Tom Watson

Their Heads on a Pike

Strange to watch the American financial system teeter on the abyss, to listen to serious analysts use the word "depression," to witness the failure of massive financial institutions - and to see it all reduced as just another factor in the endless Presidential horse race. How will it play to voters - as if the Obama candidacy itself is more important than the U.S. economy, or the latest McCain gambit a bigger factor than crashing exchanges and frozen credit markets.

Loans are being called against capital that's not there. Companies are scouring their balance sheets and sharpening the axes down in HR. Credit is dry. The party is over. Yet, it's all about as important as Sarah Palin's lip liner tattos (I kid you not). The looming changes in our society don't matter. The big question is this: how does it play? Bored with it all and with the rising dread we all seem to feel, Dennis Perrin discards his scalpel for an ax handle:

Another month of this endless, dreadful election. Like dragging dead cows through wet shit and mud. Maybe I should be amazed by how excited and energized many observers remain, reacting to the tiniest items, looking for any angle to celebrate and promote their tribal leaders. But that would be wasted energy. Still, how sad and sick it is that these jabbering proles have convinced themselves that their opinions and concerns matter to the main players, especially in the current financial maelstrom. The more contemptuously they are treated, the more servile they become.

[snip]

Still, I'm glad that Obama showed who he really is, an energetic, sometimes eloquent servant of empire, agreeing with McCain about NATO expansion on Russia's doorstep, calling Venezuela a "rogue" nation, pumping Iran up to monstrous proportions, etc. There was also the requisite Kill Bin Laden moment, as if icing that figurehead would have any real effect on the Terror Wars, apart from a short-lived propaganda spike. Bin Laden serves as a boogeyman piñata that Obama keeps whacking, hoping to see votes pour out once it breaks. He needn't swing so hard. Obama could announce later today that he supports public beheadings for "terrorists," and his liberal choir would sing their approval, however edgy it may make them personally. Once you embrace Joe Biden, anything's possible. Remember, this ticket is the "humane" option. What better cover for ongoing brutality?

While browsing in a local bookstore recently, I noticed that a number of anti-Bush items, playing cards, coasters, 1/20/09 gear, were on sale, many slashed down to practically nothing. We're nearing the end of the Hate Bush industry, and it's been a profitable one for liberals, despite their distaste for the man himself. Indeed, it was their distaste that sold. Say what you will about Bush -- he moved liberal product, much more than Ronald Reagan ever did, whose final days in office swiftly evaporated to little fanfare. Not so Bush. And as their reactionary cousins do with Bill Clinton, liberals will continue to hate Bush for years to come, perhaps forever. Unless McCain is elected, dies, and Sarah Palin becomes president. I'm certain some liberal hustler is already preparing for that possibility. Can I interest you in a 1/20/13 ball cap?

Over at his place, Jim Wolcott quotes a high financier talking about the gulf between the very rich and the rest of American society. Class warfare's in the air like fall pollen down on Broad Street, and Wolcott forecasts the end of the luxe television style we've all come to tolerate:

In the gray light of an economy slipping into shark waters, the ads for ABC's "Dirty Sexy Money," a whirlwind of louche, deluxe showponying (limos, pet lions, and palatial lairs), seem particularly smirky and loathsome. Television's prostration before the jaded flauntings of the superrich doesn't seem like such fun anymore, if it ever was. Entertainment's glamorizing of predation and luxury spending mirrors the corporate pandering that has led us to this earthquake juncture.

The broadsheets lead with arcane academic graphs explaining the market forces and leveraged derivatives - but the tabloids know where it's really at: they're running big gaudy graphics of fortunes lost by boldface names, a bit of old morning schadenfreude for the working class stiff gripping his takeout coffee in one hand and the Daily News in the other.

As Ian Welsh posits at FireDogLake, the failed Paulson bailout may be the first shot in a real class war - not the one the GOP tarted up over the last two decades, the political strawman it could convince voters to run away from.

The US has been trending towards plutocracy for over three decades. From being the Western nation with the most social mobility, America went to being the country with the least. From having the least inequality in the Western world it went to the most. The amount of money the rich had ballooned to Gilded Age levels and the middle class didn't get a single raise. Families went from being able to support themselves with one wage earner to needing two.

There has never been a better time to be rich in America. In the last decades the truly rich have gone from merely flying first class to owning their own jets. They've gone from earning 20 or 30 times what a normal employee earns to taking home tens of millions of dollars every single year—even when they are running the company, and the country, into bankruptcy.

[snip]

Getting off the financial path, off the junkies fix of fake profits and loose money is going to hurt. Let no one tell you otherwise. Over the next few weeks and months we are going to hear a lot of screams that everything bad that happens (and bad things are going to happen) wouldn't have happened if only the American Plutocracy Act (aka the bailout bill) had passed. As with withdrawal from a deadly addiction, this is true to an extent. Stop taking heroin and the withdrawal effects may make you wish you were dead, and claw for another hit to make them stop. But going back on the drug isn't the solution to it nearly killing you.

Cue the mob.

UPDATE: The most popular story on CNN.com this morning as we wait for economic Armageddon tells the societal tale all too well: 'Dancing' bids goodbye to another star.

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Pre-order Tom's new book CauseWired: Plugging In, Getting Involved, Changing the World

Comment of the Week: Bailout Edition

I see headlines and polls everywhere stating how unpopular the bailout is. Everywhere. And I don't need a poll to know this either. People can't declare bankruptcy anymore and are forced to hand their house keys back to the bank but are expected to hand over $700B to a bunch of millionaires who created this mess in the first place? Impossible to sell that to the American public. This will hang over many a politician's head much like votes supporting the Iraq war did. Whether the bail out is necessary is beside the point. I think the gut reaction to this is what counts and it feels rotten. The ultimate in rich corporate America running D.C. And in fact it is.

- Slappy

Targeting McCain in the Heartland

So much of the focus this political season is on the horse-race - endless analysis of the daily trackers, swing state polls, trends, and demographic groups. In terms of issues, the economy and American security tend to drown out specific concerns in the national din of election coverage. But there are signs out there that the long-awaited micro-targeting of local - or sub-section demographic and economic issues - is well under way, particularly on the left.

Here's a perfect example: RuralVotes is a 501c4 advocacy organization focused on progressive initiatives to revitalize rural America. Based in Massachusetts, RuralVotes pushes a progressive agenda that's in the economic interest of both U.S. farmers and the millions of who live in rural America - issues that, in the organization's words, include "alternative and renewable energy, sustainable food and agriculture, bridging the 'digital divide' in telecommunications, protecting natural resources and the quality of life that makes rural America a special place and other noteworthy endeavors."

Taken as a whole, it's part of an attempted reinvention of the heartland - away from despoiling agribusiness monopolies and toward self-sufficient rural communities. A lofty goal indeed, but the work is often a combination of statehouse trench warfare and guerrilla communications. Outside of the big yearly Farm Bill, rural issues don't general find widespread debate on the American political stage.

So I was pleased to see RuralVotes run a highly-targeted rural issues radio campaign against John McCain in New Hampshire, a swing state where Barack Obama is somewhat vulnerable. And then, in spirited of CauseWired activism (yes, that's a book plug - get used to 'em!) they kicked it up a notch with a viral YouTube campaign, simply taking the radio feed and connecting it to compelling images from rural New Hampshire and a link back to RuralVotes.com and its terrific BackForty blog. Well done, indeed:

I've Got No Expectations: Those Oxford Blues

To listen to the campaign spinmeisters, Barack Obama can't string two words together in a debate setting and John McCain is a virtual novice going up against the Zeus of orators. As the national economy teeters and the suspense of McCain's tarted up "suspension" of campaigning this week wears off, the old ways of pre-debate expectations spin are out in full force today.

Obama's people are simultaneously playing down his debating skills while attempting to ratchet up the expectations for the Republican. "If he slips up, makes a mistake or fails to deliver a game-changing performance, it will be a serious blow to his campaign. Given his unsteady performance this week, he desperately needs to win this debate in a big way in order to change the topic and get back to his home turf," said Bill Burton, the official leg-breaker of the hope and change juggernaut.

Meanwhile, McCain's camp is....well...what exactly? Who the heck knows. Coming up with some other lame-brained stunt? Suspending spin? Plotting to replace Sarah Palin on the ticket? More flailing panic? They are playing up Obama's speaking skills and casting their guys as the underdog; but they're also running online ads already claiming a debate victory. But the expectations game with John McCain these days pretty much revolves around his ability to shock and surprise. He's morphed into the Bizarro version of a Republican presidential candidate.

So, for those of us who love political theater, rooting for another shocker comes with the territory. Can a debate be a game-changer? Not usually, but in this crazy year....the heavy stuff begins at 9 with co-host Jason Chervokas and me, but jump on in anytime.

UPDATE: Meantime, read Howard Wolfson's take on the McCain craziness. I think Howard's got it.

UPDATE II: And away we go - action's in comments.

Shut Up and Deal: That Lemmon Song Tonight

Over at newcritics, Lance Mannion will continue our New York-oriented Wednesday Night at the Movies film fest with a tribute to The Apartment, my favorite Jack Lemmon flick and that's saying something. Join me, the Sireen (as I like to picture the Bogie of Sierra Madre calling her) and Sir Lancelot - along with the brilliant Lemmon, Fred MacMurray (as the heavy), and the bubblicious Shirley MacLaine - starting at 9 pm EDT at newcritics. (I'll note Bush speaks at the same time - er - stick with Lemmon and co).

A couple of other programming notes whilst I'm at it:

I'm in the middle of blogging the annual Clinton Global Initiative for onPhilanthropy.com - you can follow reports by me and Susan Carey Dempsey here. And my report on meeting President Clinton to discuss the economy is posted over at CauseWired.

And They Still Come to New York

These days, there's a bank on every corner in Manhattan. Some of them are still solvent. The old-timey diners and burger joints and real neighborhood bars are dwindling relics. The smoke shops and drug stores - not the chains, the ones with soda counters - are gone. The newsstands have been redesigned in sleek Euro post-modernism. The cabs have video screens.

New York is replacing itself with a version that is less recognizable, more saccharine and less grimy. Sleek signage. Big brands. Soaring towers. Streetscapes will all the interest of a bad virtual reality walk-through, all pale vanilla and man-made granite. Glass curtain walls, once the province of visionary architects, now slide from street to sky on every failed insurance building and former investment bank in town. The damned napkins have ads on them.

Yet, they still come to New York.

From my day-time perch over 42nd and Second, I watched the comic book armed camp that envelops the east side of midtown when the General Assembly opens and the president comes to town. Security becomes a cartoon best watched from on high, a parade of emergency services vehicles, ambulances, blacked-out Suburbans, snarling NYPD Harleys, police buses, scooters, bikes and what appear to be lightly-armored troop carriers. The hotel next door swarms with men in dark suits speaking into lapel pics as curly little chords run down into their shirts. Machine guns in Grand Central and out on Lex are the norm. Two Coast Guard warships sit in the East River. There are dogs. Many of them. And strangely, in a way, plain old uniformed cops directing traffic and standing around waiting for orders, doing what the Feds direct.

Yeah, they still come to New York, though our financial center is failing, perhaps for the final time. Will Wall Street be truly vestigial old-fashioned New York reference, clinging to the marketplace like that burger joint up on 52nd Street where not a single waiter was born after 1940?

The traffic cones and people barriers form extra lanes of traffic all along 42nd Street and avenues from First to Lexington, routing a virtual parade of motorcades. look, that was has 10 motorcycles, two ambulances, a dozen suburbans, and screaming sirens. Might  be Bush. But there's another: one SUV, one NYPD cruiser, and a single motorcycle. The president of what small country? He (or she) still comes to New York, and not just for the half-price sale that is the flood of Euros to the city's stores.

Last night, a few bloggers made their way to the top of the Sheraton over on Seventh. I've been going there since the mid-80s, when I was a young political reporter covering the annual Bronx County Democratic dinners - the ones hosted by boss Stanley Friedman, a man with serious personal style who grandly feted the old titans, guys like Carmine DeSapio. The place has had a face-lift, but the big ballrooms are still there and the man who is hosting his own shadow gathering of world leaders for the fourth year was in fine form on the 45th floor. Bill Clinton can still hold a crowd of smart people in the palm of his hand, holding forth with a depth of knowledge that stuns and overshadows and destroys the tiny, cramped intellect of the man who rode in the really big motorcade past my office this afternoon, the forgotten man just serving out his failed term as big events swirl around his deserted island of contempt.

We waited in small, steamy hotel room making small talk about blogs with aides while the Secret Service watched the hallway and the greatest president of our lifetimes talked about economics (or so we guessed) with the president of Paraguay down the hall. Then we all sat around the living room in the suite and mostly listened (questions were few) to Clinton discuss the economic crisis and what he'd do. Suffice to say, he suggested a better deal than the rapine weaseling of $700 billion from the taxpayers' account. We all thought the same thing though no one spoke it aloud. Yes, what a difference an administration makes.

Then it was down into the New York evening, my walk from west to east to the station, dodging the motorcades and lock-down zones. Was that fall in the air or just the chill of the city's tax base at basement temperature?

Still, the streets were filled. They were filled today. The helicopters buzzed and the motorcades whizzed along. Yes, they still come to New York.

UPDATE: We'll be blogging CGI over at onPhilanthropy - and I'll be Twittering away as the spirit moves me.

The Race Race

Twelve men to hold office of President were slave-owners during their lifetimes - eight of those keeping black men and women in bondage while they were chief executive. The first was George Washington, who freed his slaves upon his death and was the rare American leader of his day to change his mind about the actual humanity of African slaves. Of the first five presidents, only John Adams never owned a black man. The last slave-owning American to serve as President was Ulysses Grant, the great Union general who died in 1885 -  a year after Senator John McCain's paternal grandfather was born to a former slave-owning plantation family from Mississippi...and only ten years before Barack Obama's paternal grandfather was born in Kenya.

You can tease the family roots of both of our major candidates for president, and unwind a fading history of slavery, racism, colonialism and segregation. Indeed, Obama's unusually broad genealogy may contain the ultimate irony: several of his mother's ancestors appear to have been slave owners. To me, it's the immediacy of that history that stirs the imagination; in terms of generational advance, the turning over of leaves in the family scrapbook, most American history is shockingly near to us as we choose the 44th President of the United States.

Just 45 years after "I Have A Dream" - when I was a year old and Obama was all of two - an African-American man accepted the nomination for president of the Democratic Party, the same party whose solid Southern bloc opposed civil rights for a century after the Civil War. In the same year as Dr. King's speech at the Lincoln Memorial, a popular Democratic governor proclaimed: "segregation now, segregation tomorrow and segregation forever."

It is easy to forget just what a leap Obama's candidacy really is for this country; and it's a mistake to pretend we all enjoy a post-racial society in America. Today, a study by Stanford University for the Associated Press is making headlines with its claim that "40 percent of all white Americans hold at least a partly negative view toward blacks," including almost a third of independent and Democratic voters - the voters Barack Obama needs to win the Presidency.

"There are a lot fewer bigots than there were 50 years ago, but that doesn't mean there's only a few bigots," said Stanford political scientist Paul Sniderman. Some excerpts from the study:

"We still don't like black people," said John Clouse, 57, reflecting the sentiments of his pals gathered at a coffee shop in Somerset, Ohio.

Given a choice of several positive and negative adjectives that might describe blacks, 20 percent of all whites said the word "violent" strongly applied. Among other words, 22 percent agreed with "boastful," 29 percent "complaining," 13 percent "lazy" and 11 percent "irresponsible." When asked about positive adjectives, whites were more likely to stay on the fence than give a strongly positive assessment.

Among white Democrats, one third cited a negative adjective and, of those, 58 percent said they planned to back Obama.

The poll sought to measure latent prejudices among whites by asking about factors contributing to the state of black America. One finding: More than a quarter of white Democrats agree that "if blacks would only try harder, they could be just as well off as whites."

Those who agreed with that statement were much less likely to back Obama than those who didn't.

Among white independents, racial stereotyping is not uncommon. For example, while about 20 percent of independent voters called blacks "intelligent" or "smart," more than one third latched on the adjective "complaining" and 24 percent said blacks were "violent."

Nearly four in 10 white independents agreed that blacks would be better off if they "try harder."

The survey broke ground by incorporating images of black and white faces to measure implicit racial attitudes, or prejudices that are so deeply rooted that people may not realize they have them. That test suggested the incidence of racial prejudice is even higher, with more than half of whites revealing more negative feelings toward blacks than whites.

Is any of this surprising? Not to me. If you keep your ears open in daily life, experience will confirm in anecdotes what numbers say in polling. But it doesn't tell the whole story. [Indeed, there's an argument to be made that the Stanford/AP numbers are misleading]. In my research for CauseWired - my first book, due out November 10th - I looked very closely at the attitudes of millennials, that super-wired (and perhaps over-hyped) next boom generation born after 1980. Study after study on the attitudes of Americans in their teens and 20s shows a far more tolerant society growing toward their majority; in all the research, bias in race, gender, sexuality is fading. This does not necessarily portend support for progressive policy - or liberal politicians; indeed, the generation is less overtly political than the ones that precede it. But it's more color-blind and more open-minded. Again, keeping your ears open can confirm the research - my kids simply don't see color, and I'm sure yours don't either. [Also, there is plenty of evidence that the so-called Bradley Effect is no longer an operative worry for black candidates].

Yet, the electorate clearly does. For liberals, Barack Obama's ethnic mixture is a net positive - I will freely admit that after Hillary Clinton's historic campaign ended, the prospect of electing the first African-American president was one helluva consolation prize for this Democrat. Among independents, race is also just as clearly a mixed bag. Yet I would suggest that there's a strong point yet to be pressed that is lurking in the Obama political toolbox - and that's the idea that Barack Obama represents the sweeping reform of the black political landscape.

Clearly, there's a generational change in the wind; the group of African-American politicians who came to prominence during and after the civil rights movement of the 50s and 60s is fading. But age is just part of the equation. Obama represents a new path: the African-American politician who happens to be black  - perfectly aware of the problems of the black community in America - but not tied entirely to representing those concerns as (in general perception) almost the entirety of his policy brief. Early in Obama's candidacy, the combination of Obama's refusal to "be black" politically and close historic ties to President Clinton, kept many prominent African-American politicians from his side. Winning changed that, of course. Evident talent changed that. And perhaps the chance to move finally from the traditional we/they structure of racial politics in the United States also played a role.

In the last few weeks of this campaign, as Senator Obama attacks the treacherous economy, our perilous foreign policy, and issues like poverty, infrastructure, taxation, the environment, health care and education, the descendants of slaves and slave owners alike will see a politician of color take on the broad responsibility for public policy - and make his final, specific arguments for the highest office.

And that ain't hope, baby. That's change.

I'm Tom Watson, and I Approve (Of) This Message

Jason and I have been discussing the "power of the positive" over the last few days and both of us agree that just because we need a tough new Obama 2.0 to win the election, that doesn't mean our ticket-topper should stoop to conquer. Mainly because he'd fail.

Given the economic crisis - and it's going to get worse, folks - reasonable, mature leadership is desperately needed in this country. That, and a plan - a structure for a new way forward, the bones of the garden if not the blooms; that is to say, something well beyond "change."

This two-minute ad is easily the best of the general election campaign for the Obama-Biden team. They should continue with this message, and continue to put a little more meat on these terrific policy bones. Truth be told, I think the exciting Obama brand of the winter and early spring had become a little shop-worn - the mantras tired and useless, the enthusiastic "hope" church of the converted simply unable to recruit more believers with the rhetorical toolset of the primary campaign.

I think the tide is swinging back a bit, and I think a "New Deal" call to the swing state voters is the right call. What do you think?

Free Review Copies of CauseWired for Bloggers…Pass It On

Review copies of my book are in. And thanks to my friends at Wiley, we’re launching a program to get as many review copies of CauseWired: Plugging In, Getting Involved, Changing the World into the hands of bloggers as we can before publication. If you’re interested in writing about CauseWired - and it covers online social activism across charities, NGOs, politics, cause marketing and more - we want to rush you an advance copy of the book.

Just drop a note with your name, blog, and snail mail address to Wiley’s extraordinary book marketer/guru/blogger, Andrew Wheeler, at [email protected] and we’ll make sure you get one. Andy very kindly put up a post on his own excellent book blog and had some nice comments:

CauseWired doesn't just have something to say, it has a real, direct connection to what we're both doing right now, and what we're (all of us) doing more and more every day in the 21st century: connecting electronically about the things that matter to us. So this is a book I'm excited about, and want to see spread as widely as possible.

And that's why I want to give away as many of those bound galleys as possible, to bloggers and podcasters, to forum junkies and Facebook super-users, to LiveJournal mavens and MySpace eyeball-destroyers, to people who live in the wired world and who want to know what's going on there. If you want to read this book before it's published, and you have somewhere (preferably online) to talk to people about it afterwards, I'd like to send you a copy. Also, if you work at a bookstore and think your customers might want to know about CauseWired, you qualify as well.

Please feel free to pass this on to other bloggers or writers who think might like an advance copy. And you can still hit the link - top right on this page - for advances sales of the final hardcover!

No Lipstick on Lehman's Pig

We may not be yet headed toward a world made by hand - to borrow the title, if not the mood of James Kunstler's dark cinematic novel of our post-energy future - but we may be headed toward a New York without its economic engine. Tonight, Lehman Brothers and its 158 years of Wall Street history teeter on the edge of oblivion, with no bail-out on offer from you and me, the humble taxpayer. Merrill Lynch is in talks with Bank of America to save itself. We - that's you and me, dear reader - have guaranteed the mortgage-backed security nest of vipers at Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae in order to "save" that market. Insurance giant AIG edges toward the edge. The dollar's in the crapper, thanks to Republican policy protecting companies who make beau coup bucks by selling American-made on the cheap. And the polls now favor that failed political party and its former opposition leader, now comfy in the arms of both the K Street lobbyists who sold the economy down the river - and the flunky neocons who send other people's children to die in a failed experiment. Yeah, I don't know what the Bush Doctrine is either, except what I've heard on Fox. But when those thousands of six - and yes, seven-figure jobs - leave New York never to return in the lifetimes of those holding the pink slips and carrying cardboard boxes, it means the pork barrel of Federal emergency aid is empty. And there ain't puttin' no lipstick on that pig.