Category: Current Affairs

Some Bonds Can’t Be Cashed In

 

Barry Bonds was convicted of obstruction of justice in the BALCO case. Apparently our government has spent something like $50 million on this effort. It’s stunning on multiple fronts. Bonds won’t have to serve any jail time and isn’t banned from working Major League Baseball. Typically, a player with his pedigree would have his pick of jobs but that won’t happen for Bonds.

 

ESPN’s Tim Kurkjian says that the taint of steroids is too strong for baseball teams to take a chance by hiring a player who is associated with the drugs. That’s why Barry Bonds won’t be employed by a major league team again. I disagree strongly with his reasoning.

 

Mark McGwire's job as the hitting coach in St. Louis is evidence that it's not about steroids; it's about personality. If you're beloved, you're more easily forgiven. In ‘98 McGwire lied repeatedly about his use of PEDs but he's been given a chance to work in MLB again. He never demonstrated any attempt to give back any gains he made from his drug use. He never donated the money he made or asked to be removed from the record books. Nope. He just apologized.

 

And that was enough apparently to gain a high level of forgiveness. There were virtually no fans who were abusive to him as the Cardinals traveled this season and his history only came up a couple times during the teams unlikely run to a World Series championship. Big Mac is back!

 

The contrast could not be clearer when it comes to Barry Bonds. As much as some people would like to see Bonds back in the game, it won't happen simply because he won't a) put on the cape of public contrition or b) have the fan support to allow a team to hire him without issue. The Giants know that he (and they) would be publicly vilified as soon as he wore their uniform again, even as a hitting coach just like McGwire. 

 

Ultimately, Kurkjian is right and Bonds is likely done with MLB.  (Rather, MLB is likely done with Bonds.)  But don’t believe that it’s because of what he did. After all, we now know that scores of players knowingly, willingly and deliberately took PEDs. It’s not the what; it’s the who. And that’s the last sad chapter of this entirely sad story.   

 

 

FDO

 

 

Average Obama

 

I liked President Obama’s Osawatomie speech and recognize the obvious resonances it has with Teddy Roosevelt’s  New Nationalism  speech. That connection has been made in multiple places and is well worth reading and reading about. I think Obama's speech was the start of something else too. Something with great potential for Obama’s re-election campaign against Mitt Romney in 2012*. I mean the re-branding of the President as “Barack Obama, regular American.”

 

I believe that in this campaign Obama will try to present himself as a typical American with a very American story. Even though he has often been defined as an outsider, I don’t think that Obama has ever believed that to be true. Obama considers himself to be quintessentially American. That belief will be easier to spread to the public at large if Obama is running against Willard Mitt Romney.

(Much in the way that Obama’s middle name became a campaign issue, I’m convinced that Romney’s first name will be tossed about and made the subject of jokes. I assume the story about Mitt being named after George Romney’s best friend Willard Marriott is true. That’s not gonna be helpful.)

 

Obama’s campaign will work hard to present Romney as the embodiment of America’s elite. Romney is, after all, the son of a governor and was born into a highly affluent family. His own professional career has placed him squarely in the 1% as defined by Occupy Wall Street. In 2000, those would have been helpful characteristics but in the midst of our Great Recession, economic privilege is no longer perceived as indicative of inherent merit. Instead, his extraordinary level of privilege is probably a major detriment to Romney’s candidacy.

 

Obama’s own American story is well known and his recent speech cleverly emphasized his rootedness via his family of regular folks from Kansas. His single mom spent time on public assistance rolls and Obama only became an elite himself through educational attainment. He legitimately is a contemporary Horatio Alger. Even as an adult, his South Side of Chicago bona fides are clearly intact. Describing his career as working for the people of his community as opposed to having the people work for him will be a winning presentation.

 

And while folks often describe Obama’s rise to national prominence as meteoric, he will be able to define himself as a political plugger compared to Romney. Obama’s political career began in the Illinois State Senate before moving on to the US Senate and then the White House. He has been an elected official since 1997. Obama can reasonably describe himself as having climbed the political ladder, albeit with tremendous speed. Romney’s sole electoral victory was his one term as Massachusetts governor. In just those four years, Romney made many choices he has since disavowed. While I personally believe Romney’s Olympic experience is very impressive, I doubt that he’ll be able to use that time as a proxy for holding office.

 

There will likely be one other interesting area in which Obama can define himself as average and Romney as exceptional: religion. Obama’s Chicago church experience was a problem for him in 2008 but in 2012 it’ll be a big advantage. Jeremiah Wright is old news and the President has so comfortably and consistently invoked God that his religiosity seems safe, normal and generically American. Romney’s Mormonism makes him suspect in the eyes of many and makes him an outsider in the eyes of many more.  I don’t want to link to some of the vicious portrayals of Mormonism in the world of mainstream punditry but it’s very easy to find scary talk about Romney’s church. The ham handed “I’m a Mormon” campaign might have helped had it begun several years ago but in the short term it will likely make Romney (and Jon Huntsman) seem even more suspicious to non-Mormon conservative Christians.

 

In terms of family, work and faith, Obama can claim common cause with ‘the American people’ in ways that Romney simply can’t. It’s a strange world wherein the half-Black guy with the Arabic name can present himself as more authentically American than the White guy who looks like middle age Superman but I think that’s what we will begin to see in the next few months. Perhaps even more strangely, I think it’s gonna work.

 

 

FDO

 

*- I've been asked if any of this applies to the President if Newt Gingrich were the GOP nominee.

2 responses- 1- If Newt's the guy, Obama won't have much to worry about anyway. 2- Yes! Obama's team will paint a picture of the President, First Lady and their two young daughters compared to Newt's 3 marriages, adulterous affairs, Clinton era sexual hypocrisy, the cancer-ridden wife divorce story and late in life conversion to Catholicism. That's a lotta grist for the campaign mill.

 

Combine that with the difference between making lots of money by writing books about your family and making lots of money by using your government contacts to (almost) lobby for corporations and it's game over. 

 

 

 

Obama’s Magic Number

 

This weekend is the most confident I’ve felt concerning President Obama’s re-election chances. The key element in this feeling is a single number, 8.6%.  That’s our current unemployment rate. It’s a clear, surprising improvement from all our recent numbers. There are lots of important caveats to consider and 8.6% is not ideal… but relatively speaking, Obama can point to this figure as a very clear indicator of positive movement in the economy.

 

In terms of foreign policy, I’d argue that Obama’s term has been much more successful than anyone could have reasonably asked. Unfortunately for him, America’s so tired of looking beyond our shores, the President’s team will have to work to remind people of his litany of accomplishment. We’re focused on home.

 

While the economy continues to sag and broad successes are hard to find, being able to tout a specific number like an 8.6% unemployment rate will give voters the impression that the economic climate is improving.  Considering the weakness of the GOP field, this kind of improvement will probably be enough to secure a second Obama term.

 

 

FDO

 

 

NBA Fan Opt Out

 

No, I don’t want to encourage anyone to abandon the NBA, whenever it returns. We should welcome it with open arms. We should not be so kind to the owners who have deprived us of games. As a response to this ultra public manifestation of corporate greed, basketball fans should opt of using NBA owners’ businesses. Again, not their playthings, our beloved NBA teams, but the businesses that provide these guys enough money they can feel comfortable simply choosing not to have a season.

 

If you have to choose between Quicken Loans (Cav owner Dan Gilbert’s company) and Speedy Pay, choose Speedy Pay.  It may be surprising to discover how much of a game these negotiations are for some owners for whom the money involved is miniscule. See Paul Allen.

 

The owners have already gained immense concessions from the players’ union, not because the players have done anything wrong, but because the owners made bad business decisions. Those concessions have still not been enough for them. The players ARE the product yet they are being forced to accept far less of the revenue THEY produce. The owners’ stance is profoundly anti-worker, anti-union and greedy.

 

The best way to express our disapproval is to use the voice owners are sure to hear; our wallets. This is not a fight between Billionaires and Millionaires. It’s a fight working people, some of whom are millionaires, and their bosses, all of whom are worth more than anyone most of us will ever even meet. Roger Mason Jr. signs the back of his check while Jim Dolan’s name is pre-printed on the front of it.

 

Whose side are you on?

 

FDO

 

PS- To be sure, NBA players have jobs many of us dream about. But the guys we typically think about are the rare exceptions even in that world. For every Tim Duncan and Paul Pierce who have long careers at top dollar, there are dozens of guys who have short careers with league minimum salaries. It’s clearly those folks who need to preserve their incomes; Dwight Howard and Dywane Wade are gonna get theirs. 

 

 

Say It Loud!*

*- I've linked to a great article at the bottom of the page. It helpfully amplifies some of what is already here. 

 

 

Occupy Wall Street is an interesting manifestation of a new recognition of increased people power. Part of what excites me most about it is that I believe OWS is just one indication of how (many) things are changing in American life.


Two examples: Last month, Netflix announced that it was shelving the revolutionary new business model they’d been trumpeting. Not because the business model made too little sense but because the backlash against it was so strong. People didn’t care how much sense it made; they balked. Similarly, Bank of America has ended its proposed debit card usage fee. Bank of America could have weathered the storm of negative feedback better than Netflix but it recognized that the brand damage the fee generated was coming to dominate every story about the bank. Had these same changes been instituted five years ago, I’m convinced that the public response would have been a brief gasp of distress followed by a long, boring sigh.

 

Now that sigh does not seem to be enough for us. I don’t want to make any grandiose statements but I do believe that there’s a quickly increasing sense of agency among regular people. While most would probably trace this change to the Arab Spring movements, I think that it goes back a bit further. I am convinced that the 2008 Presidential election was a critical turning point in developing populism for the 21st century. After all, much of the early work of the Arab Spring seemed to take important cues from Barack Obama’s campaign.

 

Most critically, each of these populist movements created a broad enough range of connection points to transform individual interests into a perceived network of shared values.  Social media was widely credited with the successes of both the Obama campaign and Arab Spring. What I believe to be more true is that both movements used social media as a formation tool. Eventually, the networks grew large enough and loud enough to be perceived as an authentic voice of the people and achieved enough momentum to become virtually self-sustaining.

 

As much as they’d hate to acknowledge it, the TEA Party has used much of the same style to launch itself as a viable national brand. Much like Obama, the TEA Party presents itself as the representative of the regular person fighting against ‘The System’. They’ve made good use of some pre-existing networks but have built their own communities too as they continue to work outside the existing infrastructure. Preserving their independence provides them autonomy and credibility with their base.  

 

All these movements have rooted themselves in the belief that individuals and small groups of people can make the behemoths of the world yield power. At least in America, we’d forgotten about the ultimate source of that power. For too long, we’d neglected our own strength. I’m excited to be living in a time when we’re beginning to reclaim our voices and use them.

 

I’m determined to be one of those voices.

 

 

FDO

 

Here’s an intriguing article that addresses some of the issues I wrote about in this post, namely, some of the ways social media is changing the organizational possibilities of broad based movements. The author also suggests some of the ways groups like Wikileaks make information sharing more dangerous.

http://www.capitaljewishforum.org/jeffrey-bleich-from-obama-rsquo08-to-the-arab-spring-ndash-the-political-impact-of-social-media.html

 

Lessons of Andrew Johnson

 

I’m reading an interesting biography of Andrew Johnson by Annette Gordon-Reed. Her primary contention is that Johnson was a wonderfully talented man who rose far beyond the expectations of his birth. Johnson utterly failed to recognize that his ability to transcend his station came from the sheer accident of his Whiteness.

 

Johnson’s intense disdain for the aristocrats of the South was almost entirely about the status of poor Southern Whites. He never connected the condition of poor Whites and poor Blacks who were slaves then newly freed people. It’s sad that the poor of America’s 21st century still struggle so much to make cross-racial coalitions.

 

It's amazing that we can still learn so much from one of the 19th century's most dramatic failures.

 

 

FDO

 

Gay Marriage as a Civil Rights Issue

 

I believe that marriage is a public expression of a private relationship. Folks are allowed to think their own thoughts about the private element of any relationship. However, in the respects that marriage is a public issue, isn’t allowing same gender marriage simply a matter of civil rights? How can our society feel comfortable picking and choosing which people are allowed to participate within our legal frameworks?

 

The array of legal and economic benefits that marriage provides is astonishing. Telling people that the gender of their spouse should disqualify them from receiving those benefits is an obvious injustice. Yet, that’s what most of the states continue to do. It was more than forty years ago that miscegenation laws were finally lifted via Loving v. Virginia. Those laws denied marriage rights to people based on the race of their spouses. What’s the difference between race and gender here?

 

I hope that we move quickly enough toward marriage equality for homosexual couples that we don’t need another Loving case but until then I’d like to share a brief statement my wife and I included in our wedding program.

  

We appreciate and respect the values and benefits of marriage, thus it saddens us that not everyone is allowed this opportunity. Fifty years ago, our marriage would have been illegal in most states. Now, it seems clear that making different laws based on race is discriminatory and wrong. We think that making different laws based on sexual orientation is also discriminatory and wrong.

Please join us in supporting laws, initiatives and politicians who advocate marriage rights for everyone. Let love be the highest law.

 

 

FDO

Slowly but Surely

 

More thoughts on the New York gay marriage victory soon. In the meantime, here's part of a post about gay marriage I wrote last August. It feels appropriate today.

 

 

While judicial decisions are critical stepping stones, it is ultimately the support of the American people that generates the permanent force of change. That change is occurring. Most people I suggest this to think I’m crazy but I believe that gay marriage will be legal in half the states by 2020. That's my hope and my prediction. We're on the way, people. Slowly but surely. We're on the way. 

 

 

FDO

 

GOP Debate in New Hampshire… New Hampshire?!?

 

I’m excited for the GOP Presidential debate tonight. It’s such a peculiar field of candidates that I don’t understand who will or should look best. Some of these folks are just not viable contenders in the long term but can be important players in the process.

 

What an odd mix! There are only two current office holders in this debate, Michele Bachmann and Ron Paul, and they’re both in the House. I recognize that the GOP is very anti-government these days but even if you pretend that the government is the biggest problem in America, don’t we all want someone connected to the government to run it? It certainly seemed that that’s what the GOP wanted in 2008 when Senator McCain’s biggest campaign speaking point was his depth of experience. Aye carumba.

 

If nothing else, I’ll be curious to see which of these folks attack each other. While they’ll all attack President Obama (especially Herman Cain*), I wonder if the speculation is true that it will also be a gang attack on Mitt Romney. Although I understand why that would be appealing, there’s also the clear possibility that Romney could use those attacks to present himself as the outsider. And as we all know, America loves an underdog. Even a fabulously wealthy, ultra-successful outsider. So much good political fun ahead!

 

FDO

 

*- A friend forwarded me this interesting piece of speculation on Cain’s likely role in this process. Racists? Why would someone think Tea Partiers have racist leanings?