By Steve Rhodes
June 16-17.
Publication: New York Times
Cover: The eyes of Clarence Thomas through his glasses, with the rest of his head and face wiped away, represented only by the white newsprint surrounding it. Accompanying “Thomas Agonistes,” Orlando Patterson’s review of a new Thomas biography that seems to nail down the humiliations and psychological framework of the man’s upbringing while coming up short on new details of the present-day justice.
For example, Patterson describes what I think is new ground on Thomas’ relationship with women. “There is now little doubt that he lied repeatedly during his confirmation hearings – not only about his pornophilia and bawdy humor but, more important, about his legal views and familiarity with cases like Roe v. Wade.”
At least according to Patterson’s review, authors Kevin Merida and Michael A. Fletcher fail to plumb this rich vein further, connecting his views – and the forces that shaped them – to his legal theories and positions.
Beyond that, what penalty is there to be paid for a Supreme Court justice found to have lied repeatedly during his confirmation hearings? How do his supporters – then and now – respond to the clear facts before them? What is the impact on the court’s credibility with Thomas on the bench?
Patterson writes that “up to the point of Thomas’s confirmation hearings, this book is a finely drawn portrait that surpasses all previous attempts to understand him.”
That sounds like only half a book. Thomas is on the bench now, making laws of the land. That’s the only reason to care about his personal psychodrama. And if that’s where this book falls short, then it falls short at its most important juncture.
Other News & Reviews of Note: Kevin Phillips weighs in on The Reagan Diaries. Phillips, who voted for Reagan twice, says “the diaries do not make me regret that I did, but his approach to his office had both strengths and weaknesses.”He goes on to say that “if any central weakness leaps out of this book, it is Reagan’s tendency to view the presidency and its challenges in terms of personal media performance and people-to-people salesmanship. The Great Communicator thought so much about the image of his office that many of his entries show him preening like a peacock over public approval and perceived milestones . . . Nowhere does this popular president speak of the challenges of the approaching millennium, of history and its turning points, of the squeeze on the middle class that provided him with enormous support of the transformation of the American economy as manufacturing gave way to speculation and finance. These, apparently, were not his concerns.”
Can there possibly be strengths in any such presidency?
And once again I am struck by how the media constantly refers to Reagan’s popularity while it refers negatively to Bill Clinton, who spoke of exactly those things Reagan didn’t – and finished with a higher approval rating despite reams of negative press compared to Reagan’s media enablers.
Finally, for someone so concerned with image, isn’t it obvious that Reagan’s diaries were intended for and thus crafted to public consumption? Is there really any other way to view the diaries but as Reagan’s attempt to spin history and only accidentally revealing of his not-too-probing mind?
Also: Pete Hamill reviews Taxi! A Social History of the New York City Cabdriver.
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Publication: Sun-Times
Cover: A Ralph Steadman Lite (Very Lite) depiction of a rooster with his head chopped off. For a reviews of Barbara Kingsolver’s Animal, Vegetable, Miracle: A Year of Food Life and Plenty: One Man, One Woman and a Raucous Year of Eating Locally. It’s all about eating local.
Other News & Reviews of Note: Sun-Times general manager John Barron (and formerly/recently editor-in-chief) writes that Carl Bernstein’s biography of Hillary Clinton is “fresh, complete and detailed,” and that Bernstein is “dead solid perfect in his reporting,” despite reams of evidence to the contrary.
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Publication: Tribune
Cover: “The Real Saul Bellow: Richard Stern remembers his old friend and gifted writer.” Yawn.
Other News & Reviews of Note: Mark Coatney reviews Tribune reporter Naftali Bendavid’s book about Rahm Emanuel and the 2006 congressional elections. This book sprang from a Trib report called “The House That Rahm Built” that I roundly criticized last fall for its Emanuellian prism that gave short shrift to DNC president Howard Dean’s strategic vision and the conflicts that ensued with the cynical insider Emanuel crowd.
Coatney picks up the same thread of criticism, at least to some extent, pointing out for example that “though Emanuel is constantly telling his candidates how to campaign, there isn’t a lot from the candidates on whether it was Emanuel’s advice that made the difference or simply the money that his top-notch fundraising organization provided.”
I’ll take it a step further: A lot of Emanuel’s hand-picked candidates lost, while netroots candidates became the poster candidates for a new kind of Democrat.
Coatney also asks as I and many others have, if “Emanuel’s insistence on targeting races in a few states and cultivating ‘candidates who could win’ (which, in Emanuel’s formulation, basically always comes down to ‘candidates who could raise a lot of money’)” [was] a better approach to than the 50-state strategy advocated by Howard Dean and the netroots liberal bloggers?
“While there’s plenty on the clashes between Emanuel’s operation and Dean and the bloggers, they’re seen, for the most part, from Emanuel’s point of view, which is, mainly, that these people are either dreamers with little practical political experience (in Emanuel’s view, Dean) or ‘Internet blog people whining, who’ve never won an election.'”
That’s ridiculous on so many levels I can’t even begin to get into it here. But Bendavid is in Rahm’s corner.
“Bendavid lays out some of these criticisms in an afterword, but they’re not given anything more than a quick evaluation.”
In other words, Bendavid was so ensconced inside Rahm’s bubble that he failed to do his homework and felt forced to respond to critics and those dumbshit bloggers who called him out on it in an afterword.
Access is no substitute for reporting. And reporting isn’t the same thing as being inside the room.
Quote: “Bendavid likes Emanuel so much that we suggest double checking your copy to make sure the pages aren’t stuck together.” wonkette.com/politics/to-do-dept’/long+winded-weekend-263734.php
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Of Note: The Mixed-Income Myth: Northwestern prof Mary Pattillo on why even the black middle-class can’t save a poor black neighborhood in Chicago.”
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Charts
CHARTS:
1. Gore
2. Reagan
3. God
Einstein falls to 4th; Jesus 8th; Iacocca 9th; and Rickles 10th.
Posted on June 18, 2007