Category Archives: Politics and Culture

Nothing Sacred — The DSK Case Falls Apart

Politics and Culture, Things that Piss Me off from The NY Times,

“It’s like a live action metaphor. The head of the IMF trying to **** an African. It’s like he’s posing for his own editorial cartoon”

— May 16, 2011, The Daily Show with Jon Stewart

With questions about the alleged victim’s credibility, the case against Dominique Strauss-Kahn is falling apart, but in the beginning, Stewart nailed it. What a metaphor!

The story resonated with New Yorkers. It wasn’t just the IMF connection. It was about the privileged wealthy versus the poor and humble. New York has long been a city of economic contrasts, great — almost inconceivable wealth, tons of strivers, a struggling middle class, and of course the poor who we always have with us and even when some of them manage to lift themselves out of poverty within a generation or two, there are always new arrivals from third world slums.

Those of us born in this City who are well-educated and hold down good jobs — the teachers, the cops, the plumbers, doctors, nurses, lawyers, store owners, talk show hosts, financiers and so on, are often only a generation or two or three removed from poverty and oppression.

While the City does not have the kinds of gated community found in wealthy suburbs, there is often an invisible gate, hotels with suites costing several thousand dollars a day which an ordinary person may only enter through the service door, cooperatives with two laundry rooms — one for the tenants who rarely use them and another more crowded one for the servants.

There are millions of people at the lower rung who remain invisible to the wealthy or even the comfortably middle-class. These are the people that drive the taxis, work in the remaining (and sometimes secretly operating) factories, bus tables, wash dishes, and of course clean hotel rooms.

America prides itself on being, not a classless society, but a society where anyone with pluck and guts can arrive and thrive, a land of opportunity, freedom and upward mobility where the cab driver from Ghana, can dream of owning his own medallion and someday a fleet of cabs, where the bus boy may imagine opening up his own restaurant, where even a hotel housekeeper can plan a better life for herself and her daughter.

When the newspapers first reported that the head of the IMF had been taken off a plane, prevented from leaving the country and was arrested for sexually assaulting a hotel maid, New Yorkers weren’t just shocked, they were proud. The French may have been outraged watching Strauss-Kahn’s infamous perp-walk, but to New Yorkers it was a signal that there was equal justice, that even the most lowly could not be used like a toilet, and even the most powerful could not flout the law.

We were pleased that our prosecutors would pursue a case that could become politically messy. We admired our cops for believing the victim. Her story was and remains believable and supported by physical evidence. And most of all we admired the plucky maid herself, for coming forward, for standing up, for not allowing this to happen to someone else.

The newspapers didn’t create a hagiography of the victim. We did. All the elements were there — she was New York, a hard working immigrant, who came here for a better life. We didn’t know her name, but we knew her struggles. She’d come from far away. She’d seen some terrible things. We knew she was granted political asylum. She was a Muslim and wore hijab to work. Could she even do that in France? Her courage inspired us all.

And then we found out there was a lot we didn’t know. It shouldn’t surprise us. The poor can’t always afford to keep their hands clean. We know she lied to get political asylum, including a lie about having been gang raped. We’re told she claimed someone else’s child as a dependent on her taxes — though we are not told if there were any extenuating circumstances like whether or not she actually cared for her friend’s child, and spent her own money — a not unlikely scenario. We know that there were multiple phones and bank accounts in her name and this may (or may not) have something to do with her connection to a man now in jail facing drug charges.

While none of this means she wasn’t assaulted, all of it will be used by the defense if the case goes forward, a possibility less likely by the hour.

No one should be surprised that a poor woman would have a conversation with her boyfriend in jail wondering if there was any way she could cash in on pursuing charges. The bar for being a credible victim should not be perfection, but somehow we all feel a little duped, a bit conned because the maid isn’t the humble saint we created.

The whole episode I’m sure will be a movie someday. Probably one that like Reversal of Fortune or Bonfire of the Vanities explores issues of great wealth, masters of the universe who play by different rules, and lawyers who sell their services and maybe their souls. But the movie it reminds me of is the 1937 screwball comedy, Nothing Sacred. That’s the story of Hazel Flagg, a young woman from Vermont, who worked in a watch factory and was diagnosed with radium poisoning. A New York newspaper offers her a spree in New York and puts her up in a swell hotel. New Yorkers take her tragic story and courage to heart, celebrating her with girls’ clubs and many honors. But Hazel is not really dying. She found out she’d been misdiagnosed before she accepted the newspaper’s offer but she kept that secret and took what she could get. She hadn’t set out to lie, but she’s not who everyone thinks she is. She’s played by Carole Lombard, and we, the audience, are on her side the whole time. She was simply an opportunist, and what is more American than that?

Something happened between Strauss-Kahn and the housekeeper in that hotel room. No one is disputing that. It was either consensual or it wasn’t. There’s physical evidence that supports assault. We can ask ourselves which seems more likely, that Strauss-Kahn somehow “seduced” the housekeeper or that she was, as she has said attacked, My own belief is that it was more likely it happened the way the maid described it, but in Strauss-Kahn’s mind this may be a seduction. He may believe that he is irresistible, or that no means yes, or that certain kinds of woman are insatiable, or that all women are whores. That the alleged victim had a conversation about whether she could benefit financially from pursuing charges, does not make her less credible. Like Hazel Flagg, it makes her more American.

Better Than Sex — What Weiner Really Got Out of It

New York Stories, Politics and Culture, Things that Piss Me off from The NY Times, , , , ,

Many people are mystified that a smart man like Anthony Weiner, who did his job well, and seemed to have everything, could blow it so spectacularly.  But what he did had nothing to do with intelligence, or even with lust in its usual form. (One-handed surfing could have satisfied that need easily.)

The New York Times reports that Weiner knew he was being followed on Twitter by right-wingers suspicious of his activities and eager to catch him in the act.  There’s evidence that the Congressman was playing a game of cat and mouse with them, and in an interview he had three weeks ago, Weiner spoke about the risks of social media.   Even after numerous political “sex” scandals, including the recent resignation of Congressman Christopher Lee, who was also caught sending a shirtless photo, Weiner did not curtail his activities.

People who think that this was “about” sex, another example of monogamy’s being outmoded, have it wrong.

Bill Clinton’s getting a blowjob in the White House was about sex.  The most powerful man in the world was at heart an awkward adolescent who still could not believe that some pretty (albeit zaftig) young woman really, really, wanted him, and he was going to get some!  Right there in the Oval Office!  Like something JFK would have done!  He hadn’t asked for it.  He knew it was wrong, but when confronted with this gift, despite the risks, he couldn’t say no.

In Weiner’s case, there was no oral sex.  He’s a newlywed who was likely still getting laid at home, by a beautiful woman.  According to one of his virtual companions, there was some “sex chat” on the telephone.  Hardly close to the real thing.

Sex like drugs is a rush.  But where was the sex in this scandal?  And if not sex, what was he doing it for?  He’s not excusing his behavior by claiming to have been drunk or high.  He seems as bewildered as anyone.

The answer to the question “why” is simple. Danger was the drug of choice.  Weiner wasn’t pursuing women online in order to get off despite the risk. He was getting off because of the risk.  Risking it was the rush.  Gambling is a recognized addiction.   It might have started off with just joking around and flirting, but at some point knowing “they” were watching, waiting for him to slip up, made the stakes higher, and the game a whole lot more interesting.  You could lose everything with one click, but he kept on winning.

As he became even more known for his passionate political style and biting sound bites, there was more to lose and it was irresistible.   Marriage and the very real possibility of achieving his goal of becoming the Mayor of New York City, added to the thrill of possibly destroying it all every single time his thumbs got itchy and he’d grab his phone.

But he was playing too well.  His opponents couldn’t catch him.  He was too smart for an army of them.  And that must have felt like cheating death itself.

This was even better than sex with a goddess who happened to be the love of his life.   Here he was risking even that, risking his very existence, yet surviving and triumphing, again, and again and again.

Finally, like any gambler losing his streak, like any junkie who winds up on a slab, he screwed up.   It didn’t take one of his “conquests” setting him up.  His own thumb betrayed him as he publicly tweated the infamous underwear shot. Was it on purpose?  Maybe, in the same sense that someone hovering by a cliff long enough, will eventually slip.  Why they were hovering in the first place is the question.

And then he tried one last bluff — telling the press, he was hacked.  But it was over.  His heart wasn’t in it.   He knew he was done.  No finger wagging with a definitive, “I did not have sexts with that woman.”  Just a bewildered man, who knew enough not to ask his wife to accompany him when he stepped out to meet the press.

Some people worry about his mental state.  They’re right to do so.  Donald Manes was once upon the time Queens Borough President. He was accused of corruption and killed himself while under indictment.  Manes may have been bi-polar.  Bi-polar people are most at risk of suicide after a manic episode when they come back down to earth and see the consequences of their actions.  Weiner isn’t bi-polar.  He’s never been accused of the type of graft that Manes was indicted for. But like Manes, he is now, as a result of his actions facing a different future than the one he was looking at yesterday.  Weiner is a successful man, and successful people often aren’t very skilled at failure.  It hits them hard.

This isn’t about whether or not he should step down.  I leave that to the chattering classes and people at the water-cooler or the dinner table.  I would suggest that those who are his friends, however betrayed and angry they might feel, show him a little compassion, and those of us watching on the sidelines still snickering, we might find better uses for our time.

Bookstores are Dying: Does It Matter?

New York Stories, Politics and Culture, writing/blogging/publishing related,

Yes, bookstores are disappearing.  But I am shocked to find myself asking, “Does it matter?”

You had to feel just a touch of schadenfreude when the Barnes &Noble branches started to close.  Barnes & Noble in my youth was a store on lower Fifth Avenue.  It billed itself even then as the world’s largest bookstore.  Back before the days of superstores, it was so big that it was divided into a conventional bookstore on one side of the street, and a used book/textbook center on the other.   Then they went national and became the very model of a modern corporate-small-store-eating chain, the basis with Borders for Fox Books the shop that ate Meg Ryan’s Shop Around the Corner in the romanticized Upper West Side of You’ve Got Mail.

As the independents disappeared, Barnes & Noble, at least in New York, became a place that tried to promote authors and work with the locals. Readings and signings happened often.  The Barnes & Noble on 67th and Broadway was not only near Lincoln Center, but a couple of movie theaters as well, including my favorite, the Lincoln Plaza Cinema, known for showing off-beat independents and foreign films.  Barnes & Noble was a great place to go after you got your tickets and still had half an hour or so to kill.  But it is no more.

Last Sunday, I went to the movies.  This in itself is an increasingly rare occurance in the age of Netflix and instant downloads. Why would anyone leave their home and sit on chairs that might be bedbug infested next to strangers who probably have the flu and forgot to turn off their cellphones?

I made the mistake of not getting tickets online for the extra $2, The film was sold out so I had an hour and half before the next showing. With no Barnes & Noble available, I walked five blocks over to the Time Warner Center, the most mall-like structure in the City, only to find that while the Border’s was still there, it shut its doors at nine pm on Sunday nights.  That might work in Santa Fe — but in the Big Apple it just seemed weird, but then again so is the whole mall-in-Manhattan-thing and most New Yorkers probably don’t even know there is a bookstore on the second floor at Time Warner.  The Time Warner Mall, by the way, is best known for the statue of a very fat man with a small penis.  Japanese tourists in particular seem to find this hysterically funny and are constantly posing for pictures in front of it.

Yesterday, I ventured out of my neighborhood again, and found myself in the East Village with a little time to kill, so I stopped into the St. Mark’s Bookshop which hasn’t actually been on St. Mark’s Place in years, since the rents drove it out.  There on the display shelf in front was Meowmorphosis (I refuse to provide a link; you’ll have to find this one for yourself). This is a book whose conceit is that  Gregor Samsa awakes one day to find he’s been transformed into an adorable kitten.  This was a “collaboration” between a long-dead Kafka (Zombie-Kafka?)  and a pseudonymous fantasy writer working under the umbrella of the same clever lads who brought us the Jane Austen Zombie books.  Kafka, who of course, wanted all his manuscript burned,  seemed to intuit the holocaust.  I wonder if he saw this coming as well.

Given that this non-chainstore in what was not that long ago the city’s pre-eminent hipster stronghold is now reduced to selling cutsey over edgy, is there really any hope for bookstores at all or even a reason for their continued existence?

Just to clarify, I love books.  I don’t want to read all my books in tablet form.  I realize that booksellers are up against it.  Even the new and well-managed, Book Culture uptown where I live has taken to selling things that aren’t books — soaps, refrigerator magnets, fair-trade handicrafts like woven African baskets and scarves.  And if it keeps the place open, I’m not against it, but this doesn’t bode well.

Perhaps its personal bitterness showing through.  After setting up my own micro-press to print my opus, I found that most local bookstores weren’t willing to shelve it, even if purchased through Ingrams, or at deeper discount (with returns) through me or even given to them on consignment.  It didn’t move them if I offered to pack the place with friends for a reading.    They too are believers in the publishing system that is destroying them, and don’t want anything that bears the taint of self-publishing which they still mistake for vanity press.  So despite being a reader, and consumer of books, I feel as a writer, betrayed by the shopkeepers who don’t wish to be bothered by me and treat me like a pariah.  It’s like defending the homeless person who curses you out when you don’t place money in his cup.

I am for lack of alternatives, a Kindle writer.  My novel is available online worldwide in paperback and every e-book form.  My sales are modest and my name is mentioned on blogs that few have heard of, but at least I’m not paying tens of thousands each month for retail space used mostly by people in need of a public bathroom or with a few minutes to kill before their table is ready.   I don’t think I’ll be happy or sad when the last bookstore is gone.  It’ll  be more like hearing about a now dissolute old crush who wasn’t that into me to begin with and has now gained weight and is facing legal problems.

Please Sign Up for My New Religion

Politics and Culture, , ,

Woe onto us.  The earth was not destroyed, and despite some backtracking on the part of Mr. Camping, judgment does not appear to be upon us.

Yet, verily I say unto you that the entrepreneurial spirit is upon me and I am CALLED to start a new Church.  This will be called the Church of Whatever You Fucking Believe. There will be no ministers, rabbis, priests, imams, gurus or sensei.  The precepts are simple: Believe whatever the fuck you want.  Worship as you choose.

You want a heavenly afterlife?  You got it, baby.  You need the threat of hellfire to stay on the straight and narrow?  Not a problem.  Perhaps you worship a god or two with an elephant’s head or a monkey’s?  Why not?  Maybe dead people can speak through you, or you think God is dead.  Or maybe not dead, just gone out for a pack of cigarettes a couple of millennia ago, and hasn’t been heard from since.

Each week a “service” will be held.  Services will be held on either Saturday or Sunday or Monday evening.  The exact day of that week’s “worship” will be chosen though rock, paper, scissors. Why Saturday or Sunday?  Because most people have off from work, silly.  Why Monday night?  Because it’s pretty dead and a lot of restaurants and shows are closed.   Please note, there has been some feedback:  Services will not be held in America on Monday nights during football season.

Services will be lead  by a random congregant who will be picked through a lottery.  Don’t worry; we know you’ve read that story.  The lottery winner will not be stoned!  Wait a second. You didn’t read the story?  Oops!  Sorry about the spoiler.

The random congregant leading that week’s service gets to give a sermon on whatever topic he or she chooses, and the rest of the congregation is expected to listen politely, unless he or she says something really offensive that pisses them off, in which case they can rattle noisemakers that will be distributed before every service and pelt the leader with Nerf balls.  Paint balls, however, are strictly prohibited by the Church of Whatever You Fucking Believe.

The service itself will consist of reading from religious texts, works of philosophy, blogs, Pride and Prejudice, Pride and Prejudice with Zombies, treatises on Lost, or Lost in Space, song lyrics, words of the prophets written on subway walls or tenement halls, shopping lists, and/or anything else chosen by that week’s lucky congregant.

At the end of the service, there will be a collection plate passed around.  Proceeds will go to feed the hungry, and clothe the poor, or to whatever cause that week’s congregant is pitching, or even into his or her own pocket as long as there’s full disclosure.  That is after a percentage for the use of the hall and a percentage to the founder emeritus of the Church of Whatever You Fucking Believe.  That would be me.

Some Things to Consider Before Peddling Your Prose on Kindle

Politics and Culture, Things that Piss Me off from The NY Times, writing/blogging/publishing related, , , ,

God might not be calling his elect up today, but something truly extraordinary is taking place.  The gray lady herself, the esteemed New York Times, has an essay in the BOOK REVIEW section extolling self-publishing.

Neal Pollack who describes himself as “midlist, midcareer” finds that for a writer in his position, “self-publishing seems to make a lot of sense.”

He plans to put out a novel that he doesn’t believe would be the “easiest proposition for mainstream publishers” as the theme doesn’t involve vampires, but Jews and basketball and the length is short.  He plans to charge $4.99 and believes this will quickly earn him the equivalent of a pleasant advance.

He thinks there may be expenses including of course cover art and plane fare if he decides to do “readings and on-the-ground media in New York and Philadelphia where the book is set.”  He mentions a “modest print run.” Good luck with that, Neal.

Neal references Amanda Hocking (of course).  He writes of Stephen King’s e-book experiments, but he seems to have no real clue about what savvy self-publishers already know.   He writes, for instance, that he wouldn’t recommend self-publishing to a “first time author.”  Yet, several first time novelists who found the gates closed on traditional publishing have done quite well on their own.

I’m not an expert, nor am I Amanda Hocking for that matter.  My own experiment with self-publishing has yielded only modest results, but I know enough to know that Neal might want to do a little more research before setting out.  If you happen to have stumbled onto this, Neal, might I ask you to examine a few of your assumptions and assertions:

Price point:  $4.99? Yes, that’s half what Amazon is charging on Kindle for your book, Never Mind the Pollacks, The Literary Music of Neal Pollack which is not exactly flying off the shelves, but $4.99 is still considered a lot for a self-published e-book even by a previously published author.  Stephen Leather and JA Konrath have turned their back-lists into gold at 99 cents a piece, and even the New Yorker’s Susan Orlean who will be entering the fray with a short work to be published with some hoopla by Amazon, will be charging no more than $1.49.   Yes, you have a following, but maybe not at the Kindle Store yet or for the type of book you are planning.  Most of the bestsellers on Kindle are genre novels — mysteries, thrillers, and those “teen vampire” books you make fun of.  Books like the one you are writing don’t appeal to publishers because the market is small, not non-existent, just modest and the gamble on a print run may be not be one publishers can afford.  E-books cost less to produce.  But there’s a glut of high quality, self-published books selling for less than $4.99, on Kindle. You may find your market there, but it won’t be huge and you’ll have to work for it.  Your competition won’t be the $9.99 bestsellers from mainstream publishers, but the already known “independents” selling at 99 cents to $2.99 a pop.

Are you really in a position to give advice to first-time authors? You advise first-timers not to try self-publishing, lest they wind up in a “virtual slush pile.” Have you read anything about how difficult it is for someone, even someone with previous publishing credits to get a contract on a first novel these days, especially something like the one you’re publishing — a book with no vampires or zombies? The gates are shut.  Yet, if you look at the top hundred Kindle sellers in the US and UK Kindle store, you’ll see many “indie” writers unknown to publishers.  And if you take a peek at the genre lists, you’ll see even more.  I’m no insider, but I am actual virtual friends with three “first-time” writers who are bestselling authors. Lexi Revellian’s book Remix, was in the top 100 in Amazon UK for months.  It’s now down to around 126, but her new one Replica is holding at 50.  Jake Barton’s Burn Baby Burn is #26 in the UK, and he has two others that aren’t doing badly.  Dan Holloway’s first “indie” literary novel, Songs from the Other Side of the Wall, got some good reviews but didn’t take off.  His thriller, set in Oxford, The Company of Fellows is holding its own in the top 50 in the category of “mysteries and thrillers.”

Think about that “modest print run” you propose and find some alternative uses for the print books you don’t sell — doorstops, kindling, etc:  Print runs cost money.  Many successful independently published writers aren’t even bothering with them, especially for shorter books.  Those that do, generally use print-on-demand.  Traditional printing is less expensive for a run of a thousand books or more, but it’s still going to be both a huge risk and a substantial out-of-pocket expense. I hate to break this to you, but getting your independently published book into bookstores is going to be difficult.  Prepare for rejection like you’ve never seen it.   As for your plan to do “on the ground media” in New York and Philadelphia, there are tons of local authors trying to get readings at stores and to get their books onto shelves.  It doesn’t sound like you’ve thought through the pitfalls, including the 55% discount and return policies that online and brick and mortar bookstores demand.

I’m not trying to be discouraging, Neal.  This isn’t an exclusive club. Nobody needs an invitation.  Granted, you have experience that many first-time self-publishers lack.  You’ve done book publicity before, you have a name and a following, and you are a professional.  But this is still a new game, and you’ll play better if you learn the rules before you jump in.  Your essay in the Times implies an access to media that most new independent authors lack, but I hate to break this to you, the readers of The New York Times Book Review aren’t necessarily the biggest e-book buyers or purchasers of the self-published. Your potential readers are in places like Big Al’s Books and Pals, Kindle Boards, and RedAdept Reviews.  Ever heard of them?  If the answer is no, you have a lot to learn.