If you follow news coverage of the trade book business, it may not be entirely clear why the main players appear to be experiencing so much trepidation.  The narrative goes like this: publishers and traditional booksellers are in a state of disarray because sales have been down and no one seems to know the extent to which the digital realm will ensnare part of the market. 

While declining sales seem to support the built-in fear that people are increasingly distracted by various entertainments and therefore not reading as much these days, sales have been down in other markets as well.  People have been operating in a layoff environment, and this has an impact on spending habits. 

On the digital publishing front, meanwhile, news coverage seems to support a theory of inevitability that readers are, at some unknown point in the future, going to abandon traditional books in great numbers to embrace the Amazon Kindle or some other device, even though e-books only represent 1 to 3 percent of total book sales. 

Considering that small percentage, it's not at all clear why so much of the reporting on the book trade is focused on the digital realm.  Of course, quite a few predictions have been made about the pending gravitational force of digital books.  The argument is that people will increasingly opt for staying home and doing everything in life by pushing a button.  After all, who needs to go out for anything when everything in the world may be downloaded?

The prediction, though, fails to recognize the social component in which the book trade has always survived.  Hang around at any bookstore long enough to get a feel for the place, and it becomes clear that readers like to talk about books as much as they like to read them.  The counter argument could possibly be that some of the discussion will take place online, but interacting with people in a bookstore is easily a more rewarding experience.  And it gets the reader out of the house for a while. 

Perhaps the disproportionate amount of reporting that has been devoted to digital publishing derives from the fact that digital publishing is the newest thing going.  Reporters need narratives and this seems to be the narrative of the time.  What's not at all established is if any of the ink that's being spilled reflects reality on the ground.  People like to get out and move around.  They like to talk to each other and look at stuff.  These things won't change.    

 

Already, it seems like a couple of years ago that Lieberman stood up to regale the citizenry with his vision of unity through his candidate McCain.  Lieberman, you see, who the record will show spoke for some time last night, on September 3, 2008, of his belief that now is the time for unity, got to observe the fruits of his choice a day later when McCain's VP selection, Mrs. Palin, opted for the culture war message.  It appears that Lieberman agreed to speak on behalf of McCain so that the McCain campaign, a day later, could pit "cosmopolitan elitists" against "small town folks," or something along those lines.  How exactly we will all be unified in the end is not exactly clear to the admittedly reluctant observer of goings-on at the GOP convention, but one thing seems clear: Lieberman will no doubt turn up again in the coming days to participate in McCain's openly divisive message so as to strive for a "united" America at some magical point in the future.  Who knows? Maybe all those elitist, cosmopolitan types will take the animosity in stride. 

Dear Senator Lieberman,


It was telling to hear you speak of the importance of experience "in these times" in one part of the speech, only to endorse Mrs. Palin in another part of the speech.  It may have been the Romans who had a saying: "Hic funis nihil attraxit."  (This line has taken no fish.)  



Yours Sincerely,


Lovelace
 

I don't watch much TV in the summer.  Tonight I played golf in a league made up mostly of hacks on a public course that charged us twenty dollars for nine holes so as to putt over a bunch of bumps and ballmarks and, depending upon the green, more than a few goose turds.  (The geese begrudgingly walked off and became a sneering gallery in the rough when they saw that we really intended to try to salvage our poorly managed approach shots.)

Still, it was better than watching Campbell Brown on CNN and having to hear the newest slogan, "No bias, no bull."

It's understood that political campaigns adopt catch-phrases to sort of bludgeon the public consciousness with, but when commentators take up the tools of propaganda, the whole enterprise of delivering a genuine program of news and thoughtful analysis begins to sound like more jingo and jive cooked up by the marketing people and the numbers runners in the corporate office, where ratings and advertising are priorities. 

The Fox people rammed that "fair and balanced" business down everyone's throat for so long and apparently had enough success with it that the other bosses, program managers, numbers runners, migratory birds, commentators, pollsters, hacks and hucksters decided to gather together in a big, long committee room in the sky to conjure something suggestive. 

But no bias, no bull? Hard for anyone living in the real world and paying attention to believe, that's all.  The gang at CNN have obviously decided that you, the viewer, are too damn dumb to discern when a slogan's being hurled at you repeatedly so as to manipulate your impression of the program. 

Today at work, about mid-afternoon, I took a walk over to the snack bar.  The person who runs the little area launched into a rather biased assessment of the political scene and expressed some views that were bull.  I then contributed my own bias to the discussion and no doubt held forth with a little bit of bull in my own right.  We parted amicably until the next time.   

In a famous speech in 1963, JFK mentioned that we all breath the same air.  I would add that we all have biases. 

If you have a case, make it, but don't tell me that you don't have biases.  Campbell Brown should chuck the slogan and do her show.  She should do her best to make it interesting.  Even then, though, bias and bull will be part of it because human beings are the participants. 

Arriving home, after dipping into his one dollar bill savings account to pay for fuel (never spend a one dollar bill for three months, keeping the stash in a drawer, a cigar box, or behind some books in your burgeoning library), the "ordinary American" goes through his stack of mail: a company newsletter, retail ads, and a couple of letters from big-time and small-time politicians. 

The big-time politician has a national arena to oversee and nothing short of the Supreme Court is on the line.  The small-time politician is throwing a party and he asked for twenty-five bones.  If he decides to attend, the "ordinary American" will likely get some brisket, some kind of bread and barbeque sauce, and a side of potato salad.  He's on a diet, however, having been drawn into a ridiculous weight-loss contest at the office, mostly because he spent January and February in front of the television, hooked on election results and analysis from an assortment of people in the biz. 
Yes, the lucky recipient of today's mail ate a lot of his favorite rich foods in those months and sat smoking his delicious, Belinda Black cigars as well.  It was all quite stressful. 

Now, in July, he realizes that some of the worry was for nothing.  Events played out and no amount of talking back to assertions being made on TV tipped the results either way.  He could have slugged it out at the gym more.  He could have mixed in some oatmeal, a few carrots.  What is it about Italian food in February that just seems so right?

Well, all he knows for sure is that it's a little bit hot for a barbeque, so he decides to run the numbers.   

Even allowing for the inevitable impulse book purchases and the times when he can't take it anymore and he has to have the good stuff at one of his favorite restaurants (just give him, for godsake, the Sicilian butter and the bread, the creamy red sauce, and the ultra rich chocolate dessert), the potential contributor can probably make room for a donation or two between now and November.  True, the car could break down.  Someone else could (and no doubt will) come along and ask him for a favor.  And he's saving for a trip (a trip!) next spring. 

Decision time: he opts out on the party but chucks forty in the mail for the up-and-comer.  The guy can go buy a few stamps or cover the bread that he bought for the party.  The big-time pol has hope: the "ordinary American," as it were, is one determined saver of one dollar bills, even if he does have an appetite. 

Although he knows full well how to avoid the MSNBC commentator when operating the remote control at home, he found time to swing by the gym after work and they had the show on in the lockerroom. Lovelace removed his glasses and therefore could not see, but in the rush to get changed so as to minimize becoming aware of whichever way the wind was blowing on "Hardball," he was unable to summon a daydream state or some equivalent thereof that would have rendered the program mere background noise. Consequently, Matthews could be heard. It seems that the talkshow host, who has blurted out hundreds of thousands of predictions over the years and probably can't remember a single one, is now just completely, unalterably, cross his heart and hope to die convinced (well, tune in tomorrow just in case), that a Democrat can't possibly win the general if Pennsylvania goes to the G.O.P. That's all Lovelace heard. Perhaps a daydream kicked in. Perhaps somebody said something. He had his shoes on and he left. Then he remembered back in the fall (or was it summer?) when Matthews was dead solid certain about some other things. Back then, Clinton had it all locked up.  Screw the voters.  Matthews had it in sight.  See, he's psychic.  They pay him millions for this gift. 

Perhaps it was mentioned around the blogosphere, or in the papers, or on the talk shows, after Hillary Clinton's little shindig of a warm-hearted closing address at the Texas debate, that when she sounded just so caring about the wounded down in front of her, she had herself to thank for the troubles of the very same people to the extent that she authorized the mess from which they were trying to recover.  To borrow a rhetorical stroke from the candidate she so much admires on the other side of the aisle, you can always leave it to Hillary Clinton to estimate the public's intelligence a shade low.  She has a way of weighing in, from one glorious day to the next, in an utter state of sublime confidence that people are too stupid to see through her.  Much has been made of the phony tactics of her advisors, but most people, by the time they hit thirty (if not before), of necessity have more than come round to the essential lesson for survival on planet earth: if you have a mess, a problem in your life, then you can damn well put money down that there's always one great place to look, and that's in the glass.  Hillary Clinton can thank herself for making calculated political choices that came back to haunt her in the form of a large block of voters in her very own party who know good and well what she's about.  So today, in front of the flags, we got to see her one more time, just in the moment when the light came down, holding forth at length about the threshold.  Leave the politics of fear to Hillary Clinton.  The torch has been passed. 

Standing in line at the grocery store the other day, I picked up a copy of Time Magazine and read an article about McCain's intention to discuss Iraq in terms of what we should do now instead of in terms of what we should have done or in terms of mistakes that were made.  Fair enough.  In the coming general election, let's discuss it.  But if McCain wants to talk about strategy, then the cost of that strategy must be on the table in full.  The public needs to have a complete understanding of what the package will cost, and a good way to start is by gaining a comprehensive understanding of what we've already paid.  Bob Herbert has a column about this subject in today's New York Times. 

He quotes Nobel Prize winning economist Joseph Stiglitz, who says, "For a fraction of the cost of this war, we could have put Social Security on a sound footing for the next half-century or more."

So what's next in the debate about Social Security? No doubt we will hear Republicans holding forth about "entitlement programs," and how the retirement age needs to be raised.  Really? Too bad. 

Of course, to hear these sanguine assessors of the world order hold forth on the subject, it's merely a matter of degree.  You hear pronouncements such as, "People are living longer now and don't mind working until they're 67 or maybe even 70."

Yeah, well, that's possibly true if you're a congressman or a senator with a cushy set-up, and plenty of room in which to kick back during the day on a nice leather sofa and ponder the universe. 

Peddle that jive to a guy who earns his living on the shop floor, though, in a manufacturing plant that's not air conditioned.  That guy wants to work until he's 70? I don't think so.  Drag him into the shop that long, make him stand around on the hard floor and sweat that long, and the guy won't be 70, he'll be dead. 

As I understand it, the body breaks down as you age. 

Herbert's makes an excellent point in his column.  The war should not be discussed solely in terms of military strategy.  The public needs to understand the cost as well, especially in terms of what it means for their retirement and quality of life. 

A lot of us have been paying into Social Security since we were 16, thank you very much, and we wouldn't mind collecting some of the money prior to being planted in the ground. 

Outside the cloakroom, McCain looked over and saw Brownback reaching for his cloak.  The Senator from Kansas appeared to be deep in thought.  McCain kept walking.  He had a few quandaries of his own.  Truth to tell, he didn't much care for Hagee or the clown who kept repeating Obama's middle name when all the young people could be seen in the background, holding up a damn "McCain" sign.  Who the hell came up with that? Screw it, he decided.  The solidarity theme got plain old ridiculous at times.  In fact, the whole campaign, from start to finish, was a major pain in the behind.  Yet he had no choice but to soldier on with the Iraq theme, telling people, "no surrender," and hoping that the scare tactics worked.  If he changed course at some point and said that he wanted to get out, that the enterprise was a drain on the public treasury, then Democrats would hurl the flip-flop label and frankly, so would everyone else.  No choice there: no surrender.  Right? The thing with Hagee, though, wasn't good.  Catholics were an argumentative bunch and they wouldn't care for it at all...not that they were easy to pin down.  He tried to run through it, thinking of the Catholic mindset.  You had the minority sort of literal-thinking types like Brownback, who didn't object to fundamentalists so much, but even Sam had seemed mildly irritated.  And the rest of the Catholic types would undoubtedly be turned off.  You had the scholarly liberal types who'd be voting Democratic, anyway.  They'd do it on judges alone, even if they didn't like the candidate.  The scholarly conservative types? Well, they wouldn't like Hagee.  The armageddon business was too much.  Somewhere along the line, most Catholics had been exposed to the metaphorical way of looking at things, and they landed in the middle of the spectrum.  Plus, Hagee was a dork.  That guy the other day, up on stage, was even a bigger dork.  McCain was trying to round up dorks.  He needed endorsements from dorks.  That was what everybody said.  Then he realized something: in the conversation with Brownback, he'd somehow left the room without his cloak.  He wanted a new cloak.  The one he wore now didn't fit. 

"Sam, can I ask you a question?"

"Go right ahead, John."

"You won't get mad?"

"What's the question?"

"Well, pastor Hagee endorsed me yesterday."

"I heard that."

"You're not disappointed?"

Senator Brownback had to be truthful.  "A little."

"But not totally."

"John," Brownback said, "let's just say that I'm incrementally but not irreversibly let down by the development."

"If I understand you, then," McCain said, "you won't renounce my acceptance of the endorsement--even if Russert pressures you on Meet The Press--thereby revoking your own approval."

Brownback said, "I've asked for guidance."

"Very good, Sam," said McCain.  "So will I."

Brownback, apparently lost in thought, might well have been asking for guidance.

McCain waited before proceeding. 

"Will Catholics quit sending me money when they hear a guy who hates them came on board?"

"They might."

"I'll make a statement."

McCain left the cloakroom.  He had big plans for the month of March: 13.1 million.

What with the campaign beginning to drag on the rest of forever and thereby in danger of losing the sizzle and pop that it had for much of February, and to the extent that Senator Clinton's weekend matinee performance felt like something out of a David Mamet thriller (House of Games comes to mind, for example), I'll confess right here on this blog, right now, that I couldn't (wouldn't?) watch the debate.  Instead, I worked on editing a friend's manuscript and admittedly flipped, at various points, between Talking Points Memo and Andrew Sullivan for reports on how it was going.  It was sort of like listening to a basketball game on the radio.  As far as I can determine, my team (Obama) turned in another solid performance and should be making the playoffs.  I'm glad.  I look forward to seeing this guy's 360 tomahawk jam when he gives his inaugural address. 

If you hang around in English departments long enough, you might hear something similar to the above posted title.  All it means is that, in a piece of writing, the elements are interconnected.  In a great literary work, everything is of a piece. 

The principle probably would not apply to a political campaign in exactly the same way, but it might be said that a true campaign, or one that connects with voters on a deeper level, will somehow reflect in action what it promises in theme.  At the very least, an observer of a campaign should not be able to point, over and over again, to inconsistencies between message and action. 

Senator Clinton, unfortunately, has never been able to connect the elements of her campaign, not even in a two hour debate.  Her unquestionably fine, warm, closing, for example, was undermined by her ridiculous pursuit of the plagiarism subject. 

It's just impossible to give her the benefit of the doubt when she pursues this preposterous angle.  She said something like, "If you're going to make your candidacy about words, then your words should be your own..."

Well, in a democratic system, it's no great revelation that political campaigns are about words.  They are the means by which the message, the theme, is delivered to the public.  Obama's candidacy is about words to the extent that his words are effective.  The man can't be blamed for having gifts.  Senator Clinton's candidacy is about words as well.  Her problem, all along, is that she never connected her words to her theme and to her action.  If you follow the logic, therefore, her warm, eloquent closing did not connect with the flailing, hollow aspect of her plagiarism accusation. 
The structure of the Clinton poem is not the theme of the poem in action. 

The Senator is no doubt trying to undermine one of Obama's big advantages (he gives better speeches) by reminding Americans that speeches are only part of the equation when it comes to presidential leadership.  Last night on MSNBC, however, it may have been Buchanan who said that Senator Clinton needs a new speechwriter.  It was either Buchanan on MSNBC or David Gergen on CNN.  (These commentators run together after a while.)

So while the Senator keeps talking about speeches and trying to undermine Obama's speeches, her own speeches are too damn flat.  Does she have a speechwriter?

Perhaps she's mostly relying on herself.  In his book, Falling Up: How A Redneck Helped Invent Political Consulting, Raymond Strother referred to her, on page 208, as "another lawyer with the misguided notion that she was a wordsmith.  Her specialty was to insist that we beat to death some word or phrase that wasn't even important to the commercial." 

Perhaps the Senator has somehow equated intelligence with writing ability: "I'm smart, therefore I'm a writer."

This sounds about right.  If you make your living as a scribe, there's never any end to all the brilliant wordsmiths out there who could easily do your job if only they had the time. 

So McCain, if you follow the argument of tonight's speech, plans to emphasize his experience, presumably highlighting the rare level of wisdom exhibited when authorizing the war in Iraq.  The Senator will no doubt argue that the surge is a roaring success, all the while pointing out that we can't pull a solitary troop out of the country until those of us who were young when the damn thing started, will probably have entered middle age and beyond by the time it's permissible to withdraw. 


Meanwhile, over at MSNBC, Buchanan continually mentioned Michelle Obama's unfortunate comment from earlier in the week.  Republicans are obviously going to play that one over and over again, so the Obama camp needs an answer for it now, not later. 


Obama is a not just a good talker, but a damn good talker.  That said, he should trim the victory speech down just a bit.  What he wants is fifteen minutes building toward the crowd going wild.  Tonight's speech was better than anyone else's, but even Obama needs to understand that the attention span of Americans will begin to waver after a while.  For the next round, he should continue with what's working but wrap the rhetoric package a little different next time.  He has two weeks to take his message to the next level.  


Prediction: If the Clintons try to drag this guy down with negative campaigning, it will hurt them more than it hurts Obama. 

In addition, Senator Clinton keeps talking about work.  Work, work.  Well, even though the Puritans lobbied for it, work is a four letter word.  The Senator is conjuring negative imagery. 
  

Although Democrats have succeeded in capturing the attention of voters, it's risky to have such a complex nominating system in place.  While much of the reporting on the issue has been helpful, questions must be raised about a process that requires such extensive explanation.  On the one hand, party officials are trying to get people excited about the election.  They want people out there voting, and they want Democrats to get in the habit of voting on election day.  It's risky, though, to assume that voters will respond favorably to a system that is obviously loaded with counter-measures.  The layers of influence, right or wrong, threaten to turn people off.  There are too many variables in the equation.  Better to give the public something linear.  It's probably not unreasonable to say that a fair percentage of voters don't want to be bothered with decoding a Byzantine nomination process.  They want to support a candidate and get out and vote.  They want the votes to be counted and to be told who won.  Then they want to get on with the business of living.  On the whole, party officials ought to at least recognize the possibility that the existing system may seem dodgy to a fair percentage of people.  Weigh that possibility against the merits, whatever they may be, and decide if an overhaul is warranted.  If the wheels come off to the extent that voter turnout is low come November, then it might be time to revisit the program.