John Birch Society Blues

Yesterday’s passing of Otis Chandler has prompted dozens of articles lauding the pivotal role he played in the history of journalism as well as the evolution of Los Angeles. But some of his adversaries are starting to emerge, hoping the attention on Chandler’s career will help them settle old scores.

First up: The ultra-right-wing, conspiracy-minded John Birch Society. Thanks to Google News, which put this story near the top of its Otis Chandler news links, we get to read their reaction. On The New American, Birch Society President John F. McManus has this to say:

Death notices about the passing of Otis Chandler, the Publisher of the Los Angeles Times from 1960 until 1980, mentioned his decision to have the newspaper devote several feature articles to the infant John Birch Society in 1961. JBS Founder Robert Welch remarked at the time that those articles, while not complimentary, were evidence of “honest reporting.”

The attention given to the Society by the Times had been prompted by widespread awareness that many of Southern California’s leading citizens, including several members of Mr. Chandler’s immediate family, had become members. But, after the series about the Society appeared, Mr. Chandler took it upon himself to place his own critical and condemnatory editorial on the paper’s front page. Strangely, its condemnations pointed to positions and policies never voiced by the organization and, in fact, were positions that the Society had vigorously opposed.

Previously known for its strong conservative and anti-communist stance, the newspaper under Chandler’s leadership veered sharply leftward, a stance it has never wavered from over the past 45 years. In 1973, Robert Welch included the name of Otis Chandler among several leftwing luminaries he accused of “working, throughout their whole careers, to bring about a one-world government.” It is, perhaps, because of The John Birch Society and despite the efforts of men such as Otis Chandler that the American Republic continues to enjoy independence.

McManus wants it to sound like a David vs. Goliath story, but by 1961, the Birch Society was no “infant.” It had 60,000 to 100,000 members, dozens of paid staff, hundreds of active volunteers, and was using state-of-the-art grassroots organizing techniques, many of which were later adopted by the two major political parties. It had a strong presence in Southern California especially, so the Times was taking something of a risk in picking a fight with the Birchers — especially since the Times itself was still loyally read by conservative Angelenos.

Chandler’s Times could hardly ignore a group of that size whose founder claimed that President Eisenhower was a “conscious, dedicated agent of the Communist Conspiracy,” who took orders from his high-level Communist brother Milton. Despite the madness of such statements, the Birch Society continued to be power-brokers in the Republican party at least through the mid-60s, despite being denounced by William F. Buckley and other hygiene-minded conservatives. Buckley’s name is still a dirty word among Birchers along with Chandler’s.

(The Times‘ more mainstream conservative critics have been gracious or, so far, silent.)

And Speaking of History…

Andrew at Here in Van Nuys has posted a list of some of the History Channel’s latest contributions to historical understanding.  Pretty pathetic.  If I were History, I’d sue to get my name back. For example:

How William Shatner Changed the World
An Alien History of Planet Earth
Star Wars: Empire of Dreams
“Jaws”

The whole post is worth reading, but keep the Xanax nearby.  “Those who cannot learn from history are condemned to repeat it?”  Maybe we need to revise that to, “Those who cannot watch the History Channel are condemned to watch Star Trek repeats.”

Seeing It Coming

When I was young and first learned about World War Two, Hitler and the Nazi party, I remember feeling baffled that Germans were now our ally. It’s a child’s question: How did the Germans go from hating us and wanting to kill us, to liking us and wanting to help us?

The answer I’d get — that Hitler was not representative of Germany and that most Germans never hated us — deepened the mystery rather than resolving it.

As I got older and read history, I had another question: Hitler told the world everything he planned to do, long before taking power; and he told us how he was going to do it. It was all written down, in Mein Kampf, a book in wide circulation in the 1930s. Why did so few believe him and prepare to stop him? The unsatisfying answer was, his book was so crazy, no one really believed he meant it.

I grew up on movies about the glorious Allied victories and heroic struggles of World War Two — Von Ryan’s Express, The Longest Day, The Great Escape, countless others. While I still love those films, I’m not so taken anymore by the notion of World War Two as a “good war.” It was a terrible war. Tens of millions of people died. And it could have been avoided.

Once the Allies finally were roused to fight Hitler, he was so much more powerful than he had been when he began violating the Treaty of Versailles, drafting an army, and marching troops into the Rhineland. These were illegal acts. France and Britain had the right to enforce the treaty militarily. Compared to the horror of WWII, a fight in the Rhineland would’ve cost few lives. A humiliated Hitler might have been ousted from power…and all over the world, hundreds of millions of people would have grandparents today.

On the other hand, if D-Day had failed, Hitler would have had more time to complete his development of a nuclear weapon. He would have won the war and dictated the peace. That avoidable outcome was a nearer thing than we like to admit. The movies made it seem like the Allies won because we were more heroic and had superior values. Unfortunately, that’s false. Our soldiers were brave, but our countries were also lucky.

David Warren is a columnist for the Ottawa Citizen. In an essay on the Danish cartoons issue, which is getting passed around on the web, Warren finds parallels between the 1930s and today. Like the Brits who felt sure their friends in Germany wouldn’t let that wacky speechmaker go too far, the West is deluding itself by relying on the irrelevant fact that most Muslims don’t hate us.

I do not doubt the great majority of Muslims, in Canada and around the world, are decent, “moderate” people, who want no part in a “clash of civilizations”. But it has become obvious they can do nothing to stop the triumph of “Islamism” internationally, or oppose the fanatics proselytizing in their own communities.

Germany was full of moderate Germans, as Hitler rose; Stalin drove his oars through a sea of moderate Russians. While we must not forget that the Muslims are the first victims of “Islamism”, and may suffer most from its triumph, we are beyond the point where we can do more for them than destroy the tyranny by which they are enthralled.

Indeed, many Muslims, by birth or faith, remain our best allies, warning us as many fine Germans did of what is coming our way. For example, Ayaan Hirsi Ali, the Somali-born politician in the Netherlands — a magnificent young woman — speaking recently in Berlin:

“Publication of the cartoons confirmed that there is widespread fear among authors, filmmakers, cartoonists, and journalists who wish to describe, analyze or criticize intolerant aspects of Islam all over Europe. It has also revealed the presence of a considerable minority in Europe who do not understand or will not accept the workings of liberal democracy. These people — many of whom hold European citizenship — have campaigned for censorship, for boycotts, for violence, and for new laws to ban ‘Islamophobia’. … The issue is not about race, colour, or heritage. It is a conflict of ideas, which transcend borders and races.”

Could these radicals, a minority within a minority, win? Could they bring the governments of Europe to heel? Could they accomplish what they’ve publically said they intend to accomplish? Sure they could. They can scare their opposition into silence. They can force politicians, diplomats, editors and academics to weave elaborate rationalizations to cloak their fatalism and fear. They can operate unopposed for quite awhile, and march into positions from which it will be extremely difficult to dislodge them.

Following the course they’re on, the Islamicists will be able to blackmail much of what we used to call the Free World. They’ve already started. They don’t even need a nuclear bomb to force the West’s hands. Small-scale terrorism and street action is sufficient. But the jihadists will eventually get the bomb and then it won’t be about cartoons anymore.

It’s not so hard, now, to see how the Nazis came so far. We’re watching a show just like it again.

Otis Chandler, R.I.P.

LA Observed and, naturally, the Los Angeles Times‘ website are the primary places to go for the obituaries and other links to remembrances of Otis Chandler, the most consequential publisher the LA Times ever had.

History will probably say the last great era of newspapers was the 1960s and 70s. If that turns out to be right, history will say the era was dominated by the Washington Post‘s Katherine Graham and Otis Chandler, two unlikely characters — a widow and an heir who were initially dismissed as lightweights — who carved out a new role for newspaper journalism in the face of the “new media” challenge of their era, television.

In 1960, major cities had as many as half a dozen daily newspapers engaged in cutthroat circulation battles, using sensationalized news coverage as the bait. But nothing was more sensational than seeing news happen right in front of you, something newspapers could not offer but TV could. For that and many other reasons, newspapers began dying off and the industry’s future was most uncertain.

In the face of that threat, both Chandler and Graham got creative. They developed new models for their respective newspapers, giving readers in-depth coverage, investigative reporting and analysis that TV could seldom provide. You can’t say it was innovative, because the New York Times was already doing something similar. But don’t forget, it was not possible for people in Los Angeles to read the New York Times back then unless they got it mailed to them. (I know because when my parents moved us in 1968 from a New York suburb to a L.A. suburb, they got one of those by-mail subscriptions. I can still see the big white envelopes that used to jam our mailbox.) Treating Los Angeles newspaper readers with respect was an entirely new phenomenon.

With his radical remake of the LA Times, Chandler proved a city other than New York would support a newspaper aimed at discerning readers. His vision of a quality newspaper was no New York Times clone. Chandler created a paper distinctly reflective of Los Angeles’ suburban lifestyle — less stuffy, more colorful, a paper that emphasized stylish writing over tight editing, that understood its readers to be active people who spent their weekends at the beach, in the garden or on hiking trails.

In the tradition of his family, Chandler unashamedly used his newspaper to boost Los Angeles. Chandler’s boosterism, however, was more about culture than real estate (although he certainly could not have been unhappy to watch LA’s suburbs grow, with a potential new subscriber in each new split-level.) He embodied the LA intelligentsia’s inferiority complex; but he didn’t just fret about it, as it was fashionable to do back then. He addressed it. Nowadays, I don’t think LA is seen as a culturally backward city, lacking in venues for serious music and fine art. That’s a big change and Otis Chandler had a lot to do with it.

Chandler enjoyed a long retirement, but he emerged from it like Marley’s Ghost in the aftermath of the damaging LA Times scandal involving Staples Center — a scandal bad enough in itself, but also a symbol of the Times’ slow-and-then -rapid decline in the 20 years after Chandler left.

I happened to attend a USC Annenberg School fundraiser in 2000 where Otis Chandler was one of the honorees. It was one of the most dramatic events I’ve ever attended. The room was full of Times reporters, most of whom paid their own way to see their spiritual leader, whose legacy was now in the hands of the wrong kind of people. The new Times’ management initially didn’t want to support the event, but they capitulated and bought a table under pressure from staff veterans.

The Times’ table was directly underneath the podium in some kind of makeshift ballroom on the 20th Century Fox backlot — if I recall correctly. While the Times’ reporters filled seats near the back, then-publisher Kathryn Downing sat up front with other executives. To cheers from the gallery, Chandler let them have it with both barrels, addressing Downing directly, pointing a finger at her, holding her personally responsible for the damage the Times’ reputation had suffered.

Chandler was justly proud of the edifice he’d built. What we all saw that night was the rage of a man who’d been forced to endure its decay — the rage of a king. It was a powerful coda to one of the great Los Angeles stories.

Four months later, the Chandler family sold the Times to the Tribune Company. Otis Chander said the family didn’t even tell him about their plans until two days before the sale was consummated.

I was at a meeting this morning when I saw the news of his death on my laptop. I passed the info along to others at the meeting — people younger than me — and got blank stares. Of course, how would anyone know what Otis Chandler accomplished if they were schoolchildren when he retired? Yesterday’s newspapers wrap flowers. Newspapers from 30 years ago barely exist at all. But a great newspaper has consequences, and if you’re in LA today, your daily life is in part a consequence of Otis Chandler’s determined vision of a better newspaper and a greater city.

(Update 2/28/06.  A little more about Chandler and the John Birch Society above.)

Mario…Save My Brain!

I’m 50. Well let me back up. I grew up in a household with four brothers. Even when I was 15 and my brain was young and dew-covered, I didn’t always call them by their correct names. But now that I’m 50, all kinds of memories seem a little further out of reach than they were ten years ago. Don’t get me wrong. The offsetting benefit of experience adding perspective makes up for the fade-out of things I used to remember.

I want to be able to use that experience for at least another two or three decades. But if I can’t remember stuff…wait, what was I saying?

Fortunately we live in a time when functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) can track what’s going on inside our skulls, showing us with great precision the brain locations were different work is done. For example, the Max Planck Institute in Germany recently discovered the precise spot inside our brains where complex grammar gets processed — a key trait that separates humans from other species. (Hat tip to ZDNet’s Emerging Technology Blog.)

There is a spot inside your brain that lights up on the fMRI when you need to process a simple linguistic concept: Subject, verb. Article, noun. Apes are also equipped with that capability. We, humans and apes, can understand the difference between a likely combination that conveys information, and an unlikely combination that conveys nonsense. However, when you have to understand or create a complex sentence, what lights up is an area of the brain that apes never developed.

English majors like me will be glad to find out that the ability to understand a complicated sentence provides an evolutionary advantage. Adept use of parenthetical phrases got you better mates.

This kind of knowledge is more than just scientifically interesting. It can help us prolong the useful life of our most precious physical asset.

Our brains age, but the effects of aging can be reversed. University of Illinois scientists, using the same fMRI imaging technology, discovered the brain can be exercised; and that those who train their brains can restore their ability to think and remember.

For the new study, researchers in (Professor Arthur F.) Kramer’s lab looked at areas of the brain known to be associated with executive control — scheduling, planning, juggling multiple tasks and working memory. These areas, the ventral and dorsal prefrontal cortexes, are tied to cognitive declines in aging.

Participants were 32 men and women, ages 55 to 80, and 31 younger adults. They were divided into control and experimental groups, with the latter receiving training on a time-measured task of identifying green or yellow Xs and/or whether a letter on the computer monitor was a B or C. Researchers then analyzed comprehensive fMRI data compiled before and after training of various parts of the brain and of changes in performance and times involving the tasks.

Before and after results were dramatic in ventral regions of the brain, said lead author Kirk I. Erickson, a psychology postdoctoral research associate.

“You can see,” Erickson said as he pointed to graphs showing results of activity in the left ventral region, “that even though the older adults start out with a lower amount of activation before training, those who were trained actually increased the amount of activity. You see a convergence with the young people. After training there are less age-related differences. Older adults begin to look more like the younger adults in brain activation.”

This is big news to people like me. Where can we learn these exercises? I can tell the difference between green and yellow. Hook me up!

Like magic, the consumer market responds. Specifically… Nintendo. The Mario Brothers guys. The study isn’t even officially published yet, but…

Brain Age: Train Your Brain in Minutes a Day for Nintendo DS is a fun, rewarding form of entertainment everyone can enjoy, as it helps players flex their mental muscles. Brain Age is inspired by the research of Professor Ryuta Kawashima, a prominent Japanese neuroscientist. His studies evaluated the impact of performing certain reading and mathematic exercises to help stimulate the brain.

Brain Age presents quick mental activities that help keep your DS brain in shape. Activities include quickly solving simple math problems, counting people going in and out of a house simultaneously, drawing pictures on the Touch Screen, reading classic literature out loud, and more. You can also play sudoku, the number puzzle game which has become an extremely popular feature in U.S. newspapers.

On your first day of exercise, you will take a series of tests and get a score that determines how old your brain is. This number is called your “DS Brain Age”. By performing daily exercises just minutes a day over weeks and months, the better you’ll get at the exercises and the lower your DS Brain Age will become.

Of course, baby boomers, the most paranoid about losing our edge, aren’t big users of electronic game consoles. They came on the pop culture scene a little late for us. But Nintendo has sure figured out a way to get our attention, haven’t they? And for those of us with kids, what are we supposed to say now?

“Kid, turn that infernal machine off and do your homework.”

“Dad, don’t bug me. I’m training my brain.”

“D’oh! Move over son…”

I’m sure more products like this are on their way. These next few years are going to be very surreal as consumer marketers start handing us new tools for self-transformation.

Get ‘em While They’re Young

One of my problems with the Democratic Party is that it seems to re-invent itself every election based on polls, vogue issues and the policy preferences of the person who happens to win the presidential nomination. All kinds of things are wrong with running a political party that way. The Republicans’ current run of success can be attributed in part to the party’s philosophical consistency, which if nothing else conveys commitment, even if it sometimes leaves them looking out of touch. Democrats don’t like being out of touch, but being too “in touch” can make you seem like a chameleon.

At least one Democrat is thinking ahead, however: Jeremy Zilber, author of the new children’s book, Why Mommy is a Democrat. Here’s a sample page:

The sample pages on Zilber’s website do a better job of explaining core Democratic values than any speech John Kerry or John Edwards made during the 2004 campaign.

As a political scientist, Zilber is surely aware of the cliche that the Democrats are the “mommy party,” while Republicans are the “daddy party.” In troubled times like now, these identities don’t do the Democrats much good. But I give Zilber a lot of credit for being unafraid to steer right into that reputation; I expect this book to be very successful. The worst nightmare of a committed Democratic activist is for their child to grow up and become a Republican. I’m not sure this book will prevent it, but why not go down fighting?

But — maybe this conveys my ambivalence — imagine Harry Truman’s reaction to a book like this.

(I have to admit; I found out about this book via Powerline, which could barely keep its pants dry chortling about it.)

Turning Point…But Which Way?

The coverage of the bombing of the shrine in Askariyah flags this event as a turning point toward civil war. If there is any U.S. consensus about Iraq among pundits left and right, it’s that Iraq’s divisions are so great, and this event will so inflame them, that it’s only a matter of time until the entire country descends into bloody chaos and finally breaks apart — making a mockery of the huge U.S. effort to render a democratic state out of the ruins of Hussein’s dictatorship. The right says “it was a worthwhile gamble.” The left says, “told you so.”

But this Baghdad blogger, who goes by “24 Steps to Liberty,” reports another kind of turning point might have been reached due to this latest act of terror:

The first reaction to the bombing which “targeted a Shiite” shrine came from the Sunni residents of Samarra. The first demonstration to condemn the attack was held spontaneously by Sunnis in the area where the shrine is. Almost all Sunni leaders went on TV to condemn the attack and show solidarity and unity with the Shiites. Here are some of what the Sunni leaders said on TVs all day yesterday [that’s what I could get]

- Wafiq Samarraie, a Sunni politician from Samarra city and serves as Iraq’s president’s advisor for security issues. [from Arabiya satellite channel]
He said “Iamam Ali al-Hadi is not only for Shiites. The shrine is a symbol of all Iraqis and of Samara city in particular. I demand to dismiss the governor of the province and take all the legal procedures to prevent strife. There will be no strife in Iraq. Iraqis will not fight each other. Samarra city should be protected. The information is very clear. The government should have chased the terrorists in eastern Samarra and they are a few. The government and the governor should have done something this issue. I tell the tribes in Samarra, especially in eastern Samarra, that ‘ it is a shame to leave the strangers among you. You should inform the police force about them.’”

- The Iraqi Islamic Party, IIP, one of the most powerful Sunni political and religious groups, issued a statement saying: “The size of the wicked conspiracy that is targeting the Iraqis, their sacred symbols, and unity, is clear now. After the series of attacking mosques and assassinations of clergies, people of Samarra woke up today on the bombing of Imam Ali Al-Hadi dome. We, the Iraqi Islamic Party/ Samarra branch, denounce this criminal act and demand a wide investigation to reveal the controversies that raise many questions on who was behind this incident.

(snip)

We in the Iraqi Islamic Party/ Samarra branch, urge our people to go in wide, peaceful demonstrations to condemn this crime. We also remind all Iraqis to protect their unity to prevent the chance for suspicious conspiracies, which target all Iraqis with no exception. IIP/ Samarra branch”

- Iraq’s Kurdish president, Jalal Talbani, net with tribal leaders and prominent figures from Salahudin province, where Samarra city is, and talked about the incident. [from Iraqiya satellite channel]
He said “This is a crime against Iraq as a whole, not against Shiites only. It aims to provoke a sectarian strife and a civil war among us. I hope the Sunni clergies would condemn this crime. We all are facing a conspiracy against Iraq and its entity. Therefore we should all unite to prevent the danger of civil war.”

The title of his post: “We Are All Misinformed.”

Read the Iraq-based bloggers, and you learn they are very aware of how their country is being depicted in the U.S. media — and how it enrages them. They complain about the U.S. media even more than we do. No wonder, since so much more is at stake for them than for any of us. Not all of them agree; some are more anti-U.S. than others, but collectively, they give a perspective that the American and British reporters will never give you.
I think it’s still okay to be optimistic about Iraq. Uncool as it might be to say it in some precincts, there’s heartening evidence of progress and reconciliation, if you look for it.

However, the Baghdad dentist Zeyad who writes “Healing Iraq” was a little too close to some frightening street fighting today:

Fierce streetfighting at my doorstep for the last 3 hours. Rumor in the neighbourhood is that men in black are trying to enter the area. Some armed kids defending the local mosque three blocks away are splattering bullets at everything that moves, and someone in the street was shouting for people to prepare for defending themselves.

There’s supposed to be a curfew, but it doesn’t look like it. My net connection is erratic, so I’ll try to update again if possible. The news from other areas in Baghdad are horrible. I don’t think it’s being reported anywhere.

My father and uncle are agitatedly walking back and forth in the hallway, asking me what we should do if the mob or Interior ministry forces try to attack us in our homes? I have no answer for them.

Does P.R. Exist? A Case Study Right Before Our Eyes

The past week’s hullabaloo over Dubai’s DP World’s bid to buy out a seaport management firm that runs several U.S. ports will be studied from many angles for many years to come. The horrified reaction of so many otherwise intelligent journalists, politicians and pundits contains a fair amount of opportunism on all sides, so you can discard some of it. Once the political winds start blowing in a different direction, many of these so-called leaders will keep smilin’, and shift course.

The opportunists’ rhetoric, however, reflects a genuine public panic. And underneath that panic is, I think, widespread public discomfort and ambivalence over the rapid evolution of the global economy.

The picture many of us carry around in our minds of the American economy is out of date. Not only are many American assets no longer owned or controlled by strictly American companies, not only are many American brand-name products no longer produced in America, not only are dyed-in-the-wool American merchants now largely selling foreign-made products; the entire concept of a national economy distinct from the world’s is rapidly melting away.

The port-management contracts that Dubai seeks were already in the hands of a foreign company — P&O, a British concern. United Arab Emirate companies already have an established presence in Houston’s port, have had for many years, and no one’s complained. The contracts Dubai DP were taking over were for terminal operation. Something like 80 percent of the terminal operations at the Port of Los Angeles are conducted by foreign-owned companies. The contracts do not give Dubai DP responsibility for security. And anyway, this is not a takeover of anything. DP World can be fired from any of these contracts if the public agencies owning the ports believe it is not acting in their best interests.

Besides, ports are already incredibly insecure, a problem no one has figured out a cost-effective way to fix. A nuclear bomb could be on its way to the Port of Los Angeles right now, and our chances of detecting it are close to mathematical zero. The Dubai deal doesn’t change that sad fact one way or the other.

Once these facts got into the public discourse, the reaction was interesting. Some critics went into Emily Litella mode: “Never mind.” But others — from Tom Delay to Hillary Clinton — plowed ahead with legislative proposals to limit who can get U.S. port-management contracts.

And, see, that’s the problem. The story hit the public consciousness sideways, like a two-by-four swung out of a shadow. Of course, the initial reaction was going to be reflexive and irrational.

How did that happen? The same facts journalists, politicians and bloggers have “unearthed” in the past few days have been out there, like grapefruit in a tree, ripe for the picking. Is it the fault of the scribes and politicians for shooting from the hip? Or shouldn’t the vast economic interests involved in global trade, including our own government, have done a better job educating the public on the whys and wherefores of the international shipping industry?

A few months ago, I started doing research and collecting notes for a book I hope to write on the history of the public relations industry and exploring the continued relevance of the PR approach in a communications landscape that has shifted so radically. In the course of this research, I started reading Edward Bernays, one of a handful of people who can claim parenthood of the public relations industry. (Bernays’ Wikipedia bio is here.)

The only one of Bernays’ many books that’s currently in print is Propaganda, a slender 1927 volume that distills his approach to its very essence. This book is where Bernays famously defined PR as “the manufacture of consent,” and as “applied social science,” which can be used to correct what he perceived as democracy’s great flaw — the potential for mobs to form around bad ideas that would damage the orderly operations of business and government. (Yes, I’m aware that this sounds creepy and manipulative. Read the book.)

Bernays applied his theories to clients that included governments, large corporations and utilities, as well as for product marketers.

His basic strategy can be illustrated by a small example:

One of Bernays’ clients was a piano manufacturer that wanted, naturally, to sell more pianos. Bernays suggested the pianomaker could accomplish this goal indirectly — by working with home builders on home designs that would include a music room, and to promulgate images, warm cozy images, of families singing around the piano in the music room. So, when families moved into these new homes the absence of a piano would make the room seem unfurnished, and the family deprived. Piano sales took off.

The same techniques should be applied, per Bernays, to the great projects required by government, utilities and business. The voting public might be confused, upset, frightened by some plan of these large institutions, but Bernays’ “applied social science” could “manufacture consent” by educating the public on the necessity for the plan, indirectly, by using the various communications outlets of that era — such as newspapers, radio, movies, school classrooms, speeches social and business organizations — to build awareness of the problem and steer the public to the desired conclusion.

Like it or hate it, that’s how PR is supposed to work, back then and today. Anyone who has worked in the PR industry surely is familiar with campaigns that have been structured like this.

The Dubai shipping controversy demonstrates one of two things. Either a global industry that generates billions in revenues and underpins the world’s economy has so little faith in the techniques of PR that they chose not to use them; or the industry used those techniques, and they failed.

Until this week, the Dubai bid to operate port terminals was deemed by senior officials in the Bush Administration, Dubai officials and shipping industry leaders to be a run-of-the-mill event — something not worth notifying either the president or his Homeland Security secretary about.

A reasonably intelligent 27-year-old PR pro could have told the client otherwise, that the industry needed to prepare the public for this plan. And maybe they tried! The ad supplements that appear in USA Today and other papers promoting the United Arab Emirates might have been part of a multi-million dollar PR and advertising blitz to distinguish the UAE from Al Queda. But from what I can tell, the shipping industry and its many stakeholders — like Wal-Mart, Target, Home Depot — made no impact on the public debate.

So, you might ask, what’s the harm? Aren’t the the facts getting out now? Yes, but it’s too late. Key political leaders like Clinton, Delay, Rep. Peter King, Sen. Charles Schumer, the mayor of Baltimore and dozens of others have already run far out onto a limb demanding this deal be rescinded and that future deals of this type be banned. Their careers are at stake. The crediblity of news outlets and various pundits is also at stake. They’ve got a dog in this fight now — their own reputations. The industry can’t start running a campaign now that says, in essence, “you’re all a bunch of idiots.” So while the sudden emergence of old information as if it’s new information might save the port deal, a lot of unnecessary damage has been done and bad will created. Consent has not been manufactured, and now it might never be.

Unless you want to argue the controversy and the damage it has caused couldn’t have been avoided. Is that an argument anyone in the PR industry wants to make?

Put Away Your Bibles and Methadone

Weary thumbs all over Los Angeles and the nation are going to have to suck it up and keep tapping out messages on those little blue blinking devices for the indefinite future. But their owners are breathing a sigh of relief that they won’t have to take the BlackBerry cure just yet. A federal judge this morning chose not to order an immediate shutdown of the BlackBerry portable e-mail system. You can keep sending messages — for now. The judge, James Spencer, didn’t sound very impressed by the Research In Motion argument (joined by the U.S. government) that a national crisis would ensue if he ordered the injunction the patent owner NTP sought:

“I am surprised, absolutely surprised, that you have left this incredibly important decision to the courts. I’ve always thought this was a business decision,” the federal district court judge said.

Earlier in a packed courtroom, NTP described the Canadian makers of the BlackBerry as “squatters” who need to pay for using NTP’s patented technology in the popular wireless e-mail devices.

Lawyers for NTP argued that RIM should pay at least $126 million US in damages for plus $250 million US in royalties on BlackBerry sales that have been collecting in an escrow account.

Spencer also heard from lawyers representing RIM and the U.S. government, which is concerned that the five-year-old patent dispute could affect national security by disrupting a critical communications service.

(snip)

Although Spencer didn’t formally address RIM’s software “workaround” solution, he did say it didn’t make sense that Research In Motion could argue both that an injunction against the BlackBerry would provoke a national crisis and also that RIM had a technical fix that would the problem completely.

I admit it — I’m having too much fun with this issue, largely because I am no longer a BlackBerry user. But if you told me I couldn’t bring my laptop into Starbucks, where I am right now, and couldn’t connect to the Internet wirelessly while I sip capuccino and eat a Rio Citrus Salad, I would be upset. My writing, research, blogging, and e-mail might not represent a national security matter, but I think it’s important, and that’s all that counts.

But it’s hard not to laugh at the absurdity of the case itself. The judge and I have the same question: How could a profitable company like Research In Motion, and an alleged “patent troll” like NTP–which has never produced a single product but stands to make an enormous payday no matter what but seems to be holding out for more, more, more–not have reached a settlement a long time ago?

For enlightenment on this issue, I recommend this article from Knowledge @Wharton, The Wharton profs and experts come to no consensus, but do suggest the U.S. patent system has a little catching up to do.

While there are many moving parts in this five-year patent battle, the basic conflict is over NTP’s contention that RIM’s use of a wireless messaging network to deliver email infringes on patents that NTP owns. But the dispute raises other, more far-reaching questions, such as: Should Research In Motion have to pay a percentage of its sales to NTP, which may not have commercialized its patent anyway? Why has the battle gone on this long? Could RIM be shut down over a patent dispute even while the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) is re-evaluating several of the disputed patents? (Indeed, according to several news reports, the USPTO has already indicated that it eventually intends to reject all of NTP’s claims.) And finally, can the U.S. patent system, which in 1977 permitted a patent for a “comb over” — technically a “method of styling hair to cover partial baldness using only the hair on a person’s head” — keep up with technological innovation and a flood of patent requests? Does the patent system itself need a do-over?

“That’s the central question,” says Wharton professor Eric Clemons. “The balance is between encouraging innovators and benefiting society. This debate has been around for hundreds of years, and it ebbs and flows. Ben Franklin opposed patents in any form, and obviously he was wrong. Innovation is encouraged if innovators are rewarded. But when patents are too easy to get, mini-innovations can either shut down real services or command enormous payments for, in essence, doing nothing.”

Lomita’s Great Awakening

Lomita, the little town in between Torrance, Rancho Palos Verdes, Harbor City and Carson — the town that has a lot of signs so you don’t forget you’re in Lomita — is the home of a new coffeehouse, Awakenings.

It might seem at first that Awakenings’ owners, Julie and Joseph Olson, have come a little late to the coffeehouse trend. Starbucks’ CEO Howard Schultz has expounded for years about making his giant chain a “third place” between home and work. Internet access is pretty standard; although Awakenings’ is free while Starbucks and Coffee Bean are hot spots only for paid-up wi-fi subscribers.

Open-mike nights and Saturday night jazz, blues and rock are scarce, but not unknown in the South Bay — Sacred Grounds in San Pedro, Coffee Cartel in Redondo are two places you can expect some indie-style entertainment on a Saturday night.

Awakenings, however, does add two things to the formula: Kids and God.

Starbucks is not kid-friendly (which doesn’t prevent a lot of South Bay moms from letting their little prodigies run wild in them) because too many breakable items are within a toddler’s reach. But according to the Daily Breeze story this morning, Awakenings has “separate kiddie room where children can play with toys or doodle, so long as their latte-sipping moms and dads supervise.” As for God:

…come Sunday mornings, spirituality is brewed.

That’s right, Joseph and Julie Olson are also pastors of the multiethnic church known as Vineyard Xtreme, which holds its weekly services at Awakenings.

But the Olsons stop short of billing Awakenings as a religious coffeehouse. It’s a venue for all sorts of performances and events, they say, including the Sunday service.

Nevertheless, Julie Olson acknowledges there’s a thin line to be walked as a businesswoman and pastor.

“Sometimes religion can polarize, and it has polarized in this country,” she said. “I don’t want anyone who comes in here to feel uncomfortable or alienated.”

Even more unique than all of this is foot traffic in Lomita. City officials quoted in the story were excited that something “new age” has come to their little village. “New age” is not the phrase that generally comes to mind when envisioning Lomita.

Three-Way Tie (For Last)

Microsoft’s “geek blogger” Robert Scoble (coauthor of a new book on business blogging, Naked Conversations) writes about “hanging out with Joe Trippi,” the now-disgruntled architect of Howard Dean’s explosively successful 2004 Web strategy. Trippi’s Democratic Party passions did not begin with Howard Dean, although that’s how he became well-known. I recall hearing Trippi’s name bandied about as a creative strategist as far back as 1988′s Michael Dukakis campaign.

According to Scoble, Trippi has sworn off presidential politics in favor of consulting with politicians overseas and multinational corporations. No wonder, when you hear what he foresees for 2008:

In the 2008 election he expects that Hillary Clinton will be a lockin for the Democrats. He doesn’t see anyone who can challenge her from the Democratic side. On the right side he’s expecting a far more conservative (candidate) than even George Bush is. Why? His reasoning is that the powerbase that put George Bush in power is mad that they haven’t gotten things done, for instance, repealing of abortion and other conservative issues. He doesn’t think that a moderate Republican has any chance in getting nominated at all. If that weren’t bad enough, he theorized that a Democrat would split ranks and run as an independent. He isn’t sure how this would play out, but it probably wouldn’t be good for Hillary, who’ll have a tough time getting elected anyway.

Gosh, this is exactly what I think will happen, too. And I’m equally stumped as to who would emerge victorious in such a scenario. A three-way tie for last looms as an entirely plausible result.

Clinton is the centrist who everyone thinks is a leftist. Everyone, that is, except the left itself, which disavows her and probably would do as Trippi suggests: Coalesce around a “netroots” candidate who will galvanize our nation’s latent socialist/pacifist majority. (Right.) Clinton’s other major disadvantage is that she is not even close to having the persuasive skills required to win the presidency. She’s just not a performer on that level.

I’ve long felt that a true-blue religious-right conservative like Sam Brownback will move to the inside track to the 2008 GOP nomination, a process where there is no current favorite, most of the candidates are unknowns, and for many obvious reasons, the incumbent VP won’t be able to capitalize on his position. Passion will count for a lot, and only the religious right has it. These activists would rather lose than nominate a sure winner like McCain whose sympathies they don’t trust.

A lot depends, of course, on the war’s status two years from now. Not just the one in Iraq, but the jihad against which we are defending ourselves and our (sometimes) feckless allies.

I’d be curious to see others’ 2008 presidential scenarios. If you feel so inclined, put ‘em right here.

Random Signs

Garrison Frost of the South Bay’s art-focused “The Aesthetic,” has a funny-but-true post up today asking why certain cultural attractions get signs, but others don’t. He makes CalTrans’ sign policy sound almost as random as the contents of a blog (or at least my blog).

One could also wonder why the tiny Lomita Railroad Museum gets a sign at all. Have you seen it? Sure, it’s a neat little thing, but let’s get serious, if you see that sign on the freeway, you’re likely to picture something a lot more significant. Even though it is Lomita’s big claim to fame, it is not nearly as big a deal as the Torrance Airport or the Redondo Beach Performing Arts Center.

One could also wonder why drivers going north get specific directions to Manhattan Beach while drivers going south do not get a sign at all.

You might now be curious about the Lomita Railroad Museum. What about it struck CalTrans’ signmakers as so noteworthy? It does have a website, which reveals that the museum has been around since 1966.

Dedicated to the proud era of the steam engine, complete authenticity is the hallmark of the Museum. On display is a Southern Pacific Railroad Steam Locomotive(1902-1960) and Tender. Nearby stand a 1910 Union Pacific Caboose and a modern all-steel Santa Fe caboose. On display at the annex are a 1923 Union Oil tank car and a 1913 Southern Pacific outside-braced wood box car. Also check out our Water Tower.

And of course who can forget the 72 x 25 ft. Railroad Mural at the corner of Pacific Coast Highway (PCH) and Narbonne Ave that once guided visitors to the museum. Postcards if (sic) the mural are available at the museum.

One clue could be the museum’s vintage. In 1966, CalTrans and most other state government agencies thought they had a lot of taxpayers’ money to throw around. That was the last year of the great Pat Brown era, when anything could happen, if it was made of steel or concrete.

Three More Seasons

If you were born in the New York area in 1944, and started listening to Dodger games on the radio at age six, then moved with the team to Los Angeles eight years later, where you’ve remained til now, then you would have a perfect Vin Scully attendance record. And when Scully retires at the end of the 2008 season, you would be 64 years old.

The eternally smooth Vin Scully. He’s been fumbling his words a little more than he used to, like you’d expect a man in his late 70s would do. But his delivery is still clean and clear and his voice as young as a cool mountain stream.

Scully is an advertisement for the fountain-of-youth benefits of baseball. The game is for little boys (and girls). When the players’ competitive juices get fired up, when they exhibit the uninhibited joy of a victorious moment, Scully loves to say “you have to have a lot of little boy in you to play this game.”

Baseball still brings out the little boy in him — and that brings out the little boy in me, and probably you, too, if you’re his fan.

I assume I’ll still be around in 2009 after Scully’s current contract expires, to begin the post-Vin Scully period of my Dodger fandom. I assume I’ll still follow the team. Old habits die hard. Vin already takes about a third of the games off, so I’m used to hearing other, lesser voices describe the action.

We can let go of you, Vin. We knew we’d have to some day. But this is one of those moments when the cliche encomium “immortal” seems more like a cruel deception. The immortals are merely mortal like the rest of us. The idea of Vin Scully taking his well-earned retirement makes us yearn that it could be otherwise.

(Update 2/22/06:  Sorry if this post was unreadable earlier. PCs have an aspect-ratio problem now.  My laptop has a wide screen, but many PCs don’t.  On the narrower screen, the image of Scully & Doggett covered up part of the text.)

Quick. What Do You Think of This Post?

First, Blink: The Power of Thinking Without Thinking. Now this. As a society, are we really ready to discard the use of reason and logic in our decisions?

In a series of experiments reported last week in the journal Science, a team of Dutch psychologists found that people struggling to make complex decisions did best when they were distracted and were not able to think consciously about the choice at all.

The research not only backs up the common advice to “sleep on it” when facing difficult choices, but it also suggests that the unconscious brain can actively reason as well as produce weird dreams and Freudian slips.

(snip)

Psychologists have known for years that people process an enormous amount of information unconsciously — for example, when they hear their names pop up in a conversation across the room that they were not consciously listening to. But the new report suggests that people take this wealth of under-the-radar information, combine it with deliberately studied facts and impressions and then make astute judgments that they would not otherwise form.

Between Jimmy Carter’s agonizing search for the optimum allocation of tennis court time at the White House, and George W. Bush’s flashes of divine inspiration — which resembles the “distracted…not able to think consciously” model described above — there must be a happy medium for making important decisions.

But on the other hand: In life, we all have known people whose “gut instincts” were more reliable than most. Are such people in better touch with their subconscious reasoning power? Or do they just have bigger brains?

So, from now on, if you ask a colleague a question, and they say, “I’ll get back to you on that,” maybe you should thank them for not thinking about your problem.

P.S. Thanks to Ann Althouse for the link. Writing as a law professor, she applies this study to her field in a fascinating way:

What does this (study) say about judicial decisionmaking? Judges take in a lot of information. They make a decision and must put their reasons in a piece of writing that we sometimes casually call the “decision,” but we know they can’t transcribe their actual decision. You can try to reconstruct how you made a complex decision, but you can’t really even know the answer yourself. That’s one of the reasons it’s so endlessly fascinating to read judicial opinions. You know the real reasons exist at some deeper level, no matter how forthright the judge is.

Let’s face this fact: Appellate judges probably know what decision they want to render, and then find the citations to justify it. They will all say their decisions are rooted in the law and the constitution. How could they call themselves judges if they didn’t believe that? But it’s their gut that drives them. That’s why appellate court decisions are only occasionally unanimous.

If this kind of research becomes commonly accepted wisdom, maybe all job interviews and judicial confirmation processes will become efforts to probe the applicants’ subconscious mind.

I’d also be curious to hear what marketing/PR people think about this study. Perhaps it confirms Edward Bernays’ original conception of public relations as propaganda — social science and psychology applied to the art of subtle persuasion. To boost sales, or get votes, don’t try to reason with people. Approach their subconscious minds, and do your persuading there.

Brr.

Heckuva Job, Brownie

The $105 million, seven-year contract the Los Angeles Dodgers signed in 1999 with Kevin Brown has expired.  So, therefore, Brown is likely to retire, according to his agent, Scott Boras.

Brown’s signing was breathtaking.  At the time, he was one of baseball’s top pitchers. He had just finished, in successive seasons, pitching the Florida Marlins and the San Diego Padres into the World Series. It had been a long time since the Dodger rotation featured such a dominant pitcher — a right-hander who could throw a hard, sinking fastball that induced feeble grounders.

However, the signing was not a good move, and it came to symbolize the reign of Kevin Malone, the Dodger GM whose poor decisions arguably still haunt the team today. The problem with the Brown deal was its riskiness. Brown was healthy when he signed, but quickly developed back problems.  So he was frequently missing from the team, all the while consuming $15 million/year of payroll.

Brown had two great years in LA: His first and his last. He was highly competitive, and when he was pitching a good game, you could marvel at his dominance.  But his Dodger teams never made the playoffs.  He was an obnoxious, surly presence; one of those players who seemed to despise the game of baseball despite his gifts. Fans found it hard to root for him.

Dan Evans was the GM who succeeded Malone.  He was pretty good, but when Frank McCourt bought the Dodgers in 2004, he put Evans in limbo while he considered whether to replace him.  Evans made his best move, when he was able to convince George Steinbrenner that Kevin Brown would replace Roger Clemens as ace of the Yankee staff — in return for Jeff Weaver and Yhency Brazoban.  

Really, I would’ve given Brown’s contract away for nothing, just to get the $15 mil off the rolls, but Evans got value.  Weaver pitched well before leaving this winter as a free agent. Brazoban is a very promising reliever who has had his ups and downs.  Together, the two pitchers helped the Dodgers win their division in ’04.

But Brown came off the books too late to allow Evans to sign Vladimir Guerrero, the great hitter who had agreed to a Dodger deal.  At that time, McCourt’s ownership was in the process of getting approval, and the story is told that Major League Baseball Commissioner Bud Selig leaned on McCourt to veto Guerrero’s signing, because he didn’t want the Dodgers to become a big-spending team.  What got the Dodgers in Selig’s cross-hairs was the Kevin Brown contract.  

Brown’s act didn’t wear well in New York. He was famously destroyed by the Red Sox during a 2004 playoff game.  He disabled himself at a crucial time by punching a wall and breaking his hand.  A quick scan of Yankee blogs shows little in the way of commentary on his retirement. Tom Verducci of SI.com says, “good riddance” while asserting Brown has no shot at the Hall of Fame despite “a brilliant five-year peak in which his worst ERA was 3.00.”   

Which all proves that it is possible to make too much money.  I’m not sure Kevin Brown would agree.  Given his health, he probably should have retired after 2004, but didn’t. Dignity’s worth a lot, but not $15 million, I guess.

“More, faster, better, now.”

Seth Godin thinks signs are everywhere that we are becoming a “culture of dissatisfaction.” No matter how much you like your current (fill in the blank), someone will tell you that you can, should and deserve to get something better — now.

We’re using electronic media to spread this benchmarking message far and wide. Because there’s always a company offering a better or cheaper or faster product, or a person who’s more clever than Oprah or cuter than Tyra, it’s easy to shop around, to demand more, to be constantly dissatisfied.

Every day I get angry email (not angry with me, fortunately, but angry nonetheless) from consumers of all kinds complaining about perceived slights in customer service. Looked at with a clear eye, most of these complaints don’t make a lot of sense. Yes, the correspondence could have been a lot more thoughtful, but these are organizations that are largely doing a great job, at a great price. Doesn’t matter. Someone else is often more, faster, better, now.

The problem with this emerging culture, aside from the fact that we’re unhappy all the time, is that it doesn’t give marketers a chance to build products for the long haul, to invest in the processes and products and even operating systems that pay off over time. The problem is that when brands fizz out so fast, it’s hard to invest in anything except building the next hot brand.

Godin’s post ends up with advice to marketers — build relationships with your customers for the long-term. But I’m not ready to skip to the answer yet, if there is one. I think he’s onto something with broader implications for our politics and social relationships, and we need to ponder it.

Yes, it is in the American grain to be cynical about politics, and impatient with government. What’s different is the velocity. If political leaders can’t make a quick score, they give up and move onto something else, because they assume the public won’t stick with a long-term plan. They believe this because of what you, as voters, as constituents, tell them. But, I suspect, you’re still not getting what you want.

SABR-Presidents

Former President Bill Clinton, quoted by Ron Brownstein in Monday’s Los Angeles Times, when asked about how historians rank presidents:

“I really think the circumstances determine where you are ranked — whether you have big wars, like the Civil War or World War II. But there are three or four tests you can apply to any president, which are much fairer than ranking them where the deal is rigged based on the time in which they served.

“First, did they understand their times and articulate a vision of a more perfect union? Did they refrain from abusing their power? Then you have to say, Did they execute [their agenda], and were people better off when they stopped than when they started?

“Those tests are fair to apply to every president.”

I have another idea. Why don’t we turn the business of ranking presidents over to Bill James, author of the seminal series of Bill James Baseball Abstracts, or to guys like Will Carroll at Baseball Prospectus?

These are two of the leading exponents of sabermetrics. Sabremetricians use sophisticated methods to factor out things like luck and particular circumstances (such as the fact that some ballparks favor pitchers and others favor hitters), so that the numbers more accurately measure a player’s contribution to his team winning ballgames.

Among most baseball fans, sabermetricians’ measurements remain unfamiliar. You have to be a pretty devoted fan to know how Win Shares are calculated, or what your favorite player’s VORP (value over replacement player)and EqA (equivalent average) were last year. The only saber-stat that has really caught on is On-Base Percentage (OBP), which, quite logically, overturns the practice of omitting walks and errors from a player’s batting statistics on the theory that a walk usually is as good as a single.

Sabermetrics remains controversial. Traditionalists prefer to evaluate players by watching them and judging intangibles like “character,” “intensity,” or ability to hit well in “clutch situations,” and think the sabermetricians are a bunch of “stat geeks” who have their noses too far into their laptops.

It was thought by some that Dodger owner Frank McCourt’s firing of sabermetrician General Manager Paul DePodesta last fall was the baseball equivalent of the Restoration — a return to the old-fashioned values. The saber-fans over at Dodger Thoughts hope this isn’t the case, but find it discouraging that new General Manager Ned Colletti once said, “How a player approaches the game, how he approaches life, far outweighs what the stat line looks like.” To sabremetricians, you can’t project performance based on something as subjective and nebulous as how a player “approaches life.”

To go back to my original point: In his Times interview, Bill Clinton sounds a little put out that, because there wasn’t a “big war” during his presidency, he is automatically disqualified from the ranks of Great Presidents. He has a point. The lack of a “big war” shouldn’t be held against a president’s historical reputation. Maybe he avoided a “big war” — shouldn’t that count for something? Yes, if war is truly averted and the conflict resolved peacefully (but no, if the war is merely postponed.)

I’m sure Clinton realizes with some frustration that historians tend to devalue the performance of the economy during a presidency. Clinton presided over a great economy, and actually erased the federal deficit briefly, but as the years pass, the aura of that success is fading. Franklin Roosevelt was an inspiring leader, but he was unable to revive the United States economy in his first two terms — and is still considered one of the greats. Were it not for the Second World War, Roosevelt today might be considered a failure. Presidents Kennedy and Johnson presided over a roaring boom economy, but compared with the Cold War, civil rights and Vietnam, their economic policies are usually glossed over.

What should count in evaluating a president? In sabermetrics, there is a term, “replacement-level player.” That means a major-league player whose production can be projected to reach mean, or average, levels. They’ll have good days, and play better against certain pitchers, or in certain ballparks, but over the whole season, they will “regress to the mean” and end up producing what’s expected of them, but no more or less — unless they are especially lucky or unlucky.

Most teams want replacement-level players at most positions. They can’t afford too many stars. The star players are, by definition, above “replacement-level.” Couldn’t the same be said about presidents? Shouldn’t the real test of Clinton’s quality be whether he did as well as, or better than, a “replacement-level” president would have done, given the same circumstances?

To get to that kind of evaluation, the stat geeks would need to orient themselves. What is the equivalent in politics of winning a baseball game? Clinton’s measure, “did they understand their times and articulate a vision of a more perfect union?” is too vague. There need to be quality-of-life measurements that include traditional economic factors such as unemployment rates, average income, but also include, perhaps, environmental progress, or education attainment, or crime. And they would need to be weighted.

An American president also will be judged as a world leader, given our country’s unique role in global security and politics. Ronald Reagan could qualify as a great president, if the saber-president-metricians give him credit for ending the Cold War and liberating Eastern Europe. But, some might argue, Reagan deserves only part of the credit, with other Cold Warriors like Truman and Kennedy due a share. Obviously, the reputations of Franklin Roosevelt and Abraham Lincoln rest heavily on their wartime leadership and liberation of oppressed people. Woodrow Wilson’s wartime leadership is not often discussed, but he did, after all, win his war, too.

George W. Bush clearly is trying to work his way into the front ranks using the “people liberated from oppression” standard — but he’s got a big hole in his swing, and seems unable to deliver consistent results. Also, John Kerry would argue that “antagonizing allies” like France and Germany should be a negative factor in determining Bush’s “value-over-replacement president.” I’d leave it to the stat geeks. Was losing support from France or Germany measurably important?

I’m sure the political sabermetricians would have a lively debate trying to figure out how much credit to give a president for a good economy. Should the credit go, perhaps, to his predecessor? To what degree is the economy influenced by presidential policy — if at all?

The fact is, even under the microscope of the saber-stats, the great players in baseball history, like Henry Aaron, Babe Ruth and Sandy Koufax, still come out on top. The new stats serve primarily to underscore and dramatize what we already knew. The stats also show that true greatness is rare. Sabermetrics has found few “diamonds in the rough.” Its main contribution is to puncture over-inflated reputations.

I would think the same would be true for saber-president-metrics in terms of determining the very top tier. You’re going to see Lincoln, Washington, Jefferson, the two Roosevelts — and perhaps Truman and Reagan will compete at the margins. There might be a surprise or two — Calvin Coolidge, or even Lyndon Johnson. But the ranks of truly great presidents will remain thin.

The real value of a statistical system that ranked presidents from 1-43, best-to-worst, would be predictive. In the next election, it is unlikely that either party will nominate a potentially “great” president. But with the help of stat geeks, maybe we could figure out what factors contributed to the making of a good president, one who is “above replacement value.” That’s not too much to ask.

Maybe they can get Bill James to moderate the 2008 presidential debates.

UPDATE 2/21/06: Correcting the spelling of sabermetrics, sabermetrician and SABR throughout. Sorry, baseball fans. Also a few other edits, since I’m “fussy.”

Thank You’s

This blog and its author have a few people to thank. Many, in fact.

First of all: Word Press, the host of this and many other excellent blogs, has a site called “Best Blog on Word Press.” This morning, this post cited “From the Desert to the Sea…” Thank you for that.

Last Friday, readers of the Los Angeles Daily Journal, a newspaper serving the legal community, might have seen a story about the blog and my background. The reporter, Erin Park, did a good, fair job detailing the unusual circumstances surrounding this blog’s gestation, and also had some complementary things to say about it. (The Daily Journal is not online, but LA Observed posted an excerpt.)

After that story, I got a number of very nice e-mails from friends old and new, including some fellow bloggers whose respect I truly cherish.
Most importantly, I’m grateful to anyone and everyone who stops by here to read my various musings. Your time is precious, so it is indeed a humbling thing to know that someone spares a few minutes of it here. Thank you.

To show my appreciation, here’s a desert pic from this weekend in Borrego. No flowers, but lots of clouds.

East Coast Ice v. West Coast Kelp

The American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) has been living large in St. Louis the past few days, with scholars and educators attending its annual meeting getting not one, but two new explanations for how and why human beings occupy the North American continent.

According to this story on LiveScience.com, the concept most of us vaguely have in our minds — that the Americas were first populated via a land-ice bridge across the Bering Strait and then gradually moved south — might be wrong. The glaciers began melting 17,000 years ago, recent studies show, rendering that transitway impossible. But also:

(W)hen archaeologist Dennis Stanford of the Smithsonian Institution places American spearheads, called Clovis points, side-by-side with Siberian points, he sees a divergence of many characteristics.

Instead, Stanford said today, Clovis points match up much closer with Solutrean style tools, which researchers date to about 19,000 years ago. This suggests that the American people making Clovis points made Solutrean points before that.

There’s just one problem with this hypothesis—Solutrean toolmakers lived in France and Spain. Scientists know of no land-ice bridge that spanned that entire gap.

Stanford has an idea for how humans crossed the Atlantic, though—boats. Art from that era indicates that Solutrean populations in northern Spain were hunting marine animals, such as seals, walrus, and tuna.

They may have even made their way into the floating ice chunks that unite immense harp seal populations in Canada and Europe each year. Four million seals, Stanford said, would look like a pretty good meal to hungry European hunters, who might have ventured into the ice flows much the same way that the Inuit in Alaska and Greenland do today.

But wait! Couldn’t Asia’s ancients use boats too? According to another anthropologist’s study (also summarized on LiveScience), humans from Asia might have followed an “ocean highway” made of dense kelp. Jon Erlandson of the University of Oregon found:

Today, a nearly continuous “kelp highway” stretches from Japan, up along Siberia, across the Bering Strait to Alaska, and down again along the California coastline, Erlandson said.

Kelp forests are some of the world’s richest ecosystems. They are homes to seals, sea otters, hundreds of species of fish, sea urchins and abalone, all of which would have been important food and material sources for maritime people.

Although the coastal migration theory has yet to be proven with hard evidence, it is known that seafaring peoples lived in the Ryukyu Islands near Japan during the height of the last glacial period, about 35,000 to 15,000 years ago. These peoples may have traveled 90 or more miles at a time between islands.

Some scientists believe that maritime people boated from Japan to Alaska along the Aleutian and Kurile Islands around 16,000 years ago. Before that, people may have island-hopped their way to Australia 50,000 to 60,000 years ago.

Scientists have discovered settlements 11,500 to 9,000 years old along the coasts of some of these Pacific islands, which also have ecologically-rich kelp forests nearby that Erlandson believes existed when people were island hopping. The remains of kelp resources have been discovered in a settlement in Daisy Cave in the Channel Islands off southern California, dated to about 9,800 years ago.

“The fact that productive kelp forests are found adjacent to some of the earliest coastal archaeological sites in the Americas supports the idea that such forests may have facilitated human coastal migrations around the Pacific Rim near the end of the last glacial period,” Erlandson said. “In essence, they may have acted as a sort of kelp highway.”

Kelp forests also provide a barrier between coastal settlements and the rough open seas and lessen the wave forces on beach-side settlements. Sometimes the kelp washes up on land, where land animals, which humans could kill and eat, can munch on it.

These were just two of hundreds of papers presented in St. Louis over the weekend (where it’s been in the 20s overnight and topping out in the low 40s during the day. Was the LA Convention Center booked up?) AAAS’s Board of Directors took the occasion to denounce legislation and policies that would “deprive students of the education they need to be informed and productive citizens in an increasingly technological, global community.” Among the states considering anti-evolution legislation: Missouri. According to a release on the AAAS website:

Some of these bills would seek to discredit evolution by emphasizing “flaws” in the theory of evolution, or “disagreements” within the scientific community, the AAAS Board noted. Other bills would encourage teachers and students to explore the concept of intelligent design or other non-scientific “alternatives” to evolution, or to “critically analyze” evolution and “the controversy”. But, AAAS emphasized, “There is no significant controversy within the scientific community about the validity of evolution.”

Moreover, “Evolution is one of the most robust and widely accepted principles of modern science,” the AAAS Board concluded, reconfirming its October 18, 2002 statement, as well as the December 2005 ruling of federal District Court Judge John E. Jones III, who found that intelligent design is based on religion, not science.

I can’t find the citations right now, but from what I’ve read on a few conservative sites (especially on The Corner), Judge Jones’ smackdown of Intelligent Design is going to cause political ripples. It’s apparent that the Republican Party’s supporters in the religious right continue to see Intelligent Design as occupying a legitimate place in the classroom, and don’t take kindly to Republicans who admit they think it’s hooey.

From the tone of the attacks on the conservative pundits who dared to admit they found Intelligent Design an intellectual embarassment — and from the rapid “I never meant to suggest” backfilling that followed — anti-evolution is fast becoming a religious right litmus test on the same level as anti-choice and anti-gay marriage.

As the east-coast/west-coast migration theories show, there is plenty of room for debate about how we got here and who we are. To paraphrase former President Clinton, we don’t have the brain cells to waste on debating settled matters.

Ultimate Disrespect

Jay Rosen of PressThink writes a challenging response to former Reagan and Bush, Sr. Press Secretary Marlin Fitzwater’s criticism of how Vice President Cheney’s staff handled news of the hunting accident in Texas.  Fitzwater has been quoted, essentially, as describing it all as an “appalling” bungle — the VP’s delay in reporting the news of the shooting, the delegation to the ranch’s owner the job of spokesperson rather than his own staff, the use of a local Corpus Christi newspaper as the sole outlet.  To Fitzwater, it appeared as if Cheney’s people foolishly thought “they could keep it a secret.”

Rosen believes this was not a bug, it was a feature — of the Bush Administration’s perceptions of, and approach to, the news media; and an omen that the media’s long-accepted “Fourth Estate” role in government cannot be presumed anymore.

Cheney figures he told the country “what happened.” What he did not do is tell the national press, which he does not trust to inform the country anyway. Making sense yet? Ranch owner Katharine Armstrong is someone he trusts. He treated the shooting as a private matter between private persons on private land that should be disclosed at the property owner’s discretion to the townsfolk (who understand hunting accidents, and who know the Armstrongs) via their local newspaper, the Corpus Christi Caller-Times.

“I thought that made good sense because you can get as accurate a story as possible from somebody who knew and understood hunting,” he told Britt Hume of Fox News.

From the Caller-Times it got to the Web, then the AP and CNN. And there you are: The American people were informed of the basic facts (though not at the speed journalists want) and Cheney did not have to meet questions from the press, an institution without power or standing in his world. “I thought that was the right call,” Cheney said yesterday on Fox. “I still do.” (He also said the furor among reporters is just jealousy at being scooped by the Caller-Times.)

And:

Cheney has long held the view that the powers of the presidency were dangerously eroded in the 1970s and 80s. The executive “lost” perogatives it needed to gain back for the global struggle with Islamic terror. “Watergate and a lot of the things around Watergate and Vietnam both during the 70’s served, I think, to erode the authority I think the president needs to be effective, especially in the national security area,” he said in December.

Some of that space was lost to the news media, and its demand to be informed about all aspects of the presidency, plus its sense of entitlement to the star interlocutor’s role. Cheney opposes all that, whereas Fitzwater accepted most of it. That’s why Fitz is appalled and Cheney is rather pleased with himself.

The people yelling questions at Scott McClellan in the briefing room, like the reporters in the Washington bureaus who cover the president, are in Cheney’s calculations neither a necessary evil, nor a public good. They are an unnecessary evil and a public bad— ex-influentials who can be disrespected without penalty.

Most White House reporters proudly regard themselves as gadflies, a thorn in the side of whoever is in power, and a tribune of the public in a democratic society. It was never so apparent as it is now that government bestows that role on the press — and can, with ease, take much of it away.  The emperor has, well, some clothes, but not as many layers as before.

If the barrier to entry to publishing your own news is so low that a blogger like me can start writing and getting read, just on my own say-so, it is certainly low enough for the president and vice-president to do essentially the same thing. The press wasn’t mishandled, Rosen is saying.  To use the schoolyard expression, they got served.

Salute to Ray Davies

The first 45 I ever bought was Lou Christie’s “Lightning Strikes.” Not a bad song, but I’m prouder of the second single I bought, “Well-Respected Man” by the Kinks. It’s still one of my favorite songs, and the Kinks are one of my favorite bands. Two of their albums, “Village Green Preservation Society” and “Muswell Hillbillies” are on my MP3 player in their entireity, along with many other brilliant songs like “Days,” “Waterloo Sunset,” “Victoria,” “David Watts,” “Sunny Afternoon” and “Where Have All the Good Times Gone?”

The Kinks recorded dozens of great songs, mostly released in the 1960s. They also have quite a few terrible songs, mostly released in the 1970s and 80s, but even their bad songs have something lovable about them. Ray Davies was the principle songwriter and lead singer, although his brother and adversary Dave Davies contributed a few key tunes, especially “Death of A Clown” and “I’m Not Like Everybody Else.”

Ray Davies is a portrait artist. “Well-Respected Man” is a good example — a vivid portrayal of a certain kind of London young gentleman of the time.

And he plays at stocks and shares,
And he goes to the Regatta,
And he adores the girl next door,
‘Cause he’s dying to get at her,
But his mother knows the best about
The matrimonial stakes.

‘Cause he’s oh, so good,
And he’s oh, so fine,
And he’s oh, so healthy,
In his body and his mind.
He’s a well respected man about town,
Doing the best things so conservatively.

Davies manages to be both snotty about this fellow, and sympathetic to his deep longings, and that duality characterizes almost all his songs. He laughs at, and cries with, the characters he meets, gets to know, and captures in a three-minute single with a tune you never forget — at his peak, anyway. “Waterloo Sunset” never fails to move me:

Dirty old river, must you keep rolling
Flowing into the night
People so busy, makes me feel dizzy
Taxi light shines so bright
But I don’t need no friends
As long as I gaze on Waterloo sunset
I am in paradise

Every day I look at the world from my window
But chilly, chilly is the evening time
Waterloo sunset’s fine

Terry meets Julie, Waterloo Station
Every Friday night
But I am so lazy, don’t want to wander
I stay at home at night
But I don’t feel afraid
As long as I gaze on Waterloo sunset
I am in paradise

So it’s good news, if a bit under-reported, that after more than a decade of silence, Ray Davies has issued his first solo album, “Other People’s Lives.” (Which would be an appropriate title for a collection of the Kinks’ best songs.)

It’s a little scary, the prospect of new songs from Ray Davies. The final years of the Kinks were far from glorious. Had his muse deserted him, or was he just tired from the constant touring?

Based on two singles that are available to download, it sounds like Davies, who is now in his early 60s, benefited from the time off. But even if the album doesn’t compare with the brilliant achievements of Davies’ youth, its release is a fine occasion to salute this great, timeless artist.

Wishful Thinking, or Smoke on the Horizon?

The other night, Turner Classic Movies showed “The Best Man,” the 1964 film based on Gore Vidal’s play, about two Democratic presidential candidates at a brokered convention in Los Angeles (the Coliseum and Sports Arena are among the locations). The good guy, played by Henry Fonda, has gotten ahold of some dirt on the bad guy, Cliff Robertson — evidence of a homosexual liaison — that he’s reluctant to use. But he knows Robertson has dirt on him — evidence of past mental health problems.

Fonda and Robertson end up meeting in a supply closet to have a tense discussion in which Fonda says he’ll bury his dirt if Robertson will also bury his, but Robertson refuses. Ever the principled one, Fonda decides he’s too good to use his dirt on Robertson, but has to stop Robertson somehow. So he drops out and engineers the nomination of a dark-horse candidate.

Where is Henry Fonda now?, I asked myself as I read an article on the conservative site RedState today posted by “Blanton” entitled “The Democrats’ Coming Civil War.”

I don’t know how much of what Blanton reports is true and how much just wishful thinking by Republicans who face their own divisions in the upcoming election. But I credit the reportage to some degree. I would not be surprised that the party’s dreadful current leadership would use the tactics described below. If this really is a ‘civil war,’ it’s one I hope both sides lose.

Anyway, for what it’s worth, here’s what Blanton thinks is going on:

There is a growing sense of restlessness on Capitol Hill and it is not the majority that has this sense. With Democrats potentially on the cusp of making a significant dent in the Republican majority, tensions that have been well below the surface are starting to spill out and may soon boil over into a Democrat civil war.

Various people on Capitol Hill tell me that the Democrats are struggling to keep their internal disputes from boiling over. They all lay the blame at Howard Dean and the Democrat leadership on Capitol Hill failing to get along. Right now, individuals loyal to Howard Dean are compiling dossiers on embattled Senate minority leader Harry Reid and House minority leader Nancy Pelosi. Couple these potential trouble spots with the pending William Jefferson plea bargain, Democrat netroots leader Kos’ perceived selling out to the establishment through his failure to engage the DLC and failure to back Hackett in Ohio, and the failure of the minority to rally around one set of talking points and you have the a higher chance of a Democrat civil war than an Iraqi civil war.

Howard Dean has compiled a solid file on the corruption of Harry Reid. For years Reid has operated as the quintessential back room politician, trading favors and legislation for money and choice positions for his children at top firms with high salaries. Reid’s ties to Jack Abramoff are more extensive than some of the Republicans allegedly tied to Abramoff. Dean himself said that any Democrat doing favors for Abramoff’s clients would be a “big problem.” He knew before he said it that Reid had done so.

Nancy Pelosi’s husband is rumored to be living large off her name and power. Individuals out to bring down Pelosi, viewing her as a threat to potential Democrat gains, are, as I write, digging through records around Washington trying to pull a Harry Reid on Nancy Pelosi — they’ll try to tie her to legislation and lobbyists via her husband’s connections and clients.

And:

More and more the grand coalition between activists and establishment is coming unglued. Nuclear bonds that once held together the various elements of the party are starting to weaken as the various factions each come to their own conclusions about what it’ll take to win in November and what it will take to solidify positions.

Dean wants to keep quiet on Pelosi and Reid to leverage his own position in the party. Democrats, including Pelosi and Reid, who blame Dean for a lack of fundraising prowess are out to get him. The competing dynamic had led to détente beween the parties. But House Democrats convinced that Pelosi is more of a liability than an asset are plotting to oust her on the information Dean has. Netroots, starting to bristle under what they perceive as growing ties between Kos and an out of touch establishment, want revenge for Alito. A mixture of netroots activists and establishment figures are waking up to the fact that the Republicans have the same dossier on the Democrats that Dean does and, should the Democrats keep beating the corruption drum, Republicans will begin beating the Democrats over the head with it. William Jefferson’s problems add to this.

Democrats who were once assured of their 2006 strategy are starting to be less sure. Several prominent Democrats, seeing that the Republicans in Congress are still twiddling their thumbs over reform are ready to show Democrat competent, and in the process are willing to take a few of their own leadership’s scalps. The nuclear bonds are getting weaker and weaker. The only question now is whether the bond will fully break down before or after November.

Will There Be Flowers?

As March approaches, the California desert guessing game begins: What will the flower bloom be like this year? The desert explosion of colorful blossoms is one of the state’s great natural attractions, except you can’t always count on it. Depending on how much it rains, when it rains, and when you can get a weekend off, you might see a magnificent explosion of colors — or you just might just see the desert. Like my son says, “It’s all good.”

However, last year’s bloom was colossal and lasted for weeks. I went out to Anza-Borrego, the remote desert region in eastern San Diego County, and took some so-so pictures, but this month’s Sunset Magazine has an article about Borrego that is illustrated with the incredible shot of desert sand verbena, at right.

Matthew Jaffe writes (in a story behind the subscriber wall) about the desert journey he took during last year’s flower season that nicely captures the evanescence of peak moments in that other-wordly landscape:

The wind picks up, and we decide to make another visit to the dunes. Despite strong gusts, the blossoms seem to be holding up. But wandering around, I notice some less densely flowered areas before a flash of gold catches my eye. It is the almost metallic stripe on the back of a sphinx moth caterpillar, and I realize that the verbena all around me is being devoured by hordes of these binging creatures. Back down on my belly, a closer look reveals mandibles in perpetual motion as stalks, leaves, and blossoms disappear with frightening speed.

So it goes with desert wildflowers. I feel darn fortunate to have caught this rapidly vanishing display — and so, I suspect, do the caterpillars. Just about every other time I’ve visited Anza-Borrego, there’s been some guy who’ll say, “Oh, you should have been here a few days ago” or a few years ago or whatever. Listening to such boasts, I vowed that if I ever got lucky enough to catch Anza-Borrego at its peak, I’d never taunt anyone with such what-coulda-beens. But you know what? You definitely should have been here.

There really is no rhythm to it. Just because last year was a great year for flowers doesn’t mean this year can’t be just as great. Even if you miss the flowers, you’ll definitely be able to enjoy the other features: The incredible night skies (best enjoyed when there’s no moon out), the sweet California grapefruits for only $3/bag, the constant play of light and shadow on the mountains in the early morning and late afternoon, and the comfortable temperatures typical for this time of year.

I’m very partial to Anza-Borrego because it is everything Palm Springs is not. There isn’t one chain restaurant or store, and no outlets. There are no movie theaters. You can shop, but mostly what you’ll find is either desert clothes and supplies, or curious second-hand stuff. Saturday night is still, I believe, karaoke night at Carlee’s, a roadhouse bar and grill with a superb seafood gazpacho. If you go, you’ll almost certainly hear a retired engineer named Dusty sing his signature song: “Itsy-Bitsy, Teeny-Weeny, Yellow Polka-Dot Bikini.”

You could hunt for that legendary shipwreck full of pearls. And maybe the elusive flowers.

Democrats — and the Country — Catch a Break

James Webb, who served in the Reagan Administration as secretary of the Navy and under-secretary of Defense, has announced his intent to run in the Democratic senate primary in Virginia. If Webb gets the nomination, he will be up against Sen. George Allen, who is presumed to be a 2008 GOP candidate for president.

Webb’s decision — prompted as much by his dissatisfaction with the Bush coterie’s below-the-belt attacks on veterans opposed to its war policies as by his opposition to the war itself — represents a huge, much-needed stroke of good fortune for the Democratic party nationally. If Webb wins, it will mean nothing less than the restoration of the two-party system in America.

For the past five years or so, the weird, conspiracy-nut rhetoric of many leading Democratic officials and its most out-front champions has forced a lot of serious people to embrace the execrable Bush at least part-way, as the one-eyed man in the land of the blind.

Bush policies on homeland security and fighting the jihad war have not been seriously challenged by any political leader who we can trust to share his Administration’s accurate understanding of the real peril we face. There is plenty of room for criticism of how Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld and the homeland security bureaucrats have managed every facet of this war. But the Republicans have lined up in lock step behind them, even “mavericks” like John McCain, with Karl Rove playing the enforcer.

There would seem to have been a huge opening for a centrist Democrat, but for the most part, Democrats seem to be living in a fantasy-land, in which they cannot even acknowledge that our country is at war without thinking they’re helping Bush politically. Whether it’s because of Bush-hatred, misguided political opportunism, or genuine ignorance, most leading Democrats don’t seem to get what it’s about, or what this country is being called upon to do to safeguard the targeted populations of the world. This lack of depth applies especially to our last two presidential candidates, John Kerry and Al Gore, and to the Democratic National Committee chair Howard Dean.

I don’t throw a fit on this site every time one of those three says something idiotic or irresponsible — I don’t need to repeat what 1,000 other bloggers say — but I will say this: After his outrageous performance in Saudi Arabia this week, I am one Democrat who never needs to hear another word from former Vice President Gore on any subject. If there was a way to defrock him as a party member, or to strip off his party stripes, I would favor that. He sold out his country this week in Saudi Arabia. It was genuinely disgusting to read what he had to say.

There is no reason to fear James Webb will ever remind you of Gore, Dean or Kerry. He is a brave, brilliant, experienced leader and thinker in whose capable hands we could comfortably place the destiny of this nation. His disagreement with Bush about the strategic value of winning the war in Iraq is honorable and intellectually coherent; if he’s successful, it will prompt the kind of debate we really need during the next few years — and needed since 9/11.

Smart Republicans know that, politically, they’ve been leading a charmed life lately due only to Democratic cluelessness. The incoherence of the GOP on domestic issues, combined with the poor management of the war from the White House and Defese Department, has been unforgiveably forgiven — but I blame the Democrats for depriving us of real choice.

Not only does the GOP recognize that Webb is a real threat to their primacy, I think many of them are quietly rooting for his success. Check out what National Review Online Contributing Editor Mackubin Thomas Owens said today at the conservative website:

Republicans should worry. Webb is an impressive man. He is a 1968 graduate of the U.S. Naval Academy. As a Marine officer in Vietnam, he led an infantry platoon and company, was wounded twice, and was awarded the Navy Cross (second only to the Medal of Honor as a recognition of valor) and the Silver Star. After he was medically retired from the Marine Corps, he attended Georgetown Law School and later served as counsel to the House Veterans Committee. He is the author of six novels, including Fields of Fire, the best novel there is about Vietnam. During the Reagan administration, he served as an assistant secretary of Defense and secretary of the Navy. Combine his virtues with the fact that Virginia is one of the few states where a conservative Democrat might win, and, if Webb prevails in the Democratic primary, Senator Allen is likely to be in for the fight of his life.

And:

Jim will be a formidable candidate. I already know a number of Virginia Republicans who are inclined to vote for him because of what they (rightly) perceive as his sterling character. It will be interesting to see what happens if he wins (assuredly not a foregone conclusion, given Allen’s real strengths). Somehow I can’t see him hanging out with Teddy Kennedy, Barbara Boxer, Chuck Schumer, or John Kerry, whose hand Jim once refused to shake. And the idea of Harry Reid bending Jim to conform to his will makes me laugh. When Webb abruptly resigned as secretary of the Navy in 1988 after clashes with Defense Secretary Frank Carlucci, he remarked to reporters, “It’s no secret that I’m not a person who wears a bridle well.”

This has been a miserable, rotten time in American politics — another “low, dishonest decade” to quote W.H. Auden’s line about the 1930s. However, this country has been fortunate many times when the right leader appeared at the right time, just when it seemed like we’d run out of luck. I’m hopeful that this pattern is about to repeat itself with the emergence of James Webb in the Democratic Party in 2006.

New Holiday Tradition: Feathers Fly

What to do on Valentine's Day if you aren't in a relationship? Send yourself flowers? A flash-mob organized in San Francisco offered this alternative:

Roughly 1,000 people drawn by internet postings and word-of-mouth converged near San Francisco's Ferry Building on Tuesday night for a half-hour pillow fight.

The underground event erupted at 6 p.m. in the center of Justin Herman Plaza with a mass rush of shrieking, laughing combatants – many of whom arrived with pillows concealed in shopping bags, backpacks and the like.

Within minutes, pillows were arcing, feathers were flying, and by the time the Ferry Building's clock tower clanged the half-hour, the plaza and hundreds of people were covered in white down that gave the scene a wintry lustre.

"I haven't giggled so hard for a really long time,'' said San Francisco resident Amy Davis, 35, an office manager for a construction company that manufactures stone facades for buildings.

Davis – who said she has been unlucky in love and was grateful for an antidote to Valentine's Day — lasted for most of the battle, but pulled out toward the end when she had her fill of breathing feathers.

Like many others, Davis learned of the pillow fight from a friend who directed her to a web site – in her case it was Wikipedia – that gave details about a planned flash mob pillow fight on Valentine's Day in San Francisco.

Apparently, last night's combat was only the latest in what is becoming a worldwide phenomenon: Pillow Fight Club. As in the "Fight Club" movie, Pillow Fight Club has rules (according to Wikipedia):

1. Tell everyone about Pillow Fight Club.
2. Tell everyone about Pillow Fight Club.
3. Turn up at the arranged Pillow Fight Club venue with pillow hidden in a bag.
4. At the exact given time pull out pillow and fight.
5. You cannot fight anyone without a pillow (unless they want it).
6. Nothing heavy can be hidden in the pillows

In addition, you are strongly encouraged to bring a feather-filled pillow. A fiber-filled pillow doesn't cut it.

The San Francisco Chronicle's SFgate.com has photos. Here's one.

San Francisco, like Los Angeles, has a lot of people in it who are separated from family roots; especially single, young people. Couldn't you see pillow fights become an alternative way to celebrate Thanksgiving, Christmas, Easter… ?

UPDATE: More pictures here from SF blogger Laughing Squid, who participated and said afterward:

Man, I now have feathers in really strange places.

Happy Valentine’s Day

Is it Something About LA?

LA Observed links to a Crain’s Chicago Business piece documenting the latest outburst of investor negativity toward the Los Angeles Times and its dragging effect on the Tribune Company. A few pertinent grafs:

“They’ve been throwing anything they can think of at that paper and nothing seems to work,” says media analyst Edward J. Atorino of New York-based Benchmark & Co. “Wall Street likes the company, and we love Dennis, but if results don’t start improving . . . it’s going to be merciless.”

For Tribune executives, the Los Angeles problem is “critical, and it’s the most troubling kink in the turnaround story,” says Eric McKissack, CEO of Chicago-based Channing Capital Management LLC, which holds more than 600,000 Tribune shares. “It’ll be very difficult to turn the company around without turning the Times around….”

“When Tribune bought the Times, there was a sense that it was an underachieving paper that could be turned around with the right management,” says James Goss, an analyst with Barrington Research Associates Inc. in Chicago. “Well, it’s six years later, and I think they’re beginning to understand why Times Mirror couldn’t figure it out.”…

I don’t even have to look. Patterico, Hugh Hewitt, Michelle Malkin…Crain’s just made their day. The Times is getting its just desserts, that liberal, out-of-touch bastion of political bias. I’m sure they’re dancing across their laptops tonight.

But, just to be contrarian, let me propose something that the Times-bashers in the blog world might not have considered. Could it be the problem is not some failing at the Times — not its quality, not its politics, not its ad rates?

Could it be… Los Angeles?

What is the Los Angeles economy about, nowadays?

• International trade, an amorphous global enterprise that happens to transit through LA’s sea-and-airports, barely stopping long enough to add significant value to the local economy. The professionals engaged in international trade are perhaps more interested in the Asian Wall Street Journal or the Financial Times of London. As long as the ships, planes, trains and trucks keep moving, that’s all they need to know about Los Angeles.

• Real estate, which is all about hot neighborhoods and new “edge city” developments, not the city as a whole.

• Tourism, which is about generating feature stories outside the LA market to draw visitors in. Tourism is also not a source of high-wage jobs.

• Entertainment media, for which the Los Angeles Times will never be most important source of news. Arguably this is a failing of the newspaper’s editors over the decades who looked down at “Tinseltown,” while the New York Times and Wall Street Journal assigned top reporters to the beat. Now entertainment news is so ubiquitous, the Times has no leverage to grab the lead it should never have relinquished in the first place.

Add in the fact that Los Angeles has some of the highest rates of illiteracy — in any language — in the nation. That’s no good for selling newspapers.

We’ve got people who buy things. Los Angeles is at the center of one of the two biggest markets in the nation. That should be the good news, and is probably the basis for the high ad rates the Times tries to charge. But now we’ve got an exceedingly diverse population, not the broad, general interest market for which the Los Angeles Times was designed.

When the Times was so thick that comedians joked about the Sunday Times causing hernias, those pages were mostly filled with mid-market department store ads, placed by stores that, like the Times, tried to appeal to everyone. Most of those stores are out of business now.

But that’s not all of it. Something’s gone out of Los Angeles — confidence, a sense of identity, a belief in the future. A thriving newspaper is, at some level, a product of boosterism. Los Angeles has a lot of paid advocates, but few boosters. That’s a big change, historically.

Way back in about 1989 or so, my friend Joel Bellman wrote an op-ed for the now-defunct Herald-Examiner, in which he said (as I recall) 1984 was Los Angeles’ “last good year.” At the time, I worked for Mayor Tom Bradley, so of course I challenged his implication that the mayor wasn’t a boon to the city anymore, and saw political danger in it. But I’ve thought of that essay many times since it ran.

Los Angeles has had a tough couple of decades since the triumph of the 1984 Olympic Games. Once upon a time, we accepted progress as a given. Nowadays, we accept decline and the intractability of our problems. Schools, traffic, housing costs, the environment — who is telling us these things can get better? Well, sure, lots of people say so, especially when there’s an election coming up. But who really believes?

For many Angelenos, it’s just a matter of how much longer they can hang in there, or how well they can insulate themselves from what everyone else seems to be suffering from. People who feel that way really don’t really want to read the newspaper. Opening it up each morning is too depressing. They want to keep their world nice and small, and manageable. A cocoon.

The Times does almost nothing to build this community’s confidence in itself. Maybe that’s too much to ask of it. Probably, most reporters and editors would quit if their publisher told them boosting Los Angeles’ future was now their job description. But I don’t see the Times recovering until Los Angeles recovers a sense of itself as special; and if the Times wants to play a role in that, it would certainly be in the institution’s self-interest.

Love Not For Sale

Continuing the thought, as Vin Scully would say… 

In the previous post, I teed off from a story in the New York Times business section about Robert M. Greenberg, a digital media pioneer, to raise questions about how many of the new ideas for slipping advertisements and PR spin into the public’s latest digital pursuits will actually garner the desired attention, and lead to “sales” — which I broadly define as “the message” getting through sufficiently to influence individual choices. 

So, I’m flipping through other sections of the Times that I skipped this morning, and found this column in the Sunday Styles section by Daniel Jones, summing up all he’s learned since he started writing on the topic “Modern Love.” 

You might want to read his clue-filled column if you’re trying to figure out how to utilize digital media to a marketing advantage. But don’t expect good news.

Here’s the problem.  Digital media has, forever, blurred the lines between the media we turn to for entertainment and enlightenment, i.e. TV, radio and newspapers, and the media we utilize for communications.

The way Daniel Jones sees it, when we turn on our computers, we expect to find love and sex on the other end.  Not merely depictions of love and sex. Actual liaisons. 

According to the personal accounts I’ve read, men and women today are apt to plunge into love affairs via text message, cut them off by PowerPoint, lie about who they are and what they want in forums and blogs and online dating sites, pretend they’re young when they’re old and old when they’re young, ignore the people they’re physically with for those who are a keystroke away, shoo their children off their laps to caress their BlackBerrys, and spend untold hours staring at pixilated porn stars when they should be working, socializing, taking care of their children or sleeping.

It begs the question: Has electronic communication officially become the most seductive mistress of all time?

For all the role-playing and infidelity one associates with life on-line, Jones also notes the life-changing experiences that result from cyberstalking, which he says “nearly everyone” does. You can find and reconnect with a past love, check out a potential date, monitor your ex, or mix and mingle via online dating.

When people are following this pursuit of love, my sense is, that’s not the only thing they’re  doing.  Attention is splintered among many different interests and needs.

They’ll pause from writing their seductive PowerPoint to check out how the Clippers are doing. They don’t want to see any ads; they want the score and then, click, back to their romantic lives. Soon enough, they’ll be watching a downloaded “Sopranos” episode, but insert their own break at the moment of their choosing, to flip to their inbox to see if the beloved has replied.  Or, they’ll watch a movie, but unblock their Instant Messaging only for special people who are allowed to interrupt. And, of course, make ample use of cell phones, Dodgeball and GPS to shadow their soul-mate while they cruise around town. 

Nowhere in all that multi-task romancing is there room for a message from our sponsors. I suppose that much is obvious to most marketers. “Vote for me” is a turnoff if deployed at an intimate moment. 

But, as more and more of life moves online, how is a marketer supposed to know where the customer’s attention is focused? Is it on business, personal life, education, or just chilling out?  Increasingly, that’s all going to happen within the same device: A convergence of telephony, web surfing, music and video player, contact list and portable office. 

This convergence will tend to make every moment a private one, where marketing is unwelcome, and where the device owner will demand total control of his or her own mindspace. 

The old models for advertising and PR depended, as Greenberg said, on a more linear focus.  We’d sit ourselves down on the sofa the same time every week and watch “The Beverly Hillbillies” – ads and all.  We’d read the newspaper first thing every morning, and through it absorb what the political spinners wanted us to know.  If we didn’t want to be pitched, we would just turn off the TV or radio, and shut the magazine or newspaper.  For most of the day’s waking hours, we were completely unplugged.

Now we take our communications media with us wherever we go. We have to. Our kids need to reach us, or our boss, or that woman you met online last night (at least you hope it was a woman.) That being the case, we don’t want any messages coming through our media that don’t fit our specific, ever-shifting agendas. 

If we want to be marketed, we’ll click our way into that marketing space, of our own volition.  Otherwise, it’s “How did you find me here? Leave me the f*** alone!“  That’s the challenge. Where, in this kind of environment, will there be any room at all for marketers to make impressions?  

Blue Smoke in a Box

If you’re interested in marketing, advertising and PR, you probably started this morning’s lengthy profile of Robert M. Greenberg in the New York Times business section, but about half-way through started wondering if the story would ever deliver on its promise to tell you how Greenberg believes “advertising needs to be shaken up, and shaken up immediately.”

I mean, Greenberg certainly has been an innovator, as the story amply documents. He was a pioneer in use of digital graphics, first in motion picture titles, then in advertising. If you remember being amazed at seeing Paula Abdul dance with Groucho Marx, or Woody Allen shaking hands with Calvin Coolidge and Babe Ruth in “Zelig,” it was Greenberg who was doing the amazing. The story is heavily freighted with these bits of digital history.

And yeah, Greenberg agrees with everyone else; it’s tougher for anyone marketing anything out there because,

“It’s not about linear communication, and the millennials understand that; it’s about symbols and icons and you click here and you click there and you control it,” he says. “Corporations have to create products that people want and customers are going to help them make that decision — and that means quality, imagination and transparency.”

This sounds right, but I would imagine that anyone responsible for putting this kind of insight to practical use might feel like they’re being asked to put smoke in a box. Well, the New York Times isn’t here to help you do your job. Neither am I…but at least I have been close enough to the process myself to understand the desire to find out what, really, is next.

So, in case you got IM’d in the middle of reading the story and want to get the takeaway, here it is:

Too many agencies, (Greenberg) believes, are tethered to a “30-second TV spot” mentality because “agencies get paid based on 30-second spots and that financial incentive keeps them from changing their model.” Whip up those spiffy Super Bowl ads and those catchy print ads as much as you like, he says, but their impact is fossilizing and the companies that foot advertising bills are increasingly aware of it.

Direct mail remains the most heavily used advertising medium because its impact is clearer and more response-oriented than most print, TV and radio ads. Spending on Internet advertising still amounts to a small fraction of that for other media, but it has measurable impact. And digital interactions can be tailored in an infinite number of ways.

Other marketing frontiers are arising, and Mr. Greenberg is happy to tick off some examples: quick response codes embedded on movie posters that allow trailers to be downloaded directly onto cellphones placed near them; billboards used by companies like Dove that let consumers vote on themes or messages by cellphone; instant messaging and ads streamed through game consoles like Xbox or online gaming networks; and wireless services like Dodgeball that help people find peers at bars and restaurants within a 10-block radius after they pinpoint their own location by sending a short text message to the service.

Ah dunno. I’m about 30 years too old to be a millenniel, but this all sounds like a combination of annoying and useless to me, and a diversion from a marketer’s perspective. You ever watched someone play a game on Xbox? I’d sooner take a piece of prime rib out of a pit bull’s mouth than interrupt a serious gamer who’s about to reach the next level on Halo with an instant message or an ad. If the ad is somewhere in the background, they’re apt not to register it beyond a vague sense that some idiot must’ve paid a lot of money for a meaningless placement.

As for voting with your cell phone? I hear pitches all the time to do this during ballgames. Hit some four-digit code if you think the manager should put in a left-hander. I never do it, and I love second-guessing the manager. You’d have to be really bored to vote on a Dove ad. The idea of being able to use your cellphone to cast votes like this, or momentarily control an electronic billboard in Times Square, or download a movie trailer; all that might be a testament to your cell phone’s heretofore hidden powers, but it doesn’t add much to the value of the billboard that first caught your eye.

Dodgeball is, of course, a fascinating idea, which isn’t all that new even though it’s yet to be widely applied. Still, isn’t that just another “gee-whiz” feature for your cellphone, or iPod, or heart monitor, or whatever device the technology gets attached to? It sells what? Maybe the bar where your friend is hiding from you, but I’m not sure what else.

In short, I’m not overwhelmed by the vision of the future described in this morning’s story. Greenberg seems like a brilliant visualizer, but either he has no better handle on the future than I do, or the reporter nodded off at just the wrong time. The search for the truly new and useful continues…

Salute to Richard Thompson

The upcoming issue of Newsweek spotlights singer/songwriter/blazing guitarist Richard Thompson, promoting his five-disk box set, The Life and Music of Richard Thompson. Writer Malcolm Jones makes a bold claim for Thompson:

Nothing here—and the song list runs to about 80 songs—sounds dated. There is no disco period to live down, no glam rock to wince at, no electronica era to omit. Instead, the material has a consistency of intent and execution that puts it totally at odds with the faddish history of most other pop music. One has to look to the likes of Dylan to find someone who has written this many good songs over the same length of time.

Someone comparable to Bob Dylan you’d think might be as famous as Bob Dylan. But if you’re unfamiliar with Thompson, that’s not surprising. I don’t think his music was ever played on commercial radio — possibly excepting when he was a member of Fairport Convention in the late 60s, when pretty much anything got played on FM rock stations.  Otherwise, you would have had to read about him.

I have to admit, what originally got me interested in Thompson was gossip.  For several years in the 70s, Thompson was teamed with his wife, Linda, a gorgeous singer. Their final album together, Shoot Out the Lights, coincided with their breakup. 

The press glommed onto the juicy discomfort of their plight.  Here they were, already split, touring in support of an album of songs documenting the betrayals, paranoia and resentment they were both experiencing at that moment.  Sure, I’ll check that out. The songs were amazing, with titles like “Did She Jump or Was She Pushed,” “Don’t Renege on Our Love,” and the utterly beautiful, painful, “Walking on a Wire.”

An even greater revelation was Thompson’s guitar-work. His electric guitar solos are as piercing as Neil Young’s — except with much more technique (sorry, Neil.) His acoustic playing is not only virtuoso-level, it demonstrates a thorough knowledge of English and American folk styles.  His melodies are rooted in the modal sounds of folk music, even when the backing sound is conventional rock (with perhaps a button accordion mixed in.)  

His lyrics alternate from sorrowful to scornful, and this is probably why his gifts haven’t gotten the recognition they deserve. Thompson has many uptempo songs, but not upbeat. His outlook is a bit on the bleak side, though never lacking compassion. 

One of my favorite Thompson songs is “Al Bowlly’s in Heaven,” in which, over a dirge-like beat, a disabled beggar recalls his glory days during World War Two.

We were heroes them, and the girls were all pretty
And a uniform was a lucky charm
Bought you the key to the city
We used to dance the whole night through
While Al Bowlly sang, ‘The Very Thought of You’
Al Bowlly’s in Heaven, and I’m in limbo now

I gave my youth to King and country
But what’s my country done for me
But sentenced me to misery
I traded my helmet and my parachute
For a pair of crutches and a de-mob suit
Al Bowlly’s in Heaven, and I’m in limbo now

Hard Times, hard hard times
Hostels and missions and dosser’s soup lines
Can’t close me eyes on a bench or a bed
For the sound of some battle raging in my head

Old friends, You lose so many
You get run around all over town
The wear and the tear of it just drag you down
St. Mungo’s with its dirty old sheets
Beats standing all day down on Scarborough Street
Al Bowlly’s in Heaven, and I’m in limbo now

Can’t stay here, got to foot slog
Once in a blue moon, you might find a job
Sleep in the rain, sleep in the snow
When the beds are all taken, you’ve got nowehere to go

I can see me now, back there on the dance-floor
With a blond on me arm, red head to spare
spit on me shoes and shine in me hair
And there’s Al Bowlly, up on the stand
That was a voice, and that was a band
Al Bowlly’s in Heaven, and I’m in limbo now

There are few more eloquent anti-war songs. In fact, I don’t think it’s an anti-war song so much as a song about war’s tragedy. I love the specificity of the character’s memories: Al Bowlly was a beloved British pop singer of the times; a de-mob suit was the outfit British soldiers were given when they re-entered civilian life.

Thompson’s written dozens of songs as good as “Al Bowlly’s in Heaven,” and has recorded guitar solos every bit as thrilling as Eric Clapton, Jimmy Page or U2′s the Edge.  He’s been successful enough to keep making records and touring into his mid-50s. So this isn’t a sad story about a neglected artist. It’s a sad story about the millions of people whose lives would be enriched by hearing Richard Thompson’s music, but who haven’t heard of him.

If you’re into iTunes, Yahoo! Music or Rhapsody, here are some additional songs (some with Linda Thompson) you might want to download if you can:

1952 Vincent Black Lightening; Beeswing; When the Spell is Broken; Walking on a Wire; Shoot Out the Lights; Tear Stained Letter; How Will I Ever Be Simple Again; Turning of the Tide; Waltzing’s for Dreamers; I Misunderstood; I Want to See the Bright Lights Tonight; For Shame of Doing Wrong; Down Where the Drunkards Roll; Dimming of the Day; She Twists the Knife Again…. and I’d better stop there.

Harder to find is a 2003 live disk called, 1000 Years of Popular Music. Somehow Thompson takes us from “Sumer is Icumen in,” through “Shenandoah,” to Hoagy Carmichael’s “Old Rocking Chair’s Got Me,” then songs by the Who, the Beatles, ABBA, Prince and Britney Spears’ “Oops, I Did it Again.” Yep. In his hands, it’s a pretty good song.