Tom Watson

Summer in New York

Sure, there's a foot of snow on the ground, the trains are running late, and the endless gray January sky has increased the Zoloft and Paxil sales in the New York metro area by a factor of ten. My thoughts of late have been turning to the summer in New York - or more specifically, this coming summer, when two huge forces will collide: the national Republican Party and New Yorkers.

It's so delicious for politics and media junkies. Thousands of conservative Republicans led by Tom Delay will arrive to renominate George W. Bush in a late summer convention - that's even later this year because of craven attempts to link the convention to the Sept. 11th anniversary. Throw in the lukewarm (at best) support of Michael Bloomberg (whose GOP roots run about as deep as a line on the ballot) and the now-you-see-him, now-you-don't leadership style of George Pataki. And then consider the early stages of the 2005 mayoral election, when Democrats line up to challenge Bloomberg. (Disclosure: I serve on the board of directors of the Drum Major Institute for Public Policy, of which Fernando Ferrer, a likely candidate, is president).

Bring on the press, the war coverage, the anti-terrorism efforts, and the Red States' visceral hatred for liberal New York. What a simmering pot!

So yeah, I'm cold and miserable, stuck in the frosty deep freeze. But summer dreamin' is warmth enough.

News by Google

It's obvious that I'm a news junkie, and much of the time I spend online is spent in gathering news, on behalf of my clients and for my own information. One of the finest tools in news-gathering and research these days is Google's email news feature - which allows you to subscribe to any news search by email. Every day, I get timely briefs and links to news stories I would otherwise have missed. This has been incredibly valuable in tracking client news, politics, and sports. Google's email news alerts have that Ron Popeil quality - set it and forget it.

That brings me to Google's widely anticipated IPO - the hottest (in theory) in five years. This is a company that succeeds via experimentation; it's very nature is to try new ventures in public. That kind of "trust our users" mindset brought us the Google news alerts, toolbar, and many other features. But will quarterly reports to stockholders rein in Google's mad scientists? I think so. The public markets, as enriching as they are, are also inherently conservative. They reward expectations met, steady planned growth, a proven formula. Google has no proven formula. Itss vitality is not in its search algorithms (sorry guys) - but in its "brand of experimentation."

GOP Against Bush

The amazing Kos has a great factoid this morning. In the unreported Republican primary in New Hampshire, fully 2,500 registered GOPer's wrote in the name of a Democrat! Think there's dissatisfaction among more liberal northeastern Republicans? Here are the GOP results:

Bush 57,670 Kerry 835 Dean 633 Clark 545 Edwards 541

NH Media Embarassment

Have they learned nothing from 2000? The idiot network political journalists - I flipped between MSNBC, CNN, and Fox - began the 8 pm hour by declaring New Hampshire too close to call, based on their exit polling. There was Wolf Blitzer declaring that Howard Dean might pull a stunning upset, and Chris Matthews talking about John Kerry's lowered expectations. Only James Carville chimed in - "you know, we'll have actual returns within the hour - let's wait."

Well, Carville was right. The actual numbers gave Kerry a whopping 13-point blowout of Dean with Clark and Edwards battling for a distant rearview mirror third. So now Kerry is 2-for-2, Dean's much-vaunted election army has lost two straight, and Clark's balloon is sagging badly.

How did the networks get it so wrong? The answer - too much spot analysis, too little reporting. I mean, within a 30-minute period, CNN flipped from too close to call to "major victory" - it was stunning. And it was based on their predeliction to ask "Jeff Greenfield, what does this mean?" about an hour too soon. What an embarassment live NH was.

John Kerry

The tracking polls have all swung back to Senator John Kerry in New Hampshire, as Democrats and independents in that state go to the polls in the nation's first primary. I've been behind Kerry personally since last summer, never bought the Dean sell, and flirted briefly with Clark when Kerry appeared buried.

Yeah, the guy can be pedantic. His speeches are often ponderous. But I've heard him enough times on Imus to know he's real, has a sense of humor, and knows wat's going on in the world. And he can give Bush a real run on security and the military.

In New York, the Democrats I know are alread coalescing behind their own dream ticket: Kerry-Edwards. They're impressed with Edwards, and have always see quality and depth in Kerry. And now they think he's looking more presidential than the current occupant in the White House. We'll see if he can relegate Dean to second-tier status today.

Baseball - The Dead Zone

We're stuck in the gray, endless landscape known as January - that dead time between the flurry of off-season deals and the start of spring training, a time when even the Mets Winter Caravan makes back-page news. Make no mistake, New York is a baseball town. Sure, we follow the new-look Knicks and the old-look Rangers, and the Super Bowl has becomea national holiday.

But our calendar is set around baseball. And there's nothing happening. The beat writers are all in rehab, er, that is to say, on vacation, resting up for the spring. The wire has nothing but non-roster invites and minor league contracts. And the anger of Rick Reed's agent at Dan Duquette is actually news. As is anything Roger Clemens says or does. Talk about a no news zone.

That said, I've become hooked on a terrific portal for baseball fans - essentially a news blog - that really does a great job grabbing each little piece of news. ProSportsDaily - which is updated Monday-Friday - saves innings of time surfing the various newspaper sites around the country. Check it out. And wish for spring.

Where Garage Bands Meet

My latest obsession is a survivor of the dot-com meltdown called GarageBand.com. Founded as the "new online record label" by Talking Head guitarist Jerry Harrison, and still featuring Sir George Martin and rocker Steve Earle as advisory board members, GB continues on now as a community of thousands of musicians. The premise is that these "garage bands" - in fact, the majority are solo performers riding the boom in home recording of music - will post and critique each other's tracks. The best-rated songs make it onto compilation disks and get some FM radio play.

The site makes money by charging a $20 upload fee, as well the compilation CDs and other services, like track mastering etc. Performers have the option of uploading for free if they complete 30 reviews of other tracks. Those reviews themselves are then graded for quality - the theory being that the system can ensure quality reviews. In practice, this works less than half the time. Many of the reviews are short and brutish, written by cranks just to get free uploads of their own.

Still, as an amateur musician, the reviews by those who take the time to really listen and critique - and to make real suggestions - are worth the other flotsam. I admit to checking the site by the hour to read the latest reviews of my songs, and hanging on the opinions of other musicians. Sometimes enfuriating, sometimes rewarding, and sometimes illuminating. But I think the site is an important one for two reasons:

1. Finding new music in a fractured record business.

The old American recording business, in case you haven't checked lately, is in trouble. Its copy-cat reliance on manufactured megahits has backfired and file-sharing, lost revenue aside, has increased the appetite for wide-ranging sound - it has expanded consumers' tastes and interest. GB taps into this by giving new acts an audience. These are small-time acts to be sure. No major record labels. Few bands who make a living playing music. Tiny sales. Thousands of would-be coffee house performers (me included). But it's all new music, semi-professionally produced. There will be some minor hits from this, and some acts who become part of the ever-growing "alt" music category.

2. Home grown music.

In a trend that has escaped most media commentators, home-made media is exploding. Sure, it's mostly digital photos and DVD movies of the family summer vacation. But the public is spending more of its "media time" creating media, and a bit less consuming the pre-packaged variety. And the Guitar Center Movement, as I call it, is still flying below the radar. In case you haven't heard, Guitar Centers are supermarket-sized department stores for musical gear - they just opened one on 14th Street. Along with sites like MusiciansFriend.com and others, they are putting gear into the hands of people who want to create music.

It's a true "bottoms up" movement (see Fred Wilson's take on this with regards to baseball stats) and worthy of attention.

So check out GB - and if you can stand it, listen to my tunes.

Dean = Dead Man Walking

I feel sorry for Howard Dean - and at the same time, indebted to him.

Dean's implosion on caucus night in Iowa has made him the butt of jokes from coast to coast. Let's face it - there's no coming back from his "heeeyeaaah" moment. And yet, Dean did something both noble and important. He put the spotlight squarely on the failed Iraq policy of the Cheney-Bush administration, got angry people mobilized, and ended that period when we all felt powerless.

Just a few months ago, like many of my liberal friends, I slummed around New York convinced that Cheney and his little sidekick (the President) were all but reelected. My only solace - Cheney's age and health history. He couldn't run in 2008. Dean dispatched the hopelessness. I never for a moment thought he could win, but I knew he could get people moving - a huge chance from the morass of political despair.

Having lived through the Internet bubble - and created a new career during those years - I knew that his online prowess was somewhat overrated. Sure, he'd used the Net to raise money, build lists, and increase the market cap of MeetUp.com. But so what? He didn't have a defensible position - anyone could replicate the "techniques" of the Dean campaign.

But Dean, who first came to notice with his health care plan (indeed, he spoke at a gathering of the Drum Major Institute for Public Policy, on whose board I'm privileged to serve) , got the anti-war crowd fired up. I was against the war from the start, even as I cheered our troops and wished them victory. Now, I believe we're on the cusp of being middle men in a civil war over the remains of the former Iraq, courtesy - as the phony cowboy Toby Keith might say - of the red, white, and blue.

Dean focused attention and poll numbers on the war. John Kerry, who I support, voted for the infamous Senate resolution supporting the use of force. But like everyone else I know, he had massive reservations - fears that were borne out all too well by the Cheney team's incompetence. Thanks to Dr. Dean, there was a real opposition - an opposition prepared to vote.

I never thought Dean would be president, and hoped he wouldn't be the Democratic nominee. I agree with pundits who predicted that a Dean nomination would hurt the Democratic Party big-time, reducing its numbers in Congress and handing a landslide to the Cheney-Junior team. I'm glad Kerry, whose record and temperament trump Deans in every category on my Presidential spreadsheet, is suriging after Iowa.

But I also thank Howard Dean for his service.