Columnist and historian Eric Alterman has written a new book entitled Why We’re Liberals: A Political Handbook for Post-Bush America, which came out this week. Here’s an interview I did with him that appeared on playboy.com. PLAYBOY: Okay, Eric—why are we liberals? ALTERMAN: Depends on what you mean by “we,” Kimosabe. On the one hand, …
Nominations for the 2008 National Magazine Awards were announced yesterday, and I’m happy to say that a number of my friends and former colleagues are among the nominees. Popular Mechanics, which is edited by Jim Meigs, my former boss at Us, was nominated for Best Magazine with a circulation between 1,000,000 and 2,000,000, and also …
Being the world’s most reliable consumer of historical dramas, I obligingly clicked on HBO for the first two episodes of its seven part series on John Adams, which was titled, with no-frills certitude, John Adams. The show was as dutiful, as earnest and as joyless (and ultimately less moving) as a big bowl of All-Bran. …
So Governor Eliot Spitzer has acknowledged importing a prostitute from New York to Washington DC. This certainly seems like the 21st century, service economy version of carrying coals to Newcastle. One would think it would be possible to find a prostitute in Washington, but maybe Jack Abramoff‘s experience had a more salutary effect than we …
Just received a note from Harry Lee of Crestwood, Kentucky. He writes “I just finished your book, The Coup, and I must say it was a very good read, in fact it was a page-turner. Your character development was masterful, the pace was enjoyably steady and your insight of the political process is, well, delightfully …
Was The Wire the most existential drama in the history of television? Episode in and episode out, all those with dreams or standards, no matter which side of the law stood on, were brought low if not destroyed in a world in which cynicism, corruption and indifference governed human affairs the way gravity governs the …
Congratulations to Drew Friedman, the distinctive and distinctively hilarious illustrator whose new book More Old Jewish Comedians which will be published in April, got a tremendous bookwarming at the Friars Club last night. Drew’s “Private Lives of Public Figures” was a fixture at Spy, where I was intermittently part of the delegation that helped think …
The Writing Center of Marymount Manhattan College is marking its 15th anniversary, and I was very flattered that I was invited to the dinner celebrating this milestone that was held at Doubles in the Sherry Netherland Hotel on Wednesday night. I was delighted to see former Spy colleagues Roy Blount Jr. and Patty Marx, and …
Is life is imitating The Coup? With the publication of a story in The New York Times about John McCain‘s relationship with a comely female lobbyist, we’re certainly in the neighborhood. A presidential candidate and a female lobbyist have some kind of relationship–is it sex? Is it a flirtation? Is it an older guy just …
Richard Zoglin, a former colleague of mine at Time magazine, has written an excellent piece of history of entertainment history called Comedy At The Edge, about stand-up comedy in the 1970s. Not only has Richard been a longtime observer of the stand-up scene, but he is a top-notch reporter, and the book captures the broad …