Filed under: Art, Book Conservation, Politics, Publishing, Society, U of Iowa Ctr for the Book, University of Missouri, Writing stuff
Earlier this year I got a nice note from the Director of Libraries at MU, asking whether I would be able to attend the Library Society annual dinner. As part of the evening’s event they were going to have on display some of the more noteworthy items from Special Collections Adopt-a-Book Program – work I had done, supported by donations – and they wanted to introduce me to their membership. Director Cogswell kindly offered to have my wife and I attend the fundraiser as guests of the Library Society.
* * * * * * *
It’s been a long week. I was sorely disappointed in the outcome of our local elections held on Tuesday, which saw a shift from Smart Growth advocates to a more “pro-development” slate of candidates for our city council/mayoral positions.
I’ve been involved in local politics at a very low level the last couple of years, mostly in trying to make sure that there was some balance between neighborhood interests and development. I’ve served as our neighborhood association president, and that has led to my participation in a variety of training workshops, as well as keeping a weather eye on development & rezoning issues in our area. I’m not against development – hardly – but I think it ought to be done with some intelligence and awareness of how it serves a community rather than just the bank account of a developer.
* * * * * * *
I confirmed that my Good Lady Wife and I would be happy to attend the Library Society dinner, though I preferred to pay the modest fund-raising donation for the dinner, and that I likewise would enjoy chatting with anyone in the Society who had an interest in my work. I’ve always been willing to do this sort of thing, meeting with donors, explaining the work I do and why it is important. In one sense, it’s self-serving – the donors are helping me earn a living – but beyond that my motivation is to help make sure the historically valuable books in these collections get the care they need.
It may sound a bit odd, but I’m actually fairly passionate about that. Yes, I do get paid for my conservation work, and it is a business – but I have always done a lot more work on rare books than I actually bill for. I don’t make a big deal out of this, it’s just my way of contributing something to the community and culture. If I were financially independent I would probably continue to do my conservation work, just as an in-kind donation to appropriate collections.
* * * * * * *
After Tuesday’s depressing election results, I had the last in a series of workshops scheduled on Wednesday to attend. The topic was “infill development” – a series set up by our Department of Planning to help explain why utilizing unused or neglected property within the city was a good strategy, and what the various issues pertaining to this kind of development were, and how development in cooperation with an established neighborhood could be to everyone’s benefit.
Let me tell you, it was damned hard to work up the motivation to attend that session. But I went, and was glad I did so.
* * * * * * *
The featured speaker for the Library Society dinner was to be Peter Hessler. Cool – I’ve read some of his work, heard him in interviews, respected his intelligence and humor. That alone would be worth the price of admission.
It was.
* * * * * * *
Thursday night there was another public event I needed to attend. It was the 2010 Neighborhood Leadership class. I had been in the 2009 class (the first one), and had been asked to sit in on a panel discussion about my actual experiences with building my neighborhood association. The other panel member is a fellow I know, like, and respect for the things he has done in his (much larger) neighborhood in this regard, and I knew that we would make a good team discussing this topic.
It went really well. I did a variation of my “don’t be afraid of failure” spiel in saying that each neighborhood would present a unique set of challenges and would need a unique set of solutions – that the neighborhood leaders would need to experiment, innovate, risk failure if they were to find the set of solutions that worked for them.
But like all such public speaking situations, it left me pretty much wrung out and a bit jittery after. Being an introvert is hell, sometimes.
* * * * * * *
We got to the pre-dinner reception, and it didn’t take very long to figure out that what I thought was going to be just a bit of a mention and some chatting with donors was actually a bigger deal than that.
These sorts of functions usually have assigned seating, with the ‘top table’ reserved for the emcee and featured speaker, a few Really Important muckity-mucks, right in front of whatever podium is being used. Well, my Good Lady Wife and I got our name tags, and discovered that we were assigned to table #2. And that our assigned seats were in perfect sight-line to the podium. And that we had the honor of sitting with the much-beloved chancellor-emeritus of the University, a couple of Deans, and assorted other Pretty Important People.
Furthermore the Director of Development caught me shortly after we got into the room, and pointed out that the centerpiece of each table was a nice flat cake. A nice flat cake which had “before” and “after” images of conservation work I had done, complete with the name of the donor who supported that work. And the cake on the #2 table was a book of Mark Twain’s “In Honor of James T. Downey”.
Huh.
* * * * * * *
Friday afternoon, before the Library Society dinner, we had another function to attend. A former employer of my Good Lady Wife’s, who is still a professional colleague and friend of hers, was celebrating his 70th birthday.
We got to the party late (it was being done as an Open House at the offices of his architecture firm), knowing that the evening event would take at least a fair amount of energy. This was a good decision.
Oh, it wasn’t riotous or anything, but there were a lot of people in attendance – current and former employees, other architects and engineers in the community. It was relaxed and informal, and I felt a little out of place in a suit & tie (we were going directly from this party to the Library Society event). I hate feeling out of place. But at least I wasn’t under-dressed for the occasion.
We chatted, enjoyed ourselves. People asked what we were doing these days. It was a good warm-up for me.
* * * * * * *
I went over to the display of the rare books, said hello to Mike Holland, who is the University Archivist, Director of Special Collections. One of his staff people was there as well, and they were doing a fine job of talking about the books on display. I joined in – introducing myself to the donors who were looking, explaining some of my working methods and materials, and so forth. It was exactly what I expected, and thanks to my previous socializing at the birthday party, I was already past my nervousness and in full “GalleryMan” mode. I had several very nice conversations.
Then we were called to take our seats so the evening festivities could begin.
The program listed my Good Lady Wife and I among the ‘sponsors’ of the dinner. I did indeed get a very nice introduction to the crowd, and a round of applause for my work. During the course of dinner several people came by the table to talk with me further, ask opinions and advice about books they owned, et cetera. We had delightful dinner conversation with our table mates. It was, all in all, a very affirming experience that helped me see that my efforts have been worthwhile and appreciated.
So, as I thoroughly enjoyed the presentation by Peter Hessler after dinner, it was easy to not feel any jealousy for his recognition as a writer and author. Yeah, I did flash on how fun it would be to return to that dinner in a couple of years as the “noted author and featured speaker” of the event, but I could see that as just a fantasy. Knowing that if I got hit by a truck tomorrow my life would not have been in any sense wasted was extremely rewarding.
We all need that, now and again.
Jim Downey
I don’t think most people here in the US understand violence. They have too little experience with it. They think violence is a schoolyard fight, or gunplay in slow motion on a screen.
It’s more visceral than that. More basic. It is the unleashing of an older part of ourselves – a genetic memory of survival.
For decades I have watched reactionary forces strut and hype, threatening violence or implying the threat of violence. You see it with the rhetoric of the Tea Party in its latest incarnation. I’ve kept an eye on it, but never paid it too much attention – people fear change, and those fears sometime manifest as that kind of low-level violence. Oh, I don’t mean to deny the damage that a few lone loons can do – our history has shown repeatedly that political violence can indeed change the course of events for the short term. But even that is limited.
What worries me much more is something I have begun to see over the last few years, and in increasing amounts recently: rhetoric from the left which is starting to match the threats of violence from the right. It is always cloaked in terms of self-defense, or of ‘standing up to the right’ – but it is there, nonetheless.
And this is much more dangerous. Because then it is not a matter of just ‘simple’ violence. It is gang-war. It is tribal. It is the madness which erases civilization for a while.
We don’t think that it can happen here. Not again. We think we are too advanced. Too educated. Too secure in our democratic structures.
Bullshit.
When one side starts using the language of violence, even to the point of flaunting guns and invoking the Civil War, they’re crazy.
When the other side decides the time has come to take the crazies seriously, to the point of talking about arming themselves or de-humanizing the Right (both of which I have seen a lot of in recent weeks), then we’re playing with fire.
It’s not like I am a pacifist, or unwilling to defend either myself or those people and values I hold dear. I understand the need for taking a threat from someone seriously. But increasingly things feel like they are starting to spin out of control.
Jim Downey
Filed under: BoingBoing, Civil Rights, Daily Kos, Government, Politics, Privacy, Society, Travel
Go ahead: what if this were you, or your four-year old kid?
Did you hear about the Camden cop whose disabled son wasn’t allowed to pass through airport security unless he took off his leg braces?
* * *
Mid-morning on March 19, his parents wheeled his stroller to the TSA security point, a couple of hours before their Southwest Airlines flight was to depart.
The boy’s father broke down the stroller and put it on the conveyor belt as Leona Thomas walked Ryan through the metal detector.
The alarm went off.
The screener told them to take off the boy’s braces.
The Thomases were dumbfounded. “I told them he can’t walk without them on his own,” Bob Thomas said.
“He said, ‘He’ll need to take them off.’ “
You know the rest of the story, no doubt. The screener insisted that the boy’s braces come off (in violation of the TSA’s own guidelines), and the kid walk through the metal detector. Debate ensues, and eventually the boy hobbles through the detector. Parents are ticked off, make a bit of a scene. A supervisor was called, who just walked away when told that the boy’s parents wanted to file a complaint. There’s a bit more of a scene. The local police (this was at the Philadelphia airport) show up, and here’s where things change from the usual story line in these cases. The local police find out the father was a cop, and things get smoothed over enough that the family was allowed to go on with their flight.
But put yourself in that picture, instead. What would have happened to you? What would have happened had things deteriorated to the point where the local cops were called?
Yeah, maybe you shouldn’t have gotten annoyed and insisted that the TSA screeners and then the supervisor treat your child with a little bit of consideration and in accord with their own regulations. And maybe you shouldn’t have threatened to file a complaint. But according to everything else that everyone saw, you did nothing more than this.
Again: what would have happened to you?
If you were *very* lucky, and if you were *very* chagrined when the local police showed up, you would only have been taken to a small room somewhere nearby and hassled, probably missing your flight. Unlucky, or stand your ground, and you likely would wind up being held in jail for at least a few hours to ‘teach you a lesson’, perhaps with some actual charges filed against you. It happens all the time.
Policeman Bob Thomas got cut a little slack. He’s a cop, and I don’t really begrudge him that. And he called a local columnist, who has done a couple of stories on the Philadelphia airport’s TSA nightmares. This prompted the local TSA spokesperson to confirm that the whole incident was poorly handled, TSA rules were not followed, and she said that Thomas had received an apology last week from TSA’s security director at the airport, Bob Ellis. She said that Ellis provided Thomas with the name of the agency’s customer service representative, should he have a problem in the future.
Good. I’m glad that this got the attention of the press.
But imagine if it were you.
Jim Downey
(Via BB. Cross posted to dKos.)
Filed under: Civil Rights, Constitution, Emergency, Failure, Government, Politics, Predictions, Preparedness, Privacy, Terrorism, Violence
Look, not to be too explicit about this, but the use of full body scanners won’t make a damned bit of difference to someone who wants to smuggle a bomb or bomb components onto a plane (or anywhere else.) Because there are these things called body cavities, where people have actually been known to insert and hide stuff.
The Dutch have already announced that henceforth all passengers heading to the US will have to go through such scanners. Yesterday on All Things Considered I listened to professional fear-monger and former Bush Administration Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff claim that full body scanners are the solution, but that the evil ACLU had thwarted their use:
Mr. CHERTOFF: Well, a couple of years ago we began the process of testing them to see, first of all, if they worked and second, if they could be deployed without unduely restricting the flow of traffic. And the good news is that we were able to demonstrate that they were successful. We could use them without slowing up traffic and we could also protect privacy.
The difficulty is the ACLU and other similar organizations began a very aggressive campaign to limit or prevent the use of these machines and it culminated frankly last year in a vote by the House of Representatives to be very sharply restricted of the use of these machines. So, although we have acquired these machines, they are not as widely deployed as they should be.
Yeah, as reported this morning on NPR, there are concerns about the scanners being “intrusive”:
But lawmakers have been among those reluctant to deploy the machines. In June, the House of Representatives voted overwhelmingly to restrict their use. The vote was big — 310-118 — and bipartisan. Members of both parties said they were concerned that the pictures were too intrusive and questioned their effectiveness.
That’s what also worries privacy groups, which have mounted a major campaign against the machines, now being tested at 19 U-S airports. They say there’s no guarantee the pictures won’t be misused.
“There’s nothing to prevent images from being retained even when they say they won’t be retained,” says Lillie Coney, associate director of the Electronic Privacy Information Center, an advocacy group at the forefront of the campaign.
But above and beyond the privacy concerns, is the simple fact that just scanning what is on the outside of someone’s body, or in their carry-on, or in their luggage, is insufficient. Because you can insert sufficient explosive into your rectum to do serious damage. In fact, it’s already been done on at least one occasion this year:
On the evening of Aug. 28, Prince Mohammed bin Nayef, the Saudi Deputy Interior Minister — and the man in charge of the kingdom’s counterterrorism efforts — was receiving members of the public in connection with the celebration of Ramadan, the Islamic month of fasting. As part of the Ramadan celebration, it is customary for members of the Saudi royal family to hold public gatherings where citizens can seek to settle disputes or offer Ramadan greetings.
One of the highlights of the Friday gathering was supposed to be the prince’s meeting with Abdullah Hassan Taleh al-Asiri, a Saudi man who was a wanted militant from al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP). Al-Asiri had allegedly renounced terrorism and had requested to meet the prince in order to repent and then be accepted into the kingdom’s amnesty program.
* * *
But the al-Asiri case ended very differently from the al-Awfi case. Unlike al-Awfi, al-Asiri was not a genuine repentant — he was a human Trojan horse. After al-Asiri entered a small room to speak with Prince Mohammed, he activated a small improvised explosive device (IED) he had been carrying inside his anal cavity. The resulting explosion ripped al-Asiri to shreds but only lightly injured the shocked prince — the target of al-Asiri’s unsuccessful assassination attempt.
I’ve joked about this as the TSA’s “Grab your ankles, please” moment – but as a matter of simple fact, unless we actually go to full body-cavity searches, we cannot prevent this technique from being used in the future. Anything short of that is nothing more than a minor annoyance for terrorists, and an intrusion into the privacy of all other individuals who fly. Do we *really* want to take that step?
Jim Downey
(Cross posted to UTI.)
So, last night I had to attend a “public information meeting” in my capacity as Lord High President of our Neighborhood Association. I got there a bit early, to do the usual schmooze with people, and we waited chatting in the lobby of the City building downtown. A bit before 5:30, we made our way up to the mezzanine office where the previous meeting was held, which was open and lit, and which is the only meeting room in the building I had ever used other than the formal (large) Council room.
Well, 5:30 comes (scheduled start time), and no sign of City staff or the applicant for the rezoning, I note. 5:35, and I check my postcard notification to confirm time & place. Wording on ‘place’ is a bit vague. I go wandering up to the P & Z offices, poke around until I find someone, and ask. Well, gee – seems that they’re using a “conference room” up there which isn’t readily obvious to the public (it is literally in the corner of the building, with no signage or ready access from the public corridors). So, I go downstairs, announce this, and lead everyone up to the correct location. I get a dirty look from the applicant’s attorney as one of the City staffers there thanks me for getting everyone to the right room and explains that this room is “sometimes used,” and that is why the wording on the postcard is such as it is. Right.
Gee, I cannot *imagine* that someone would move a meeting, leave no indication of it, and then close the public meeting once an ‘appropriate waiting period has passed’ and thereby avoid having to actually let people know what is going on. I’m sure that it was all just a harmless misunderstanding on our part.
But I’m glad I’m suspicious enough to go looking.
Jim Downey
Filed under: ACLU, Civil Rights, Government, NPR, Politics, Predictions, Privacy, Science, Society, tech
And the march of progress continues:
‘Insecurity Cameras’ To Track All Of Town’s Traffic
A little town in California has a big and controversial idea: It wants to install security cameras on roads leading into town so that it can screen and record every license plate that comes inside city limits. The plan could effectively turn Tiburon into perhaps the nation’s first public gated community.
* * *
“Tiburon is unusual because there are only two roads going in and out of the town,” says Mayor Alice Fredericks.
It’s quite easy, she says, to keep track of every car along those two roads. Last week, the Town Council decided to spend $200,000 to place six security cameras at strategic points along the road. For now, the plan is to make sure none of the cars coming into town are stolen. Crime statistics are low in Tiburon, but in a small town, Fredericks says, even a few crimes make an impact.
* * *
Police run license-plate checks all the time, says Jennifer King, an expert in technology and public policy at the University of California, Berkeley. Tiburon’s plan is to just run many plate checks. The problem, she says, is that once the equipment is installed, safeguards to protect privacy can change. For instance, the license plate information is supposed to be purged after eight hours, but what if a crime occurs and suddenly that information becomes more important?
“They may start today by keeping it eight hours, but I’ll almost bet you that what they’ll find is that somebody will come back and go, ‘If only we had the data from those cameras,'” she says. “We call it ‘scope creep’ in the technology world. That scope can really crawl, really grow very quickly.”
Nah, that’d never happen, would it? I mean, the police would never seek to use the collected data in an inappropriate or unethical fashion, would they?
Police routinely arresting people to get DNA, inquiry claims
Police officers are now routinely arresting people in order to add their DNA sample to the national police database, an inquiry will allege tomorrow.
The review of the national DNA database by the government’s human genetics commission also raises the possibility that the DNA profiles of three-quarters of young black males, aged 18 to 35, are now on the database.
* * *
The crime and security bill published last week by the home secretary, Alan Johnson, proposes to keep DNA profiles of people arrested but not convicted of any offence on the database for six years. This follows a landmark European court judgment last December, ruling illegal the current blanket policy of indefinite retention of DNA profiles whether or not the person has been convicted of an offence.
It adds that parliament never formally debated the establishment of the DNA database. Its evolution involved a “function creep” from being used to confirm police suspicions to identifying suspects. This resulted in the addition of more and more profiles without being clearly matched by an improvement in convictions.
Gods, what are people thinking? In my own hometown there is once again an effort to put “security cameras” in place in our downtown area, a subject I have written about previously. Last spring our City Council decided to put a stop to it, but proponents have gathered enough signatures to now have the matter put on the ballot for a special election next year. It’s like the damned “red light cameras” which cost more than they’re worth, do not lead to improved safety at intersections, and just decrease everyone’s privacy.
But hey, they make people feel good, right? And all that matters is good security theatre, not actual security. Don’t scare the sheep, or they’ll panic and run.
Jim Downey
PS: since I’ve been told that sometimes I need to be less subtle, let me be bloody obvious – I chose the title intentionally. Yes, I think that religion and the perceived need for security theatre come from the same source: that reassurance that someone else is watching over you to make sure you are safe. What else is the Abrahamic God but a paranormal surveillance system?
(Cross posted to UTI.)
(Cross posted to dKos, but thought some here may find it interesting. JD)
One of the guiding principles of my life, and my politics, is that education makes a difference. Not just to give people the tools they need to succeed in life, but to also help improve our society through the reduction of fear. Because all too often, fear springs from ignorance. It can be ignorance of science. Or ignorance of other cultures. Or ignorance of sexuality. Or ignorance of firearms, which is my topic for today.
For years I have tried to tell other gun owners and 2nd Amendment supporters that the single most effective thing they could do to insure continued support for the 2nd Amendment is to take new people shooting. And preferably, to take someone who is liberal/progressive. Don’t talk politics. Don’t argue over this or that candidate. Just take people out to the range, and give them a safe and relaxed introduction to shooting.
It’s easier for me, because my liberal and progressive friends know that I am on their side. I don’t have a macho attitude, I’m intelligent and well educated, I understand quite well that things are complex and simple solutions are suspect. In other words, I’m about like every Kossack who isn’t a troll.
When introducing someone new to shooting, I will first go over the safety issues. Explain the four rules of firearm handling (this without even opening the gun cases yet.) Take out and hand around eye protection (unless they are already wearing glasses with safety lenses. Take out and hand around hearing protection (I prefer the newer electronic type which allows for full normal hearing, but shuts off with loud noises. I keep a couple extra pairs of these in my range bag so they can always hear me talking to them.) Then we will discuss the particular range where we’re shooting, and any additional safety issues which pertain to it (actually, I’m lucky in that I have private land where I can go which has an ideal set-up for short-range shooting).
Only then will I take out the first gun, carefully explain how the “four rules” apply specifically to it. Then I will set it aside, locked open, no ammo in sight. I will do the same thing with each of the usually 6-8 guns I bring along, explaining what they are and how they function, how the “rules” apply specifically to handling them.
Then we’ll start. I always prefer to start with just a .22 rifle. If someone has done shooting at camp or in school, chances are that they were using a .22 rifle of some sort. I go over once again how the “four rules” apply. How the gun operates. How to hold it. How to aim (though accuracy isn’t important at this stage – just gaining a safe familiarity with guns is all I want to accomplish.) Only after we’ve been over all of this do I break out the ammunition – and then just one round. I’ll go over how to load the gun, once again how to operate it, and how to hold it. After answering any questions, and checking that everyone has their eye and hearing protection in place, then I will fire the gun, demonstrating the recoil and report from it. With a .22, neither is really noticeable, and it provides a good introduction to the whole idea of shooting.
If anyone has any questions at this point, I’ll answer them. Then I’ll make safe the rifle, hand it to the first student (I prefer to only teach one or two people a trip – three max.) Make sure they understand how to hold it, how it operates. Then I will get out one more round of ammunition, and either help them load the gun, or load it for them. When they are ready, and comfortable, I walk them through the process of aiming and firing the gun, just gently squeezing the trigger. When it goes off, there is almost invariably a bit of a squeal of joy or laughter from the shooter. And that is one of the best sounds in the whole world.
Sounds tedious? It isn’t really. I just do it in a very thorough and slow manner, taking my time. Because to the person who has never handled or shot a gun before, it can be very scary. Showing that guns can be safely handled, and even fun, is worth a bit of time.
We’ll shoot the .22 rifle a few more times. I’ll let the student gain some level of comfort in loading and shooting the gun on their own, even allowing them to load two or three rounds into the magazine, so that they can shoot it multiple times without stopping to reload.
Then we’ll move on. We’ll go from the .22 rifle to a .22 revolver, then a .22 semi-automatic, each time going over all the steps outlined above, always ALWAYS stressing the four rules of gun safety and how they apply to each firearm. It depends on how much time we have (I usually like to allot about three hours – that’s long enough to tire out most people new to shooting), and what guns I’ve brought, but we’ll progress from smaller caliber guns to larger ones, as the student wants. I usually have up to a .44 magnum – a large frame gun that is actually quite comfortable to shoot with “special” loads in it. But it hasn’t always been so – you can go with whatever you have. After we’ve gone through all the guns once, I give my friend a chance to go back and shoot anything that they want, once again going over the handling of that specific gun for safety.
When we’re done, I will pack up everything securely, as I answer questions. It isn’t often that anyone “gets hooked” on shooting sports – it does happen, and I always tell them that if they want to go shooting again, I will be happy to provide everything. But that wasn’t my goal. My goal was to show that guns, while potentially dangerous, can be handled safely and sanely. To de-mystify them, turn them from an object to be feared to a tool which is understood. Once that happens, my liberal friends may or may not change their mind about the 2nd Amendment – but at least they will now be more informed of the issues involved. And over time, I have found that most of the people I have taught have become much more willing to see the matter from my perspective.
Jim Downey
I heard the news when the radio went on this morning at 6:00, and just started laughing:
OSLO – President Barack Obama won the 2009 Nobel Peace Prize on Friday in a stunning decision designed to encourage his initiatives to reduce nuclear arms, ease tensions with the Muslim world and stress diplomacy and cooperation rather than unilateralism.
* * *
The award appeared to be a slap at Bush from a committee that harshly criticized Obama’s predecessor for his largely unilateral military action in the wake of the Sept. 11 terror attacks. The Nobel committee praised Obama’s creation of “a new climate in international politics” and said he had returned multilateral diplomacy and institutions like the U.N. to the center of the world stage.
“The award appeared to be a slap at Bush . . . “ No shit, Sherlock. I can just imagine heads exploding all across the Right today.
Heh. Hehehehehe . . .
Jim Downey
(Cross posted to UTI.)
In spite of how it might seem sometimes, I’m politically independent – I tend to support specific policies (and to a very limited degree individuals), not this or that party.
And one thing I have long objected to has been the existence of an ‘American Royalty’ within our political system. Here in Missouri we just got rid of one Republican governor who is the son of a long-term US Congresscritter. On the Democratic side, the Carnahan family has held or currently holds several important political offices.
Nationally, it’s even worse. Look at the Bush family, and the debacle of having W rise to power almost solely on the power of his father & family. Al Gore is the son of a Senator. The Clintons have long operated as a family unit, sharing power and position.
And then there are the Kennedys.
Now, Ted Kennedy was loved on the left. All last week we got to hear and read (and see, for those who watch television) plenty of discussion about his place in American history, how he matured into a true leader of the Democratic party, how he managed to rise above the scandals and substance abuse of his youth, how he came to represent much of what was good about American politics, with his ability to work with members of the other side of the political divide, et fucking cetera.
Yeah, he was an accomplished pol. But I have a really hard time coming to the conclusion that we as a nation are better off for his having been in office for 40 years, gaining office purely because of the power of his family and his relationship to his two sainted brothers. Furthermore, I’ll say that his affirmation of the Kennedy name as a political power unto itself was inherently bad for our nation, along with all the other political royalty we have now and have had to suffer with in our history.
There, a bit of political sacrilege. But I had to say this, in reaction to something which made a minor flap this weekend: the horror of Jenna Hager (nee Bush, one of W’s twin daughters) being hired by NBC as a reporter for their Today show.
NEW YORK — NBC’s “Today” show has hired someone with White House experience as a new correspondent – former first daughter Jenna Hager.
The daughter of former President George W. Bush will contribute stories about once a month on issues like education to television’s top-rated morning news show, said Jim Bell, its executive producer.
Hager, a 27-year-old teacher in Baltimore, said she has always wanted to be a teacher and a writer, and has already authored two books. But she was intrigued by the idea of getting into television when Bell contacted her.
“It wasn’t something I’d always dreamed to do,” she said. “But I think one of the most important things in life is to be open-minded and to be open-minded for change.”
And from Glenn Greenwald:
It’s time to embrace American royalty
We’re obviously hungry to live with royal and aristocratic families so we should really just go ahead and formally declare it:
Bush daughter Jenna Hager becomes ‘Today’ reporter
NBC’s “Today” show has hired someone with White House experience as a new correspondent — former first daughter Jenna Hager, the daughter of former President George W. Bush. . . . She “just sort of popped to us as a natural presence, comfortable” on the air, [Executive Producer Jim] Bell said. Hager will work out of NBC’s Washington bureau.
They should convene a panel for the next Meet the Press with Jenna Bush Hager, Luke Russert, Liz Cheney, Megan McCain and Jonah Goldberg, and they should have Chris Wallace moderate it. They can all bash affirmative action and talk about how vitally important it is that the U.S. remain a Great Meritocracy because it’s really unfair for anything other than merit to determine position and employment. They can interview Lisa Murkowski, Evan Bayh, Jeb Bush, Bob Casey, Mark Pryor, Jay Rockefeller, Dan Lipinksi, and Harold Ford, Jr. about personal responsibility and the virtues of self-sufficiency. Bill Kristol, Tucker Carlson and John Podhoretz can provide moving commentary on how America is so special because all that matters is merit, not who you know or where you come from. There’s a virtually endless list of politically well-placed guests equally qualified to talk on such matters.
It’s a fair point, but Greenwald doesn’t then make the connection to the Kennedys. Gee, I wonder why that is?
Jim Downey
(Cross posted to UTI. Oh, a personal note: I’ll be on vacation for the next week, so don’t expect to hear much from me after Tuesday.)
I’m sick with a nasty lower GI thing, which might explain why I think this is hilarious:
**GAH! F***ing YouTube pulled it, and I can’t get the Hulu version to patch. Go HERE to see it.**
Anyone who remembers Bill’s other spoken-word stuff will recognize this for the genius that it is.
Jim Downey
(Via Balloon Juice. Cross posted to UTI.)
Communion Of Dreams 