Jerry Seinfeld did a web series this summer called "Comedians In Cars Getting Coffee" with guests like Ricky Gervais, Larry David, and Bob Einstein. Some of the episodes were funny, some were boring, some were overly self-indulgent. But this week's is the best of the bunch because it features Carl Reiner and Mel Brooks sitting in Reiner's living room, where the two comedy legends and friends of 62 years spend every night eating dinner off TV trays while watching "Jeopardy" and movies now that their wives are gone. They tell stories, they do shtick, they get mustard on their faces, and Seinfeld realizes that Mel has no idea what he does in his stand-up act.
After you watch those 17 minutes, click on the Spare Parts at the bottom of that site and watch the first one, in which they talk about ending a TV show at its peak -- as both "Seinfeld" and Reiner's "Dick Van Dyke Show" did -- despite network entreaties (and big checks) to continue.
30 Eylül 2012 Pazar
Seinfeld, Reiner, and Brooks
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Steve Sabol, NFL Films
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He made about a half-dozen appearances on my radio shows in the 1990s, always had great stories to share, and put up with my obsessive questions about process -- explaining how NFL Films shot from different angles from everyone else, convinced players and coaches to wear microphones, and managed to get amazing footage of every game in the league, then ship it back to Cherry Hill, New Jersey, to process, edit, score, and produce, often in less than 72 hours. This was all in the pre-digital, pre-instant-transmission era, when he had employees carry the cans of film from each home city on their laps as they were taken to the airport by a police escort to fly back to NFLF headquarters.
I hadn't talked to Sabol for over a decade, unfortunately, but was sad to learn of his death, and also sad to read this Robert Weintraub piece about how the future of NFL Films looks dim because of the way the league is treating its product.
I'd been fascinated by NFLF's work for years, watching the 30-minute "Game Of The Week" and "This Week In The NFL" telecasts, with the basso profundo of John Facenda narrating it all as if it were an epic. I was also taken by the original music Sabol commissioned, so much so that when he released a CD compilation, I went out and bought it, then listened as I imagined the frozen tundra of Lambeau Field.
When we had our first conversation in September, 1991, I started by asking about the music, specifically why he used "What Do You Do With A Drunken Sailor?" as the theme for one of his first NFL Films. We chatted for a few minutes, then he and my sports guy Dave The Predictor made their picks for that weekend's games. As you'll hear, Sabol wasn't shy about voicing his opinions, and at the end he correctly forecast the two teams that went on to play in Super Bowl XXVI, although he chose the wrong one to win it.
Listen, then click here to subscribe to these podcasts via iTunes!
He made about a half-dozen appearances on my radio shows in the 1990s, always had great stories to share, and put up with my obsessive questions about process -- explaining how NFL Films shot from different angles from everyone else, convinced players and coaches to wear microphones, and managed to get amazing footage of every game in the league, then ship it back to Cherry Hill, New Jersey, to process, edit, score, and produce, often in less than 72 hours. This was all in the pre-digital, pre-instant-transmission era, when he had employees carry the cans of film from each home city on their laps as they were taken to the airport by a police escort to fly back to NFLF headquarters.
I hadn't talked to Sabol for over a decade, unfortunately, but was sad to learn of his death, and also sad to read this Robert Weintraub piece about how the future of NFL Films looks dim because of the way the league is treating its product.
I'd been fascinated by NFLF's work for years, watching the 30-minute "Game Of The Week" and "This Week In The NFL" telecasts, with the basso profundo of John Facenda narrating it all as if it were an epic. I was also taken by the original music Sabol commissioned, so much so that when he released a CD compilation, I went out and bought it, then listened as I imagined the frozen tundra of Lambeau Field.
When we had our first conversation in September, 1991, I started by asking about the music, specifically why he used "What Do You Do With A Drunken Sailor?" as the theme for one of his first NFL Films. We chatted for a few minutes, then he and my sports guy Dave The Predictor made their picks for that weekend's games. As you'll hear, Sabol wasn't shy about voicing his opinions, and at the end he correctly forecast the two teams that went on to play in Super Bowl XXVI, although he chose the wrong one to win it.
Listen, then click here to subscribe to these podcasts via iTunes!
The Blue Cheese Conundrum
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Yesterday, a friend and I wanted a couple of Cobb salads to go from a restaurant. When I called to place the order, I asked the waitress to make sure there was no blue cheese on mine. "No problem," she replied. "We'll see," I thought.
When we went to pick up our food, there was one regular styrofoam container and another with the words "no blue cheese" written on it. Familiar with the "always check your order" rule, we opened them to take a look and they both had blue cheese on top. We could not figure out how this happened. If you can, let me know.
This was our thinking: if neither container had anything written on it, but both had blue cheese, I'd assume the order wasn't transmitted to the chef correctly. If only one had blue cheese, but nothing was written, okay, I got what I asked for. But at what point did someone write "no blue cheese" on one of the containers if both of them had blue cheese? Did someone put the blue cheese in and then write the message on top? Did they pass it off to someone else who wrote it without checking?
By the way, the restaurant also had no setups (forks/knife/napkin) to give us. Not in the mood to eat salad with our hands, we asked a woman at a nearby food cart for utensils, which she graciously supplied. We walked away, shaking our heads at the multiple levels of incompetence we'd just encountered. Why bother with to-go orders if you don't have plasticware for your customers? How does the supply get depleted without someone noticing they're low and need to order more? That's why I didn't ask the restaurant to fix my order -- who knew what else there were capable of getting wrong? I pushed the blue cheese off to the side as I ate.
I was reminded of the time my wife and I were driving across Florida and pulled off to get lunch at a Burger King. After ordering burgers and fries, I asked for some ketchup and the cashier informed us they had run out. We were stunned. How are you out of the most-used condiment in the burger world? At lunchtime? Does "Have it your way" not apply in this franchise?
I noticed a Piggly Wiggly supermarket across the parking lot and thought, "Why don't you take $5 out of the register, go over there, and buy a couple of bottles of Heinz?" Notice I didn't actually say that to the Burger King cashier, because I'm sure she would have answered "we're not allowed to do that" or something similar from the world of no-rational-thinking-allowed-on-the-job. I'd had first-hand experience with this during my summer as a teenage McDonald's employee, when some of my colleagues clearly had their brains in neutral.
I also remember the time at another drive-through place when I asked, "Do you have root beer?" and the immediate response was, "No, but we do have Diet Sprite!" As if that's the fallback beverage for root beer. It's apparent Mensa membership is not a requirement for fast food employment.
With no ketchup to be had at this Burger King, we cancelled our order and went across the street to Wendy's, which had miraculously avoided The Great Ketchup Drought, so our burgers came with all of the appropriate condiments.
And no blue cheese.
Quick Hits
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Finally, in his "60 Minutes" interview last night, Romney tried to explain to Scott Pelley how he's going to lower taxes on people and corporations, but he claimed that by eliminating deductions, everyone's going to continue paying about the same amount they pay now, because:
A friend points out that while Mitt Romney is paying more taxes than he has to, he has a fail-safe -- if he loses the election, he can file an amended return, claim the deductions retroactively, reduce his tax rate, and get money back. Romney's counting on the fact that most Americans have no idea how the tax code works, with its loopholes and deductions exploited primarily by the wealthy. He's also hoping you don't remember that he said, during a GOP primary debate in January:
I pay all the taxes that are legally required and not a dollar more. I don’t think you want someone as the candidate for president who pays more taxes than he owes.Then there's this quote from Romney about airplane windows, made to the LA Times Saturday night after Ann Romney's plane had to make an emergency landing when an electrical fire filled the cabin with smoke:
When you have a fire in an aircraft, there's no place to go, exactly, there's no - and you can't find any oxygen from outside the aircraft to get in the aircraft, because the windows don't open. I don't know why they don't do that. It's a real problem. So it's very dangerous.Really, Mitt? You don't know why airplane passengers can't open the windows? I know the GOP scores poorly on all things scientific, but you might want to look up the word pressurization.
Finally, in his "60 Minutes" interview last night, Romney tried to explain to Scott Pelley how he's going to lower taxes on people and corporations, but he claimed that by eliminating deductions, everyone's going to continue paying about the same amount they pay now, because:
I don't want a reduction in revenue coming into the government.I thought that was the whole idea of the tea party and the right-wing fiscal policy -- have the government take less and do less. If everyone's going to pay the same amount we pay now (highly unlikely!), how does that solve anything? Oh, right, we're not allowed to ask about specifics.
Blowing It In The NFL
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My tweets after the horrible calls by the refs during -- and especially at the end of -- the Green Bay/Seattle game tonight:
- This was the worst ruling by officials since those replacement justices blew the call at the end of the big Gore-Bush game 12 years ago.
- I wonder how Wisconsin's anti-union Governor Walker feels about his state's only NFL team being screwed on nat'l TV by non-union scab refs.
- Ironic that Steve Sabol, who did more to build the NFL brand than many, died last week -- just as the brand is being destroyed by league HQ.
- In retrospect, the '87 NFL scab players season seems 1,000% better than this scab referees season. How can Goodell not see the damage?
29 Eylül 2012 Cumartesi
The Hunger Games
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I finally got a chance to see the Hunger Games. With all the hype around the DVD release, how could I not ... especially since I felt left out of all the buzz when the movie made it's future release. And in fact I distinctly remember getting grief from my friends for not going to the theater since they all thought it was going to be the next big movie "brand".
As I hit the "on demand" button, I felt a sinking feeling of being disappointed. Generally when you see a movie with this much attention after the fact, it's very anti-climatic. Boy was I wrong.
I loved it. Loved it. The movie was so well written, so well designed, so well filmed ... it was a piece of art. I loved it.
The best part? I couldn't get over the parallels to reality television today, especially for some reason American Idol. I just found the primping and the prodding and the rivalries and the drama so similar to American Idol. The movie was such a great satirical story on the state of our current reality television.
Is it the next big movie "brand?" Given the anticipation for the next installment, it just might be. I have not seen a lot of spin off merchandise yet, but I imagine that is coming.
Did you see it? What's your experience? Jim.
Jim Joseph
President, Cohn & Wolfe NA
Author, The Experience Effect series
Professor, NYU
I finally got a chance to see the Hunger Games. With all the hype around the DVD release, how could I not ... especially since I felt left out of all the buzz when the movie made it's future release. And in fact I distinctly remember getting grief from my friends for not going to the theater since they all thought it was going to be the next big movie "brand".
As I hit the "on demand" button, I felt a sinking feeling of being disappointed. Generally when you see a movie with this much attention after the fact, it's very anti-climatic. Boy was I wrong.
I loved it. Loved it. The movie was so well written, so well designed, so well filmed ... it was a piece of art. I loved it.
The best part? I couldn't get over the parallels to reality television today, especially for some reason American Idol. I just found the primping and the prodding and the rivalries and the drama so similar to American Idol. The movie was such a great satirical story on the state of our current reality television.
Is it the next big movie "brand?" Given the anticipation for the next installment, it just might be. I have not seen a lot of spin off merchandise yet, but I imagine that is coming.
Did you see it? What's your experience? Jim.
Jim Joseph
President, Cohn & Wolfe NA
Author, The Experience Effect series
Professor, NYU
Katie
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Seems like ever since Oprah hit her stride, we've been looking for the next Oprah. So obviously when she left her slot in daytime television, the quest for the next Oprah heated up. Truth be told, it will never happen. There will never be another Oprah, so we need to stop trying. Some have made the attempt, but that brand will never be replaced IMHO.
So when Katie Couric announced her new daytime show, I thought to myself "here we go again" ... the search for the next Oprah. Much to my amazement, though, the comparison hasn't really been made and hence the expectations have not been set.
Know what happened? Katie is a smash. Not because she's trying to be brand Oprah, but because she already is brand Katie. We lost her for a little while when she personally went off her brand and got too serious on the CBS Evening News. That wasn't brand Katie, and she lost her audience. We like a little serious from Katie, but we like all the rest of her too. Her new show, Katie, brings back the brand much to our delight, and her audience has followed right along.
It's not like she pulled out the HUGE celebrities to kick off her show. Sure, there were some there but for the most part it was just Katie being Katie with her Katie clan ... the Katie were grew to love and admire and want more of. Now we can get her ... in daytime television.
Have you seen the show? What's your experience? Jim.
Jim Joseph
President, Cohn & Wolfe NA
Author, The Experience Effect series
Professor, NYU
PS - Join us Sunday night, 9/23, for live tweets about the marketing during The Emmy Awards at 6:30EST at #EmmyExp ... tweet you there!
Seems like ever since Oprah hit her stride, we've been looking for the next Oprah. So obviously when she left her slot in daytime television, the quest for the next Oprah heated up. Truth be told, it will never happen. There will never be another Oprah, so we need to stop trying. Some have made the attempt, but that brand will never be replaced IMHO.
So when Katie Couric announced her new daytime show, I thought to myself "here we go again" ... the search for the next Oprah. Much to my amazement, though, the comparison hasn't really been made and hence the expectations have not been set.
Know what happened? Katie is a smash. Not because she's trying to be brand Oprah, but because she already is brand Katie. We lost her for a little while when she personally went off her brand and got too serious on the CBS Evening News. That wasn't brand Katie, and she lost her audience. We like a little serious from Katie, but we like all the rest of her too. Her new show, Katie, brings back the brand much to our delight, and her audience has followed right along.
It's not like she pulled out the HUGE celebrities to kick off her show. Sure, there were some there but for the most part it was just Katie being Katie with her Katie clan ... the Katie were grew to love and admire and want more of. Now we can get her ... in daytime television.
Have you seen the show? What's your experience? Jim.
Jim Joseph
President, Cohn & Wolfe NA
Author, The Experience Effect series
Professor, NYU
PS - Join us Sunday night, 9/23, for live tweets about the marketing during The Emmy Awards at 6:30EST at #EmmyExp ... tweet you there!
#EmmyExp
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It's time for #EmmyExp - a little Twitter party I will host during The Emmy Awards on September 23rd!
Those of you who have joined my Twitter parties before know that we have a blast! We participate in major pop culture events and comment on the marketing ... and well some other stuff too.
So coming up Sunday are the Emmy Awards ... a perfect event for us to start commenting. There is sure to be a lot of marketing and a lot of dishing so please join in on the live tweeting.
I am so psyched to announce that I will have a co-host this time around ... Helayne Spivak, the new Director at the Brand Center of VCU (Virginia Commonwealth University). Helayne is a whip ... a true creative with a mind for brands. She's run some of the largest advertising creative departments on the planet and now she is bringing her branding and creative expertise to the next generation. Now I know we will have a good time!
We will start at 6:30pm EST on Sunday 9/23/12 so that we can jump in on the red carpet action on E!, and then flip over to the telecast. Jimmy Kimmel is the host, so that should bring a whole new layer to it all.
The hashtag on Twitter will be #EmmyExp. We'll hang in for as long as we are having fun.
@JimJosephExp
@HRSpivak
Just so you know, social engagement during these kinds of events on the rise. We are not the only ones! Here's a recap of the top 5 "social moments" as ranked recently by AdWeek so far for 2012:
- Grammy Awards
- BET Awards
- Opening Ceremony of the Olympics
- Academy Awards
- MTV Video Music Awards
Will the Emmys top the list? Join us at #EmmyExp.
See you Sunday night at 6:30EST where Helayne and I will ask you, "What's your experience?" Jim.
Jim Joseph
President, Cohn & Wolfe NA
Author, The Experience Effect series
Professor, NYU
It's time for #EmmyExp - a little Twitter party I will host during The Emmy Awards on September 23rd!Those of you who have joined my Twitter parties before know that we have a blast! We participate in major pop culture events and comment on the marketing ... and well some other stuff too.
So coming up Sunday are the Emmy Awards ... a perfect event for us to start commenting. There is sure to be a lot of marketing and a lot of dishing so please join in on the live tweeting.
I am so psyched to announce that I will have a co-host this time around ... Helayne Spivak, the new Director at the Brand Center of VCU (Virginia Commonwealth University). Helayne is a whip ... a true creative with a mind for brands. She's run some of the largest advertising creative departments on the planet and now she is bringing her branding and creative expertise to the next generation. Now I know we will have a good time!
The hashtag on Twitter will be #EmmyExp. We'll hang in for as long as we are having fun.
@JimJosephExp
@HRSpivak
Just so you know, social engagement during these kinds of events on the rise. We are not the only ones! Here's a recap of the top 5 "social moments" as ranked recently by AdWeek so far for 2012:
- Grammy Awards
- BET Awards
- Opening Ceremony of the Olympics
- Academy Awards
- MTV Video Music Awards
Will the Emmys top the list? Join us at #EmmyExp.
See you Sunday night at 6:30EST where Helayne and I will ask you, "What's your experience?" Jim.
Jim Joseph
President, Cohn & Wolfe NA
Author, The Experience Effect series
Professor, NYU
Mr. Clean Car Wash
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Yesterday I commented on Tide expanding its brand into Dry Cleaning establishments ... such a great example of a brand broadly expanding yet staying true to its essence. Love it.
Then I come to find out that Mr. Clean has also expanded into Car Washes. Mr. Clean Car Washes! Now both of these brands are from the Procter & Gamble portfolio of brands so it shouldn't be surprising to see another brand do an equity expansion.
I love this one just as much as the dry cleaners. It makes total sense for Mr. Clean to do car washes, total sense. Although admitedly, I may have gone with a home cleaning service personally (can you imagine the liability!). And once again, we see the Procter & Gamble dedication to adding value to the experience.
I was talking to a colleague about this and she opened my eyes even further. While on the surface these both feel like smart brand extensions and probably profitable franchise deals, they are also an attempt to bring these great national brands into local communities ... right next to where the brands' consumers are living their lives. Right into their neighborhoods. That is brilliant. Plus, the brands are taking what have been traditional inconsistent brand experiences, and adding the promise of brand value to the whole experience. In this case the experience of taking your clothes to the dry cleaner or taking your car to get washed.
So what's next? Pantene hair salons? Venus hair removal stations?
What's your experience? Jim.
Jim Joseph
President, Cohn & Wolfe NA
Author, The Experience Effect series
Marketing Professor, NYU
I love this one just as much as the dry cleaners. It makes total sense for Mr. Clean to do car washes, total sense. Although admitedly, I may have gone with a home cleaning service personally (can you imagine the liability!). And once again, we see the Procter & Gamble dedication to adding value to the experience.
I was talking to a colleague about this and she opened my eyes even further. While on the surface these both feel like smart brand extensions and probably profitable franchise deals, they are also an attempt to bring these great national brands into local communities ... right next to where the brands' consumers are living their lives. Right into their neighborhoods. That is brilliant. Plus, the brands are taking what have been traditional inconsistent brand experiences, and adding the promise of brand value to the whole experience. In this case the experience of taking your clothes to the dry cleaner or taking your car to get washed.
So what's next? Pantene hair salons? Venus hair removal stations?
What's your experience? Jim.
Jim Joseph
President, Cohn & Wolfe NA
Author, The Experience Effect series
Marketing Professor, NYU
Elmo Chooses Apples
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It doesn't take a super hero to notice that using popular pop-culture characters as part of a brand experience can certainly help sell products. Almost every major studio releases of an action adventure film comes complete with an entire roster of brands that co-promote. We see this in the cereal aisle, as well as in cookies, snacks, candy ... a whole host of food categories and beyond.
So why not fruit? Fruit!
If such promotions help sell packaged goods, why wouldn't they help sell apples and oranges and bananas?
Some folks at my alma mater, Cornell University, conducted a test to see and you know what ... they found out that Elmo can help sell apples too! That's right, in a comprehensive study, researchers found that children did in fact choose apples with stickers of Elmo on them over cookies.
Well, it kind of makes sense. In many cases, the kids are not thinking necessarily about what they feel like eating. They are merely reacting, with all of their senses, to what they see around them. They are reacting to a brand experience. If there's a familiar character that they love attracting their attention, why wouldn't they reach out and want to be a part of it? In this case, the brand has added value beyond just the product, making it a better choice.
Beyond the obvious, I think the lesson here is that observing and leveraging marketing tactics that work in one category (packaged goods) and applying them to another (fresh fruits and vegetables) is a good thing ... like I always say, "marketing is a spectator sport!" Or as I've heard many a marketer say, "search and reapply!"
What's your experience? Jim.
Jim Joseph
President, Cohn & Wolfe NA
Author, The Experience Effect series
Marketing Professor, NYU
It doesn't take a super hero to notice that using popular pop-culture characters as part of a brand experience can certainly help sell products. Almost every major studio releases of an action adventure film comes complete with an entire roster of brands that co-promote. We see this in the cereal aisle, as well as in cookies, snacks, candy ... a whole host of food categories and beyond.
So why not fruit? Fruit!
If such promotions help sell packaged goods, why wouldn't they help sell apples and oranges and bananas?
Some folks at my alma mater, Cornell University, conducted a test to see and you know what ... they found out that Elmo can help sell apples too! That's right, in a comprehensive study, researchers found that children did in fact choose apples with stickers of Elmo on them over cookies.
Well, it kind of makes sense. In many cases, the kids are not thinking necessarily about what they feel like eating. They are merely reacting, with all of their senses, to what they see around them. They are reacting to a brand experience. If there's a familiar character that they love attracting their attention, why wouldn't they reach out and want to be a part of it? In this case, the brand has added value beyond just the product, making it a better choice.Beyond the obvious, I think the lesson here is that observing and leveraging marketing tactics that work in one category (packaged goods) and applying them to another (fresh fruits and vegetables) is a good thing ... like I always say, "marketing is a spectator sport!" Or as I've heard many a marketer say, "search and reapply!"
What's your experience? Jim.
Jim Joseph
President, Cohn & Wolfe NA
Author, The Experience Effect series
Marketing Professor, NYU
28 Eylül 2012 Cuma
Israel Must Be 'Eliminated'
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At the Wall Street Journal:
'To see what is in front of one's nose needs a constant struggle."Continue reading.
—George Orwell
Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad speaks at the United Nations today, which also happens to be Yom Kippur, the holiest day on the Jewish calendar. The timing is apt because when it comes to Iran and Israel, the hardest thing for some people to see or hear is what Iranian leaders say in front of the world's nose.
"Iran has been around for the last seven, 10 thousand years. They [the Israelis] have been occupying those territories for the last 60 to 70 years, with the support and force of the Westerners. They have no roots there in history," Mr. Ahmadinejad told reporters and editors in New York on Monday.
"We do believe that they have found themselves at a dead end and they are seeking new adventures in order to escape this dead end. Iran will not be damaged with foreign bombs. We don't even count them as any part of any equation for Iran. During a historical phase, they [the Israelis] represent minimal disturbances that come into the picture and are then eliminated."
Note that word—"eliminated." When Iranians talk about Israel, this intention of a final solution keeps coming up. In October 2005, Mr. Ahmadinejad, quoting the Ayatollah Khomeini, said Israel "must be wiped off the map." Lest anyone miss the point, the Iranian President said in June 2008 that Israel "has reached the end of its function and will soon disappear off the geographical domain."
He has company among Iranian leaders. In a televised speech in February, Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei called Israel a "cancerous tumor that should be cut and will be cut," adding that "from now on, in any place, if any nation or any group that confronts the Zionist regime, we will endorse and we will help. We have no fear of expressing this."
Major General Hassan Firouzabadi, chief of staff of the armed forces, added in May that "the Iranian nation is standing for its cause that is the full annihilation of Israel."
Benghazi-Gate
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The Blaze reports, "'Benghazi-Gate': Lawmakers Demand Answers as Obama Administration's Inconsistent Libya Story Falls Apart."
And see the editorial at the Wall Street Journal, "The Libya Debacle":
Check back for developments...
And see the editorial at the Wall Street Journal, "The Libya Debacle":
Well, a good chunk of the media are complicit in helping to cover up the story. As I've argued, this is shaping up to be a massive scandal and I'm glad GOP members of Congress are starting to make a stink. At the clip Senator Bob Corker calls the administration's stonewalling a disgrace, it's "Benghazi-Gate." That's got quite a ring to it. Indeed, this morning Da Tech Guy tweeted that had such events taken place during the Nixon administration, "Tricky Dick" would have been able to serve out his 8 years in office uninterrupted. It's simply unreal what's happening during this administration and the American people need a full hearing.
In his United Nations speech on Tuesday, President Obama talked about the September 11 attack on the U.S. consulate in Libya and declared that "there should be no doubt that we will be relentless in tracking down the killers and bringing them to justice." What he didn't say is how relentless he'll be in tracking down the security lapses and intelligence failures that contributed to the murders. Let's say there's some doubt about that.
None of the initial explanations offered by the White House and State Department since the assault on the Benghazi consulate has held up. First the Administration blamed protests provoked by an amateurish anti-Islam clip posted on YouTube. Cue Susan Rice, the U.N. Ambassador and leading candidate for Secretary of State in a second Obama term: "What happened initially was that it was a spontaneous reaction . . . as a consequence of the video, that people gathered outside the embassy and then it grew very violent."
Administration officials also maintained that the diplomatic missions in Libya and Egypt, the site of the first attacks this September 11, were properly defended and that the U.S. had no reason to prepare for any attack. "The office of the director of National Intelligence has said we have no actionable intelligence that an attack on our post in Benghazi was planned or imminent," Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said last week, calling the security measures in place there "robust."
Cell phone video footage and witness testimony from Benghazi soon undercut the Administration trope of an angry march "hijacked" by a few bad people. As it turned out, the assault was well-coordinated, with fighters armed with guns, RPGs and diesel canisters, which were used to set the buildings on fire. Ambassador Chris Stevens died of smoke inhalation. Briefing Congress, the Administration changed its story and said the attacks were pre-planned and linked to al Qaeda.
You'd think this admission would focus attention on why the compound was so vulnerable to begin with. But the Administration wants to avoid this conversation. The removal of all staff from Benghazi, including a large component of intelligence officers, would also seem to hinder their ability to investigate the attacks and bring the killers to justice.
Journalists have stayed on the case, however, and their reporting is filling in the Administration's holes. On Friday, our WSJ colleagues showed that starting in spring, U.S. intelligence had been worried about radical militias in eastern Libya...
Imagine the uproar if, barely a month before Election Day, the Bush Administration had responded to a terrorist strike—on Sept. 11 no less—in this fashion. Obfuscating about what happened. Refusing to acknowledge that clear security warnings were apparently ignored. Then trying to shoot the messengers who bring these inconvenient truths to light in order to talk about anything but a stunning and deadly attack on U.S. sovereign territory.
Four Americans lost their lives in Benghazi in a terrorist attack that evidence suggests should have been anticipated and might have been stopped. Rather than accept responsibility, the Administration has tried to stonewall and blame others. Congress should call hearings to hold someone accountable for this debacle.
Check back for developments...
Security Fears Hobble Libya Attack Investigation
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The story is becoming way too big for the big media outlets to sweep under the rug. The New York Times is now doing the kind of critical reporting that we should have seen from the first day of this debacle. See, "Security Fears Hobble Inquiry of Libya Attack":
PREVIOUSLY: "Benghazi-Gate."
BENGHAZI, Libya — Sixteen days after the death of four Americans in an attack on a United States diplomatic mission here, fears about the near-total lack of security have kept F.B.I. agents from visiting the scene of the killings and forced them to try to piece together the complicated crime from Tripoli, more than 400 miles away.Continue reading.
Investigators are so worried about the tenuous security, people involved in the investigation say, that they have been unwilling to risk taking some potential Libyan witnesses into the American Embassy in Tripoli. Instead, the investigators have resorted to the awkward solution of questioning some witnesses in cars outside the embassy, which is operating under emergency staffing and was evacuated of even more diplomats on Thursday because of a heightened security alert.
“It’s a cavalcade of obstacles right now,” said a senior American law enforcement official who is receiving regular updates on the Benghazi investigation and who described the crime scene, which has been trampled on, looted and burned, as so badly “degraded” that even once F.B.I. agents do eventually gain access “it’ll be very difficult to see what evidence can be attributed to the bad guys.”
Piecing together exactly how Ambassador J. Christopher Stevens and three other Americans died here would be difficult even under the best of conditions. But the volatile security situation in post-Qaddafi Libya has added to the challenge of determining whether it was purely a local group of extremists who initiated the fatal assault or whether the attackers had ties to international terrorist groups, as Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton suggested Wednesday may be the case.
The Libyan government has advised the F.B.I. that it cannot assure the safety of the American investigators in Benghazi. So agents have been conducting interviews from afar, relying on local Libyan authorities to help identify and arrange meetings with witnesses to the attack and working closely with the Libyans to gauge the veracity of any of those accounts.
“There’s a chance we never make it in there,” said a senior law enforcement official.
PREVIOUSLY: "Benghazi-Gate."
Red States' Income Growing Faster Than Blue States'
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Some of the income gains were due to an increase in transfer payments in Republican states, but the key is that in a number of red states the rise in income is driven by energy-friendly economic development, and the differences between the Democrat states are dramatic.
At USA Today:
At USA Today:
Income is growing much faster in Republican-leaning "red states" than in Democratic-tilting "blue states" or the pivotal swing states that will decide the 2012 presidential election, a USA TODAY analysis finds.There's more at the link, including a very cool graphic.
Personal income in 23 red states has risen 4.6% since the recession began in December 2007, after adjusting for inflation. Income is up just 0.5% in 15 blue states and Washington, D.C., during that time. In the dozen swing states identified by USA TODAY that could vote either way Nov. 6, income has inched ahead 1.4% in 4 ½ years.The big drivers of red state income growth: energy and government benefit payments such as food stamps.
By contrast, Democratic blue states are more affluent but were hit harder by the downturn. Connecticut, dependent on the financial industry, suffered the largest income drop except swing-state Nevada. Yet Connecticut residents still make $10,000 a year more on average than people in fast-growing North Dakota.
When averaged nationally, the robust gains in red states and meager gains in blue states produced a national growth rate remarkably similar to that in the swing states.
USA TODAY analyzed income data released this week by the Bureau of Economic Analysis to compare how red, blue and swing states have fared through June 30. The difference in income gains is partly because blue states are richer and more populated than red states — 42% of the nation's income vs. 30% in red states. Also, the economic recovery since the recession officially ended in June 2009 has been distributed unequally around the country.
North Dakota, a red state, tops the nation in income growth thanks to an oil boom. Other major energy states — Alaska, Louisiana, Oklahoma and Texas — are solidly Republican, polls show. Poor, southern red states depend heavily on government transfers for income and benefited from increases in Medicaid and other federal programs.
Libya Terrorists Bragged About Attack on U.S. Consulate
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Eli Lake keeps digging away at this story, at the Daily Beast, "Intercepts Show Attackers on U.S. Consulate in Benghazi Bragged to Al Qaeda" (at Memeorandum):
Plus, here's an interesting piece at Foreign Policy, "Kerry, Rice position themselves on Benghazi attack."
I'll be interested to see why Susan Rice continued to claim a spontaneous attack in Libya days after the event and in the midst of administration knowledge of the truth, including information on the Ambassador's notebook. Is she covering up for the president? What did she know and when did she know it?
More later...
Conversations monitored by U.S. intelligence show Ansar al-Sharia jihadists boasted to Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb about the attack that killed Ambassador Chris Stevens and others—more evidence the assault was not a spontaneous reaction to the anti-Muslim video.Continue reading.
In the communications, members of Ansar al-Sharia (AAS) bragged about their successful attack against the American consulate and the U.S. ambassador, according to three U.S. intelligence officials who spoke to The Daily Beast anonymously because they were not authorized to talk to the press.
At this stage there is no consensus inside the U.S. intelligence community that AQIM planned the attack, but the communications are more evidence that the attack was no spontaneous reaction to an Internet video, as the Obama administration had said for the first nine days after the attack.
This week, Obama administration officials are coming around to the view that the assault on the consulate in Benghazi was a planned terrorist attack. Speaking to reporters at the Pentagon on Thursday, Defense Secretary Leon Panetta said, “As we determined the details of what took place there and how that attack took place, it became clear that there were terrorists who planned that attack.”
After the attack, there were multiple pieces of intelligence that strongly pointed to al Qaeda. The Daily Beast reported Wednesday that early intelligence pointed to al Qaeda, including strong leads on four of the attackers, and the location of one of those attackers. That said, the intelligence community did not offer Congress or senior Obama administration officials any consensus analysis on the perpetrator of the attack in those early days after it occurred...
Plus, here's an interesting piece at Foreign Policy, "Kerry, Rice position themselves on Benghazi attack."
I'll be interested to see why Susan Rice continued to claim a spontaneous attack in Libya days after the event and in the midst of administration knowledge of the truth, including information on the Ambassador's notebook. Is she covering up for the president? What did she know and when did she know it?
More later...
27 Eylül 2012 Perşembe
The Red Light Camera Hoax
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Here are excerpts from an anonymous (of course) comment from someone objecting to a recent post that ridiculed red-light cameras and the bogus claims being made for them.
"The Insurance Institute for Highway Safety (which is not part of the "red-light camera industry") has done the best work in this field. The Institute found that the number of red-light fatalities ... decreased dramatically at intersections with cameras and significantly at other intersections in red-light camera cities. The Institute also found that a majority of individuals support red-light cameras, but opponents have become increasingly vocal. I trust that you don't run red lights with or without cameras, Joe."
Well, now. The Insurance Institute for Highway Safety is a lobby group funded by automobile insurers, a group of entities (not to put too fine a point on it) that would also have a financial interest in forcing everyone to drive 15 miles an hours in daylight hours only, and then only if the driver is between the ages of 25 and 55.
Our anonymous red-light camera lobbyist adds somewhat pointedly that he has "trust" that I don't run red-lights, with or without cameras.
Along with all of the other spurious and often bogus claims by the red-light camera lobby, that little hint is quite telling.
Of course I have crossed through intersections when the light abruptly turns red. Everyone has! Who among us has not suddenly found ourselves at a badly designed intersection, perhaps with a big truck fast on our bumper, and had to make an instant decision, based solely on a judgment about safety, when the light suddenly turns yellow?
There is a notorious intersection in a commercial district about three miles from my house where rear-end collisions are up by 40 percent in two years. Why? Because my city, tapping into the allegedly easy money offered by the red-light camera industry, has installed these insidious devices at that intersection. People I know now avoid businesses in that location simply because they do not trust the red-light cameras.
The cameras don't just flash when someone overtly "runs" the light (and "runs" is a term favored by the camera-industry lobby, in that it implies wanton disregard for public safety). Oh no! The industry has devised new ways to catch motorists "running" the red when they are, for example, just stuck in an intersection behind someone who dawdles on a left-hand turn and the camera flashes or, even more infuriating, making a right turn and being stuck slightly into the intersection when, say, a woman pushing a baby stroller crosses in the pedestrian lane and the light suddenly changes. The choice? Get flashed and pay up, or force woman and baby off the road.
I have never had a red-light camera ticket. Yet. But the increasing number of people I know who have been trapped by these odious devices are all safe drivers -- not the idiots who actually do run red lights with disregard for public safety. To a person, they are outraged at the injustice of these devices. They claim that the red-light they allegedly ran was really a yellow light timed too fast (and lots of real studies have shown that normal yellow-light times are shortened at most intersections that have red-light cameras). And they are stunned to find that the ticket also includes mandatory attendance at a "safety" school where the fee is in the $300 range and the cynicism about the system, from attendees and "instructors" alike, runs shockingly deep. Everybody feels that justice is mocked. Everybody knows that red-light cameras are a scam!
Independent studies (that is, studies not funded by the industry or its accomplices) have always found that red-light cameras are simply a bad idea. And they are also a dangerous invasion of personal privacy, not to mention a base insult to legal due process. The dopey media, especially the local dimwits, can always be depended upon to parrot the red-light and speed-camera industry, mainly because the dopey media don't have the brains or even the courage to cogently evaluate research.
The National Motorists Association, a vocal and reliable opponent of these surveillance cameras (which gets some funding from the highway-engineering industry that lobbies for better intersection safety-design) does do intelligent evaluation of the data. I recommend that anyone interested in the subject peruse its Web site. This is its basic position on red-light cameras:
***
"NMA Objections To Red Light Cameras
Here are excerpts from an anonymous (of course) comment from someone objecting to a recent post that ridiculed red-light cameras and the bogus claims being made for them."The Insurance Institute for Highway Safety (which is not part of the "red-light camera industry") has done the best work in this field. The Institute found that the number of red-light fatalities ... decreased dramatically at intersections with cameras and significantly at other intersections in red-light camera cities. The Institute also found that a majority of individuals support red-light cameras, but opponents have become increasingly vocal. I trust that you don't run red lights with or without cameras, Joe."
Well, now. The Insurance Institute for Highway Safety is a lobby group funded by automobile insurers, a group of entities (not to put too fine a point on it) that would also have a financial interest in forcing everyone to drive 15 miles an hours in daylight hours only, and then only if the driver is between the ages of 25 and 55.
Our anonymous red-light camera lobbyist adds somewhat pointedly that he has "trust" that I don't run red-lights, with or without cameras.
Along with all of the other spurious and often bogus claims by the red-light camera lobby, that little hint is quite telling.
Of course I have crossed through intersections when the light abruptly turns red. Everyone has! Who among us has not suddenly found ourselves at a badly designed intersection, perhaps with a big truck fast on our bumper, and had to make an instant decision, based solely on a judgment about safety, when the light suddenly turns yellow?
There is a notorious intersection in a commercial district about three miles from my house where rear-end collisions are up by 40 percent in two years. Why? Because my city, tapping into the allegedly easy money offered by the red-light camera industry, has installed these insidious devices at that intersection. People I know now avoid businesses in that location simply because they do not trust the red-light cameras.
The cameras don't just flash when someone overtly "runs" the light (and "runs" is a term favored by the camera-industry lobby, in that it implies wanton disregard for public safety). Oh no! The industry has devised new ways to catch motorists "running" the red when they are, for example, just stuck in an intersection behind someone who dawdles on a left-hand turn and the camera flashes or, even more infuriating, making a right turn and being stuck slightly into the intersection when, say, a woman pushing a baby stroller crosses in the pedestrian lane and the light suddenly changes. The choice? Get flashed and pay up, or force woman and baby off the road.
I have never had a red-light camera ticket. Yet. But the increasing number of people I know who have been trapped by these odious devices are all safe drivers -- not the idiots who actually do run red lights with disregard for public safety. To a person, they are outraged at the injustice of these devices. They claim that the red-light they allegedly ran was really a yellow light timed too fast (and lots of real studies have shown that normal yellow-light times are shortened at most intersections that have red-light cameras). And they are stunned to find that the ticket also includes mandatory attendance at a "safety" school where the fee is in the $300 range and the cynicism about the system, from attendees and "instructors" alike, runs shockingly deep. Everybody feels that justice is mocked. Everybody knows that red-light cameras are a scam!
Independent studies (that is, studies not funded by the industry or its accomplices) have always found that red-light cameras are simply a bad idea. And they are also a dangerous invasion of personal privacy, not to mention a base insult to legal due process. The dopey media, especially the local dimwits, can always be depended upon to parrot the red-light and speed-camera industry, mainly because the dopey media don't have the brains or even the courage to cogently evaluate research.
The National Motorists Association, a vocal and reliable opponent of these surveillance cameras (which gets some funding from the highway-engineering industry that lobbies for better intersection safety-design) does do intelligent evaluation of the data. I recommend that anyone interested in the subject peruse its Web site. This is its basic position on red-light cameras:
***
"NMA Objections To Red Light Cameras
The NMA opposes the use of photographic devices to issue tickets. With properly posted speed limits and properly installed traffic-control devices, there is no need for ticket cameras. They can actually make our roads less safe.
1) Ticket cameras do not improve safety.
Despite the claims of companies that sell ticket cameras and provide related services, there is no independent verification that photo enforcement devices improve highway safety, reduce overall accidents, or improve traffic flow. Believing the claims of companies that sell photo enforcement equipment or municipalities that use this equipment is like believing any commercial produced by a company that is trying to sell you something.
2) There is no certifiable witness to the alleged violation.
A picture may be worth a thousand words, but it may also take a thousand words to explain what the picture really means. Even in those rare instances where a law enforcement officer is overseeing a ticket camera, it is highly unlikely that the officer would recall the supposed violation. For all practical purposes, there is no "accuser" for motorists to confront, which is a constitutional right. There is no one that can personally testify to the circumstances of the alleged violation, and just because a camera unit was operating properly when it was set up does not mean it was operating properly when the picture was taken of any given vehicle.
3) Ticket recipients are not adequately notified.
Most governments using ticket cameras send out tickets via first class mail. There is no guarantee that the accused motorists will even receive the ticket, let alone understands it and know how to respond. However, the government makes the assumption that the ticket was received. If motorists fail to pay, it is assumed that they did so on purpose, and a warrant may be issued for their arrest.
4) The driver of the vehicle is not positively identified.
Typically, the photos taken by these cameras do not identify the driver of the offending vehicle. The owner of the vehicle is mailed the ticket, even if the owner was not driving the vehicle and may not know who was driving at the time. The owner of the vehicle is then forced to prove his or her innocence, often by identifying the actual diver who may be a family member, friend or employee.
5) Ticket recipients are not notified quickly.
People may not receive citations until days or sometimes weeks after the alleged violation. This makes it very difficult to defend oneself because it would be hard to remember the circumstances surrounding the supposed violation. There may have been a reason that someone would be speeding or in an intersection after the light turned red. Even if the photo was taken in error, it may be very hard to recall the day in question.
6) These devices discourage the synchronization of traffic lights.
When red light cameras are used to make money for local governments, these governments are unlikely to jeopardize this income source. This includes traffic-light synchronization, which is the elimination of unneeded lights and partial deactivation of other traffic lights during periods of low traffic. When properly done, traffic-light synchronization decreases congestion, pollution, and fuel consumption.
7) Cameras do not prevent most intersection accidents.
Intersection accidents are just that, accidents. Motorists do not casually drive through red lights. More likely, they do not see a given traffic light because they are distracted, impaired, or unfamiliar with their surroundings. Even the most flagrant of red light violators will not drive blithely into a crowded intersection, against the light. Putting cameras on poles and taking pictures will not stop these kinds of accidents.
8) There are better alternatives to cameras.
If intersection controls are properly engineered, installed, and operated, there will be very few red light violations. From the motorists' perspective, government funds should be used on improving intersections, not on ticket cameras. Even in instances where cameras were shown to decrease certain types of accidents, they increased other accidents. Simple intersection and signal improvements can have lasting positive effects, without negative consequences. Cities can choose to make intersections safer with sound traffic engineering or make money with ticket cameras. Unfortunately, many pick money over safety.
9) Ticket camera systems are designed to inconvenience motorists.
Under the guise of protecting motorist privacy, the court or private contractor that sends out tickets often refuses to send a copy of the photo to the accused vehicle owner. This is really because many of the photos do not clearly depict the driver or the driver is obviously not the vehicle owner. Typically, the vehicle owner is forced to travel to a courthouse or municipal building to even see the photograph, an obvious and deliberate inconvenience meant to discourage ticket challenges.
10) Taking dangerous drivers' pictures doesn't stop them.
Photo enforcement devices do not apprehend seriously impaired, reckless or otherwise dangerous drivers. A fugitive could fly through an intersection at 100 mph and not even get his picture taken, as long as the light was green!
###
Thank You from American Airlines: Those Old Miles That Were Never Supposed to Expire? They're Expiring! !
To contact us Click HERE
I will never, ever understand the propensity of airlines for clumsily insulting the intelligence of their customers. The tin-ear syndrome is always on full display.
Here's a beauty that one Suzanne L. Rubin, who runs the AAdvantage loyalty program, sent out in e mails to customers, thanking them for their loyalty while advising them that those "miles with no expiration" will now expire. It's a "streamline," she says!
***
"For more than 30 years the American Airlines AAdvantage program has been making travel special. Thank you for your loyalty for so many years as an AAdvantage member.
In order to streamline our program, we are announcing a change to AAdvantage miles earned before July 1, 1989, also called Miles With No Expiration.
Starting November 1, 2012, these miles will automatically be converted to Miles Subject to Expiration, and because of your tenured loyalty, you will earn a 25% mileage bonus on every unredeemed mile earned prior to July 1, 1989. To have your Miles With No Expiration converted and to earn the mileage bonus, you do not need to take any action. For more information about this change, please visit AA.com/MileConversion.
Once your miles have been converted, as long as you earn or redeem AAdvantage miles at least once every 18 months, your miles will not expire. This is our normal mileage policy and more information can be found at AA.com/AAdvantageTerms.
It is easy to keep your account active! In addition to earning AAdvantage miles for travel, you can earn miles for making everyday purchases such as dining out, shopping and paying your electricity bill. Plus, you can redeem miles for hotel stays, rental cars, flight awards, and more! Find out more ways to earn and redeem miles by visiting AA.com/AAdvantage.
...Thank you for your continued loyalty!
Sincerely,
Suzanne L. Rubin
President
AAdvantage® Loyalty Program"
###
Here's a beauty that one Suzanne L. Rubin, who runs the AAdvantage loyalty program, sent out in e mails to customers, thanking them for their loyalty while advising them that those "miles with no expiration" will now expire. It's a "streamline," she says!
***
"For more than 30 years the American Airlines AAdvantage program has been making travel special. Thank you for your loyalty for so many years as an AAdvantage member.
In order to streamline our program, we are announcing a change to AAdvantage miles earned before July 1, 1989, also called Miles With No Expiration.
Starting November 1, 2012, these miles will automatically be converted to Miles Subject to Expiration, and because of your tenured loyalty, you will earn a 25% mileage bonus on every unredeemed mile earned prior to July 1, 1989. To have your Miles With No Expiration converted and to earn the mileage bonus, you do not need to take any action. For more information about this change, please visit AA.com/MileConversion.
Once your miles have been converted, as long as you earn or redeem AAdvantage miles at least once every 18 months, your miles will not expire. This is our normal mileage policy and more information can be found at AA.com/AAdvantageTerms.
It is easy to keep your account active! In addition to earning AAdvantage miles for travel, you can earn miles for making everyday purchases such as dining out, shopping and paying your electricity bill. Plus, you can redeem miles for hotel stays, rental cars, flight awards, and more! Find out more ways to earn and redeem miles by visiting AA.com/AAdvantage.
...Thank you for your continued loyalty!
Sincerely,
Suzanne L. Rubin
President
AAdvantage® Loyalty Program"
###
United Airlines, Who Else?
To contact us Click HERE
A mutiny ensued among furious, exhausted United Airlines passengers stuck for days in Shanghai, trying to get to Newark. United, of course, is downplaying the trouble but is nevertheless offering the stranded passengers a voucher.
Here's the report on the latest United fiasco, in the Newark Star-Ledger newspaper.
United put its deputy PR shitstorm first-responder Rahsaan Johnson on the case. Johnson is the guy they trot out on these occasions, and he's the least respected PR guy in the airline business, which is saying something. Says Johnson, ".... the situation clearly didn’t go as smoothly as we would like. We did not meet these customers’ expectations. We hope they will give us another chance." He added that the United stalwarts "did their best under those circumstances."
###
Here's the report on the latest United fiasco, in the Newark Star-Ledger newspaper.
United put its deputy PR shitstorm first-responder Rahsaan Johnson on the case. Johnson is the guy they trot out on these occasions, and he's the least respected PR guy in the airline business, which is saying something. Says Johnson, ".... the situation clearly didn’t go as smoothly as we would like. We did not meet these customers’ expectations. We hope they will give us another chance." He added that the United stalwarts "did their best under those circumstances."
###
9-11
To contact us Click HERE
Anniversary stories are a particularly chintzy form of journalism, and I'm grateful to the Times today for not going overboard on the 9-11 anniversary. (The amusingly irrelevant Poynter Institute and its professed shock aside, perennial anniversary stories can become, over time, as empty and forced in sentiment as Hallmark anniversary cards.)
There was, however, an important story in the paper today -- not a commemorative waddle through the oft-said, but rather a sharp and crucial piece on the op-ed page by Kurt Eichenwald, who used to be one of those bylines you looked for when he was on the staff of the Times.
Eichenwald's article examines the chronology of a series of urgent memos and other warnings from the C.I.A. to the Bush White House in the months right before the horrific, spectacular Al Qaeda attacks on the World Trade Center towers and the Pentagon. Yes, we've known about the memo of Aug. 6, 2001, in which Bush's daily presidential briefing file began with a top-secret warning: "Bin Laden determined to strike in the U.S." Famously, Bush and his cronies chose to shrug off that warning -- fixed, as they were, in the stubborn and absurd mind-set that Saddam Hussein was the enemy, not Al Qaeda.
Not well-known, though, are other briefing memos from the C.I.A. that Eichenwald describes preceding the Aug. 6 one, posing warning after warning that an Al Qaeda attack was coming, and that agents of the terrorists were already in place in the U.S. planning that attack, with potentially "dramatic consequences." These also were ignored by Bush and his cronies, to the profound frustration of officials and agents in the C.I.A.
You might want to read the Eichenwald piece using this link, because as it appears in the print edition of the paper it's a little difficult to read. Someone on the op-ed page thought it would be a good idea to allow one of those infernal "graphics" people to set the article in negative type (white letters on a black background), in two twin columns meant to resemble the fallen towers. But as I said, it's difficult to read in pribnt because somebody got too cute with the graphics.
And incidently, along with the online interest, there have been some sharp demurrals in reaction to the Eichenwald article, which is evidently part of the promotion for a book he has out. Essentially, the criticism is that all of this stuff was already on the record.
Anyway, I'm glad for the subdued 9-11 news-pages coverage, if only because I don't have to read some reverential reporting on the reappearance at the site of the odious Rudy Giuliani -- you know, the faux warrior and Vietnam draft-dodger who installed his palatial, shockingly luxurious "emergency command center/tryst pad" inside one of the World Trade Center towers after that complex had already been attacked by Al Qaeda terrorists in the 1993 bombing that killed six and injured more than 1,000.
Meanwhile, the breathtakingly expensive memorial at the World Trade Center site continues to be a source of controversy and scandal.
And it raises questions about what, exactly, we are commemorating at this complex -- the horror and valor of 9-11, or the excessive, freedom-choking security-industrial state that it spawned.
In Slate, Mark Vanhoenacker has this compelling article looking at the issues of the stringent, ridiculous security that greets visitors to the memorial, and what those measures signal as the cost to a free society.
Among the past articles he links to in his article is a piece by me in this space, which I wrote last spring after a visit to the memorial. Here it is:
***
"Remove your belt!"
I'm passing through the crowded security checkpoint at the new 9/11 Memorial on the site of the World Trade Center ruins in lower Manhattan and I realize this goon in a blue shirt that says "SECURITY" is yelling at me.
He is also poking some kind of a wand into the tray holding my camera and cellphone, knocking them around a bit before they pass through the magnetometer.
"Be careful with that stick you're banging my camera with," I tell him.
"Remove your belt," he repeats loudly, in a tone that not even the rudest TSA screener would dare to use at an airport. He glares at me in a way that says, "If this was Guatemala, you'd be on the ground right now, pal."
Welcome to the 9/11 Memorial where, given the absurd degree of pointless security that abounds, the terrorists have clearly won.
There is not a sign, and barely a reminder, of the courage and fortitude shown by New Yorkers on that terrible day as those huge buildings crumbled and all of those people died at the hands of religious-fanatic murderers who were determined to bring this great city to its knees.
No, there is just the security, the fear that is so obviously on display, now that the actual threat is gone.
You need to go online and arrange a pass and a time to visit the memorial site, which is dominated by two giant sunken pools with waterfalls cascading into the pits where the Twin Towers each once stood.
I know that ground well, because I worked for years at the Wall Street Journal, pre-Murdoch, when Dow Jones was based at the World Financial Center across the street from the World Trade Center. When I go there today, I see not those holes in the ground, so tastefully designed to eradicate all memory of the offense of the horror, but the vast and unspeakable emptiness in the air. All of that mass, gone, and yet I still feel it there.
The security, I am deeply saddened to say, spoils any sense of reflection or reverence at the site. Instead, the fear is everywhere, in the humorless faces of all those rent-a-cops, all those real cops, all on guard. All that law-enforcement presence, and for what?
Against what?
I wanted to tell the hump who ordered me around at the metal detector, Listen, Skippy, you are aware, are you not, that this place has already been blown up? That there is nothing left to destroy? That the threat to American freedoms is from the likes of you in your quasi-military blue uniform and your Guatemala militia manners? The terrorists have moved on. There is no opportunity at this place now.
The New York City police commissioner, Ray Kelly, has given interviews about the security at this site and come up with little more than an expressed concern that some people might be so overwhelmed with grief that they might feel the impulse to jump into one of those reflecting pools. I am not kidding.
"People might commit suicide," Kelly said in one interview. "We're concerned about the possibility of somebody jumping in. This is what we're paid to think about."
It does not matter, because common sense has died, that anyone with a desire to end it all can merely cross the street, stroll a block west, and hop a low railing right into the churning Hudson River.
No, we have a memorial at the World Trade Center site, the site of such courage and resolve when the enemy was real, and the memorial is to fear. And to the growing security state. And in a very sad way, it is a pathetic tribute to the murderers who sought on 9/11 to make that hideous statement about the vulnerability of America.
I'd post a photo or two of the site that I took yesterday but I cannot. As I left the security area, I turned around to snap a picture, and one of the glowering rent-a-cops blocked my exit.
"You can't take a picture. You have to delete it," he ordered me.
I insisted that he call an actual police officer, and two responded. Yes, they agreed, I would have to delete the picture.
I wasn't sure how to do that, so the rent-a-cop took my camera and did it for me. Deleted all. And then dropped the camera, which no longer functioned properly.
This, of course, would be an illegal act in America. But not here, I guess. Not at this tasteful memorial to fear, where the security state rules.
###
There was, however, an important story in the paper today -- not a commemorative waddle through the oft-said, but rather a sharp and crucial piece on the op-ed page by Kurt Eichenwald, who used to be one of those bylines you looked for when he was on the staff of the Times.
Eichenwald's article examines the chronology of a series of urgent memos and other warnings from the C.I.A. to the Bush White House in the months right before the horrific, spectacular Al Qaeda attacks on the World Trade Center towers and the Pentagon. Yes, we've known about the memo of Aug. 6, 2001, in which Bush's daily presidential briefing file began with a top-secret warning: "Bin Laden determined to strike in the U.S." Famously, Bush and his cronies chose to shrug off that warning -- fixed, as they were, in the stubborn and absurd mind-set that Saddam Hussein was the enemy, not Al Qaeda.
Not well-known, though, are other briefing memos from the C.I.A. that Eichenwald describes preceding the Aug. 6 one, posing warning after warning that an Al Qaeda attack was coming, and that agents of the terrorists were already in place in the U.S. planning that attack, with potentially "dramatic consequences." These also were ignored by Bush and his cronies, to the profound frustration of officials and agents in the C.I.A.
You might want to read the Eichenwald piece using this link, because as it appears in the print edition of the paper it's a little difficult to read. Someone on the op-ed page thought it would be a good idea to allow one of those infernal "graphics" people to set the article in negative type (white letters on a black background), in two twin columns meant to resemble the fallen towers. But as I said, it's difficult to read in pribnt because somebody got too cute with the graphics.
And incidently, along with the online interest, there have been some sharp demurrals in reaction to the Eichenwald article, which is evidently part of the promotion for a book he has out. Essentially, the criticism is that all of this stuff was already on the record.
Anyway, I'm glad for the subdued 9-11 news-pages coverage, if only because I don't have to read some reverential reporting on the reappearance at the site of the odious Rudy Giuliani -- you know, the faux warrior and Vietnam draft-dodger who installed his palatial, shockingly luxurious "emergency command center/tryst pad" inside one of the World Trade Center towers after that complex had already been attacked by Al Qaeda terrorists in the 1993 bombing that killed six and injured more than 1,000.
Meanwhile, the breathtakingly expensive memorial at the World Trade Center site continues to be a source of controversy and scandal.
And it raises questions about what, exactly, we are commemorating at this complex -- the horror and valor of 9-11, or the excessive, freedom-choking security-industrial state that it spawned.
In Slate, Mark Vanhoenacker has this compelling article looking at the issues of the stringent, ridiculous security that greets visitors to the memorial, and what those measures signal as the cost to a free society.
Among the past articles he links to in his article is a piece by me in this space, which I wrote last spring after a visit to the memorial. Here it is:
***
A Visit to the 9/11 Memorial in New York Where Silly Security Shows That the Terrorists Did In Fact Win
"Remove your belt!"
I'm passing through the crowded security checkpoint at the new 9/11 Memorial on the site of the World Trade Center ruins in lower Manhattan and I realize this goon in a blue shirt that says "SECURITY" is yelling at me.
He is also poking some kind of a wand into the tray holding my camera and cellphone, knocking them around a bit before they pass through the magnetometer.
"Be careful with that stick you're banging my camera with," I tell him.
"Remove your belt," he repeats loudly, in a tone that not even the rudest TSA screener would dare to use at an airport. He glares at me in a way that says, "If this was Guatemala, you'd be on the ground right now, pal."
Welcome to the 9/11 Memorial where, given the absurd degree of pointless security that abounds, the terrorists have clearly won.
There is not a sign, and barely a reminder, of the courage and fortitude shown by New Yorkers on that terrible day as those huge buildings crumbled and all of those people died at the hands of religious-fanatic murderers who were determined to bring this great city to its knees.
No, there is just the security, the fear that is so obviously on display, now that the actual threat is gone.
You need to go online and arrange a pass and a time to visit the memorial site, which is dominated by two giant sunken pools with waterfalls cascading into the pits where the Twin Towers each once stood.
I know that ground well, because I worked for years at the Wall Street Journal, pre-Murdoch, when Dow Jones was based at the World Financial Center across the street from the World Trade Center. When I go there today, I see not those holes in the ground, so tastefully designed to eradicate all memory of the offense of the horror, but the vast and unspeakable emptiness in the air. All of that mass, gone, and yet I still feel it there.
The security, I am deeply saddened to say, spoils any sense of reflection or reverence at the site. Instead, the fear is everywhere, in the humorless faces of all those rent-a-cops, all those real cops, all on guard. All that law-enforcement presence, and for what?
Against what?
I wanted to tell the hump who ordered me around at the metal detector, Listen, Skippy, you are aware, are you not, that this place has already been blown up? That there is nothing left to destroy? That the threat to American freedoms is from the likes of you in your quasi-military blue uniform and your Guatemala militia manners? The terrorists have moved on. There is no opportunity at this place now.
The New York City police commissioner, Ray Kelly, has given interviews about the security at this site and come up with little more than an expressed concern that some people might be so overwhelmed with grief that they might feel the impulse to jump into one of those reflecting pools. I am not kidding.
"People might commit suicide," Kelly said in one interview. "We're concerned about the possibility of somebody jumping in. This is what we're paid to think about."
It does not matter, because common sense has died, that anyone with a desire to end it all can merely cross the street, stroll a block west, and hop a low railing right into the churning Hudson River.
No, we have a memorial at the World Trade Center site, the site of such courage and resolve when the enemy was real, and the memorial is to fear. And to the growing security state. And in a very sad way, it is a pathetic tribute to the murderers who sought on 9/11 to make that hideous statement about the vulnerability of America.
I'd post a photo or two of the site that I took yesterday but I cannot. As I left the security area, I turned around to snap a picture, and one of the glowering rent-a-cops blocked my exit.
"You can't take a picture. You have to delete it," he ordered me.
I insisted that he call an actual police officer, and two responded. Yes, they agreed, I would have to delete the picture.
I wasn't sure how to do that, so the rent-a-cop took my camera and did it for me. Deleted all. And then dropped the camera, which no longer functioned properly.
This, of course, would be an illegal act in America. But not here, I guess. Not at this tasteful memorial to fear, where the security state rules.
###
RIP Gaeton Fonzi
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Gaeton Fonzi has died, age 76. He was one of the most dogged investigative reporters of his generation and the author of what is widely regarded as the most persuasive book arguing that President Kennedy was murdered in a conspiracy that the Warren Commission willfully chose not to investigate fully.
Here's the obit in the Philadelphia Inquirer.
I remember Fonzi from the incipient glory days of Philadelphia journalism, when the city had three daily newspapers (later four), three aggressive local TV news operations and a monthly magazine, Philadelphia, that defined the dawning era in national city-magazine investigative journalism.
Like most serious investigative reporters, Fonzi could seem like a nut, especially when he was intensely focused. But he usually delivered, even if some of the prose was purple.
I think he indirectly helped clear the way for Gene Robert's fabled Philadelphia Inquirer that gained traction starting in 1972. In the late 60s, Fonzi and Greg Walter broke the story, in Philadelphia Magazine, of the old Inquirer's master shakedown-artist, a thoroughly corrupt reporter named Harry Karafin, who was blackmailing major Philadelphia businesses and institutions when the Inquirer was owned and operated by another scoundrel, Walter Annenberg, a gangster's son who had parlayed the Inquirer into an enormously successful business empire that included TV Guide and television stations.
Fonzi also wrote a book about Annenberg, who evidently decided by late 1969 that Philadelphia had become too inhospitable, or at least insufficiently malleable, and sold his paper to the reputable Knight Newspapers chain, which later became Knight-Ridder. The rest was journalistic history. Annenberg, who had prostituted the Inquirer shamelessly, received his reward from Richard Nixon, who named him ambassador to Britain.
While Annenberg went to the Court of St. James (and would later become better known for his and his wife's philanthropy), Karafin went to prison.
Fonzi, I always thought, had helped Annenberg make up his mind to sell the paper and blow town. And like a surprising number of other Philadelphia journalists from that era, he had started out at the then-scrappy Delaware County Daily Times -- where I myself had my first job right out of the military, as a columnist, before I went to the Inquirer in 1970.
Incidentally, I never got the chance to share with Fonzi my own take on the Kennedy Assassination, which I call the Sharkey Unified Theory. To wit:
Lee Harvey Owsald did it, acting alone that day. But at the same time there were at least two ongoing conspiracies to kill JFK in various stages of planning and preliminary execution at the time Oswald fired those three shots. Kennedy, clearly, had an array of powerful and resentful enemies.
Oswald, known for being unstable even to conspirators who might have met him, had some association with at least one of those conspiracies. But he nevertheless acted on his own that day. When he killed Kennedy, members of the actual conspiracies -- which overlapped at the edges -- were dumbfounded, and assumed that the the deed had gone down, somehow. Hence the mob's hair was on fire, as was the hair of the Bay of Pigs renegades. None of these players were known for a high degree of competence, after all.
The Sharkey Unified Theory accounts for all of the anomalies unearthed in the endless conspiracy-theory speculations, including Jack Ruby, lashing out in the mistaken belief that Oswald was working with the mob conspiracy. Both (or all) of the conspiracies to kill Kennedy were dangerous and ruthless, but also half-assed in their planning and organization. Hey, no one ever said the Bay of Pigs exiles or the mob were geniuses!
So the truth has actually been out there hiding in plain sight all along, in fractured pieces lying among among all of the incorrect shards and theories. And my guess is that some aged villains to this day believe they were part of the plot, unaware that Oswald, for his own twisted reasons, beat them to the trigger.
Fonzi might not have bought it, but he would have considered the possibilities.
###
Gaeton Fonzi has died, age 76. He was one of the most dogged investigative reporters of his generation and the author of what is widely regarded as the most persuasive book arguing that President Kennedy was murdered in a conspiracy that the Warren Commission willfully chose not to investigate fully.Here's the obit in the Philadelphia Inquirer.
I remember Fonzi from the incipient glory days of Philadelphia journalism, when the city had three daily newspapers (later four), three aggressive local TV news operations and a monthly magazine, Philadelphia, that defined the dawning era in national city-magazine investigative journalism.
Like most serious investigative reporters, Fonzi could seem like a nut, especially when he was intensely focused. But he usually delivered, even if some of the prose was purple.
I think he indirectly helped clear the way for Gene Robert's fabled Philadelphia Inquirer that gained traction starting in 1972. In the late 60s, Fonzi and Greg Walter broke the story, in Philadelphia Magazine, of the old Inquirer's master shakedown-artist, a thoroughly corrupt reporter named Harry Karafin, who was blackmailing major Philadelphia businesses and institutions when the Inquirer was owned and operated by another scoundrel, Walter Annenberg, a gangster's son who had parlayed the Inquirer into an enormously successful business empire that included TV Guide and television stations.
Fonzi also wrote a book about Annenberg, who evidently decided by late 1969 that Philadelphia had become too inhospitable, or at least insufficiently malleable, and sold his paper to the reputable Knight Newspapers chain, which later became Knight-Ridder. The rest was journalistic history. Annenberg, who had prostituted the Inquirer shamelessly, received his reward from Richard Nixon, who named him ambassador to Britain.
While Annenberg went to the Court of St. James (and would later become better known for his and his wife's philanthropy), Karafin went to prison.
Fonzi, I always thought, had helped Annenberg make up his mind to sell the paper and blow town. And like a surprising number of other Philadelphia journalists from that era, he had started out at the then-scrappy Delaware County Daily Times -- where I myself had my first job right out of the military, as a columnist, before I went to the Inquirer in 1970.
Incidentally, I never got the chance to share with Fonzi my own take on the Kennedy Assassination, which I call the Sharkey Unified Theory. To wit:
Lee Harvey Owsald did it, acting alone that day. But at the same time there were at least two ongoing conspiracies to kill JFK in various stages of planning and preliminary execution at the time Oswald fired those three shots. Kennedy, clearly, had an array of powerful and resentful enemies.
Oswald, known for being unstable even to conspirators who might have met him, had some association with at least one of those conspiracies. But he nevertheless acted on his own that day. When he killed Kennedy, members of the actual conspiracies -- which overlapped at the edges -- were dumbfounded, and assumed that the the deed had gone down, somehow. Hence the mob's hair was on fire, as was the hair of the Bay of Pigs renegades. None of these players were known for a high degree of competence, after all.
The Sharkey Unified Theory accounts for all of the anomalies unearthed in the endless conspiracy-theory speculations, including Jack Ruby, lashing out in the mistaken belief that Oswald was working with the mob conspiracy. Both (or all) of the conspiracies to kill Kennedy were dangerous and ruthless, but also half-assed in their planning and organization. Hey, no one ever said the Bay of Pigs exiles or the mob were geniuses!
So the truth has actually been out there hiding in plain sight all along, in fractured pieces lying among among all of the incorrect shards and theories. And my guess is that some aged villains to this day believe they were part of the plot, unaware that Oswald, for his own twisted reasons, beat them to the trigger.
Fonzi might not have bought it, but he would have considered the possibilities.
###
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