Frequent reader and correspondent Hugh Cook sends along this item from Mediaweek about the plummeting fortunes of my former employer:

“Big cuts are in store at Hugh Hefner’s Playboy, which is slashing its rate base a whopping 38 percent as the iconic men’s magazine battles advertising and circulation declines, Mediaweek has learned. Starting with the January 2010 issue, Playboy’s rate base will drop to 1.5 million from 2.6 million. . . .The company has hinted at the possibility of more rate base cuts along with other big changes to the print edition, including an outright sale. And the writing has been on the wall for some time. Like other mass-circ magazines from Reader’s Digest to TV Guide, Playboy has whittled its rate base over the years. In 1971, it stood at 6 million. Playboy missed its 2.6 million-rate base by 146,734 copies, or 5.6 percent, for the first half of 2009, according to the Audit Bureau of Circulations. Its ad pages declined 33 percent to 275 this year through the November issue. . . . With the rate base cut, Playboy will lose its standing as the biggest circulation men’s lifestyle magazine by circulation. Now, the next biggest behind Playboy is Alpha Media’s Maxim, with a rate base of 2.5 million; and Rodale’s Men’s Health, 1.8 million.”

This is sad news, sort of, but hardly tragic. No single cause is to blame. Decades of poor business decisions and a refusal to evolve the editorial product faster than a glacial pace are factors, but there’s no way around the dominating fact that Playboy was once the Saudi Arabia of erotica, and now every man has a derrick in his yard. But there was once a time when Playboy rather daringly articulated the proposition that sex is fun, and those of us who happened to be somewhat confused ex-altar boys, and I’m sure others as well, appreciated the encouragement. Now the magazine seems determined to present sex mostly within a world of glittering debauchery. In some ways, it reflects the path of Hefner himself, that of a man who began his venture interested in and confused by sex, and concludes it as an almost cartoonish king of a silicon-enhanced Xanadu. Whatever–Hefner remade the world into a place that no longer has a place for him in it.

It is perhaps is an indication of how pathetic my life has become, but still. . . in Sunday’s episode of Mad Men, Don Draper is riding to work on the train when he is joined by his paramour, Suzanne Farrell. Don, obviously, is heading south to Manhattan from Ossining, and as he moves right to left, the disappearing scenery we see through the window by Don’s right shoulder is full of orange and gold and red autumn leaves. WRONG! The train line that connects Ossining to the Scarborough station at Briarcliff Manor (my station, as it happens) is the Hudson Line. It is called that because it runs along the Hudson River. You don’t get beautiful woodsy scenery out the right side of the train; you don’t even get a beautiful uninterrupted riverscape, because the train tracks run a good part of the way through the gray concrete edifices of the Sing Sing Correctional Facility (when Jimmy Cagney would tell Pat O’Brien that so-and-so had been sent up the river, the Hudson was the river, and Sing Sing was the up to where he’d been sent) before hitting some marshland. If Don lived in Bedford or Mt. Kisco or Chappaqua, yes, lots of leaves. But Ossining is one of the river towns, and the river is what you’d see. Above, top: the platform of the Ossining train station; on the right, the river, separated by a few trees that do not a woods make; on the horizon at center and left, the buildings of Sing Sing. Above left: the Ossining station. Above right: the Big House, or a sign outside of it, anyway. This picture makes Sing Sing seem infinitely more colorful and jaunty than the ugly merciless grounds appear from other vantage points.

A very tough-minded Yankee team won a marathon 13 inning game that began at 7:57 PM and ended sometime after one AM. Played in miserably cold conditions, the game featured excellent pitching by both the Yanks and the Angels. A.J. Burnett pitched seven strong innings in which he gave up only two runs, although he certainly lived up to Buck Showalter‘s analysis that Burnett will give you four brilliant innings, “and then he comes out and you say, `Who is this guy?’ Burnett had one horrid inning last night, the fifth, in which he three 33 pitches, walked a guy, hit a batter, and threw a wild pitch that allowed a run to score. Still, he did not melt down completely, as he often has, and he left with the game 2-2, a typical tight playoff game, thanks to equally excellent pitching of Angel starter Joe Saunders. The Angels did take a 3-2 lead in the top of the 11th, but on an 0-2 pitch leading off the bottom of the 11th, Alex Rodriguez homered, an amazing hit in that he neither had the fat part of the bat on the ball nor did he fully extend his arms. Rodriguez thus joined David Ortiz (2004), Kirk Gibson (1988) and Dave Henderson (’86) as the only players to have two or more game-tying or go-ahead home runs in the ninth inning or later of one postseason. The Yanks won in the bottom of the 13th (yet another walk off win!), thanks to a lead-off hit by Jerry Hairston Jr., who later scored from second on a bad throw by the Angel second baseman (see it here.). It’s very exciting to see the bench players contribute in games like this. On to California, with five down, and six to go.

On a cold, damp evening, C.C. Sabathia pitched brilliantly, giving up just one run and four hits in eight innings, and completely covering up the fact that the Yankee hitters have not exactly been tearing the cover off the ball. In fact, had the Angels’ infielders not botched a simple pop-up, Game One of the series may have taken a rather different course, since John Lackey also pitched exceptionally well. One thing–I am curious why Joe Girardi isn’t more aggressive with his running game. Tonight he even had Supposed secret weapon Brett Gardner on first, and let him sit there for three pitches until he could be erased on a double play. I don’t think these are exactly the same Angels who have haunted the Yanks for the last few years. I would pressure them more, and see if they broke. Regardless-the Yanks won 4-1, and now it’s four down, seven to go.

Cara passed her driver’s test yesterday. I’m proud of her. She practiced all summer. Did a good job. Maintained the speed limit. Left a lot of distance between her and the car in front of her. Used good judgment.

When we got home, predictably enough, she wanted the keys. Needed to go to the supermarket. Wanted to take the neighbor girl to the park. Had to go to the video store. Perfectly legitimate reasons. So why was I surprised to feel a clutch of fear in my throat? All summer she ran such errands without incident, though we me sitting shotgun. Now, with her having been ratified by the State of New York, I feel the grip of alarm. It’s nonsensical. If anything, were she to have an accident, I’d be safer. Of course, that’s not the point.

Ginny and I knew what we were doing. We looked forward to the liberty that would be ours when we could retire our joint chauffeur’s cap. But now the moment is here, and I don’t feel so free. We have given our girl to the world, and we know what a careless and indifferent place the world can be.

Andy Pettitte, adding to his glowing resume, and Carl Pavano, finally pitching the game he was always meant to pitch, locked last night in a tense pitching duel that was playoff baseball at its best. The Twins broke a scoreless tie in the bottom of the sixth, but the lead didn’t last a half inning, as in the top of the seventh, Alex Rodriguez (continuing his torrid ALDS) and Jorge Posada hit solo homers to take the lead. The Twins might have equaled things in the bottom of the eighth when Nick Punto led off with a double and Dennard Span hit a sharp grounder up the middle. Punto must have thought the ball was headed for the outfield, because he rounded third and headed for home. But Derek Jeter, moving far to his left with range he was no longer supposed to possess, fielded the grounder, and threw a one-hopper to Posada, who fired to Rodriguez to nab Punto scrambling back to third. The Yanks added two in the ninth for a 4-1 lead, and Mariano Rivera added a four-out save. After the game, Twins manager Ron Gardenhire praised the Yanks. “It’s a great baseball team,” he said. “They deserve all the accolades. They have got a great bullpen. Those guys come out there firing. Bench. The whole package. They’ve got the whole package, they’ve got the whole deal, and they have got some of the classiest players in the league out there, guys I really enjoy watching play. I hate it when I play against them because they kill us, but I enjoy watching Derek Jeter and A-Rod and those guys play. Those guys are very talented and classy people out in the field.” Pretty classy yourself, Gardy. Friday night: the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim.

Yesterday in The New York Times Book Review, Slate‘s Internal Affairs Correspondent Jack Shafer favorably reviewed A Bomb in Every Issue: How the Short, Unruly Life of Ramparts Magazine Changed America, by Peter Richardson. “Ramparts stands with a handful of 20th-century American magazines–Playboy, the Harold Hayes-era Esquire, Rolling Stone, Spy and Wired–whose glory days continue to influence editors. Each of those magazines not only grabbed the zeitgeist but helped shape it. . . . Like those other great magazines, Ramparts [at left, the cover of the April 1966 issue] influenced competitors across the media universe.” Nice to hear. On a related note, Kurt Andersen was recently friended on Facebook by Paul Krassner, the editor of Ramparts, the great magazine of the 1960s, who used the photo in which he is wearing a Spy T-shirt. I would like to be able to show it to you, but I can’t bend the copy function to my will, so if you wish to see it, click here.

The walk-off has become the by-word of the 2009 Yankees. Fifteen times the team won in its last at-bat, enjoying implausible theatrics at the hands of Melky Cabrerra (3 times), Johnny Damon, Hideki Matsui, Robinson Cano, and even Francisco Cervelli and Jose Miranda. Last night, in a terrific Game 2 of the ALDS, the heroics were performed by the boss stud of the Yankee line-up, Mark Teixiera. Heretofore this year Teixiera (above right) confined his massive contributions to normal players’ hours, but last night led off the 12th by smoking an angry liner that barely got over the left field wall to gve the Yankes a 4-3 victory (According to hittrackeronline.com, a Web site that crunches numbers to determine speeds and true distances of home runs, Teixeira’s blast went from bat to stands in just 2.88 seconds, making it the fastest home run to leave the yard in a major-league game this year.) This moment was made possible by a whole bunch of wonderful moments that preceded it, including most prominently a monster 2-run home run in the bottom of the ninth when the Yanks were trailing 3-1 by Alex Rodriguez (above left), who had three RBIs on the night and continues something which seems like a redemption tour but which, if it continues, might end up seeming like something between a punitive raid and a crusade. Other very nifty moments: a heads-up play early in the game when Nick Swisherr threw to second behind the runner and Derek Jeter applied the tag a nanosecond before another runner could cross home plate, negating a certain run; splendid relief pitching by rookie David Robertson, who calmly extinguished a three-on, no one out jam in the top of the 11th, one of the outs coming on calm and collected 3-1 play from Teixiera to Cervelli. Teixiera’s throw was terrific, soft and firm, eye high, easily catchable. It wasn’t magnificent or brilliant; it was just perfect. Two down, nine to go.

Writing in The Daily Beast, Rebecca Dana contends that by avoiding the use of euphemisms in his announcement of his sexual affairs, David Letterman “has perfected the art of disclosure.”

“When David Letterman confessed last week to having had sex with women who work on his show, the real shock wasn’t the affairs themselves (I mean, honestly people) but rather the language he used to describe them. “I have had sex with women who work on this show,” he said.

He didn’t euphemize. He didn’t dissemble. He didn’t confess alcoholism, drug addiction, or personal weakness. He didn’t appeal to Jesus or the state of New York; didn’t define simple verbs, praise his in-laws, haul out his wounded spouse or dwell on how much he’d let everyone down. It was the most skillful handling of a sex scandal in the modern era.”

Dana contrasts Letterman with Mark Sanford, Eliot Spitzer, John Ensign and other politicians who cloaked their admissions with evasive language. “All of these men had sex. But none of them plainly mentioned the fact of it, as if `seriously sinning’ somehow softens the blow.”

Dana’s observation is accurate but myopic. Letterman not only broke no law but is allegedly the victim of a crime, while Spitzer and Ensign may have been guilty of violations and Sanford had disappeared. More importantly, a frank admission based on the Letterman model would have been useless to these men. Does Dana really believe that if Spitzer had said “I was having sex with high-priced call girls” his `perfect disclosure’ would have helped him weather the storm any more easily?

The real implication of Letterman’s admission is that for a large and growing segment of the population, shame is an outdated concept, a vestigial idea from a disappearing world. Whole ranges of behavior that just a generation ago needed to kept secret out of fear of embarrassment and humiliation are now forgiven, accepted and even encouraged. Young people live their entire lives on Facebook with no fear of reproach. Various empowerment efforts mitigate the stigma of a disadvantaged background. Struggles with drugs and alcohol are causes for therapy and ultimate vindication. Homosexuality, interracial relationships, children born out of wedlock, divorce–mere retro plot points on Mad Men. People don’t even bother to deny looking at internet porn. Ordinary girls go wild and bare their boobs while starlets flash their labia. In the UK, where CCTV security cameras are prevalent, young drunks arrested for fighting outside pubs frequently ask police for copies of the tapes of their brawls.

Privacy is a crucial legal concept to those of us who remember when a person’s private actions could be used to cause him or her emotional, financial and even legal harm. But among young people, the domain of privacy is shrinking, and as it diminishes, the idea of shame is shrinking as well, and across all sectors. Is there any sense that the gang of bankers and brokers who brought on the financial collapse feel any shame? I’m not aware of any.

Letterman could get away with his admission because audiences have fewer moral expectations than electorates, and because his audience in particular simply had no expectation of faithfulness on his part at all. He would have invited judgment had he acted ashamed. But younger people are getting older and older people are getting deader. One can well imagine in twenty years time a politician who’s being questioned about sexual misconduct looking into the camera and saying “Yeah, I did it. Haven’t you?”

Even before I liked the Yankees, even when I still cheered my beloved Baltimore Orioles, I knew that for someone who lived in New York, it was important for the Yankees to win. Their success changed the psyche of the city. People here are happy if the Mets, Giants or Jets win, and a certain small subset is delirious if the Rangers win, and a lot of people are happy if the Knicks win. But a successful Yankee team is essential to the city’s sense of itself. It’s the same with Wall Street. It’s good when the big boys do well.

The Yanks haven’t won a World Series since 2000. I was most upset when the team didn’t win in 2001, after 9/11, after coming back in three immortal games in Yankee Stadium, after taking the lead against the valiant Curt Schilling and us having the great Mariano Rivera on the mound for the ninth. Oh well. Since then, things haven’t gone well. A lousy loss in the 2003 World Series to the Marlins (and after having knocked off the Red Sox in a magnificent seventh game); allowing the Red Sox to come back from a 3-0 deficit to eliminate us in 2004; eliminated by the Cleveland bugs in 2007. Too many games with Randy Johnson and Kevin Brown.

But this year’s group looks good, and they got off to a good start in Game One against the plucky Twins, winning 7-2. C.C. Sabathia pitched like an ace, the bullpen pitched like firemen, Derek Jeter and Hideki Matsui hit two-run homers, and even Alex Rodriguez, haunted by previous playoff failures, had two hits and two RBIs. An excellent beginning. One down, ten to go.