William Safire, Rest in Prose

Posted on September 29, 2009 by Campaign Outsider

Nice sendoff to William Safire in Monday’s New York Times: a respectable (although not Grade A) obit, and a reprint of Safire’s final op-ed column from Jan. 24, 2005.

Headlined “How to Read a Column,” Safire’s swan song starts this way:

At last I am at liberty to vouchsafe to you the dozen rules in reading a political column.

The dozen rules not only puncture the pomposity of the punditocracy (that one’s for you, Bill), but also poke fun at Safire himself. To wit:

9. Cherchez la source. Ingest no column (or opinionated reporting labeled “analysis”) without asking: Cui bono? And whenever you see the word “respected” in front of a name, narrow your eyes. You have never read “According to the disrespected (whomever).”

10. Resist swaydo-intellectual writing. Only the hifalutin trap themselves into “whomever” and only the tort bar uses the Latin for “who benefits?” Columnists who show off should surely shove off. (And avoid all asinine alliteration.)

(Also avoid “to wit,” nitwit.)

Agree with him or not, Safire rarely misfired during his 37-year Times tenure. The politerati are poorer without him.

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Pale Fire (Back) on Nabokov’s Posthumous Novel

Posted on September 28, 2009 by Campaign Outsider

Saturday’s Wall Street Journal piece headlined “Ghost Writers” detailed “[a] new wave of posthumous books by iconic authors.”

Among them: Vladimir Nabokov’s “The Original of Laura.”

Vladimir Nabokov instructed his family to burn his final novel, “The Original of Laura,” after his death. He had sketched out the novel on 138 index cards, a process he used to write “Lolita” and other works. Nobody, not even Mr. Nabokov’s son and literary executor, Dmitri Nabokov, knows the exact order the author intended for the cards.

But Nabokov’s son Dmitri said that “his father had appeared to him in a vision and told him to ‘go ahead and publish.'”

The Journal also reported:

Dmitri Nabokov’s decision to publish the book unleashed a torrent of criticism from scholars and writers who argued that the author’s wish to suppress his work outweighs the public’s desire to read it. Harvard English professor Leland de la Durantaye and British playwright Tom Stoppard called for it to be destroyed.

Others clamored to have it published, arguing that if Franz Kafka’s literary executor had carried out his order to burn his work, we would not have “The Trial,” “The Castle,” or “Amerika.”

No mention, though, of Nabokov-nik Ron Rosenbaum, who’s been on Dmitri like Brown on Williamson for almost a decade to publish “The Original of Laura.” (See here and here. I chronicled the tug-of-war in a WGBH radio commentary last year.)

But so far Rosenbaum (aka “others” in Journal-speak) hasn’t weighed in on the snub.

Where you at, Ron?

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The Acorn Doesn’t Fall Far From My House

Posted on September 27, 2009 by Campaign Outsider

From Saturday’s Boston Globe front page:

With conditions right, acorns go nuts

Bumper crop plumps up squirrels while humans duck and cover

[I]n many parts of the region this time of year, particularly this year, the sky is falling – or at least it feels that way. Hard-shelled orbs are cracking windshields, thwacking gardeners, and tripping up joggers on their daily slog.

They are also making squirrels and other rodents pleasantly plump, leading to a potential bulge in their population.

Given this year’s bountiful rains and the mysterious cycles of nature, oak trees are producing one of the region’s largest crops of acorns in memory, forcing people to run for cover or gingerly avoid what can feel like a carpet of marbles on sidewalks and backyards.

And me with two (or more) squirrels that I’ve been trying unsuccessfully to evict from my roof for three weeks with humane – I swear – traps that are essentially a Squirrel Relocation Program landing the lovable critters in Medfield or Medford or one of those M-towns.

Splendid readers of Campaign Outsider, pray for me.

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Errors o’ the Day (pat. pending)

Posted on September 27, 2009 by Campaign Outsider

Let’s stipulate, as they say on the Law & Order industrial complex (Coming next fall: Law & Order Lunch), that there but for the grace of God go the hardworking staff at Campaign Outsider.

Regardless . . .

Error o’ the Day #1:

Roger Williams University School of Law’s David A. Logan had an op-ed piece in Saturday’s Boston Globe about the “crazy-quilt of law” around reporter’s privilege – that is, the legal rights of journalists to protect confidential sources.

Recalling the rumpus when first-Robert-Novak-and-then-others outed CIA operative Valerie Plame (really, do you need links to all that?), Logan writes :

The jailing of Judith Miller from The New York Times and Matthew Cooper from Time underscores the risk of contempt citations and even incarceration that face reporters who rely upon confidential sources in the present legal and political environment.

Problem is, Matthew Cooper never went to jail.

(Miller, on the other hand, did 85 days in the sneezer, although not exactly “standing on her head” the way tough guys used to describe their stretches in stir.)

At post time, no correction had been appended to Logan’s Globe op-ed.

Error o’ the Day #2:

The Globe’s Names section on Saturday included this scoop:

Knisely off the air at WCRB-FM

Richard Knisely is out at WCRB-FM, where he’s been spinning classical music for a quarter century. WGBH, which this week announced plans to buy the station for $14 million, has unceremoniously dumped the longtime DJ.

Problem is, Knisely is out at WGBH-FM, not WCRB-FM, where he’s decidedly not been spinning classical music for, well, forever.

Saddled with an albatross of a building and a knee-buckling budget deficit, WGBH is one of the sadder cautionary tales of Boston media.

The Globe’s Names section should be careful it doesn’t follow suit.

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Taking a Flyer

Posted on September 26, 2009 by Campaign Outsider

As I walked through Coolidge Corner Friday night, I was intercepted by a nice young woman who handed me a flyer headlined, “When the government puts private wealth in charge of public health, service workers can’t afford to stay healthy.”

The flyer – which opposed the mandatory health insurance created by the Massachusetts Health Care Reform Law – came from the Eastern Service Workers Association (ESWA), which describes itself this way:

ESWA is a free and voluntary unincorporated membership association of service and temporary workers and those unemployed or on fixed incomes. We are uniting together with professionals, small business people and other concerned citizens to fight to improve living and working conditions.

Of course, whenever you see the phrase “free and voluntary unincorporated membership association,” you should check to make sure you still have your wallet.

Checking ESWA, on the other hand, is not quite as easy. Stick “ESWA” into the Googletron, for instance, and you wind up with 1,260,000 results, but pretty thin gruel on the information front.

There’s (now-defunct?) Boston Underground’s sandblasting of ESWA from several years ago, and a dyspeptic Yelp review from last year: “This is a political cult. Do not donate to them.

Yowp.

Switch to the Google Newstron, and you’ll find an offhand (and content-free) reference to ESWA in a Media Matters post last week.

And that’s about everything the hardworking staff at Campaign Outsider could find at this time of night.

Inconveniently, the Eastern Service Workers Association itself has neglected to produce its own website.

So we’re left with this question:

What the hell are we supposed to think about ESWA?

Discuss among yourselves.

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Sign o’ the Times®

Posted on September 25, 2009 by Campaign Outsider

The former Hollywood Video store on Harvard Street in Brookline remains closed (umpteen years and counting), thanks to a lawsuit filed by neighbors trying to block Chestnut Hill-based Women’s Health Services (read: abortion clinic) from moving into the space.

As the Brookline Tab reported:

The lawsuit, which was filed in Norfolk Superior Court [last month], claims town officials failed to consider the impact anti-abortion protestors could have on the neighborhood before approving permits for Women’s Health Services, a Chestnut Hill clinic that plans to move in to 111 Harvard St.

Regardless, every night the defunct Hollywood Video sign resolutely lights up. Except part of it’s burned out, so what you see is:

HO LYWO

Two questions:

1) Why does the sign light up at all every night?

2) Isn’t “Holy Woe” the best slogan ever for the anti-abortion set?

Just askin’.

(Campaign Outsider InstaNote™: To keep the hardworking staff from receiving up to several scorched-earth responses to the above post, let’s stipulate that the plaintiffs in the lawsuit aren’t necessarily anti-abortion, just anti-abortion-clinic in that location.)

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Fun Facts to Know and Tell Update

Posted on September 25, 2009 by Campaign Outsider

More fun facts about medical malpractice, this time from a recent Weekly Standard editorial:

Studies of the effects of [defensive] medicine put its price tag at a minimum of $100 billion a year and probably more than $200 billion . . .

Because doctors pay more for malpractice insurance, patients pay more too: nearly $2,000 a year in extra health expenses for an average family . . .

Tort reform works. Texas is a good example. In 2003, the state enacted caps on noneconomic damages (so-called pain and suffering) and added a requirement that lawsuits be approved by a panel of medical experts. Over the next four years, premiums fell 21 percent, the drift of doctors out of the state was halted, and 7,000 new doctors set up practices . . .

Hmmmm. Makes a fellow think.

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Re-Checkin’ NECN

Posted on September 25, 2009 by Campaign Outsider

A couple of weeks ago the paid program “Style Boston” debuted on New England Cable News, and although the local chapter of Air Kiss Nation was all a-twitter, Style Boston was toe-curling TV to any of us civilians unlucky enough to stumble across it.

Back then, the hardworking staff at Campaign Outsider noticed that NECN was not only taking money to air Style Boston, it was also taking segments of the program (which is “branded content:” sponsors don’t run ads, they’re embedded in the segments) and featuring them in the entertainment section of NECN’s website.

It still is.

At post time, five of the 16 featured stories on the first page of NECN’s entertainment section linked to segments from this week’s Style Boston, which I can’t say was dreadful only because I haven’t seen it.

But I can say this – again: Why is NECN pawning off advertising as editorial content?

NECN has a reputation for being a solid, substantial news source. It shouldn’t throw that away for short money from a third-rate production like Style Boston.

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Another Other Ad o’ the Day©

Posted on September 24, 2009 by Campaign Outsider

The local – and extremely pesky to Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center – Service Employees Industrial Union (SEIU) is at it again, with an EyeOnBI ad in the Wednesday Boston Globe char-broiling BIDMC for raising fees on late-night Emergency Room visits.

[I]t’s outrageous that Beth Israel Deaconess’ physician group would charge patients – including seniors on Medicare – for arriving ‘late’  at the Emergency Room when we have no other choice.

In turn, here’s BIDMC CEO Paul Levy’s blog post ridiculing the SEIU ad.

Once again: Leave it to a CEO to bring a knife to a gunfight.

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Another Ad o’ the Day®

Posted on September 24, 2009 by Campaign Outsider

From mediabistro’s Fishbowl LA blog:

The PSA Obama Doesn’t Want You to See.

Which is, not surprisingly in this post-modern era, a pro-Obama video – compliments of comedian Will Ferrell’s Funny or Die website and hard-left advocacy group MoveOn.org.

The po-mo sensibility of the video is undeniably cool, but what I want to know is: will it move the needle on healthcare legislation?

As far as I can tell, none of the major lawmakers in the healthcare debate is particularly po-mo.

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