A Little Of The Old In And Out



(image via telegraph)

In: Hillary Clinton. The margin of ten points or thereabouts was what can only be properly construed as a humiliation to the Obama campaign, which outspent Senator Clinton in Pennsylvania ad buys by $11 million to $5 million (Exaggerated cough suggesting feigned detachment). As much as we loathe to admit it, Senator Clinton's lowball tactics are bearing a dark and savaghe fruit. Senator Obama appeals to the sunny idealism of those who do not have baggage (i.e. college students), contrasts dramatically with Clinton's gritty appeal to those left behind in the global economy (for further reference, see the Osama ad). We won't entertain the word "bitter," because, frankly, it is probably more complicated than that. Clinton, who has, until now, been the bete noir of the white lower middle class un-ironic Budweiser drinker, beat out Obama in that demographic. She also did so in Ohio. And Massachusetts (despite the Kennedy imprimatur).

It seems that the Pennsylvania victory only cements what this blog has argued for a while, namely the fact that Obama needs to stop acting like a saucer-eyed political naif fixated on that great, big spinning world of ideas and ask that grotty fucking Senator from the Empire State to be his running mate. Running mates don't have to like one another.



(image via washingtonpost)

Out: Harold M. Ickes, Monekyfixer. The Dickensian-named Harold Ickes, already routed by the left-blogosphere in his quest to become the Democratic National Committee Chair (It went to blog fave Howard Dean), has come back -- armed with legalese and geeky pocket-protectors -- to possibly steal the convention for the Clinton camp. Monkeyfixer, fix thyself.



(image via collegeandpublisher)

In: Jane Rosenthal. The Tribeca Film Festival was in danger of becoming an unmanageable behemoth. Was this over-measured response to the desolation of 9/11 a sort of imperial excess? Perhaps. Now Rosenthal responds. From The salmon-colored weekly:

"HAVE THE CRITICS been too harsh? 'I keep quoting Keith Richards, because I cannot analyze it anymore. It just is what it is,' said Ms. Rosenthal, days from Tribeca’s opening night kickoff on April 23, a celebrity-packed premiere of Baby Mama at the Ziegfeld Theater. Ms. Rosenthal gave a pointedly silent shrug. 'It’s just a film festival; it’s not like analyzing a heart procedure.' Ms. Rosenthal was sitting in a sunny office at Tribeca Film Festival headquarters, a rosy-bricked building on Greenwich street, walls adorned with classic movie posters and black-and-white portraits of past festival participants. Seven floors below, the first truly warm day of the season had office workers leaning against buildings, turning their winter-pallored faces skyward; the sidewalks were bustling, and construction of new buildings rumbled in the distance—all a far cry from seven years ago. 'The neighborhood has rebounded more than anyone could have imagined,' she said. 'It’s the human spirit—it’s so New York.'"

(image via thewashingtonnote)

Out: Is Obama A JFK Or An Adlai Stevenson? This question has been asked in the more thoughtful spaces for some time now. Both Stevenson and JFK are important political figures in the Democratic Party in the latter half of the twentieth century. One, however, became a pivotal President and the other a carrier of some noble ideas that were probably articulated far too early to have a measurable immediate effect. Stevenson is to JFK what Goldwater was to Reagan, and in which camp would you rather belong? Me, too.

But that argument does not follow through to Obama. Matthew Yglesias wrote, "Arthur Schlesinger liked to defend his decision during the 1960 campaign to defect from the Adlai Stevenson camp to the John F. Kennedy camp in terms of the idea that Stevenson had a discomfort with the idea of power that, while arguably admirable in some respects, was fundamentally inconsistent with the realities of political leadership." Now, of course, after another big state goes Hillary, and Obama seems unable to engage in the sort of trench warfare necessary to deliver the final blow to the Clinton candidacy and secure the nomination, this question once again, unfortunately, arises. Especially on last night's Charlie Rose program.



In: Tribeca Film Fest Dinner. Attending Graydon Carter's annual thing festooned with Baby Boomers were the Seinfelds, Lee Radziwill, Sigourney Weaver, André Leon Talley, Francesco Clemente, Fran Lebowitz, Harvey Weinstein and Georgina Chapman, John McEnroe, Anjelica Huston, Larry David, Diane von Furstenberg, Martha Stewart, Zac Posen and Lola Schnabel. From Fashionweekdaily:

"'Never keep them past 11. Make sure everyone gets fed. And don't make long speeches.; These were the very succinct dinner rules that Graydon Carter established early in the evening to tame his very accomplished guests during his seventh-annual Vanity Fair Tribeca Film Festival dinner ... Joining Carter were co-hosts Robert De Niro and Ron Perelman, who graciously greeted a small army of bold-faced names on the patio of the State Supreme Court House. 'I'm thankful I was able to get up those stairs without the help of crutches,' announced Donna Karan. 'Because that's what I had to struggle with for the last two years.' Caroline Kennedy Schlossberg was equally comfortable."