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On the first night of Hanukkah this year, I found myself in an unusual place. I was supposed to be at a Jewish communal event hosted by Israel’s Ambassador to the United States, Michael Oren. But at the last minute I was asked by the Indonesian Ambassador, Dino Patti Djalal, to participate in an interfaith panel which included one of the leading Muslim clerics of his country, Dr. Din Syamsuddin. Dr. Syamsuddin is the president of Muhammadiyah, an organization of 29 million Muslims that sponsors a wide range of social and educational programs in Indonesia and more than a dozen universities. Also on the panel was Rev. Michael Livingston, a Presbyterian and former president of the National Council of Churches who is now heading up their initiative to fight poverty.
The fact is that I only accepted the invitation because of a remarkable speech I heard given by Ambassador Djalal a week earlier as part of an international conference sponsored by the Center for Interfaith Action on Global Poverty (CIFA). The organization was unveiling a new initiative to increase the engagement of faith communities in health and development efforts around the globe.
The Ambassador, who hosted a dinner for the delegates, shared his concerns about the extent to which the world was witnessing an increase in religious extremism. A Muslim himself, Djalal bemoaned the fact that in his own country religious communities that had lived side by side in harmony for centuries were set against each other because of the actions of a handful of religious zealots. He called upon the faith leaders gathered to engage in “militant moderation,” by which he meant that those of us who believe that religions can bring healing balm to a world beset by war, disease and poverty must be far more assertive than the voices of religious extremism. He called for a new “technology of peace” which would be based not on rehashing the prejudices and grievances of past generations but rather on the more positive model of interfaith collaboration to address the most pressing issues of the world.
So committed was Ambassador Djalal to advancing this kind of interfaith understanding that he arranged to bring a TV crew in from Indonesia in a matter of days to tape the conversation between Dr. Syamsuddin, Rev. Livingston and me. The program will air in prime time on one of Indonesia’s most popular programs the week before Christmas. He wanted to model for his country the ways that religious leaders from different faiths could sit together and find common ground.
For those acquainted with interfaith dialogue, the conversation covered familiar territory. We discussed how people could be loyal to their respective faiths but still be open to and respectful of those who were adherents of another faith. And while this particular dialogue took place only between representatives of the Abrahamic traditions, the nature of the conversation sent a message to the broader community of the faithful. No responsible representation of God’s will, from any faith perspective, could possibly sanction hatred or violence against another child of God.
Hanukkah is called “the festival of lights.” It marks the victory of the Jews against their Hellenized Syrian oppressors in the land of Israel during the second century BCE. The Jews had none of the weaponry of their occupiers. Yet the Maccabees would not succumb to the demands of the Syrians to give up their religious beliefs and practices. The fact that the Maccabees ultimately prevailed is recorded as the first war in history fought for religious liberty. Appropriately enough, the annual Jewish cycle of Scriptural readings assigns to the festival of Hanukkah a selection from the Book of Zecharia (4:6): “Not by might and not by power but by spirit, says the Lord of heaven.”
Two thousand years later, we are still fighting the same battles. In a world that is changing so rapidly, religion provides comfort, continuity and timeless certainty to millions of the faithful in the world. But often that religious package also includes heavy doses of triumphalism, chauvinism and intolerance. It is incumbent on religious leaders to help their adherents distinguish between the elements of faith that foster peace and understanding and those that lead to prejudice and extremism.
As with Christmas and Kwanza, Hanukkah falls during the winter solstice. It is the darkest time of the year. Appropriately enough, all three festivals have as a central symbol candles and light. If we are to move our world closer to the messianic ideal articulated in the sacred texts of most of the world’s religions, each of us will need to find ways to light a candle, increase the light and banish away the darkness.

This Blogger’s Books from
Judaism and Justice: The Jewish Passion to Repair the World
by Sid Schwarz
Finding a Spiritual Home: How a New Generation of Jews Can Transform the American Synagogue
by Sidney Schwarz

Source:www.huffingtonpost.com

Advent is a time of desire. Christians desire the coming of Christ into their lives in a new way. The readings from the Book of Isaiah, used in many churches during the liturgical season before Christmas, reveal even the earth desiring the presence of God. The wonderful “O antiphons,” sung at evening prayer and during the Gospel acclamations toward the end of Advent, speak of Christ at the “King of Nations and their Desire.”
But sadly, desire has a disreputable reputation in many religious circles. When many hear the term, they think of two things: sexual desire or material wants, both of which are often condemned by some religious leaders. The first is one of the greatest gifts from God to humanity; without it the human race would cease to exist! The second is part of our natural desire for a healthy life — desire for food, shelter and clothing.
Desire may also be difficult for some people to accept in their spiritual lives. One of the best books on Christian spirituality is The Spiritual Exercises Reclaimed, written by Katherine Dyckman, Mary Garvin and Elizabeth Liebert, three Catholic sisters. In their book, they suggest that some dynamics of Christian spirituality may present obstacles for women and may need to be re-imagined. Desire is one of them.
“Women may often feel that paying attention to their desires is somehow selfish and that they should not honor their desires if they are being truly generous with God.” The three authors encourage women to “notice” and “name” their desires.
Why this emphasis on desire during Advent, or any other time? Because desire is a key way that God can communicate with us.
Holy desires are different than surface wants like, “I want a new car” or “I want a new computer.” Instead, I’m talking about our deepest desires, the ones that shape our lives: desires that help us know who we are to become and what we are to do. Our deep desires help us know God’s desires for us, and how much God desires to be with us. And God, I believe, encourages us to “notice” and “name” these desires, in the same way that Jesus encouraged Bartimaeus, the blind beggar in the Gospel of Mark to articulate his desire.
“What do you want me to do for you?” he asks the man. “Rabbi,” he said, “I want to see.” Recognize our desires means recognizing God’s desires for us.
A few years ago, before my ordination to the priesthood, I had to undergo some major surgery. Right before as I was going under the anesthesia, I suddenly thought, “I hope I live. I want to be a priest!” I had never felt it so strongly before. It was a surprising confirmation of a desire that I had had for many years.
During my recuperation, I realized why Jesus may have asked Bartimaeus, the blind beggar, what he wanted. Naming our desires tells us something about who we are. In the hospital I learned something about myself, which helped free me of doubts about what I wanted to do. It’s freeing to say, “This is what I desire in life.” (Naming the desire may also make us more grateful when we finally receive the fulfillment of our hopes.)
Expressing these desires also brings us into a closer relationship with God. Otherwise, it would be like never telling a friend your innermost thoughts. Your friend would remain distant. When we tell God our desires, our relation to God deepens.
Desire is a primary way that God leads people to discover who they are and what they are meant to do. On the most obvious level, a man and a woman feel sexual, emotional and spiritual desire for one another and in this way discover their vocations to be married. A person feels an attraction to being a doctor, lawyer or teacher and so discovers his or her vocation.
Desires help us find our way. But we first have to know them.
The deep longings of our hearts are our holy desires. Not only desires for physical healing, as Bartimaeus asked for (and as many ask for today) but also the desires for change, for growth, for a fuller life. And our deepest desires, those desires that lead us to become who we are, are God’s desires for us. They are ways that God speaks to you directly, one way that the Creator deals with the creation. They are also the way that God fulfills God’s own dreams for the world, by calling people to certain tasks.
A few weeks after the operation, I shared this with a physician friend who is also a priest. He agreed that it was a grace to have this recognition, but then laughed and said, “Wouldn’t it have been nice if you didn’t have to have major surgery to realize this?”
Laughing, I replied that if I hadn’t had the operation, I probably wouldn’t have realized it. Not that God wanted me to be sick, or caused me to be sick, so that I could recognize his presence in this way. No more than Jesus caused Bartimaeus to be blind. Rather, when my defenses were down, I was able to see things more clearly.
Some people find that their deep desires are difficult to identify. What then? Margaret Silf, an English spiritual writer, retreat director and popular lecturer, provides one answer in her book Inner Compass. She suggests two ways that you may come to know your hidden desires. One is “Outside In” the other “Inside Out.” The “Outside-In” approach considers those desires already present, which may point to deeper ones. Desires like “I want a new job” or “I want to move” may signify a longing for greater overall freedom.
The “Inside-Out” approach uses archetypal stories as signposts to your desires. What fairy tales, myths, stories, films or novels appealed to you when you were young? The same could be asked about stories from your sacred Scriptures. Are you drawn toward the story of Moses freeing the Hebrew slaves? Or Jesus’ healing the blind man? Why? Might these real-life stories hold clues about your holy desires?
Desire is a key part of Christian spirituality because desire is a key way that God’s voice is heard in our lives. And the deepest Christian desire, planted within us, is our desire for Christ, the Desire of the Nations.
Rev. James Martin is a Jesuit priest and culture editor of America magazine. This essay originally appeared, in longer form, on “In All Things,” and was adapted from his new book The Jesuit Guide to (Almost) Everything.

Source:www.huffingtonpost.com

Like brewing your own beer, satire is tricky, time consuming, and not as rewarding as you might expect. Humor is a lousy weapon, and anyone who thinks different is in for a life of one humiliating loss after another. When people talk about humor as a weapon it always makes me think of Jamie Lee Curtis in the closet at the end of Halloween, unfolding a wire hanger to use as a spear. It’s better than nothing, but just barely.
And it’s so hard to get exactly right.
Take this current example of political satire from LibertyPost.org, where “spirited debate, varied opinions and points of view are the lifeblood of liberty”:
It’s hilarious, of course. And we can all agree that those folks were asking for it, by not being white. But it feels like a lot of work. “Sweaty,” sitcom professionals would call it. A little sweaty.
And why is a live operator asking you to press a number for English? Shouldn’t that be a recording? And how is the dog biting people over the phone? See, it all falls apart, and what good does that do for the lifeblood of liberty?
It also makes some of our Tea Party friends sound kind of racist, and we know that’s not true.
Or take this cartoon, from earlier this week, by Chuck Asay, who “sifts the events of the day through his biblical worldview”:

http://townhall.com/cartoons/cartoonist/ChuckAsay/2010/12/4

Chuck Asay has been a semi-professional editorial cartoonist for over 150 years, but, as you can see, even he misses the nail every now and then. We can all agree with the premise of the cartoon – punch gay people right in the face as hard as you can – but the execution is off. Is the Marine on the left actually gay, or is the Marine in the center misunderstanding the pat on the ass? After the Marine in the center smashes the Marine on the left right in the face, knocking him to the ground, what do the other Marines in the cartoon think? It’s impossible to tell from their expressions. Because Chuck Asay can’t draw. I think they approve. (And why wouldn’t they? Queer got what he had coming.) But I’m just guessing.
How many people have successfully created political satire, on a regular paying basis, in America, in our lifetime? Ten thousand? Cartoonists, comedians, columnists, playwrights, TV writers, screenwriters, gag men — God help us, morning zoo DJs – sketch writers, folk singers… all in, living and dead, Albee to Zappa – how many?
Five thousand? Two thousand?
Which brings me to an event tonight that I’d give a lot to attend. The title’s a little cutsie — “An Evening with the National Lampoon to Make the Lions Roar with Laughter” – but the money goes to a good cause – the New York Public Library — and the people who will be there are from a pretty small group, and they don’t get together very often.
Here are some of the high quality funny people who are going to be there:
John Weidman, Sean Kelly, Brian McConnachie, Christopher Cerf, Fred Graver, Michel Choquette, Larry “Ratso” Sloman, Joe Randazzo, Peter Reigert, Alice Playten, Paul Jacobs and Sarah Durkee.
It’s been thirty years since some of them were in the same room.
Plus, as they say, special surprise guests.
They’re together, for one night only, because of a new book by Rick Meyerowitz called Drunk Stoned Brilliant Dead: The Artists and Writers Who Made the National Lampoon Insanely Great. It’s gotten rapturous reviews – and why shouldn’t it – from the NY Times and the Wall Street Journal. It’s been excerpted in the National Enquirer, of all places, and, even though I wrote a tiny piece for it, I can recommend it without feeling the slightest guilt about conflict of interest, because I didn’t even get a free copy. I had to steal one from the office.
The event starts in two hours. If you miss it, get the book. You’ll like it.
If I was in New York, or if I were you, and you were in New York, I’d go.
Did I mention that they’re going to spend the entire evening discussing Steve Martin’s art collection? I don’t know why. They just are.

Source:www.huffingtonpost.com

The considerable buzz and fanfare swirling around James Kaplan’s new book, “Frank: The Voice” suggests that the powerful mystique of singer/actor Frank Sinatra has hardly dissipated more than a decade after his death.
Sinatra would have turned ninety-five this month. Of course, few expected Frank to make this milestone, which was a distinctive part of his charm. His ongoing routine of Chesterfield’s, Jack Daniel’s, and 3AM nightclub shenanigans was no recipe for longevity. More than length of years, clearly Frank cared about making magic and having fun, his way. We were just lucky enough to be there to listen, and to look.
Having become a top balladeer with millions of female “bobbysoxers” at his feet, Frank began appearing in pictures in the early forties, and did a series of light, likeable musicals throughout the decade, culminating in the lively, colorful “On The Town” (1949), directed by Stanley Donen and co-starring Gene Kelly (with whom Sinatra had collaborated twice before, in 1945′s “Anchors Aweigh” and 1949′s “Take Me Out To The Ballgame”).
Then, trouble. With his singing sidelined by a serious throat problem in the early 50s, it seemed Sinatra’s show business days were numbered. When his voice was restored, he had to jump-start his career, and a supporting role in a high-profile movie finally did the trick.
That movie of course was “From Here To Eternity” (1953), Fred Zinnemann’s superb adaptation of the James Jones best-seller about the intersecting lives and romances of various soldiers stationed at Pearl Harbor, leading up to the Japanese sneak attack that finally took our country into World War II. Frank scored in the role of Maggio, a diminutive Italian-American enlisted man with a hot temper. Sinatra’s claim that it was a part he was destined to play was borne out when he netted an Oscar for Best Supporting Actor. Ol’ Blue Eyes was definitely back.
Sinatra was quickly cast as John Baron, a cold-blooded killer in the gritty, intense “Suddenly” (1954). Baron arrives with his gang in a tiny midwestern hamlet called Suddenly and takes over the Benson family home, including a grandfather, mother and son. Soon, local sheriff Todd Shaw (Sterling Hayden) drops in, and becomes part of the group. The killer has selected the Benson place for a reason: it seems the President, on a whistle-stop tour, will be making an unscheduled appearance across the street from the house, an ideal vantage-point for an assassin. “Suddenly” has the look and feel of a “B” movie quickie, but Sinatra’s intensity blazes off the screen. Still thin as a reed, the actor excels as a human time bomb set to explode. Hayden provides a decent, steady counterpoint playing Sheriff Shaw.
After a musical turn opposite the young Doris Day in Gordon Douglas’s entertaining but unremarkable “Young At Heart” (1954), Sinatra the actor shifted into bleak, non-singing territory in Otto Preminger’s then ground-breaking portrayal of drug addiction: “The Man With The Golden Arm” (1955). Sinatra plays Frankie Machine, a rehabilitated junkie who wants to start a new life as a drummer. Yet the presence of his crippled, neurotic wife (Eleanor Parker) and his old pusher (Darren McGavin) undermines his dream at every turn. Only neighborhood girl Molly (Kim Novak) and misfit pal Sparrow (Arnold Stang) really want what’s best for Frankie. Though its treatment of the drug theme is dated, Frank turns in an astounding performance, earning him his only Oscar nod for Best Actor.
Sinatra then returned to more familiar musical terrain with Joseph L. Mankiewicz’s buoyant adaptation of Frank Loesser’s immortal “Guys and Dolls” (1955). Frank shines as Nathan Detroit, purveyor of the “oldest established permanent floating crap game in New York”. Brando in his prime is better than you’d expect as Sky Masterson, even with some reedy vocals, but you keep waiting for Nathan to show up again. His dealings with fiance Adelaide (Vivian Blaine) are a particular highlight. Straight from Broadway, the portly Stubby Kaye steals every scene he’s in playing Nicely Nicely Johnson.
The next six years would find Sinatra busy in recording studios, doing some of his most enduring music for Capital Records, and on movie sets, making some solid though hardly outstanding films (1957′s “Pal Joey”, 1958′s “Kings Go Forth”).
A notable exception is the atmospheric “Some Came Running” (1958), another adaptation of a James Jones novel directed by Vincente Minnelli. Frank plays a World War 2 vet and aspiring writer who has trouble re-establishing himself in his hometown after the war. He meets a good woman (Martha Hyer) and tries to clean up his act, but his acquaintance with adoring Chicago floozie Ginny (Shirley MacLaine) and card sharp Bama Dillert (Dean Martin) undermines the romance. While Frank definitely carries it, Dean matches him scene for scene, and young Shirley is aces.
With the sixties came the Rat Pack series, including “Ocean’s 11″ (1960), “Sergeants 3″ (1962), and “Robin and the Seven Hoods” (1964), all titles featuring some combination of Dean Martin, Sammy Davis, Jr., Peter Lawford and Joey Bishop, whose enduring value consists of a sort of nostalgic kitsch. These fairly forgettable movies nevertheless offered surface gloss and plenty of attitude, promulgating the “nice ‘n’ easy”, “ring-a-ding-ding” playboy lifestyle Sinatra cultivated in his middle years.
Over this period, Frank would make two more great films. In John Frankenheimer’s “The Manchurian Candidate” (1962), Sinatra is former Korean War POW Bennett Marco, who’s haunted by nightmares in which fellow prisoner Raymond Shaw (Laurence Harvey) gets ordered by the North Koreans to kill his own men. Seeking out other platoon members afflicted with similar visions, Marco pieces together the fact that Shaw is the linchpin in a deadly communist plot. Twisty and unnerving, all the players are first-rate, particularly Angela Lansbury as Shaw’s evil mother. Frank’s subtle, assured portrayal of Marco signaled a career high-point.
Mark Robson’s underrated war drama “Von Ryan’s Express” (1965), stars Sinatra as Colonel Joe Ryan, a World War 2 army flier shot down over Italy. Transported to a prison camp, he meets Major Fincham (Trevor Howard), a hard-line British infantry officer at loggerheads with strutting camp commandant Battaglia (Adolfo Celi). Ryan’s ill-advised effort to reach out to Battaglia and improve conditions for the men results in the nickname “Von Ryan”. Still, the colonel redeems himself as he leads his men out of the camp when the Italians surrender. When his unit is recaptured by the Nazis, Ryan and company hijack the train carrying them back to captivity, and make a run for the Swiss border, and safety. Gorgeously shot on location, the ensemble cast really clicks, and Robson keeps the action brisk, resulting in a breathless ride, with a stunner of an ending.
You don’t need the excuse of a milestone birthday to enjoy these titles. But Frankie, wherever you are, Happy 95th anyhow.
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Source:www.huffingtonpost.com

NEVER EVER LET THE FACTS MATTER
TAX CUTS USUALLY LEAD TO HIGHER UNEMPLOYMENT
TAX INCREASES LEAD TO LOWER UNEMPLOYMENT
Since 1950 we have had five tax increases on the rich.
Four out of five times unemployment went down.
Since 1950 we have ten cuts to the top marginal rate.
Six out of ten time unemployment has gone up.
YEAR TOP MARGINAL TAX RATEUNEMPLOYMENT RATERESULT
1962
91

5.7

BASE YEAR
1963
77

5.2

Tax cut/ Unemployment down
1964
70

4.5

Tax cut/Unemployment down
1967
70

3.8

BASE YEAR
1968
75

3.6

Tax hike/Unemployment down
1969
77

3.5

Tax hike/Unemployment down
1970
71.8

4.9

Tax cut/Unemployment Up
1971 70

5.9

Tax cut/Unemployment Up
1980
70

7.1

BASE YEAR
1981
69.1

7.6

Tax cut/Unemployment Up
1982
50

9.7

Tax cut/Unemployment Up
1986
50

7.0

BASE YEAR
1987
38.5

6.2

Tax cut/Unemployment down
1988
28

5.5

Tax cut/Unemployment down
1989
31

5.6

Tax hike/Unemployment up
1992
31

7.5

BASE YEAR
1993
39.6

6.9

Tax hike/Unemployment down
2000
39.6

4.0

BASE YEAR
2001
38.6

4.7

Tax cut/Unemployment up
2002 38.6

5.8

BASE YEAR
2003 35

6.0

Tax cut/Unemployment up

Source:www.huffingtonpost.com

The famed Peaksville, Ohio cornfield, which provided a safe haven for people to wish unwanted things into, has burned down. “It all happened so fast,” says Gregory Turnbull, the devastated owner of the 50-acre field which had been in his family for generations. “I tried to wish the fire away into another cornfield but, apparently, it just doesn’t work like that.”
Fire crews were called in to contain the blaze, but they could not combat the flames, which were being driven by high winds and a wish-to-field occupancy ratio that had reached critical mass. “There were simply too many bad things in that cornfield–very bad things,” said firefighter Jett Fulcrow. “They all had to go up sooner or later.”
The fire released all the contents that had been wished into the cornfield over the years, resulting in the reappearance of countless relatives, ex-lovers, water-powered cars, and a host of personal, political, and metaphysical constructs which took the form of dark, foreboding clouds. Dan Hollis, whose head had been grafted onto a jack-in-the-box almost 50 years ago, said, “I’ve got a lot of catching up to do.”
Turnbull insists he will not replant the cornfield, but many others hope he changes his mind. “We are willing to help Mr. Turnbull in any way possible,” said Department of Agriculture spokesperson Harriet Wolfson. “We need that cornfield back immediately. Without it, how else will any of us be able to wish 2010 away?”

Source:www.huffingtonpost.com

It has been a really bad week for progressives. The bad news piling up on the road was like the wreckage after a Mac truck topples over in a crash on the interstate, with one car after another slamming into the mess. There were bits of good news peaking through here and there, like the deficit commission falling 3 votes short on its plan to make the middle class pay for a deficit created by tax cuts for the rich and Wall Street causing an economic collapse, but it was an ugly week overall:
The co-chairs of the deficit commission got 11 votes for their plan to raise the retirement age, cut Social Security benefits, take away homeowners’ mortgage deduction, take away workers’ health care plans’ tax advantage, and give corporations and the wealthy lower taxes. Even though the plan fell short of the 14 required by its executive order to be forwarded to Congress, the campaign manager for the commission’s plan, the Washington Post, has proclaimed breathlessly that this is a great victory for goodness and truth- and that is in its “news” section. And President Obama decided on a cross between no response and a positive one: not commenting on any of the specifics while praising the work of the commission way too much.
The President’s tepid public negotiating statements on the tax cut fight are making Democrats on the Hill and everywhere else furious, with everyone I’m talking to feeling like he is undercutting them. Tom Harkin’s quote about the President needing to hope and pray that Palin gets the nomination if he gives in on the issue was only the public expression of the far more profane things I have been hearing from other Democratic members.
The President calling for a freeze of public employees salaries was a BS move- bad policy in a recession to be lowering any middle class workers’ incomes, and bad politics because no one is going to remember this come November of 2012 except those public employees who got screwed.
The President’s FCC chair announced a draft plan on net neutrality that was so riddled with loopholes that the only folks who have said anything nice about it so far are telecom companies. There is some very good news here though: FCC commisioner Michael Copps, whose vote is needed for the plan to pass, is standing strong for real net neutrality, and organizers on this issue are working around the clock to push this thing the right way.
Late Friday, the administration announced a trade deal with South Korea. Now this one is more complicated than some trade deals I’ve seen, as it is at least good enough to get the UAW’s support. I’ll reserve judgment on how good or bad a trade deal it is until I hear from Steelworkers President Leo Gerard, who I trust more on the trade issue than anyone I know, but I will say this about the politics of it: the working and middle class voters who are the biggest bloc of swing voters by far in the 2012 elections hate trade deals.
After the massive election defeat Democrats suffered in 2010, a defeat made far worse by the fact that the only thing voters understood about Obama’s economic plan was that he saved the big banks, I am in a very bad mood. This week made my mood much worse, because it feels like Obama’s emerging political strategy is what I have called DC centrism: things popular with the Washington Post and DC pundits that have no popularity with actual middle class swing voters or the base voters Obama desperately needs to re-energize, such as raising the retirement age and trade deals. If he chooses this course, he will get more attacks like Paul Krugman’s column on Friday (which has already been forwarded to me about a 1,000 times), more angry bloggers, more ticked off Democrats in Congress, more dis-spirited and dis-engaged volunteers and online donors, fewer and fewer people to defend him against the Republicans’ never ending attacks. I don’t know who it will be, but politics like nature abhors a vacuum, and Obama will get someone to challenge him in the primary, and whoever it is will turn out to be as surprisingly strong as Pat Buchanan was against the first George Bush in 1992, or as Gene McCarthy was in ’68.
You know what, though, after all this week’s bad news: I am still answering the question in my headline with a no. Having been doing politics fulltime for 30 years now, and as a student of history, I always have to smile at all the apocalyptic talk that happens after a big election defeat. Go back and look at the commentary after the Goldwater defeat about the imminent demise of the Republican Party, or check out all the discussion after the 2004 election of the Republicans’ permanent majority. Or, if you don’t like such ancient history, check out the doomsday talk about how much trouble the Republicans were in after the 2008 election. The tide can turn in politics very quickly, and politicians sometimes do get their act together after making lots of mistakes.
I know. I am a veteran of the Clinton White House that was rocked by the stunning 1994 defeat. And things looked really bleak after that election, not only in terms of winning in ’96 but in terms of how Clinton was reacting. For one thing, he was drifting and directionless for months, advancing no major initiatives or ideas and staying reactive and defensive the whole time. For another, he had brought in folks like Dick Morris, Mark Penn, and Doug Schoen, who were basically counseling triangulation and capitulation to Republicans on every issue. Everyone was assuming that Dick Gephardt would mount a major challenge to the President in the primary, spurred on by unions still mad about NAFTA and members/ex-members of Congress who fully blamed Clinton for the stunning loss of their majority. The new Republican majority rolled in those first few months, winning all the early Contract with America policy battles as Clinton gave in on too many things. And Clinton trailed Bob Dole, the presumptive Republican nominee, badly all through late ’94 and the first 8 months of ’95.
Clinton and the Democrats started to get their traction when they organized against the Republicans on the school lunch fight, which made Gingrich look like an extremist. That set the stage for the budget showdown, on which labor and other progressives ran ads both beating up on Republicans and stiffening the spine of Clinton. Morris, Penn, and Schoen were running around town telling everyone Clinton would just split the difference with Republicans on Medicare, Medicaid, education, and environmental cuts, but when Clinton sided with labor and progressives and announced he wouldn’t accept Gingrich’s draconian cuts, he forced a showdown. When the dust settled, Clinton had put Dole in his rearview mirror in the Presidential polling and never had to look back.
I don’t know what is going to happen over the next few months. Obama may decide that DC centrism is the way to go. He may consistently negotiate with Republicans from a position of weakness, and fold on one issue after the next to the emboldened Republicans in Congress. If that happens, progressives will go crazy on him and swing voters will keep stewing as the economy stays stuck in a rut and Obama looks weak. But for all my progressive friends wallowing in despair and giving up all hope, I’d encourage you to take a deep breath and keep organizing, because we are not passive victims in all this. The Clinton White House didn’t just stumble across the school lunch issue as a way to make Gingrich look like a right wing extremist with no compassion: progressives picked that issue out of the Republican budget plan and began organizing around it. Bill Clinton didn’t decide to stand up to Republicans on the budget fight because he magicly grew a new pair on his own: labor and other progressive groups ran ads, pushed back, threatened him with all kinds of ugly consequences, and all of a sudden there he was wielding that veto pen on national TV.
Progressives are not helpless in all this: we have more of a megaphone and more tools and more activists than we did in the mid ’90s. And this President is not without strength: his Philadelphia speech on race, his sound defeats of McCain in the debates, his standing up to Rahm when he wanted to throw in the towel on health care reform all proved that. Progressives need to re-form their lines and help Obama find his way. And Obama needs to regain his strength and start fighting- really fighting, in a way we can all see it- for the middle class again, not giving into conventional wisdom about what the DC elites think is the center.
This has been a bad month and a bad week for the progressive cause. But we’ve seen worse. There are no longer slaves in chains, being hunted down with guns and whips when they try to escape. Women are no longer arrested and mocked when they press for the right to vote. Little children are no longer having firehoses and dogs turned on them when they march for their civil rights. Those good people whose shoulders we stand on today never gave up their hope, and they faced far worse than John Boehner as Speaker. We need to gather ourselves for the fight ahead, and create a center of gravity that will be powerful and appealing enough that our President is pulled to do the right thing.

Source:www.huffingtonpost.com

December 2nd through December 5th, Human Rights and Sex Trafficking: A Film Forum, is taking place in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Alicia Foley Winn, Executive Director of The Boston Initiative to Advance Human Rights (BITHAR), is spearheading the event. I spoke with her to learn more about the back-story and goals of the project.
In 2005, Winn was introduced to feminist legal theory and its application to women’s human rights violations by her law professor, Kate Nace Day. Deeply impacted, she founded BITHAR, which “has a particular interest in the right of women and children to be free from forced prostitution and commercial sexual exploitation (CSE).” As Winn’s work in human trafficking was grounded in Day’s teachings, she asked her former teacher to join the BITHAR Board of Directors.
Day’s philosophy was that utilizing the imagery and visceral impact of film could bring a real understanding of sex trafficking to the public. Basing that point of view on the premise that “film reaches people in a way that print journalism simply can’t,” the two women began to examine the “feasibility of organizing a film festival.”
A year and a half ago they traveled to New York City to meet with the co-founder of Equality Now, Jessica Neuwirth, and the organization’s Executive Director, Taina Bien-Aim. Winn describes them as “two of the most generous and impactful feminist activists in the world.” The insights they garnered from their discussion were instrumental in helping to jump start their concept.
Co-sponsors of the festival include Amnesty International USA, Documentary Educational Resources, and the Harvard Kennedy School Carr Center for Human Rights Policy. Ms. Magazine, PeaceKeeper Causmetics, and The Body Shop signed on as donors. Others have offered support based on “long-standing personal, professional, and academic relationships.”
Winn explained that speakers were chosen based on their “immeasurable” insights and perspectives. Each panelist has been in the forefront of making vital contributions to the anti-sex trafficking movement. They come from diverse backgrounds–encompassing survivors, filmmakers, researchers, and activists.
The keynote presenter, Ambassador Swanee Hunt, met Winn when they crossed paths at The Protection Project in Washington, D.C. Hunt’s initiative, Demand Abolition, a program of Hunt Alternatives, has been a multi-dimensional sponsor of the gathering–giving funding, time, and participation.
During the four-day forum, there will be a performance by Sarah Jones, a speech delivered by Rep. Carolyn Maloney (D-NY), and an exclusive preview of Holy Ghetto, which “traces the narratives of marginalized women within Tel Aviv’s red light district.”
I asked Winn how she envisioned film as being instrumental in amplifying the issue of sex trafficking. She responded by e-mail:
The movies were chosen based on intensive research and extensive viewing. The deciding factors embraced the films being powerful, accessible, non-gratuitous, innovative, and geographically representative. There was a pointed focus on including narratives that examined the crisis in the America. As Foley pointed out, “It wasn’t until this year that the United States, which has been assessing every other country for nearly ten years on their efforts to combat human trafficking, actually published a self-assessment in its annual G-TIP Report. She added, “I think people are just starting to realize that we in the United States also have a major problem with trafficking.
This article originally appeared on the website cultureID.

Follow Marcia G. Yerman on Twitter:
www.twitter.com/mgyerman

Source:www.huffingtonpost.com

Bipartisanship is dead. At least that is what the chattering class would have you
believe. Look a little deeper however, and you’ll see that there is a different story to
tell in the Rocky Mountains.
Colorado is energy country – it is home to the New Energy Economy and a strong
commitment to solar and wind generation but it also has a history of traditional
energy development including coal, oil, and natural gas.
Of course, there is broad agreement that we need to move away from coal. Our
dependence is killing us. Literally.
Three million Coloradans are harmed by air pollution spewing from old coal-fired
power plants in Metro Denver. Pollution from coal plants is linked to mortality,
emergency room visits, asthma, and sick days from work and school. Kids are
hit especially hard – over 65,000 children in Metro Denver suffer from asthma.
Let’s not forget that carbon dioxide from coal plants is a major greenhouse gas
contributor too.
We can’t just sit on our hands and wait for these aging monsters to die a natural
death. And more importantly, we can’t invest millions of dollars to put them on life-
support. The good news is we have an opportunity to actually shut the coal plants
down. Very soon.
This is where the bi-partisan element of the story comes into play. This spring,
Republicans and Democrats in the state legislature agreed it was time to act. They
joined forces with the Democratic Governor, Bill Ritter, the major utility in the state,
Xcel Energy, forward thinking leaders in the natural gas industry, public health
champions, and conservation groups to pass the Clean Air, Clean Jobs act (CACJ).
The measure calls for Xcel to replace 900 megawatts of coal fired power with
cleaner burning natural gas, renewables, and more energy efficiency. In an earlier
post, my colleague at the Colorado Environmental Coalition, Elise Jones, highlights
how Colorado positioned itself to be ready to pass CACJ.
The story isn’t over though. Over the past few months the Colorado Public Utilities
Commission (PUC) has been evaluating Xcel’s plans to implement the legislation.
The coal industry, locally and nationally, is fighting tooth and nail to derail the
measure, pouring in buckets of money in hopes the PUC will require the old coal
plants to be retrofitted rather than replaced.
After months of back and forth, the PUC deliberations will start on Monday. By
voting to shutter all five coal units under discussion by 2017, the PUC will hit a
homerun for clean air and continue Colorado’s leadership at the forefront of twenty
first century energy policy. We simply can’t afford 19th century solutions to 21st century problems.
People live in and visit Colorado in large part because of our stunning mountains
and deep blue skies. Transitioning away from dirty coal will help protect what
makes Colorado unique. The PUC should honor the bi-partisan work that gave rise
to the Clean Air, Clean Jobs act, and the wishes of the vast majority of Coloradans,
and move to retire the region’s aging coal plants next week.

Source:www.huffingtonpost.com

“Sooner or later,” Robert Louis Stevenson wrote in the mid 1800s, “everyone sits down to a banquet of consequences.”
Peter Morici, an outspoken economics professor at the University of Maryland, suggests to me that President Obama is a prime candidate, following the highly disappointing November jobs report issued Friday by the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
The general expectation was that we’d see about 150,000 new job creations for the month following the addition of 151,000 in October, and that the jobless rate would remain at 9.6%. The experts fouled up again as only a sparse 39,000 jobs were added to the work force and the unemployment rate ran up to 9.8%.
Actually, if you back out health care, social services and temp services, the economy actually shed jobs — 24,000 to be precise. That hardly supports Wall Street’s growing pound-the-table argument that it’s time to barrel into stocks because a meaningful economic recovery is clearly under way.
Morici, who describes the November jobs report as “terrible, sees “grave consequences” for President Obama, telling me this latest gory jobs chapter could lead to some primary opposition and cost him a second term.
Although he didn’t say it in so many words, Morici, in effect, is suggesting that Obama — barring a significant directional change to a more positive economic climate — could join the ranks of the 15.1 million unemployed.
Many in the White House, of course, would challenge that, but Morici considers his view as highly logical, given his belief that Obama is unqualified to be president and that his economic policy is officially a failure. Noting that Obama has spent trillions of dollars in an effort to revitalize the economy, the good professor gives the president a dunce cap on his economic activities, observing that “the only people better off from all this spending are the foot soldiers in Detroit and his friends on Wall Street.”
Morici figures that as long as Obama is president, 10% unemployment will be the new norm. With the economy 17 months in a recovery, he notes, one would expect the unemployment rate to be far less than 9.6%. (A more normal rate in such a recovery phase, I’m told, would be about 5%).
If you’re hoping that Obama will pull an economic rabbit out of the hat, Morici’s advice is don’t hold your breath. The economy, he points out, must add 13 million private sector jobs by the end of 2013 to bring unemployment down to 6%. But Obama’s policies, he argues, are not creating conditions for businesses to hire those 350,000 workers each month, net of layoffs.
Since there are at least five applicants for every available job, the implied message from Morici is don’t be shocked in a few years if one of your rivals for an opening happens to be a former president.
What do you think? E-mail me at Dandordan@aol.com.

Source:www.huffingtonpost.com

As most sports fans have heard by now, Ron Santo passed away on Friday. I didn’t write anything about it at the time because… well, honestly, I didn’t want to.
Part of the reason was that I’d written a couple of column on Ron Santo previously, and they pretty much said what I thought of the good fellow and explained at length who he was and why he was a joy. No reason to repeat all that, you can see the most recent one here.
Part of the reason, too, was that I spent five hours listening to WGN Radio, which had turned over their broadcasting day to a Ron Santo tribute.
Another part of the reason is that I’m getting pissed off writing obituaries this week.
But none of those reasons and others are enough to not write about Ron Santo’s passing. Because we were lucky enough to have Ron Santo pass our way.
The all-day tribute on WGN, where Santo spent the last 21 years as the joyously goofy and endearing color analyst of the Chicago Cubs — after a 14-year career as a legendary Chicago Cub third baseman — started somberly. But after a while when people get together to tell Ron Santo stories, it can’t help but turn into a lovefest. And thanks to the invention of audio tape, listening to clip after clip of Ron Santo being Ron Santo can’t help but get you laughing.
His longtime broadcast partner Pat Hughes, with whom Santo had one of the more amazing relationships among sportscasting teams, showed up in the studio and spent hours, rather than just calling in for a few minutes, as is common. He knew that Ronnie deserved more. It was clearly difficult for him at first, but after a while the uproarious laughter and deep warmth took over. And caller after caller phoned in, from the famous to everyday listeners.
Pat Hughes and Ron Santo didn’t call a baseball game, they put on a vaudeville act that happened to take place during a baseball game. They would go off on tangents, usually started by Ron, that were otherworldly ethereal — discussing cloud formations, the best pillows to take on road trips, how to eat soup and sandwiches, tipping, clothes, whether Cracker Jacks are better in boxes or bags, which of his toupees Ron was wearing (“I’ve got the Gamer on today”), and on and on — all the while Pat Hughes would remarkably continue doing the play-by-play of the baseball game in progress.
It’s important to do more than just describe Ron Santo, and his relationship with Pat Hughes. It doesn’t do it justice. You have to hear it. And a few mere clips can’t do it justice either. But at least it will put you in the universe to understand. Here’s a brief montage of what Cubs fans had the pleasure of hearing — all the time. Keep in mind: there’s a baseball game going on during all of these excerpts (Their discussion of “favorite cake” is worth the price of admission alone.) And hearing Pat Hughes’s warmth and decency and never once cutting Santo off during any of his ramblings shows the closeness of their relationship.
On the tribute broadcast, Pat Hughes told a story about Santo’s most famous call — but it wasn’t about the call itself, but the little known aftermath. This aftermath explains as good as anything the intense passion and love for the Chicago Cubs that Ron Santo overflowed with.
The call itself came when the Cubs were fighting for the pennant with the Houston Astros. They had the lead in the ninth inning against the Milwaukee Brewers, who had loaded the bases with two outs. A fly ball was lofted to the outfield, but Brant Brown dropped it. Radio listeners were treated to the overwrought banshee moan of Ron Santo crying out, “OH, NOOO! OH, NOOOOOOOO!!!” And the Brewers went on to win the game.
What Pat Hughes explained was that after the play, when he finally had a chance to turn away from the field, he looked over and saw Santo motionless, slumped over with “his head looking like it was nailed to the desk. I really couldn’t tell if Ronnie had died on the spot. I actually had to poke him with my finger to make sure he was alive.” (Santo’s blood pressure agonies at close Cubs games were legendary. When the great Cub pitcher Kerry Wood, who was very close to Santo, wrote a piece in Sports Illustrated explaining why Santo should be in the Hall of Fame, he acknowledged that the team had likely put Santo into the hospital several times.)
But that wasn’t the end of the aftermath. Hughes went on to say that after he finished the post-game show, he went down to the locker room. Now, the game had been over for at least 15 minutes, yet there was Ron Santo sitting around among the players, still in misery, and moaning, “How could someone drop the ball in that situation?? How could a person drop that ball??! I don’t get it???” And Hughes said that he then saw something he’d never seen before and doubted that anyone has — the Cubs manager, Jim Riggleman, came over to Santo, and tried to console him, the team’s announcer. “That’s okay, Ron. The game’s over. We’ll be going down to Houston and will get them there.” (They did, and made the playoffs.)
As Hughes said, “Could you envision Mike Ditka consoling Wayne Larrivee, or Tommy Lasorda consoling Vin Scully?”
When people complain that Ron Santo had a terrible radio voice, that he was a ridiculously biased home announcer, that he wasn’t an insightful analyst, they are all missing the point why Ron Santo was utterly beloved. It was because his passion was so profound that the team’s manager had to console him after a loss.
It was because you could tell he was as honest as one could be, and when he said something you could absolutely trust him. It was because he had an indomitable spirit in a way that few humans could even imagine — enduring diabetes, heart attacks, having both legs amputated, bladder cancer, failing eyesight and more — and yet having the most upbeat, ingratiating, optimistic attitude about life. And never getting to see his beloved Cubs even in the World Series, let alone winning one. Never getting elected into the Baseball Hall of Fame despite statistics that were well-deserving.
But in the end, he had his number retired by the Cubs, an honor he always said was his Hall of Fame. And given the passion with which he engulfed himself with those beloved Cubs, it’s impossible to not believe him about that. After all, what came out of Ron Santo’s unfiltered mouth, was honesty.
He also put his money where that unfiltered mouth was. Literally. His annual Juvenile Diabetes Walk raised over $60 million.
Caller after famous sports caller on the WGN tribute said that in all their careers and lives, they never knew of a former athlete who was as passionate about his team as Ron Santo was about the Cubs. Let alone for as long, 50 years.
Ultimately, that’s why Cubs fans were as passionate about Ronnie.

Source:www.huffingtonpost.com

Democrats have played stage I of the kabuki dance on tax cuts and unemployment benefits.
Now is not the time to panic, fold, or to do anything at all.
The stage has been set. Republicans voted against the middle class, they voted against the unemployed, they showed their utter contempt for the American people.
They want a second $700B bailout for the wealthy. Guess who will pay for it? Look at the deficit commission’s proposals: raise the age for social security, gut medicare.
Give that message a time to take hold. To sear itself into peoples’ psyches. To begin to express itself in frustration, in anger. Point the finger of blame where it belongs. Talk about middle class taxpayers unwillingness to give another $700B bailout to the wealthy. Hey, the wealthy have not even said “thanks” for the first one.
Let the outrage at what Republicans have done take hold in the electorate. Let it simmer. Let it boil.
In the nanosecond news cycle we live it, it will not take long.
The President needs to get out of Washington DC to Maine to hold rallies. To Massachusetts to hold a rally with Vicky Kennedy (rumor is she will run against Scott Brown). To Connecticut. To Ohio. To Pennsylvania, not Pennsylvania Avenue.
Sitting in the White House, negotiating with a bunch of puppets, is not the way to bend the arc of the moral universe toward justice.
It is not even the way to grow the economy.
The President wants a bipartisan agreement. Here’s how to get one: get enough votes to break a Senate filibuster, and the actual vote on the measures for the middle class tax cuts and extension of unemployment insurance will, suddenly, become 65-35. Or, 68-32. And, he will not have had to make a single concession on policy or principle.
The American people are already behind this. And, after tens of millions of dollars thrown into the recent election scaring people about their taxes and the jobless recovery (which is still 1 year ahead of Reagan’s!). Their disinformation campaign of lies has peaked.
Voters remorse is setting in.
And, think of this–move the Senate to a vote, and the House Republicans are on the record voting against middle class tax cuts and for a second $700B bailout of the wealthy.
Indelibly.

Source:www.huffingtonpost.com

There is a new reason to feel vindicated, and hopeful, about India.
Last month the Indian state of Bihar – situated to the north of the country with a significant population of 83 million people (more than a quarter of the United States population) – re-elected a successful political alliance led by an outstanding Chief Minister. Bringing the alliance back to power through an unprecedented 206 of the 243 seats in the State Assembly, the voters of Bihar voiced a clear, resounding vote for good governance.
Bihar is significant not only because of the population and its corresponding political impact on the Central Government. It is significant in terms of symbolic value to the rest of the country. For several decades Bihar has been India’s darkest state, the black hole of governance, the most cited example for crumbling infrastructure, poor economic development, regressive social conditions, institutionalized corruption and criminalized political elites. In short, Bihar was India’s state of despair – one that fit the Western stereotype of a Third World society, dominated by primitive loyalties and doomed to squander its resources on infighting.
But it took one strong leader with vision to change that perception. When Nitish Kumar assumed the post of Chief Minister in 2005, he positioned his government as a unifying force, in stark contrast to predecessors and contemporaries who traditionally appealed to constituencies on the basis of community and caste. He then forged a strong development-oriented agenda aimed at maximizing economic and social gains for the broadest segments of population. In the words of the manifesto – sadak, shiksha, suraksha (roads, education, security), commonsensical goals for a land splintered by hundreds of rivers and streams, for a population with a shocking 47% literacy rate and for a citizenry that had been thoroughly oppressed by mafia goons.
In the past five years of his governance Bihar has added 10,000 kilometers of road and built 2,100 bridges – more than what was achieved in the previous four decades of government. A positive spinoff from these and other development works was the creation of 4.2 million jobs in 2009-10 and a growth rate averaging 11.4% over the five years of the new government.
To move forwards on education, nearly 100,000 teachers were hired, 400,000 bicycles distributed to female students in rural Bihar to increase access to school (where female literacy is an abysmal 29.6%) and hundreds of new schools were established.
But the boldest achievement was the focus on crime – the determination shown in tackling the criminal-politician nexus, and in breathing new life into a defunct criminal judicial system. In five years, the Nitish Kumar government ensured the conviction of more than 50,000 criminals by setting up fast-track courts to complete mass prosecutions in record time. Discerning the right officers for each post, and giving them free rein to do their jobs without undue interference, was all it took. For those of us who have worked at the cutting edge of police management in India, this is the heart of the matter.
Police managers in India are recruited through extremely competitive selection procedures, trained rigorously in professional skills and knowledge, and then, most often, expected to work under the dictates of an increasingly criminalized executive. When criminals control the Home Departments (Ministries of State) and the mafia calls the shots through political puppets in government, there is very little justice the common man can expect.
By acknowledging this reality, and having the courage to tackle the criminal-political nexus, the Nitish Kumar government measured up to the greatest challenge of governance. And by re-electing this government, the voters of Bihar have demonstrated that it is good governance, and not primitive loyalties, that matter, even in a developing country like India.

Source:www.huffingtonpost.com

Music changed, thanks to an album released 45 years ago. Now it may be changed back.
The Beatles’ Rubber Soul, released in the UK on December 3rd, 1965, is one of the seminal albums in the history of popular music. For one thing, it marked the emergence of the album as a conceptual whole beyond simply a compilation of songs or accompaniment to a movie. For another, it was the Beatles’ first album recorded in more than snatches of time stolen away from touring or making a movie.
Norwegian Wood, with behind the scenes video of the Beatles.
Prior to Rubber Soul, pop musicians in their recordings focused mainly on the single. Rubber Soul marked an evolution to a new sophistication, with artists and audiences paying more sustained attention to songs as part of a larger statement.
Ironically, the contemporary music scene is returning to the more fragmented reality that existed prior to the rise of album rock. Very much in keeping with the ADD, narrative-free nature of our current media culture, the emphasis is back to the single, stripped from larger context.
If it seems at all odd to be discussing music from going on half a century ago, offered up by a rock group that split up over 40 years ago, consider this: The best-selling musical group of the decade just past, the Naughties, was the Beatles. When they finally went on iTunes last month, the Beatles quickly flooded the best-seller lists for singles and albums.
While boomer nostalgia is undoubtedly a big part of the ongoing Beatles vogue, the fragmentation and evanescence of the current scene is probably an even bigger part. Then there is the quality of the music.
Truth be told, I was not a huge Beatles fan growing up. They were a bit before my time.
As a dyed-in-the-wool Californian, I was more into California artists. Such as Santana, the Jefferson Airplane, and the Grateful Dead from San Francisco. And the Doors, Eagles, Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young, Linda Ronstadt, Joni Mitchell, Jackson Browne, the Byrds and Buffalo Springfield from LA.
I liked the Beatles, and had their classic albums Abbey Road, Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club, and the White Album, but didn’t know their earlier work except from compilations. I had little sense of the context of the earlier music, either as the Beatles themselves intended it in their album releases, or in the the actual times themselves in which the music was released.
Nowhere Man, from the movie Yellow Submarine.
But as many readers know, I write about Mad Men, and that brilliant show’s in-depth excursions into the early 1960s have had me examining the culture and aesthetics of the era. So when the remastered versions of the Beatles’ albums were released last September, with Mad Men just underway in its third season, it seemed a good time to get into the phenomenon.
As novelist William Gibson has said, music is perhaps the most atemporal of artistic endeavors. With the advent of digital media, artists can acquire new fans long after their heyday.
In what Gibson would call otaku fashion, I decided to experience my own personal form of Beatlemania, getting only one album at a time, starting from the very beginning with 1963′s Please Please Me.
Since I was very unfamiliar with the Beatles’ early music, it was like discovering an entirely new band. They were young, raw, powerful, fresh, and powerfully melodic. Their voices blended naturally well together, as well as a later constructed American super-group like Crosby, Stills, and Nash.
Last fall in the Mad Men universe, the show’s third season, it was 1963. In the sequence of the Beatles’ career, that accounted for the group’s first two albums. With the Beatles was released, fatefully, in the UK on November 22nd, 1963.
Drive My Car brought a new level of the sardonic to the Beatles’ love songs.
The Beatles had barely been heard in the US before the assassination of President John F. Kennedy. But afterwards, with the mood of national mourning turning to yearning, the stage was set for the dramatic entrance of the Beatles in America. With the Beatles from the UK, with the addition of the contemporaneous single I Want To Hold Your Hand, became Meet the Beatles for the US.
This season in the Mad Men universe, we were up to late 1964 and 1965. The Beatles had already released their stunning 1964 movie and album, A Hard Day’s Night, depicting the lads’ picaresque adventures in the height of British Beatlemania. The 1965 follow-up, Help!, was also a smash.
That’s a terrific album, too, though much more uneven, not to mention decidedly less engaging as a movie.
Then came Rubber Soul. Spurred by a sense of competition with Bob Dylan and the Beach Boys, the Beatles unleashed a corker.
Here are the track listings on the album. All of them, aside from the two specifically designated otherwise, were written by the legendary John Lennon/Paul McCartney songwriting duo.
1.”Drive My Car”
2.”Norwegian Wood (This Bird Has Flown)”
3.”You Won’t See Me”
4.”Nowhere Man”
5.”Think for Yourself” (George Harrison)
6.”The Word”
7.”Michelle”
Side Two
1.”What Goes On” (Lennon/McCartney/Starkey)
2.”Girl”
3.”I’m Looking Through You”
4.”In My Life”
5.”Wait”
6.”If I Needed Someone” (George Harrison)
7.”Run for Your Life”
In My Life provided a surprising new level of introspection and nostalgia.
Of the 14 songs on the album, five are undeniably great: Drive My Car, Norwegian Wood, Nowhere Man, Michelle, and In My Life. And the rest are good.
As was usually the case with the US releases of Beatles albums, Rubber Soul was put out by Capitol Records with changes to the song line-up. In this case, de-emphasizing the “soul” part of the record in favor of the burgeoning folk-rock sound of the time. The effect was to make one of the Beatles’ softest-sounding albums even softer.
But whether the original UK version, now the standard in the remastered albums of 2009, or the slightly different US version, Rubber Soul marked a major advance in lyrics and instrumentation, even pointing the way to world music with its use of the sitar. The simple love songs became more textured, ambiguous, even sardonically negative at times. In My Life brought a new level of introspection, and was surprisingly elegiac coming from songwriters still in their early twenties. And Nowhere Man prefigured an emerging questioning of authority, and existential crisis, in the ’60s.
From then on, the Beatles became an album-oriented group, spending ever increasing amounts of time in the studio, with the major statements of Revolver and Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Heart’s Club coming up in the next 18 months.
Before Rubber Soul, Beatles’ albums were a blend of original songs and covers, the albums recorded in very brief periods in between other gigs. (With the exception of the great A Hard Day’s Night, comprised entirely of original songs, which was itself the soundtrack to the seminal Richard Lester movie of the same name.)
Paul McCartney performs Drive My Car live in Kiev in 2008.
I wasn’t ever a huge Beatles fan, until very recently. Though I am glad that I saw each of the Beatles live in concert in the 1970s. Given how much I’ve come to like the Beatles, I would feel sad had I missed seeing John Lennon live before his assassination, nearly 30 years ago, on December 8th, 1980.
Or George Harrison live before he died from cancer in 2001. (Though all the time devoted to Ravi Shankar and his sitar music in his show, well before the term “world music” became current, was baffling to me in my still thoroughly Westernized sensibility.)
Ringo Starr, the only Beatle I’ve ever met, put on a fun show. A heck of a nice guy, and the best actor of the four as is clear from both the Beatles movies and other pictures he’s appeared in, Starr had the best line about the Apple-Beatles deal that finally put the group on iTunes: “I am particularly glad to no longer be asked when the Beatles are coming to iTunes.”
The best show was put on by the best showman, Paul McCartney, then touring with Wings. Friends who’ve seen his recent shows, including at the Obama White House, tell me that the 68-year old billionaire still puts on a great, highly energetic concert.
Of the early Beatles albums, my favorite is A Hard Day’s Night. It has an urgency and an energy that transports me to London 1964 and the height of Beatlemania.
It also has that great anticipatory feeling that you get with some works produced by artists who you know are on the verge of becoming all-time greats.
With Rubber Soul, the apotheosis of the Beatles began in earnest.
You can check things during the day on my site, New West Notes … www.newwestnotes.com.

Source:www.huffingtonpost.com

I hope they catch that WikiLeaks guy. I hope they catch him and prosecute him for all its worth. I hope they, legally speaking, throttle this guy within an inch of his life. If what he has done has truly compromised the safety of American intelligence and diplomatic operatives around the world, he should be punished for it. Even if you can not prove that anyone directly suffered as the result of those leaks, it’s the principle, right?
Kind of like an attempted murder charge, right?
Only one condition. You hold formal hearings on the Valerie Plame scandal. And you put that Low-Down-Gutless-Excuse-For-A-Vice-President Dick Cheney and that crypto-facist maniac Richard Armitage on trial. Same as Julian Assange.
Cheney and Armitage. Assange goes on trial, they go on trial.

Source:www.huffingtonpost.com

My last post on men provoked a slew of comments — over 500 — which was exciting to me because my usual posts about ballroom dancing and other hot topics have gotten about three or four comments; ergo gender relations are far more important in the grand scheme.
But hold on — don’t you all realize that ballroom dancing is gender relations? I mean, raise your hand if you saw “Shall We Dance” and appreciated what dancing did for those characters. (Aside: the Japanese original is way better than the American remake with Richard Gere and Jennifer Lopez.) Okay, then. Partnership dancing provides some pretty terrific lessons about relationships, so in my view, everyone should stop talking (that is, writing) and get to the nearest group class in salsa or tango. All the issues raised in the colorful comment threads are resolved out there on the floor. I guarantee you. I’m sure of nothing else in this tricky dialog, but I’m sure of that.
One or two of my supportive women friends who read my earlier post offered the criticism that I wasn’t breaking any new ground, writing about having compassion for men while feminism moved things along for women. But if we all had to break new ground every time we opened our mouths or put finger to keyboard, it’d be a pretty quiet world. There has to be a reason we revisit important subjects; it may be because we don’t necessarily get the right or full answers the first time. Our enlightenment comes in waves, dim thought getting clearer as it’s processed through many minds. To put it another way: when a light bulb goes on in someone’s head, she’s probably standing on the shoulders of another who thought about it profitably before her. The fact that we’re all so worked up about gender roles, relationships and communication, still, after all this time, tells us something. At least we care.
Just so we’re clear: I care deeply about the 568 comments, and I wanted to reply to all of them, I really did. But I didn’t have time that particular weekend, because I was, in fact, away visiting a Real Man who is not only physically manly — which to me means tall, handsome, fit, graceful, broad-shouldered and capable of operating heavy machinery, but which to another woman would mean something else altogether, and vive la difference — but also emotionally, intellectually, spiritually and psychologically manly. After a hard day of work, he cooks, and cooks very well, none of this mac-’n'-cheese stuff (though I happen to love mac ‘n’ cheese). He grows massive quantities of real vegetables in his own garden, collects mushrooms without killing himself and moves tree stumps with a gigantic tractor-type vehicle out in the woods where he lives, and where he built himself a small house, which he cleans with gusto before I visit. I swoon, mind you, as much over his small carbon footprint as anything else. (Maybe not quite as much as over his You First approach to doors, second helpings and sex.) To me, there’s nothing sexier than a man who drives an 18-year-old Volvo. Being a beauty editor, I could probably show him a thing or two about ablutions, or what for men is called grooming, but I like him fine the way he is, and I frankly find a little dirt under the fingernails a turn-on. It seems even manlier to me that he doesn’t know emery boards and uses sandpaper — sandpaper! — to file his nails. Real men can be so adorable, can’t they? He grew up in a feminist-leaning household, and he tells me he likes this idea of a manual for men. Aha! Real men do read self-help books. This one is really in touch with his feelings, expresses them well — and yet has that manly need to escape into his cave occasionally for processing them, or whatever, which I can accept because I read “Men Are From Mars; Women Are From Venus.” (I apologize in advance to those of you who know this book, because it’s slightly sexist and old-fashioned, but it’s useful.)
Well, I’m just back from competing in the biggest ballroom dancing competition in the world, the Ohio Star Ball, this weekend with another kind of Real Man: a tall, lithe, elegant Lithuanian who flies across the floor like you wouldn’t believe, and who also gardens and joyously participates in childcare (he’s happily married to a tall, lithe, elegant Lithuanian woman, beautiful dancers both). I’ll leave you with the Golden Rule of Ballroom Dancing, which a former coach shared with me. It solves most of the thorny issues between couples right off the bat, on the floor or off: “My job is to think about your comfort when we dance, and your job is to think about my comfort.” Amen to that. Darius and I won the silver medal in our division, but if I made him comfy out there, then according to The Rule, I can consider myself a real winner, maybe even a Real-Woman-in-Training.

Source:www.huffingtonpost.com

Throughout 40 years of public service, Rep. Charles Rangel (D-NY) never thought it would come down to this: finding himself in the well of the House floor, publicly chewed by his peers in a humiliating 333-79 censure vote. Rangel, a vaunted legislator deeply steeped in the workings of the House, knows very well what that means. Even though his job and nearly $175,000 salary are very much intact, the dark mark of censure will haunt the Rangel name for near eternity.
Rangel is now the first Member of Congress in 30 years to receive the embarrassing public rebuke of censure. It’s not a good look or legacy for the Korean War hero. Ironically, he finds himself in a situation eerily reminiscent of his legendary and controversial predecessor Rep. Adam Clayton Powell (D-NY). In 1970, then a young rising star New York state Assemblyman, Rangel made an ambitious bid for Powell’s seat, arguing the longtime Congressman was frequently absent from the district, but also challenged by the dark cloud of ethics, as well. Congress censured Powell and stripped him of his seat in 1967 due to a brewing ethics scandal, but he regained it in 1969 after winning a case before the Supreme Court.
It’s an ugly, historical repeat that falls heavy on Rangel. Powell’s ghost appears to re-emerge in Rangel’s troubles.
But, many longtime observers are left wondering how it got this far. Questions are left hanging about the conduct of the House Ethics Committee and many, along with Rangel, found the censure recommendation unnecessary and outright unfair. Charges of double standards and tougher application of the rules when it involves African American Members of the Congress are persistent. Rangel is among an uncomfortably long list of Black lawmakers being probed by the Committee, and many wonder out loud about the motivations.
There are numerous problems with Rangel’s case. There are too many holes with respect to the Committee’s investigation and conduct. Observers, and a defiant Rangel, point to the reluctant response of Committee lead counsel Blake Chisam during the Congressman’s two-day ethics violation hearing: “I see no evidence of corruption in this case.” This later evolved into the defining moment of not just the hearing, but the entire case. If there was no corruption, why even go the distance? And whether or not it diminishes the authority or legitimacy of the Committee in the aftermath remains to be seen.
Still, despite the Committee’s role in the Congressman’s downfall, Rangel’s culpability in his own demise is indisputable – with the Harlem political king even acknowledging “sloppiness” on his part. Rangel’s story is, by all accounts, a politician’s cautionary tale where influence and inner-demons intersect, a sordid docu-drama of sorts in which the lawmaker relied too heavily on family, friends and staffers to handle sensitive work. Caught up in both the glory and intense day-to-day minutiae of bringing his political “A-Game,” Rangel may have unwittingly sacrificed himself. His deal with the devil, so to speak. And as longtime Ranking Member and Chair of the powerful House Ways and Means Committee, it was a given that Rangel would draw the ire of enemies.
In many ways, the argument could be made that his ethics trial and subsequent censure were the final culmination of a perfect political vendetta, from Republicans and conservatives who despised the progressive-leaning Congressman to political machine hacks in New York who wanted their turn – just like Rangel wanted his turn in 1971.
There were already lingering rumors of a longtime strained marriage peppered with periods of separation. And the many close advisers whom Rangel delegated tasks to ultimately let the Congressman down. In the end, however, the Congressman took personal responsibility for everything. The strain was too much. The violations seem more like a dirty laundry list of a public figure’s own emotional and financial unraveling than a criminal rap sheet of illegitimate dealings. The Congressman ended up paying his back taxes on the Dominican villa in full last week – all near $15,000 of it; but, Secretary Treasury Tim Geithner still got Senate confirmation even after the dime dropped on his $45,000 of unpaid taxes. He acknowledged the rent controlled apartments and unintended usage of the office letterhead for solicitations. Politicians are human beings, too, and some either forget or avoid paying taxes depending on where their intentions are.
Rangel appeared to have no intentions beyond his own clumsiness and absent-minded lapses. That shouldn’t excuse it, but the business can take that toll. Voters assume elected officials have both house and front yard clean. And, it’s a reasonable expectation that figures preserving the public trust should receive punishments similar to those they represent. But, Black politicians get the raw end of the deal when compared to their White counterparts. Some of it is double standard and the amplified scrutiny Black politicians expect – even these days. Yet, students of history find that modern Black political power is a very recent occurrence in American history, recalling that very long stretch after Reconstruction when there were little to one African American Member of Congress until the Voting Rights Act triggered a growth spurt in Black political activity. The routine balance between personal life and political ladder-climbing is a fairly new phenomenon for modern Black politicos, stretched thin as the middle-class foundation supporting traditionally disadvantaged families and having little access to the kinds of resources their White colleagues enjoy.
In the case of Rangel, this did not seem like the buck private who saved half an American battalion in the dead of a Korean winter while running from Chinese soldiers. It was Rangel who approached the Ethics Committee at first, pleading to look into his disheveled affairs after a series of newspaper reports hinted at missteps. But, corruption? Like Chisam and Rangel, most are convinced that was never the case. But, as the days after the censure vote pass into time, the record will remain foggy on that count. And that’s what has Charlie Rangel up at night.
– CHARLES D. ELLISON
(originally appeared in Politic365.com)

This Blogger’s Books from
Tantrum
by Charles D. Ellison

Follow Charles D. Ellison on Twitter:
www.twitter.com/charlesdellison

Source:www.huffingtonpost.com

Desire overtakes them. They are willing to risk family, friends and finances to follow their suddenly unleashed desires, even when the object of attraction is younger, earthier and offers nothing in the way of security. Nevertheless, abandon all, they do.
Am I describing yet another movie in which some hunky guy tires of his placid, aging wife and falls hard for the gorgeous and frisky young thing? Well, hardly.
Middle-aged women, rejoice! Someone out there is aware that you still have a passion pulse, that you are walking away from stale relationships in greater and greater numbers and that you may look damn good to boot. Consider two recent films, “I Am Love” and “Leaving,” which share a remarkable number of similarities. Both are foreign-made, though they star actresses better known for English-speaking parts: Tilda Swinton and Kristin Scott Thomas, respectively. In both films, the actresses portray sensually challenged, bored wives of busy, successful men; each features an affair between this initially forbidding woman and a man of a lower class who shows up at her villa for domestic purposes (one paints, the other cooks); and in both films the women ultimately choose to bid adieu to children (one per family who supports Mom, the other who is furiously unforgiving) and husband.
It is easy to say that films like these could never be made in America. There is not enough action. There are long moments of merely watching these actresses’ faces unpack and register a wide array of emotions. People don’t talk like that over here. Small details of daily life are allowed to breathe. It is also easy to point out commercial considerations, which is an excuse for fewer and fewer Hollywood films being made about women, particularly those of the middle ages and beyond. (Small wonder that Mary Louise Parker, Kyra Sedgwick, Holly Hunter and others have found safe havens on cable TV.) Even Julia Roberts bombed this year in an adaptation of a chick book that sold a zillion copies. The most touted American female performances of the year are those by Annette Bening and Julianne Moore as a married couple, directed by an openly gay woman who made a mainstream movie.
Ms. Bening and Ms. Moore won plaudits not just for playing against partner preference, but for letting their chronological ups and downs show. Well, we will take it where we can get it. Ms. Scott Thomas and Ms. Swinton are by no means old, but they are past the age that Hollywood traditionally considers appropriate for leading women. But why is that? One of the last truly sexy female performances — not to mention the best chemistry with a leading man — was Vera Farmiga’s in “Up in the Air.” Whether strutting with nothing but a towel wrapped around her waist, or sexting to fellow traveler George Clooney, she was the very essence of mature and anything-but-dormant sensuality. And hey, she got George.
And jilted George, let us not forget. Although they did not play a married couple, it was Ms. Farmiga’s character who ultimately did the hurting, as do the ladies in lust in “I Am Love” and “Leaving.” This is not strictly the stuff of reel life. Two thirds of divorces are now instigated by the wives. Some of this is attributed to child custody issues, but much of it is not. “The topography of marriage has changed as women’s role in society has expanded,” says Dr. Vivian Diller, a psychologist who writes about gender issues. “Women have come to expect more from their marriages and staying with a mate simply to have children and to be provided for financially isn’t enough. They want respect, stimulation and passion.”
This is especially true as all of us are looking at living longer than ever before. Suddenly, the thought of 30 more years of a stagnant union can seem unacceptably stifling. One sees that paralyzing possibility on the faces of Kristin Scott Thomas and Tilda Swinton as they move like elegant automatons through their cinematic European homes. Ibsen, obviously, touched on similar female discontent, but the current-day films are few and far between that give us restless women calling the shots, inflicting the pain.
If nothing else, the films have continued a European legacy of respecting — or forgiving — women as they age. Helen Mirren, Juliette Binoche and others are not only offered an impressive variety of roles, but often show openly sexual sides. (One still hears the word “brave” alongside critical assessments of their work, as if such proclivities are obviously against the norm.) Although they still get some nice supporting roles in Hollywood, it’s notable that Ms. Swinton and Ms. Scott Thomas needed to go bilingual to exhibit their multiple attributes.
Women at midlife, in a culture that screams “defy and deny,” are at a true crossroads: do they let hard earned experience and character show in their faces, or do they resort to whatever measures allow them to buy more time to feel they have not become invisible? For those in the public eye, matters are even more urgent, and looking at the Stepford faces of Meg Ryan, Nicole Kidman and so many more, one feels mostly sadness. “I Am Love” and “Leaving” are far from perfect films, but they are important in that they portray women smack in the middle of their lives who not ready to hang them up.

Source:www.huffingtonpost.com

When asked by USA Today’s pollsters last week, sixty-eight percent of Americans said we worry that the cost of the Afghanistan War hurts our ability to fix problems here in the U.S. This week, we learned just how right we were about that. Friday’s terrible jobs report shows that a crushing 9.8 percent of us are unemployed. And, millions of us are about to lose our lifeline because Congress refuses to extend unemployment insurance benefits. We’re spending $2 billion per week — per week! — in Afghanistan while millions of people face going hungry during the holidays.
Do our elected officials not get it? We’re drowning out here, and the administration is throwing money that could put Americans back to work at a failed war on the other side of the planet. In fact, that’s where the president was when the jobs report came out this morning — in Afghanistan, talking about “progress” again.
Now, it’s great that the president met with wounded troops. Goodness knows they deserve our attention. Their pictures ought to be on the cover of every newspaper until this war ends. But it would be better if the president stopped sending them to get wounded for no good reason, and it would be even better if the hundreds of billions of dollars we’re wasting each year over there were putting people back to work in the U.S.
Here’s one way to think about it: just one Hellfire missile fired in Afghanistan costs $58,000.00. That’s enough money to provide unemployment insurance benefits for almost 4 people for a full year. For the full cost of the war for one week, about $2 billion, we could extend unemployment insurance for about 6.7 million people for a week. What are the 2 million people who are about to lose their unemployment insurance benefits supposed to think when they hear senators yelling about the cost of keeping them from going hungry, while at the same time those senators shove enough money to keep the benefits going into that money pit of a war?
Do we care more about dropping bombs than we do about putting Americans to work and keeping them from going hungry when they get laid off? Are those the kind of people we’re paying to represent us in Washington, D.C.?
If so, we want our money back. And while you’re at it, bring back the money being wasted on a war that’s not making us safer. We’d like to use it to put people to work again.
If you’re fed up with wasting money on war instead of putting people back to work, join Rethink Afghanistan on Facebook and Twitter.

Follow Robert Greenwald and Derrick Crowe on Twitter:
www.twitter.com/AfghanistanDocu

Source:www.huffingtonpost.com

December is Critical National Infrastructure Protection Month. And, it’s about even more than safeguarding our homeland in a post-9/11 world through securitizing our airports, information systems, and financial institutions from attacks.
Like President Eisenhower, President Obama sees targeted investments as central to ensuring that our critical national infrastructure promotes our national security. In his proclamation establishing December as Critical Infrastructure Protection Month, Obama says:
Eisenhower looked abroad at how other countries were using infrastructure to protect their own homelands. Particularly the German Autobahn. Germany’s high quality national road system investments meant that it could use its roads as a platform to launch attacks and move munitions. According to Eisenhower, a national road system was essential to move our forces across the country quickly in case of a coastal attack.
Obama too realizes that a high quality critical national infrastructure is essential for national security. However, unlike Eisenhower who faced twentieth century security challenges, Obama and America must address twenty-first century ones.
On this front, Obama has drawn a key lesson from the impact of President Eisenhower’s security-directed investments – the federal highway system came to be the foundation of our post-War boom. As were our military investments during the Cold War which created the Internet which laid the foundation of today’s American economy.
In other words, infrastructure investments feed our economic growth which is our best guarantor of, in fact essential to – in the words of the proclamation –
Investing in economic growth to ensure our national security is certainly something bipartisan. The Department of Homeland Security’s National Infrastructure Protection Plan makes clear that our success depends upon us coordinating all levels of government (federal, state, local, tribal, and territorial) and also the private sector. This insight applies to our re-investment in American infrastructure – we must create public-private-partnerships united in a common purpose.
Moreover, as Chris Matthews speaks eloquently about – it’s about patriotism – investments in a genuinely national infrastructure can ensure that we are not a fly-over state but a sea-to-shining-sea one.

This Blogger’s Books from
Obama’s Bank: Financing a Durable New Deal
by Michael Likosky
Law Infrastructure and Human Rights
by Michael B. Likosky

Source:www.huffingtonpost.com

Source:Associated Press
__________________________________________________________________________
SAN ANTONIO — Tim Duncan scored 22 points and had 10 rebounds to help the San Antonio Spurs rally from a 15-point deficit to beat the Minnesota Timberwolves 107-101 on Friday night.
Fast Facts
• The Spurs have won 13 consecutive games vs. the Timberwolves.
• Minnesota has lost six straight games and eight of its last nine overall.
• The Timberwolves are 0-10 against teams currently .500 or better this season; they are 4-5 vs. teams currently below .500.
– ESPN Stats & Information
Tony Parker and George Hill added 20 points apiece for the Spurs, who improved their NBA-best record to 16-3. Manu Ginobili had 16 and Richard Jefferson scored 15.Michael Beasley scored 28 points and Kevin Love had 25 points and 18 rebounds for Minnesota.Ginobili sank two free throws to give San Antonio the lead for good with 1:13 remaining. He made all 13 of his foul shots.Spurs coach Gregg Popovich was ejected with 1:10 left in third quarter for arguing with referee Marc Davis.San Antonio held Minnesota without a field goal in the final 4:13.Beasley made two free throws to give Minnesota a 99-95 lead, but a turnover by the Timberwolves eventually sent Hill to the line to tie it with 2:56 left in the game.Both teams were scoreless for over the next minute and a half until Ginobili went to the free-throw line.In the third quarter, Jefferson made a 3-pointer with 2:01 to play in the third that cut Minnesota’s lead to four, but the Timberwolves answered with an 11-0 run.
Copyright by STATS LLC and The

Links:Full news story
Source:espn.go.com

By Phil Trounstine and Jerry Roberts
www.calbuzz.com
In their last pre-election survey, Oct. 10-17, the Public Policy Institute of California found that six in 10 likely voters said jobs and the economy represented the most important issue facing California and that by a margin of 47-39%, Meg Whitman would do a better job on this pressing concern.
Moreover, while the survey showed Brown leading Whitman 44-36%, it oddly found “independents” – that is, respondents identified as likely voters who said they were registered as independents — divided 36-37% for Whitman.
But in PPIC’s post-election survey taken Nov. 3-14 and released Wednesday night, Brown won the “independents” 56-38% — a staggering shift of 19 points in Brown’s favor. In addition, according to PPIC, Latinos who favored Brown 51-22% in October ended up voting for Brown over Whitman by 75-22% — a 24 point move to Brown.
By comparison, the Field Poll’s last survey (based on actual registered voters surveyed Oct. 14-26) had Brown winning independents 49-33% and the L.A. Times/USC survey from Oct. 13-20 (also based on registered voters) had independents for Brown 55-26%.
Field had Latinos favoring Brown 57-27% before the election and the LAT/USC survey had Latinos backing Brown 59-23%.
Before trying to make sense of these numbers, consider a few findings from the LA Times/USC survey also taken Nov. 3-14 among actual registered voters:
1) Among those who said they think of themselves as independents instead of Democrats or Republicans (not the same as PPIC’s question which asks respondents how they are registered), just one third of those who said they’re independents were actually registered as Decline-to-State voters.
2) Among Latino voters, Whitman’s unfavorable rating was 71% compared to 17% favorable. Among registered DTS voters, it was 65% unfavorable and 22% favorable.
3) Latinos favored Brown over Whitman 80-15% (compared to the National Election Pool exit poll that said Latinos backed Brown 64-30%).
Confused yet? What the hell actually happened?
Did something occur in the closing weeks of the campaign that drove all of the undecided “independents” in PPIC’s survey to Brown? Or were they already lined up behind him as Field and LAT/USC found? How big was the Latino margin for Brown in the end? What actually drove the vote?
First, let’s look at the independent voters. According to the LAT/USC survey, they voted 59-33% for Brown which is not far off from PPIC’s 56-38%. The difference is in the shift that PPIC found versus what the LAT/USC and Field had before the election. PPIC’s survey suggests a huge movement of independents for Brown. It’s hard to see what could have driven that.
But the movement among Latinos – about 15-20% of whom are likely DTS voters – is easily explained by Whitman’s handling of her housekeeper, Nicky Diaz. In the end, somewhere between 65-80% of Latinos ended up voting for Jerry Brown. With a 71% unfavorable rating among Latinos, that’s not hard to comprehend.
Mark Baldassare of PPIC argues that his polls in October and November were both correct, and that the same things that drove Latinos to Brown also may have propelled independents. We suspect it’s more likely that the problem is rooted in using questions, rather than actual voter lists, to identify “independents” and that the October survey, for whatever reason, didn’t capture what was actually happening among actual DTS voters. (PPIC has to ask questions to identify likely voters and to classify them by party because it uses random digit dialing instead of working from the Secretary of State’s list of registered voters.)
But let’s go back to that PPIC finding in October that showed the economy was the top issue and that voters saw Whitman as better on the issue than Brown.
What the data all seem to suggest is something Calbuzz has argued several times before: that the race for governor did not turn on issues, but on character. In the end, voters saw Brown as the more authentic candidate whose values reflected more closely their own. By emphasizing that he would not raise taxes without voter approval, he made himself safe to moderate voters who didn’t like what they saw from Whitman.
By emphasizing “at this stage of my life” Brown wanted nothing more than to do what needed to be done, he undercut the attacks that portrayed him as a tool of unions and other special interests.
In other words, the conventional wisdom – that the election would turn on the economy and jobs – turned out to be completely wrong. That’s the ground on which team Whitman wanted to fight, but once the Bill Clinton ad blew up in her face and she refused to take it down, and once Nicky Diaz surfaced, the stories that captured voters’ attention were all about character and integrity.
Why does any of this matter? Because when the story of the 2010 California governor’s race is written, it should not make it all about independents and Latinos except to the extent that these voters were moved by impressions of the character of the combatants.
BTW, the PPIC survey goes into great detail looking at the propositions and the initiative process. It’s chock full of interesting data that we’re not even touching on here.

Follow Phil Trounstine on Twitter:
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Source:www.huffingtonpost.com