaghetti Monster as the One and True God.

You are welcome to convince yourself God exists. You are welcome to try and convince others. But when it comes to how we live in the United States as a civil society, let's keep our discourse backed up by things which virtually all of us can agree on. Simple stuff like the speed of light, the effects of gravity or what happens when you mix vinegar and baking soda. It's something everyone can see.

But when hard-core Christianists get to the end of their rational arguments, and find them lacking, they call in an invisible magical being as their ace in the hole. As the Church Lady used to say, "how conveeeeenient."

The trouble really begins when another group (say, just for giggles, Al Qaeda) calls on their invisible magical being to backup THEIR argument when rational thought and scientific facts don't support whatever point they are trying to make.

The absolute hubris of it -- to think that what YOU believe is an Eternal Truth. Worse, to then try to use the power you have obtained by duping others into believing an opinion is hard fact.

Rrazz Room Opens

I still hate the name, but San Francisco's newest night club/cabaret is off to a good start. After delaying opening for many weeks, the scene that used to be at The Empire Plush Room at the York Hotel has moved downtown to the Nikko Hotel, with the swank level raised considerably.

I really loved the Plush Room, in part because it has a history (it used to be a speakeasy during Prohibition), and in part because it was a little over a block from the first place I lived in San Francisco. But I could get used to the Rrazz Room -- though probably not to its name.

The two Rs of Rrazz -- Robert and Rory -- have done an excellent job building a new cabaret. It's not stunning or especially noteworthy in a design sense, but it's elegant without being gaudy, unobtrusive without being bland. The sightlines seem good, and the sound was likewise -- but I would think they ought to install some permanent speakers. The loudspeakers they had floor-mounted put quite a few seats out of commission. The back wall is a wall of glass, sort of like Jazz at Lincoln Center, the venue in the Time-Warner Building in New York where Ellen does her show from time to time. If only the Rrazz Room looked out on Central Park and midtown Manhattan instead of the rather pedestrian Hilton Hotel across the street. Then we'd really have something.

Tonight's show was Paula West. I'd never heard her sing. She can. (And so can her backup singers, three sweet-voiced black women who really light up stage left. Best backup trio I've heard in a LONG time.) Paula interprets a range of songs, including great versions of "Something Good" from the movie of "The Sound of Music," "Jambalaya" and "You Can't Always Get What You Want."

It's a great show -- though someone ought to tell the band there is a reason "bass solo" is the punchline of a joke. (The setup for which is about explorers and jungle drums going on too long.) Paula's four-piece combo does a number prior to Paula coming onstage, and it runs on a tad. I enjoyed hearing them, but the top of the show is not the place for extensive soloing. Give the pianist and the guitarist a few bars to play with -- but save any bass and drum soloing for a little later in the show (if at all), after we've warmed up to you.

All in all, though, a great show in a great room. Visit soon.

A Prince Among Soldiers

Following a news leak, the apparently secret deployment of Britain's Prince Harry (it had been kept under wraps by the UK media, but Matt Drudge broke the embargo) is now out in the public eye. The prince (whose family nickname is "Ginger," by the way -- but for his red hair and freckled complexion, not due to any resemblance to Tina Louise) has been serving as a tactical air controller, but also goes out on foot patrols.

My question is, if the Brits can send their royal sons into harm's way, why aren't the Bush girls serving? Why doesn't Chelsea Clinton at least hook up with the Peace Corps? Why don't a few of Mitt Romney's boys enlist? (Romney's previous excuse that they were "serving the country" by helping him get elected President is now moot since he's bowed out of the race.)

Rationally thinking...

...I should probably be doing something else right now. Instead, I'm post this link to a book review in the current New Yorker about a new tome by a couple of economists discussing how people don't always make decisions in their best interest, even if the math is pretty clear. This was no surprise to. After all, it was the heartland that elected (and re-elected!) George W. Bush, and he has certainly never had their best interests in mind.

For Your Dolls*

*as in "Valley of the..."

Another wild find on etsy.com. Looks like something Keith Richards or Amy Winehouse might carry: a pillbox inlaid with moss green stingray leather. I dig it so much I almost want to develop an addiction, too.

Freeheld

It won the Oscar last night. Now it just needs to be released on DVD. Like "Sicko," another documentary that makes me mad. It is amazing to me how much injustice we put up with in this country.

Anybody home?

I know, I've been away, possums. It's been almost a week since you've had anything new from me and I just couldn't let you wait any longer.

Unfortunately, I don't have anything terribly interesting to say. (You cynics can keep your "so what else is new?" to yourselves, thanks very much.) However, in keeping with the masthead which promises comments on "politics, theater, culture, golf," I'll give you a short something on all four.

Politics: I could care less if John McCain played around with a lobbyist. People who aspire to be the most powerful person in the world have a lot on their shoulders. If they need a bit on the side, I say fine. That's their business. I don't want him as president (but mainly because of what it would mean for the Supreme Court), but what he does for giggles is his business. As long as it helps him lead better.

Theater: Last show I saw was "Mormon American Princess." A one-man show by Steven Fales, who previously did "Confessions of a Mormon Boy. That was interesting. This, on the other hand, was awful, on so many levels. Unimaginative, repetitive, self-absorbed (you're supposed to care about the AUDIENCE, Steven, not yourself -- that's what makes a true performer, they GIVE of themselves) and emotionally hollow.

That opening number was exceptionally bad. All he did was plug the word "Mormon" into 40 different Broadway tunes: "Oh What a Beautiful Mormon," "Everything's Coming Up Mormon," "Some Enchanted Mormon." It was mind-numbingly awful. And that "rap" number he attempted was pathetic. And a capella, no less. He could at least have tried a drum machine or played a tape of a rhythm track.

The show needs MAJOR help. First, he needs a writer. Then a director. And they better both be REALLY good if they want to salvage anything from this mess.

Culture: Have you used the new soap dispensers in public restrooms that deliver pre-suds soap? I hate them. I like the sense of satisfaction that comes from working up a lather. Our culture is simply trying to do too much for us.

Golf: Tiger. Who else? I wanted to watch the Accenture Match Play Championship, but I've been outrageously busy the past few days (and will be over the weekend) so I couldn't/can't -- but from what I read, he's been his usual amazing self.

Make this last. Can't say when I'll be back.

Can We Be Rational?

Click here to read an interesting review in Salon of a new work by Susan Jacoby, "The American Age of Unreason." The book examines how and why Americans have fallen prey to irrationality -- citing, for instance, the fact that a majority of Americans believe creationism should be given equal weight in education as evolution as a means of explaining how life came to be.

Money quote from the review: "The chief manifestations of this newly virulent irrationality are the rise of fundamentalist religion and the flourishing of junk science and other forms of what Jacoby calls "junk thought." The mentally enfeebled American public can now be easily manipulated by flimsy symbolism, whether it's George W. Bush's bumbling, accented speaking style (labeling him as a "regular guy" despite his highly privileged background) or the successful campaign by right-wing ideologues to smear liberals as snooty "elites." Unable to grasp even the basic principles of statistics or the scientific method, Americans gullibly buy into a cornucopia of bogus notions, from recovered memory syndrome to intelligent design to the anti-vaccination movement."

What Abu Gharaib Hath Wrought

You may have seen the video. You may have heard the story.

If you haven't, the brief story is that sheriff's officers at a Florida county jail wanted to search a man confined to a wheelchair and didn't believe he could stand on his own. Not believing the man was actually confined to his chair, the deputy unceremoniously dumped the man onto the floor.

Setting aside for a moment that the victim is described as a "quadriplegic" even though he can use his arms and is seen in the video moving his legs -- there are other conditions that can confine someone to a wheelchair that don't involve complete paralysis, it seems to me this is a further symptom of the poisonous effects of torture being approved at the highest levels of our government. If it's OK to torture a terrorist, why isn't it OK to torture a rapist? And if a rapist, why not a thief?

This is how you get to a sheriff's deputy abusing a man accused of a traffic violation.

2000 Redux

OK, here's what's keeping me awake at night. Obama continues his momentum, and wins a majority of delegates, but not enough to avoid a brokered convention, so the super delegates come into play. (As you may or may not know, "super delegates" are political insiders. Wikipedia defines them as "Superdelegates to the 2008 Democratic National Convention include all Democratic members of the United States Congress, Democratic governors, various additional elected officials, members of the Democratic National Committee, as well as "all former Democratic Presidents, all former Democratic Vice Presidents, all former Democratic Leaders of the U.S. Senate, all former Democratic Speakers of the U.S. House of Representatives and Democratic Minority Leaders, as applicable, and all former Chairs of the Democratic National Committee."

This year they will compose about 20% of the delegate total, so they can make a big difference. They can also vote, exactly how they want, regardless of what the popular vote said. Given their insider status, they could easily go for Hillary and give her the nomination, even if a majority of Democrats want Obama to be the candidate.

Power brokers -- not the people -- chose the president in 2000. Will they do it to us again in 2008? If so, where does that leave American democracy?

Gotta Love the Middle East

Arrested in Dubai for possession of marijuana. How much? A speck, invisible to the naked eye. Found on the bottom of his shoe. But, he was a Rastafarian, so he got searched a little more carefully than most, I would imagine.

Sorry -- can I have that again?

John McCain's in the address to his supporters, moments ago:

"I am, as is often reported, a little superstitious. So I don't want to make any exaggerated predictions -- and there's still a long road ahead -- however, I think it's fair to say that we might have come a little bit closer to the day when mothers in Arizona MIGHT be able to tell their children that someday they could grow up to be President of the United States!"

Going out on a limb there, are ya, John? What do you suppose is stopping them from being able to do that today?

Keep Watching Huckabee

I'm telling you, Mike Huckabee has traction. And it scares me. He won't win the nomination, but they might make him VP candidate. And McCain could win. And he's 71. He could be taken out by some radical Christianist to put a true evangelical into the Oval Office.

Can you imagine the Supreme Court appointments President Huckabee would make?

Graphic Recycling

While watching a documentary about the typeface Helvetica (I know, what a geek), I was introduced -- but not formally -- to a company called Freitag that creates messenger bags, tote bags (and certain other items) with recycled tarpaulins used to cover open-sided trucks (far more common in Europe than here). The tarps are washed in industrial machines, then the pieces of the bag are cut, with an eye toward using the color and graphic elements on the tarp to create a good-looking bag -- with a one of a kind design.

Go check them out. The web site needs some work, but there's an interesting design your own bag feature that allows you to place the pattern templates over images of the different truck tarpaulins they currently have in stock.

My Hillary Problem

It's simple. She seems manufactured, not genuine. I felt it at least twice in tonight's debate. Both times, she delivered a line that was sharp and pointed and hit a good note (example -- "It did take a Clinton to clean up after the first Bush, and I think it might take another one to clean up after the second Bush"). But then she sits back smugly with a smile on her face that says -- to me -- "nailed that line. Even better than in rehearsal."

A Savage Visit to South Carolina

"By the time they get to me, they'll be out of rocks."

A great segment from The Stranger's Dan Savage.

The Next Secretary of State (and it's not Joe Biden)

Here's a thought. It's a bit West Wing-y, but here goes: say Barack Hussein Obama wins the Democratic nomination, is subsequently elected President, and immediately nominates for Secretary of State...John McCain.

The election of Obama says, "We're sorry - we treated you with diffidence and disrespect and killed many, many more of you than was, in hindsight, actually necessary. We can't ever truly make up for what the colonial powers did in taking and/or carving up your land, but we are sorry for the mistakes we've made and wanted you to know it's not because your skin is darker than ours."

The appointment of McCain says to the world, "But just in case you might be interpreting this recognition of error as weakness of any sort, I bring with me...our finest soldier. He is my trusted friend and will be my envoy to you in many of our future dealings."

Two men who were once fierce rivals presenting themselves as staunch allies will show the world what it is that makes America great -- and still the strongest nation on Earth. Let Obama and McCain walk into Ahmadinejad's office -- or Pervaiz Musharraf's office or Kim Jong-il's -- side by side and see what they can make happen.

It Couldn't Come Fast Enough

Andrew Sullivan reminds us of this bit of important good news: "...a McCain nomination means one thing for sure. The era of legal, authorized torture in America is coming to a close. This is a critical moment. And it is more than fitting that a man who endured torture at the hands of America's enemies should now be picked to restore American honor after the disgrace of Bush-Cheney-Rumsfeld."

Freaky, Part Three

From video artist (and Speigel catalog heir) Spike Jonze.

UPDATE: The video was pulled from YouTube, but you can still see it here.

Speaking of Bowie

More mash-up art from the web. Check out more like this at sleeveface.com.

My Quandry

The absentee ballot sits on what I call "the wolf table," a small, multi-colored, folk-arty cabinet that sits at the top of my stairs and collects keys and cell phones and loose change and assorted bits of memorabilia. It's called the wolf table because on the cabinet door is a painted metal animal that is more likely a coyote. Why it ended up being called the wolf table is lost to memory.

But fauna is not the point here. The ballot is the point. How to fill it out is the point. Specifically, which Democratic presidential candidate will get my check mark. Since Joe Biden has left the race, the person I felt was most qualified to lead the country is no longer an option. John Edwards can't win, it seems (and I never really trusted him), which leaves me choosing between Barack and Hillary.

I loved Bill Clinton. Loved having a very smart man at the helm. Loved having a savvy politician guiding his way through the murk of Washington. Even though Bill isn't the candidate, I -- like so many others -- think a vote for Hillary is also a vote for Bill. What better counselor could a first-time president have than a successful two-term president. Not only that, one you can consult even when you're in the shower or flossing your teeth.

But I don't like Hillary. I don't like the campaign she is running. And I don't like the way she and Bill dumped gay people overboard after we rowed like crazy to help bring them into port. They brought us "don't ask, don't tell," and he happily signed the odious "Defense of Marriage" Act.

That leaves me with Barack. He inspires me. He talks about the same sort of unifying politics I spoke of when I began this blog. Every time he's been given an opportunity to dip into partisanship, he seems to have taken the high road. I like what he has to say about a president's duty to inspire the country, to lift us all up and motivate us to come together to make our nation greater.

My worry is whether he has the experience to actually make his vision real. More important, my worry is whether he is too liberal from an economic point of view.

As my mom says, "I just don't like any of them."

That said, I think that ballot on the wolf table is probably going to get a mark next to Barack Obama's name. I'd rather have someone who inspires me that someone who frightens me. And I love the message we send to the world if we elect a man named Barack Hussein Obama to our highest office. That, I think, will do more to heal the wounds Bush has created over the past 7+ years than anything else I can think of. (Except maybe sending W himself to reconstruct Iraq with his own hands -- and all the money he and his cronies have stolen from the American people.

Why the Internet was Invented, Part 3

Campaigning, David Bowie style.

Virtual Sommelier

Take a look at this. It's a story about new display technology being used by a high-end restaurant in New York as a way of more engagingly presenting a wine list.

Have a seat at the wine bar at Adour, and the list of available wines is projected onto the bar from above and can be searched and manipulated through intuitive gestures. You can see wines by variety, country, price, size of bottle -- and the system even delivers detailed tasting notes. The technology is from a small company called Potion Design, founded by two MIT Media Lab grads.

Look for a fuller report after my trip in April.

A Battle is Engaged

Recently, YouTube agreed to remove a Scientology video featuring Tom Cruise. Scientology claimed copyright within a few hours, but some blogs have gotten hold of it and reposted it. Here is one. (When Cruise refers to "KSW," that apparently means "Keep Scientology Working," which is a doctrine of strict adherence to the infallibility of L. Ron Hubbard. His reference to "SP" is to "Suppressed Persons," Scientology's term for the worst in humanity -- a specific personality type filled with negative energy which is used to suppress people in his/her vicinity. Hitler was an SP, the church claims. More here if you are interested.)

In protest of this move, a group of hackers that call themselves Anonymous posted the video below, in which they declare war on Scientology in rather creepy -- but disarmingly earnest -- language, read by Stephen Hawking. (Not really, but you'll hear what I mean.)



It's like something from a movie. Except Anonymous did manage to bring down Scientology's web site for a time. According to CNET, "In recent days, local chapter sites for the Church of Scientology have been defaced, and in some cases denial of service attacks have also prevented access to the same sites. Real-world attacks have included fax-spamming those same offices."

So it's war.

It's cute, but...

I realize this has a certain ironic quality -- it's a porcelain coffee cup with a silicone lid, designed to mimic the disposable cardboard cups commonly used for takeaway coffee. I'm just not certain why you'd want a very pedestrian form factor in a material that requires care that is unsuited for the planned use. I guess if you want to be snarky about your au lait -- "Look - it LOOKS like I'm being environmentally irresponsible, but actually my choice of drinking vessel is superior to yours" -- it works. But not so much for me.

Freaky, Part Two

A tiny tornado. Very tiny.

(On the tarmac at SFO.)

Freaky

Big oranges. Really big.

The Long Glide Down

When I was in college, my roommate John -- who was a sweet, talented guy, but more than a little bit neurotic -- used to make the most amazing paper airplanes. He had one design that, when launched from one railing inside the atrium of the fine arts building, could actually gain altitude -- if it happened to be a summer day and someone happened to open the door, letting in a zephyr of warm air. We took another of his planes (which we had outfitted with bottle rockets for jet assist) to the new 10-story tower being constructed on campus -- which led to a crazy adventure I know some of you have heard about, but the rest of you will have to wait for another day. Maybe.

But John and I never envisioned anything like this.

D-Day (on a budget)

This video chronicles how a small crew, minimal budget, little time, simple video tools and only three actors did a pretty good job of recreating the D-Day invasion at Omaha Beach.

What once was a trickle...

...is now a relative torrent.

This is Miller Creek, just a few hundred yards from the house, after three days of rain.

I Wish I Wrote Better Headlines

...because I really think etsy.com deserves better. It's absolutely amazing. It's an online marketplace where people can buy and sell handmade crafts. Knitting, photography, woodwork, leatherwork, pottery, jewelry...if it's a craft, they have it.

There is a fair amount of dreck, but there is also a fair amount of imaginative, well-crafted, artistic stuff. Anyone can sell their stuff, but they seem to have some way of selling featured spaces and using browser feedback so better stuff seems to rise to the top.

There are lots of ways to search. You can search by color -- but not how you might think. On the color search page, as you drag your cursor over a field of dots, they expand and reveal their color. Click when you see a color you like and items in that exact color will appear.

But what's most amazing is imagining all these people making stuff instead of machines, and finding a way to show it to the world. Very heartening.

Must get back to exploring.

In the meantime, here are a few of the things I found that I liked best:

ONE
TWO
THREE
FOUR
FIVE

UPDATE: I'm back. Found another great feature: treasuries. User-curated lists of 12 things on Etsy. Only a few hundred allowed at a time and anyone can make one, so they are hard to get. But it's a great way to be exposed to different things.

Top Ten Theatrical Experiences of 2007

It was a big year. In 2007, I estimate I took in some 60-70 live theatrical events: musicals, plays, concerts, cabaret acts. Some was brilliant, some was beastly. Here, in alphabetical order, were the 10 best:

• AUGUST: OSAGE COUNTY (Imperial Theater, New York)
Funny, tragic, multivalent -- and rich with incredible lines. A new classic for the American theatre.

• BLACKBIRD (Manhattan Theater Club, New York)
Wonderful performances from Jeff Daniels and Alison Pill, on another amazing set from MTC, plus a compelling, complex story by David Harrower.

• THE COAST OF UTOPIA (Lincoln Center, New York)
Stretching this a bit, since I saw the first two installments of Stoppard's troika in December of 2006, but since I finished the series in 2007, I'm counting it anyway. Although I can see how some might be disappointed in this last installment (it's a bit clunkier than the first two), taken as a whole, the production of "The Coast of Utopia" trilogy is one of the most stunning works of theater I've ever seen.

• FROST/NIXON (Bernard Jacobs Theater, New York)
If it weren't for the fact that the names are so familiar as politicians, the title of Peter Morgan's play could have been mistaken for a boxing match-up: Frazier/Ali. Mayweather/De La Hoya. It wouldn't be far off target, either, for the conflict at the heart of "Frost/Nixon" felt very much like a face-off between two heavyweights. And it was an enthralling battle.

• GOODBYE YELLOW BRICK ROAD (New Conservatory Theatre Center, San Francisco)
There are theatrical experiences one has where the time you invest is repaid with interest: they persist in memory, and you recall them with pleasure, reliving the wonder or the laughter or the insight the performers gave you while you sat in the dark.

Connie Champagne’s 2007 effort, “Goodbye Yellow Brick Road,” in which she appeared as Judy Garland, was just such an experience, transporting you into a world where Judy Garland is alive, well and still completely in love with music and performing. This is Garland as if aging had been suspended, but time continued to roll on, and she discovered new songs she could make her own. One might not think of Queen’s “Bohemian Rhapsody” or Aerosmith’s “Dream On” fitting within the Garland oeuvre, they sound exactly like the sort of thing she ought to have done had she lived.

This may have been the most brilliant bit of theater I’d seen since “I Am My Own Wife.” For the entire evening, I felt as if Garland herself, still hungry for the stage, had managed to project her essence into Connie Champagne in order to get just another hour or two in the spotlight.

Of course in one sense, the truth of Garland lies in artifice: she gave the public all she had, but ultimately her stage persona was still a work of art, and it is this tension between genuineness and artifice that made “Goodbye Yellow Brick Road” so compelling to me. Champagne gave us a rare treat – a visit from a Judy Garland who would look at modern life and music in the way she might have had she been able to catch some real magic and stay 44 for ever.

• TIM HOCKENBERRY (The Plush Room, San Francisco)
His voice a cross between Joe Cocker and Randy Newman with a soupçon of Tom Waits, Tim Hockenberry has real presence. It is a voice that has gravitas -- without seeming to be overpowering. He doesn't load his performances up with aural fireworks, but he always seems to be singing the truth. And that, I think, is very tough to come by.

• JACK GOES BOATING (The Public Theatre, New York)
The dramatic version of a piece of Sourpatch Kids candy -- on your first bite you say "wow, what is this?," but as you chew you discover the sweetness at the core. The big draw was Philip Seymour Hoffman, but I was surprised by the excellence of the entire cast.

• LOS ANGELES (Flea Theater, New York)
Katherine Waterston (Sam's daughter) was a revelation in the role of Audrey, a young woman lost in the shark tank of LA. As portrayed by Ms. Waterston, Audrey was gentle, fierce, intelligent, foolish, needy, bossy, impetuous and passionate -- all delivered with tremendous skill and feeling.

• PETER AND JERRY (Second Stage Theatre, New York)
For two reasons: Dallas Roberts's staggeringly brilliant performance, and Edward Albee's intricate re-imagining of his first produced play, "The Zoo Story," by revealing new levels of detail via another one-act play, "Homelife." Closed much too soon.

• SWEENEY TODD (American Conservatory Theatre, San Francisco)
The production that finally turned me into a Stephen Sondheim fan. In John Doyle's brilliant pared-down staging (in which the nine-member cast is also the orchestra), I was transported into the grand guignol world of the penny-dreadful story of the Demon Barber of Fleet Street.

Looking forward to a great 2008!

Just Take It

This story highlights an interesting study that's just been published, showing that nearly half of doctors have at some time given patients a placebo as treatment. And often it helped.

Seems to me this ought to happen a bit more often. My sense is doctors often write a prescription just to shut up a patient who is complaining, even though they don't need medication. Perhaps more of this will reduce the amount of unnecessary use of antibiotics for conditions that don't respond to them.

"Peter and Jerry"

Wow.

If I wasn’t suffering so from a cold, I could go on and on about the amazing evening of theater that is Edward Albee’s “Peter and Jerry.” (Unfortunately, as I write these words, it is having its final performance at the Second Stage Theatre.)

Albee’s first produced play, “The Zoo Story” composes the second half of the evening. For the hour prior to intermission, Albee has written a new work designed to complement and set up the action that takes place in “The Zoo Story.”

Never having seen that previous work, I can’t say how I might have reacted to the new aspect of the work. In fact, I have the strong desire to step into a parallel universe where I can experience the night all over again, this time having first seen “The Zoo Story.” I must admit I felt a bit lost (and toyed with) during the first act. Peter (Bill Pullman) sits on a sofa in an Upper West Side apartment. His wife walks in. “We should talk,” she says. And they do. About nothing. About important things. About tragic things. About memories. About connection. About being alive. Being human.

But it’s not until the second act, when Peter has taken himself to Central Park to read on a bench and is confronted there by Jerry, a rather compelling (but obviously touched) semi-vagrant hustler who has a story he wants to tell to someone. And Peter is closest at hand.

For the next hour, Jerry entertains and harangues Peter, delving deeper into the latter’s psyche than any high-priced Manhattan therapist could ever do. The shocking and tragic denouement is still here, but with Albee’s new text, it has even more impact than I imagine “The Zoo Story” could ever have on its own.

A pity you won’t have the chance to see it, if for no other reason than to experience Dallas Robert’s absolutely staggering performance as Jerry. It is probably the single best individual performance I have seen on stage since Jefferson Mayes’s Tony-winning turn in “I Am My Own Wife.”

"Trumpery"

I shall be brief, mostly because the show has already closed. “Trumpery” is the story of a seminal moment in history: the publication of Darwin’s “On the Origin of Species,” in which he first presented his theory of evolution and natural selection – and thereby stirred up a hornet’s nest that buzzes still.

Michael Cristofer is stunning as the old man himself, as hesitant as his stammer to publish his theory until he receives an essay from a younger colleague who has stumbled upon the same conclusions about natural selection as the means of the transmutation of species. Darwin’s friends George Hooker and Thomas Huxley convince him that he must forgo reticence and publish his findings or risk losing his place in history.

Overall, the play is well-done: wonderfully-acted and staged (Santo Loquasto comes through once more with a lovely set), but a bit stodgily-directed. There are times when the play seems to spin its wheels.

"Cymbeline"

I wonder what the Bard himself would think, had it been him instead of me planted in the seventh row center of the Vivian Beaumont Theatre at Lincoln Center, watching this late romance of his being played out in its vast confines. Would he have loved the elements of spectacle enabled by the high fly spaces and hydraulics (not to mention budgets), or would he have felt something human and approachable was lost amid the amazing costumes sets and effects?

“Cymbeline” is one of Shakespeare’s least-produced plays, but it’s certainly not for lack of action. Love, betrayal, jealousy, intrigue – it’s all here. And though it’s beautifully-stage and acted with energy and intelligence (with special kudos to Martha Plimpton, John Pankow and Adam Dannheisser, less for the one-dimensional Phylicia Rashad), it left me feeling chilly and unsatisfied. (Though the glory of Shakespeare’s language still comes shining through.)

"November"

David Mamet’s latest, which takes place entirely within the Oval Office, is sort of a cross between his own “Wag The Dog” and “South Park,” resulting in an offspring that resembles a “Doonesbury”-like comic strip brought to life.

If you’re expecting Aaron Sorkin-like attempts at verisimilitude in recreating the inner workings of the halls of power, you’re on line for the wrong show. “November” is satirical farce, giving us a president of unprecedented venality and stupefying ignorance, combined with an unquenchable lust for power and money. With Nathan Lane as president Charles Smith, we get a glimpse of what the world might be like if crooked producer Max Bialystock were given the keys to the White House.

In lesser hands than Mamet’s, “November” could easily devolve into a cheap frat skit, taking potshots at easy political prey. But thanks to Mamet’s talents (he’s long been one of my favorite writers), “November” succeeds on two levels: it makes us laugh, and it makes us despair at the thought that the men and women who ascend to positions of power – though not nearly as funny as the characters here – are probably no less venal, and perhaps even more so.

The story takes place during the closing days of a presidential election. President Smith is way behind in the polls, and his party (he is never identified as either Republican of Democrat) has given up even trying to win. Smith is being encouraged to accept the coming defeat and slip off quietly into the sunset. His lawyer (Dylan Baker, showing brilliant comic chops) has to repeatedly remind Smith that the country hates him and wants him out of office as soon as possible. “Why?” Smith asks. “Because you fucked up everything you touched,” his henchman replies – to sustained applause from the audience at the Ethel Barrymore Theatre.

Unfortunately, Smith is so broke that his presidential library fund has only $4000, and he is advised that if he can’t win the election, he can at least sell a few pardons.

I won’t delve much deeper here, because Mamet is a great storyteller and there are several wonderful surprises in “November,” but I will tell you it involves the pardon of Thanksgiving turkeys, a lesbian speechwriter (a wonderful turn from Laurie Metcalf, best-known for her work on “Roseanne”), same-sex marriage, Indian casinos, rumors of Iranian missile strikes and lots and lots of swearing.

The show is in previews and could use a bit of tweaking, but overall it’s a wonderfully entertaining night of theater. If only I could get over the nagging thought that, despite its farcical nature, it’s much closer to the truth than any of us would wish it to be.

"Die Mommie Die!"

Families don’t come more dysfunctional than the Arden-Sussman clan, especially when they are headed by a matriarch like Angela Arden, a boozy, washed-up chanteuse and TV star whose skyrocketing career began to sputter, fizzle and eventually tumble back to Earth when her twin sister died under mysterious circumstances.

“Die Mommie Die!” was written by Charles Busch (writer of the excellent “Tale of the Allergist’s Wife”), and he takes the leading role of Angela Arden. Busch is one of the best drag artists currently working, but one has to like drag for this show to work. “Die Mommie Die!” is a melodrama featuring buckets of bitchiness, resentments and revenge, gay subplots, murderous children and trailerloads of trashy behavior. (Even though the story takes place in Beverly Hills.)

I’d seen two of Busch’s previous works, which I enjoyed much more. “Die Mommie Die!” (adapted from Busch’s film of the same name) however, is only for the diehard camp/drag fan.

"Is He Dead?"

It's one of those stories you'd expect in a movie -- a previously-unknown manuscript by a famous author is discovered years after his death. Except that's not the story of the play, it's the story of the discovery of the play. The play was written by Mark Twain in 1898, when he was 60 and broke. It was to have been produced at Bram Stoker's London theater, but the venue burned down and Twain stuck the play in a drawer, where it languished until 2002.

Adapted by David Ives, the play has been modernized somewhat (cut from three acts to two, and tightening the comic screws a bit), but it's still Twain's work, and has a very 19th century feel to it.

The setup is simple: a painter in 1840 France comes to the realization that his work will be worth far more if he has shuffled off his mortal coil. So with the help of a few friends, he fakes his death, and creates a fictional twin sister who handles his estate -- and the millions that come to it now that he is a celebrated (thanks to his demise) artist. Norbert Leo Butz (who was brilliant in "Dirty Rotten Scoundrels") is very funny here -- especially in drag as the twin sister, which is most of the show -- and is ably supported by a cast with serious comic chops.

Just remember that "Is He Dead?" is a very old-fashioned sort of play. There is lots of falling in love, mistaken identities, physical humor -- and very little plausability. It's broad and silly and ludicrous -- and loads of fun.

"Mary Poppins"

Disney does know how to churn them out. A visitor to New York can see not just "Mary Poppins," but also "The Lion King" and "The Little Mermaid." "Tarzan" and "Beauty and the Beast" closed relatively recently.

If you really need to have a dose of Disney, and nothing else will do, the production of "Mary Poppins" actually has quite a lot going for it. First of all, the show is based on one of Disney's best films ever. It features some of the best Disney songs: "Spoonful of Sugar," "Feed the Birds," "Chim-Chim-Cheree" and "Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious."

But in adapting "Mary Poppins" for the stage, Disney somehow managed to take a great story and make it both limp and leaden. Part of the problem is that the new songs written for the stage are mostly forgettable, and the producers are rushing too fast from one number to another to let the show find its own legs.

However, you can forgive a lot when the numbers they are rushing to are as impressively staged as they are here. "Mary Poppins" won just one Tony (it was nominated for seven), for Best Scenic Design, an award that is richly-deserved. The sets are indeed stunning. The Banks's house, the rooftops of London, the interiors of the bank and the area around St. Paul's Cathedral are grander than anything I think I have ever seen on stage. I won't spoil the surprises for you, but count on lots of big set pieces, efficient, elegant movement between scenes, and some amazing staging effects.

I didn't love the show, but I'd still recommend it, especially if you have kids -- or just want to be blown away yourself. It's a giant, loud, multi-colored ball of fun -- that unfortunately misses its mark too often.

"Doris to Darlene"

...to don't. Dull, dull, dull.

Christmas Eve, 2007

4:52 p.m. Time-Warner Center, Columbus Circle.

"The Seafarer"

Conor McPherson writes Irish ghost stories ("The Weir" "Shining City"), and his latest is no exception, though it is the first play of his I have seen. "The Seafarer" is set in an intensely shabby Dublin apartment where Sharky Harkin (played with delicious restraint by David Morse) has returned to his father's home after a chauffeuring job in Lahinch went wrong. Sharky is also trying to go on the wagon, as his drinking is preventing him from being a sailor.

Unfortunately, the Harkin household is not the most supportive place to get dry, especially on Christmas Eve. Patriarch Richard Sharkey has gone recently blind (could it be the illegal poteen he sometimes gets from one of the neighbors?), but that only means he has to rely on friends and family to bring him the prodigious amounts of whiskey and beer he downs each day. As Christmas Eve morning dawns, Sharky is cleaning up the mess from the previous night's bingeing by his elder brother and their friend Ivan (brilliant sloppiness from Conleth Hill). When Sharky is upstairs, Richard and Ivan scurry to find the dregs from any bottles that were left.

The story doesn't really kick into gear until another friend of the family, another (surprise!) alcoholic, Nicky (Sean Mahon), arrives with Mr. Lockhart (the menacing Ciaran Hinds) in tow. Mr. Lockhart, we soon learn, is Satan himself, come to collect the soul Sharky promised him many years ago.

But the story isn't really the draw here. The main reason to see "The Seafarer" is the crackling dialogue delivered by a truly world-class ensemble. Stage acting doesn't get a whole lot better than this.

The Saturday Random Video

1:00 p.m. Sixth Avenue. A flock of Grandfathers Frost. Grandfather Frost (Ded Moroz, or Дед Мороз in cyrillic) is Russia's Santa Claus, an old bearded guy who brings presents. Russia TV unleashed an army of them on midtown as a promotional stunt.

"The Receptionist"

Have her put you into voice mail.

The latest offering at Manhattan Theatre Club, producers of some of my favorite contemporary plays ("Doubt" "Wonder of the World" "Fuddy Meers" "The Tale of the Allergist's Wife" "Proof") wants to be a powerful metaphor on authority, and how our culture is allowing the horrific to become mundane.

But when a 70-minute show has you looking at your watch, you've got real problems.

"The Homecoming"

Ah, Pinter. The master of subtext. In other words, what's being said is only one level of what's really going on. In this production of Pinter's 1964 play, what is presented is a family of sociopaths who can (and this is the frightening thing about sociopaths) occasionally pass for ordinary people. Much of the dialogue is simple and plain, often redundant and delivered mostly with a flat affect - or at least a sense of ordinariness: this is the sort of thing people say all the time.

So when the deep resentments and tales of violent interludes are brought into the conversation, one is first tempted to dismiss them as lies or exaggerations. Surely no sane, ordinary person could speak of such things in such a cool, detached manner. This is how we discover that what seems like an everyday working class family who have lost their mum, is in fact a collection of unrestrained hooligans turned completely in on themselves and their own concerns.

The cast in this production is uniformly excellent. Raul Esparza, Michael McKean, James Frain and Gareth Saxe each acquit their roles with tremendous skill. But Ian McShane (star of perhaps my favorite television series of all time, "Deadwood") stands out for his ability to communicate the subtext of menace. It's hard to look away from him. That said, I don't think he would be nearly as effective without the balancing power of Eve Best's portrayal of Ruth. Best exhibits a kind of understated strength that shows that either a) she can handle this batch of sociopaths pretty well, thank you very much, or b) she's a bit of a sociopath herself.

If you dig Pinter, don't miss it. It's rare you will find such a talented cast in such a terrific production.

"Xanadu"

If, after the intellectual gymnastics required by "Rock 'n' Roll," the schoolboy attention required by "The Farnsworth Invention," or the menacing familial kerfuffles of "August: Osage County, you are looking for a giant bouffant of cotton candy as a sort of palate refresher, you couldn't do much better than "Xanadu." Yes, that "Xanadu," the Olivia Newton-John film that is widely-regarded as one of the worst movies ever made. Here's how Netflix describes it:

"Concerned about angst-ridden artist Sonny Malone (Michael Beck), Zeus dispatches winsome muse Kira (Olivia Newton-John) to Earth to inspire the painter. Kira hooks Sonny up with wealthy Danny McGuire (Gene Kelly) -- a musician Kira buoyed decades earlier -- and the trio revamps a vacant building into the world's coolest disco roller rink."

That's pretty much what happens onstage, except Kerry Butler plays the Olivia Newton-John role, Cheyenne Jackson steps into Michael Beck's role, and Tony Roberts fills in for Gene Kelly. All three have serious comic chops (especially Cheyenne Jackson) that, when combined with a smart script (filled with generation-crossing pop culture references) from Douglas Carter Beane ("The Little Dog Laughed" and "As Bees In Honey Drown), make for a 90-minute long smile plastered to the faces of everyone in the audience. That's not even taking into account the show-stealing antics of New York comediennes Jackie Hoffman and Mary Testa, who turn the ELO-penned "Evil Woman" into the highlight of the night.

It's silly, it's splashy, it has more mirror balls than all of downtown New York had in the late 70s -- but it's a helluva a good time.

The Friday Random Video

1:46 a.m. Times Square.

"August: Osage County"

In the years I have been doing these reports on my New York trips -- and especially the last four, when I began blogging them -- I have focused less on trying to write full reviews, and more on creating capsule reports to give you a flavor for the show and the information you need to decide for yourself whether you'd like to see the production.

Last night's production, however, was so rich, so multi-layered and so complex that any attempt on my part to make sense of it in a few hundred words is patently ridiculous. Apart from the fact that I lack the deep theatrical background (there's just too much of the classic theatrical canon I have never seen or read) to construct such a criticism, I'd need to see "August: Osage County" at least twice more to even begin to plumb the depths of familial relationships Tracy Letts has created in this landmark new play that many critics are predicting may become an American classic, standing proudly beside the best work of Eugene O'Neill, Tennessee Williams or Arthur Miller.

So let me just say this: go. Even if you can't make it to Broadway before this closes (which, unfortunately, will be sometime before September, when "Billy Elliot: The Musical" takes over the stage of the Imperial Theatre), see it when it comes to wherever you are.

It's not an uplifting evening: the family in question has myriad problems. Dad is a once-honored, now-failed poet who drinks. A lot. Mom pops pretty much anything that comes in pill form. Their three daughters are mostly estranged from each other (and their husbands and children) -- but they all come together when dad goes missing after the first scene.

Unlike Beckett or Pinter, where much of the real action happens in subtext, little is hidden here. All the vitriol is on full public display. All the nasty things one might think about a family member who has let you down or disappointed you or failed (in your mind) to take adequate account of your needs are spoken out loud here. Nothing is held back. (And in fact, reaches its peak when the eldest daughter tells mom to "Eat the fish, bitch.") At one point, four (I think -- might have been five) groups of family are in four different spaces of the big old house (in Todd Rosenthal's multi-tiered set), conducting four different simultaneous arguments. It's a fugue of dysfunction.

Fortunately, there's also quite a lot of humor happening here. (Plus the comforting fact that almost anyone can experience "August: Osage County" and say, "at least my family's not THAT bad.") It's a good sign, I think, that the producers have chosen to sell t-shirts featuring some of the show's best lines: "You have to be smart to be complicated." "All women look better with makeup." It gives you a sense that the show has plenty of good ones. And it does. Here are just a few of the many great lines that didn't make the t-shirt cut:

- "Do me the favor of knowing when I'm demeaning you."
- "Thank god we can't see the future -- we'd never get out of bed."
- "You never know when someone might need a kidney."
- "We fucked over the Indians for THIS?" (referring to Oklahoma)

And of course, the aforementioned "Eat the fish, bitch."

Over the course of three acts (and three hours), the story builds and gets more complex and more tragic, revealing surprises to almost the very last scene.

If you can go, "August: Osage County" is not to be missed.

"The Farnsworth Invention"

I'll confess this upfront. I'm an Aaron Sorkin fan. "The West Wing," at least until he left the show, was a show I hated to see end each week. I wanted to spend more time with those characters. I have no idea why his follow-up, "Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip" never found an audience. It was very smart and addressed big issues. Oops, guess THAT was why it never found an audience. "Sports Night" was also a terrific, but short-lived show.

So I stepped into The Music Box this afternoon fully prepared to enjoy the story of how David Sarnoff basically stole television from inventor Philo Farnsworth. And did.

Others -- you, for instance -- may not appreciate a certain lecture-y quality that seeps out from this densely (but elegantly)-packaged history lesson, seen through the eyes of two titans: Sarnoff, the Russian-born exiled Jew who created modern broadcasting, and Farnsworth, the Mormon farm boy who saw the key concepts necessary to making possible perhaps the most influential technological breakthrough of the 20th century. (Hank Azaria plays Sarnoff with unapologetic ambition, and Jimmi Simpson does good work as a simple genius, overwhelmed by powers far beyond his experience.)

But me? I love the quick repartee of Sorkin's characters, the efficiency of his exposition, the richness of his characters. It's not a great show, and it's not for everyone (and it probably won't survive long on Broadway), but it tells an amazing story -- and it's going to be the perfect thing for high school drama departments that need shows with big casts that shed light on important moments in history.

And no matter what opinion you may hold of the "vast wasteland" of "57 (or 557) channels and nothin ' on" that is broadcasting today, it's impossible to argue that the introduction of television marks a watershed in human history, and watching its birth pangs is pretty darn compelling.

"Rock 'n' Roll"

Tom Stoppard's newest has been getting mixed reviews. Critics mostly seem to like it (one said it is "arguably Stoppard's best play"), but audiences (at least those who care enough to post their opinions on discussion boards) are more skeptical. Getting a ticket is pretty easy, even at deep discounts.

After seeing the production tonight, I can see why. The play itself is terrific -- filled with Stoppard's wit delivered by characters that are passionate and fiery -- but with a certain British restraint. The story is rich and important. (And should probably be considered in tandem with Stoppard's "The Coast of Utopia" trilogy -- one being about the birth of communism, the other about its death.)

But this production, for many reasons, never lets the power and passion of the play's text really come through to the audience. The cast, though capable (and including Brian Cox, Sinead Cusack and Rufus Sewell), never come together as a true ensemble. The direction is flaccid and impotent, denying not only the passions of the characters, but the menace of totalitarianism that hangs over virtually every scene. We're supposed to be frightened by what Communists clinging to control are capable of -- but we aren't. And the staging (imported, I understand, almost entirely from the National Theatre production in London last year) doesn't seem to fit very well in the Jacobs Theatre. The balance seemed off.

On the positive side, I will say the of all the actors, Rufus Sewell brought the most to his role. (Good thing, too, since his Jan is the heart and soul of "Rock 'n' Roll" -- the idealist who loves the freedom and mad release rock music delivers.)

By the second act, though, I was able to put the production's shortcomings into the background and let the power of Stoppard's words do the work he intended them to do. I loved the arguments about the nature of consciousness and the mind-body (or rather mind-brain) duality.

From what I read, there are many other plays coming up this trip that I will likely recommend more, but if you are a fan of Stoppard's on any level, I don't think "Rock 'n' Roll" is a play you should miss.

The Tuesday Random Video

The R train. Rush hour. Midtown.

At the Mercy of New York

Sometimes a plan does NOT come together. At the end of our first day in New York, our plan had been to have dinner at a swanky restaurant downtown. Specifically, Eleven Madison Park, which had once been a good but relatively straightforward place that served what many call "New American" cuisine. With the addition of a new chef a year or so ago, it has become much, well, swankier. Prix fixe only, no a la carte items. Oh, just check out the menu yourself if you like. (Do note that on an $82 for three courses of $102 for four course menu, you can still pay a little more if you're in the mood for, say, alba truffle risotto and have $120 you don't want anymore.)

So we dressed as swankily as possible, given our limited travel wardrobes. I bring options, but even I have limits. (Actually, it's United Airlines' baggage limits that are really holding me back.) As we climbed the stairs after riding the 6 train to 23rd street, and popped up into the cold night air, my cell phone got back in touch with the mothership and informed me, just as I was stepping into the restaurant and undoing the buttons on my overcoat, that I had new messages. One of the friends meeting us had had a asthma attack and they were so sorry, but they would have to cancel.

Although he was disappointed at not seeing our friends, Bob was nonetheless relieved that we could now go somewhere else for dinner. Personally, I am a fan of cuisine as theater, and love a multi-course tasting menu and artistic presentations and amuse-bouches and that sort of thing. He lives by the rule of "horizontal cuisine": if the food on the plate is taller than it is wide, it's not for him.

So we left EMP, and wandered over to Union Square Cafe. 90 minutes for a table. I scouted a place the maitre d' at Union Square Cafe had recommended, but it didn't seem sufficiently horizontal enough to please Bob, so we headed over to Gramercy Tavern, one of New York's most popular (and best) restaurants. The wait for a seat in the bar area was an hour or more, but we added our name to the list and asked the maitre d' for his recommendations. His first choice, craftbar, a Tom Colicchio restaurant was around the corner and, as I found on another scouting exhibition, had a table for us.

What they didn't have was service for us. After an hour at the table, we had been served a bowl of soup. With no entrees in sight (despite two promises from our server that "it's being plated right now"), we got up, retrieved our coats and went back to Gramercy -- where our name had just reached the top of the list.

Best Pasta Dish Ever?

Ravioli con Il Cacio e Pere -- pear and fresh pecorino-filled ravioli, aged pecorino, crushed black pepper. At Felidia, the restaurant of Lidia Bastianich. Amazing.

Sometimes...

...cute puppies are what you need to warm you on a cold day.

From a pet store window in Manhattan's upper east side.

Misguided Bromide

Whoever coined this little bit of wisdom has a very shallow grasp of astronomy.

The Journey Has Begun

Greetings from San Francisco International! The semi-annual New York City "fill-the-well" trip begins today. Over the next two weeks you will be able to access daily reports on my experiences in the capital of the world as I soak up the riches of Manhattan until I am sopping with creative juice. There will be reports on the dozen and a half shows I plan to see, as well as the occasional random thought and/or image.

Glad you are along for the ride.

A Simple Question

Mike Huckabee, it is reported, has apologized to Mitt Romney for comments he made about the Mormon faith in an extended interview with the New York Times. In this piece, Huckabee explains the context of his remarks.

Here's what happened. The reporter asked Huckabee if he thought Mormonism was a religion or a cult. Huckabee reportedly responded that he thought it was a religion, but that he didn't know that much about it. Then he asks, "Don't Mormons believe that Jesus and the Devil are brothers?" An innocent enough question, it would seem, given that the answer is, in fact, "yes."

But apparently it was enough to set off the press, who wondered if it was truly an innocent question, or a politically-motivated attempt to focus attention on the perceived strangeness of Romney's faith. Huckabee felt obligated to apologize to Romney when they met on stage at yesterday's Republican debate, even though Huckabee claims he was genuinely curious and never meant to draw Romney's faith - or any theological issues - into the campaign.

Just for argument's sake, let's say Mike is being sincere. Though I disagree strongly with his beliefs, I do believe he holds them sincerely, so I'll give him the benefit of the doubt on this one. I do this partly because it sheds light on a statement Huckabee made on "Larry King Live": "I'm trying to stay away from everything I can say. I'm being much more cautious now, because everything is being parsed."

It would seem Huckabee is beginning to notice how differently a presidential frontrunner is treated. He realizes- to a greater degree than ever - that part of the election process is surviving media scrutiny. The person who can handle knowing that every time they are in a public setting, virtually EVERYTHING they say and do is being recorded by someone. Probably several someones.

Huckabee's response? To pull back more, to say less. As Iowans endure/enjoy these final three weeks of personal attention on a national scale, Huckabee is going to be choosing his words very carefully.

But if part of what makes Mike Huckabee appealing is his seeming open and genuine nature, too much self-editing could put him at risk of losing some of that appeal.

So Mike...if you were truly being sincere, don't apologize for it. You didn't shower him with invective or call his faith ridiculous, or otherwise behave in a manner that might actually warrant an apology. You asked a simple question.

Which leads me to a simple question of my own: If you had to apologize because Romney's religion - or ANY issue of theology - is considered out of bounds in the electoral process, I want to know why.

I imagine your (and especially Governor Romney's) answer would be something along the lines of "because the Constitution dictates there is to be no religious test for the office of president. Not to mention the First Amendment."

But here's where this goes wrong for me. If religion isn't to be used as a lever in a presidential election, shouldn't it be equally out of bounds to call upon its "support" in referenda issues like one-man/one-woman marriage amendments? Our Constitution guarantees the freedom to practice whatever faith we choose, and that no state church may be established. It follows, therefore, that one religion or sect's beliefs cannot be allowed to trump any other's in the realm of civil polity.

Thus could I sing, and thus rejoice, but it is not so with me.

Same-sex Marriage=Global Strife?

According the Pope Benedict (who occasionally makes sense), same-sex marriage is a threat to world peace because "Everything that serves to weaken the family based on the marriage of a man and woman, everything that directly or indirectly stands in the way of its openness to the responsible acceptance of new life ... constitutes an objective obstacle on the road to peace."

Here's the problem. There's no proof of any sort that same-sex marriage weakens one-man, one-woman marriage. None. I would argue that greater acceptance of same-sex unions will actually strengthen not only traditional marriage (by reducing the motivation for those who use marriage to reinforce their closet doors), but our society as a whole by reinforcing the stability that comes from couplehood.

Time to shut up about Huckabee?

According to the Drudge Report, the Democrats have decided not to attack Mike Huckabee for his comments about quarantining HIV patients, believing Adam and Eve were two actual people, that God has been helping him in the polls, etc. Why? Because they feel he is so vulnerable on these points that he would be easy to take down in the general election. Apparently they'd love to see him win the nomination so they can crush him in November. I'm not entirely sure. "Do you want a president who believes the Earth is only 6000 years old?" is a question that seems likely to alienate people with even lightly-held religious beliefs.

Crazier Than You Think

As Mike Huckabee rises in the polls, he might have a hard time distancing himself from some of his past statements. Especially those where he tries to walk the line between his supposed faith and his political ambition. This one, for example:

"Interestingly enough, if there was ever an occasion for someone to have argued against the death penalty, I think Jesus could have done so on the cross and said, "This is an unjust punishment and I deserve clemency.""

That's from 1997, when Huckabee was governor of Arkansas, answering a question about capital punishment during a call-in radio show. Apparently, Huckabee's point was that since Jesus didn't say that, the New Testament therefore endorses the death penalty. Did he ever read the rest of the NT? Does he seriously think Christ would be standing with W on this issue?

Watching Ourselves

Here's a brief description of some very interesting research that shows humans tend to be more altruistic when either God or the broader community is on their minds.

An Excellent Post on Torture

From the redoubtable Andrew Sullivan. Money quote: "If they are cynical and brazen enough to destroy incriminating tapes, they are cynical and brazen enough to destroy any evidence within the executive branch that could prove that their torture policy has failed. If this isn't a form of tyranny, annexed to torture, what is? And if the executive branch can simply get away with it, and have serious commentators defend the president's trashing of the Constitution as necessary to fulfill his oath of office, we really have left the rule of law behind in the ditch."

It Is Happening Again

News of a recent poll showing Arkansas governor Mike Huckabee moving into second place in the race for the Republican presidential nomination (nationwide, not just in Iowa) have me very worried.

Why? Because his image is that of a very pleasant, likable guy with a deep Christian faith that informs his politics. Remind you of anyone? (As TV's Craig Ferguson would say.) I see far too much George Bush in Mike Huckabee for my liking. His reliance on faith is troubling -- not because he calls on it for personal spiritual support, but because it informs his policy decisions. As he says on his web site: "My faith doesn't influence my decisions, it drives them. I don't separate my faith from my personal and professional lives." So how is a man who believes in biblical inerrancy and doesn't believe in evolution, preferring instead to hold the view that dinosaurs and man walked the earth together, going to lead the scientific efforts required to advance our society? How can a man who believes that allowing same-sex civil unions will lead to the end of civilization be expected to protect the civil rights that are at the core of this country's greatness. The right is having a wonderful time talking about how the founders were men of faith and built a country based on their faith. But when it came time to write the Declaration of Independence, the FIRST self-evident truth was that "all men are created equal." What happened to that?

Huckabee scares me because he has the support of that rabid 20-25% base of delusional evangelicals, people who will vote for him no matter what, as long as he keeps up the bible-thumping -- plus the support of people who just think he's a nice guy. This man could win, and America could spiral down even further into irrational policies based on a childish faith in an unseen being. We must call our own OWN power to save us -- not some imaginary god.

My Thoughts Exactly, 3

Have a gander at this piece from Salon, discussing how Mitt Romney's protestations of religious tolerance are misplaced, and that it is actually the secularists he attacks who are far more tolerant of religious diversity.

Money quote: "If Romney is going to attack humanists and secularists as "wrong," then let him explain why they were so far ahead of his church on the greatest moral issues of the past half-century."

"You Don't Want This"

I don't know if you saw "Ray," the biopic of Ray Charles's life and music, but there's a scene where Ray stumbles upon some of his band members shooting heroin. Ray expresses curiosity, the bandmates try to talk him out of it, but Ray insists - and subsequently ends up addicted.

Here's the comic take on that scene, from the new film "Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox Story." Like all good comedy, it's funny because it's true.

The Unclosing Eye

Of perfectionism.

Guilty as charged.

Line of the Year

"My penis was clearly in his mouth." (Sorry if I shocked you, Mom.) The mouth in question belongs to Larry Craig. The penis is the property of Mike Jones. Yes, that Mike Jones, the Denver area rent boy who was responsible for the outing of Rev. Ted Haggard. The Idaho Statesman published a story today featuring interviews with five men (four of whom are willing to be publicly identified) describing flirtations, advances and full-on sexual encounters with Senator Larry Craig. (Who, remember, is still serving the citizens of Idaho, still voting.) The best feature is the sound files of excerpts from the reporter's interviews.

The Race is On

I don't know about you, but the 2008 presidential race is the most exciting election I've ever seen. With the level of media involvement and big money being thrown around, you'd think the nominations would already be in the bag. Just a month or so ago, Hillary was seen as a shoo-in for the Democratic nomination, and Rudy was the presumptive favorite to get the Republican's nod.

Then, over the past weeks, both frontrunners have begun to slip. Hillary, after her weak performance at the most recent Democratic debate, has slowly slipped in polls in both Iowa and New Hampshire. And Rudy has been losing ground to Mitt Romney and Mike Huckabee. Romney matches Giuliani in the "I have managerial experience" category that Americans seem to want after experiencing eight years of the gang that couldn't govern straight, but he has the positions on social issues required to win over evangelical voters. Huckabee seems like a sincere, honest, Christian guy -- qualities voters don't see in the former New York mayor. (Though he might have a bit of a hard time justifying the fact that he doesn't believe in evolution, but we'll have to wait and see how that plays.)

In a poll out today, the lead in Iowa -- with only about a month until the caucuses -- now belongs to Barack Obama and Mike Huckabee. Huckabee's rise is especially interesting, given that he is spending only a fraction of the money Romney and Giuliani are putting out in the Hawkeye State.

So what happens if Obama and Huckabee take Iowa? Can they extend their popularity into New Hampshire -- a much different state, with a much different nominating process (actual voting, vs. a series of caucuses)? My hunch is they can take Iowa, but they lose in New Hampshire, where Hillary holds on (but barely) and Romney wins the Republican race. Romney then takes Michigan and Nevada, Huckabee picks up South Carolina -- but we still don't know the nominee until Super Tuesday, February 5, when 20 states hold their primaries, including California, New York, New Jersey and Illinois, where Giuliani could do some catching up.

On the dems side, I don't see Hillary getting the nod now. Her negatives are just too high. On the other hand, I'm not sure America is ready to elect a black man whose name rhymes with Osama and whose father was Muslim. Obama takes Iowa, Nevada and South Carolina, but loses New Hampshire to Hillary or Edwards. On Super Tuesday, the battle begins. HRC pulls down New York and New Jersey, but Edwards brings home Florida, while Obama pulls down California. And we still don't have a nominee and Dems wait until the convention to choose a candidate.

Meanwhile, if Romney wins Super Tuesday, the Republican race is settled. But if Giuliani wins big in February, the evangelicals go crazy because of his stands on abortion and gay rights. (Only the craziest of the crazy evangelicals worry about Romney's religion, though.) That means an independent candidate could step in and break the whole race wide open.

If Bloomberg steps up, he pulls the moderate Republicans away from Romney. (If Giuliani wins, Bloomberg stays home.) But he also pulls conservative Democrats who just can't get behind voting for an African-American because, well, because they just can't.

Keep watching.

Good Point

From Pope Benedict XVI's most recent encyclical: "How did we come to conceive the Christian project as a selfish search for salvation which rejects the idea of serving others?"

Of course, he also attacks atheism as being the source of the "greatest forms of cruelty and violations of justice" in history. Gee, worse than the Crusades, or the Inquisition or clerical sexual abuse, or slavery, or terrorism? Or even the use of an unseen omnipotence to justify the denial of basic human rights right here in America? I think not.

More on the new encyclical can be found here. You can read the full text here.

The Future in Your Pocket, The Past in Your Mind

A while back, a rumor made the rounds in Khartoum, Sudan -- the same place where an English pre-school teacher has been arrested (and crowds bay for her execution) because she allowed her three and four-year old charges to name the class teddy bear "Muhammed" -- that if a man shook the hand of an infidel, his penis would fall off. The rumor spread via cell phone and text messaging. Apparently, many men took the rumor seriously. But what is amazing is that confluence of modernity and superstition. The rumor spreads via a wonder of science and technology -- yet the men who fell for this bit of ridiculous folklore simply couldn't reconcile the facts of science (even though the proof of its efficacy was right there in their hands) with their ancient xenophobic mindset.

Doesn't bode well for the future we all need to share.