2.22 Ross Douthat in the Times: “[I]t’s worth drawing some lessons from the Bush era that might apply to Trump and Elon Musk and other would-be counterrevolutionaries today. The first lesson is not to overread your mandate. Bush-era conservatism built its strong position on one overriding issue — destroying Al Qaeda and killing terrorists — …
On Tuesdaywe headed east to a snowy Gettysburg. We lunched at Dobbin House, checked out Little Round Top, and spent the night in the hospitable Gettysburg Hotel. On Wednesday, we finished up the trip in Lancaster, where we toured Wheatfield, the lovely home of the former Worst President in American History, James Buchanan.
On Monday we went to the Andy Warhol Museum. It was interesting to get a fresh perspective on someone who had such a visual impact on the culture we inhabited. For the first time, it dawned on me that so much of the art we saw on Saturday Night Live and on MTV descended from …
Last week Ginny and I went to visit our good friends Greg and Susan Schmidt in Pittsburgh. We had a lot of fun. On Saturday, after breakfasting at the crowded, somewhat disorienting Oakmont bakery, we went to the campuses of the University of Pittsburgh and Carnegie Mellon. We saw the iconic Panther statue, the iconic …
2.14 Six other prosecutors follow Sassoon and resign, including lead Adams prosecutor Hagen Scotten, who writes, “[A]ny assistant U.S. attorney would know that our laws and traditions do not allow using the prosecutorial power to influence other citizens, much less elected officials, in this way. If no lawyer within earshot of the President is willing …
This is the phone list for the staff of Time magazine during the week of December 17, 1997, posted by my erstwhile colleague Lisa Grananstein. That was the week the magazine was preparing Time‘s annual Person of the Year issue, this …
ARTIFACT: THE TIME MAGAZINE PHONE LIST, DECEMBER 17, 1997 Read More »
In November 1971 (when I was a college freshman), Playboy held a Writers’ Convention. At least 71 writers attended; the magazine reportedly paid $100,000 to assemble the group. (That’s about $779,271 today.) Of the 71 attendees, 47 gathered for this photo. I’ve actually met four members of this group: Bruce Jay Friedman, Calvin …
1.31 The Washington Post: “The highest-ranking career official at the Treasury Department is departing after a clash with surrogates of billionaire Elon Musk . . .over access to the payment system the U.S. government uses to disburse trillions of dollars every year. . . The clash reflects an intensifying battle between Musk and the federal …
JANUARY 2025: “IT’S LIKE THE SECOND ACT OF CABARET” Read More »
12.31 A Complete Unknown. I thought the film did a brilliant job of capturing what it must of felt like to be hearing those songs for the first time. 12.30 Linda Lavin dies at 87 12.29 Jimmy Carter dies at 100. James Fallows in The Atlantic: “Most reckonings have suggested that Carter might well have …
DECEMBER 2024: “ATTENTION IS THE ONLY CURRENCY THAT MATTERS” Read More »
11.30 Ivy 11.30 Lou Carnesecca dies at 99. 11.29 Lance Morrow dies at 85. 11.28 Thanksgiving at the Beekman Arms. 11.26 Gladiator II 11.26 Patricia J. Williams in NYRB, reviewing Separated, by Errol Morris: What, then, to make of a constitutional democracy that builds such a payment scheme into its very system of justice? What …