As the MLB playoffs were getting started, Ross Douthat took note of the lame "There's Only One October" ad campaign which featured Dane Cook (Dane Cook!) hawking the Cleveland Indians to the masses. I thought it was dumb too, but it could never live up to the sheer inanity of the NHL's immediate post lockout campaign. The Sun Tzu quote, the bare-chested guy sitting in skates, his "spiritual mentor" dressing him, while wearing K-Mart's least risqué lingerie herself - those were the days. So, I'm not sure what to make of the new NBA campaign that I caught as I watched Kevin Durant's debut last night.

Of course I like using Jerry Sloan for "conversation" but I can't help but feel that the self-conscious classiness of these ads is meant to distract us from the circus this league became over the last year or so. I wonder if it wouldn't be better to highlight the big stories of the year: the sudden relevance of the Boston Celtics, the incredibly competitive Western Conference, the arrival of Kevin Durant, the development of Deron Williams, the struggle of Tracy McGrady, the criminal conduct of the New York Knicks. The talent level in the NBA is off the charts. The best it's been since the mid-90s. Slowly the play is improving as well - think of the Spurs, Suns, Jazz, Rockets and Mavericks all playing good fundamental basketball with different styles and tempos.

Tim Russert finally gets the rough hand in a great little piece by Paul Waldman at The American Prospect.

Russert may be the only journalist in America who considers all his conversations with government officials off the record unless they request otherwise -- an extraordinary gift to the powerful and an inversion of ordinary journalistic practice -- but that doesn't make him an insider. Because he's from Buffalo.

My only problem with Waldman's piece is that it assumes "broadcast journalists" could (or once did) serve an important function as journalists. I can't think of any major broadcast figure who was lauded for his reporting. Instead they are all hailed from on high for possessing a quality. Jennings was dignified. Williams is warm. Murrow was authoritative. Browkaw was chewing on taffy. We should admit to ourselves that the Sunday Talk Shows are less entertaining versions of Conan O'Brien for people  convinced that television can edify them, or educate them about current events.

I spent a huge portion of my summer vacation reading the great literature of Boxing. Jack London, Joyce Carol Oates, George Plimpton - etc. This was mostly because I had started boxing myself. Writers are attracted to boxing more than any other sport. It's a rewarding subject. And that leads me to let you in on my favorite piece on the internet this week: Norman Mailer covering Evander Holyfield's recent, desperate bout with Sultan Ibragimov, in Moscow. Unlike his subject, Mailer still has something left.

Holyfield, slayer of Tyson and Holmes and Ruiz, he of the iconic missing ear tip, mustached creature of another decade, was seeking big belt number five in the slouching twilight of a career that should have ended in Atlantic City, in the TKO glow of a prone Hasim Rahman. But there was another, yet more dour follower of the Warrior Prophet in his future. The People's ex-Champion, Mr. Real Deal, born into the brick churches and bait shacks of Atmore, Alabama, was in Moscow to stand against and lean in on the Sultan Igrabimov, the undefeated hill kid champ with a blazing right paw from the badlands of Russia's Muslim underbelly of grazing goats and homemade gunshot.

 It's short, and the fight itself provided nothing spectacular in the way of content. But do read it.

I agree with the conclusion that Evander Holyfield needs to retire.

It was a decade ago when I regretted not accepting the bets of my fellow classmates - I was the only one betting on Holyfield over the recently released MIke Tyson. Holyfield had been fighting real competition while Tyson sparred with his demons. Tyson's arrest prevented us from seeing the two fight in 1991 - when Holyfield had just ripped the title from Douglas who had seemingly stolen it from the far better Tyson. Iron Mike unfairly lost his reputation as a boxer in his post-incarceration fights. People assumed that anyone who could withstand his initial flurry (Buster Douglas and Evander Holyfield) could eventually beat him.

But it is striking to see how disciplined and defensive Tyson could be in his early fights. Certainly his best chance was to use his blitzkrieg punching power. "I try to catch them right on the tip of his nose because I try to punch the bone into the brain," he famously said. But Tyson kept his gloves up high and his opponents far away if he could - so unlike Muhammad Ali, who deceptively let his arms swing wildly and hang low.

With Evander surely going, hopefully Oscar De La Hoya will also retire and the 90s can finally end.

Esquire names the Sexiest Woman Alive and it is difficult to argue with their choice.

Esquire has collected the worst video resumes on the web in order to help you avoid making some of the classic mistakes.

I actually disagree with their judgement on "Johnson," whose video resume seems to recommend him well for his job as a video game scriptwriter. I think "romantic" is a quality I'd be looking for as an H.R. person at Sony's video game group.

Am I right?

I couldn't get to this during the week but the travails of John Fitzgerald have delighted me to no end.

Here are the links.

If I wanted to make an absolutely devastating case against our modern democratic, meritocratic capitalist culture, I'd use John Fitzgerald as my first and last piece of evidence. Just to prove a point here, under "Skills" he lists the fact that he has 62% face resemblance to Billy Zane (pictured above). Poor fellow.

 

Never ask a woman to return something she stole from you. Even if it cost you two days salary and was hand stitched by an Englishman who knows your first name.

Previously, I said: Don't be the guy who  "thinks Wes Anderson films are "too precious" and overrated." I take it back now. I'll explain why. 

In anticipation of his latest flick, The Darjeeling Limited (reviewed ably by Suderman here) the Onion A.V. Club took two days to publish two important lists. 16 Films Without Which Wes Anderson Couldn't Have Happened. And 10 Films That Couldn't Have Happened Without Wes Anderson.

There are problems almost immediately. Leading off the former list is The Graduate. Name a modern filmmaker who doesn't bow down to this dead idol? You can't.

Mike Nichols' seminal comedy of disaffected youth echoes through all five of his [Anderson's] features—for its groundbreaking use of pop songs on the soundtrack, for its impeccable widescreen compositions, and for its tale of a young man of privilege crippled by uncertainty and melancholy

And these influences are all so important to Anderson specifically- why? Pop songs - how novel! Impeccable widescreen compositions (what about PTA or every other modern director not named Kevin Smith). Uncertainty and melancholy: sounds like what every member of the creative class is selling - since this is precisely the unchallenging crap that people who measure their taste by the length of their Criterion Collection shelf like to buy. 

The list of films that Anderson enabled is even scarier. Napolean Dynamite is the cinematic equivalent to Orbit gum - an attractive ad campaign, but the flavor lasts 8 seconds when you actually taste the product. Garden State - yeah, I dug the part with the flaming arrow too! Effective use of The Shins in that one and it was just so powerful and cathartic when the three leads screamed into th...ZZZzzzzz. Next!

The Squid and the Whale is the only decent member on the list of films that Anderson made possible. Of course that film wasn't so much influenced by Anderson's twee style. Instead it grew out of the increased name recognition for Noah Baumbach after he received co-screenwriting credits on The Life Aquatic. It was Baumbach's best autobiographical film since Kicking and Screaming. Better because he allowed the material to actually disturb the audience. He didn't frame the frightening performance of Jeff Daniels in multi-colored balloons and set it at 375th street in a plasticized Manhattan. Anderson's repulsive father figures are harmless, belching cartoons who deep down love their sons. Baumbach's fictionalized father is a monster who comically refers to Kafka as one of his literary predecessors, and in between Knicks games ignores his children and says to his female student, "Put me in your mouth." It may stack the deck, but it's a fair bit more interesting Royal Tannenbaum "tearing it up" with identicaly dressed grandkids.

Speaking of men's magazines, I noticed Esquire has put online it's famous 1966 profile of Frank Sinatra. Of course, the subject never granted an interview - but that wasn't going to stop Gay Talese:

Yet it would have been unwise for anyone to anticipate his reaction, for he is a wholly unpredictable man of many moods and great dimension, a man who responds instantaneously to instinct -- suddenly, dramatically, wildly he responds, and nobody can predict what will follow. A young lady named Jane Hoag, a reporter at Life's Los Angeles bureau who had attended the same school as Sinatra's daughter, Nancy, had once been invited to a party at Mrs. Sinatra's California home at which Frank Sinatra, who maintains very cordial relations with his former wife, acted as host. Early in the party Miss Hoag, while leaning against a table, accidentally with her elbow knocked over one of a pair of alabaster birds to the floor, smashing it to pieces. Suddenly, Miss Hoag recalled, Sinatra's daughter cried, "Oh, that was one of my mother's favorite . . ." -- but before she could complete the sentence, Sinatra glared at her, cutting her off, and while forty other guests in the room all stared in silence, Sinatra walked over, quickly with his finger flicked the other alabaster bird off the table, smashing it to pieces, and then put an arm gently around Jane Hoag and said, in a way that put her completely at ease, "That's okay, kid."

Very cool.  

I could see it coming and refused to believe it would happen. When I wrote the post, "You Gotta Bereave" I thought they would hang on and  the fail in about six games in the NLCS.

John Delcos, the sportswriter for my hometown paper, has ten suggestions for the Mets offseason. All of them totally debatable. Here's a controversial one.

Re-sign Tom Glavine: This isn't a popular choice given how he finished the season, but in 16 of his 34 starts Glavine gave up two or fewer runs and was the only starter in the rotation with 200 innings. That's not easily replaceable production, but they need this guy because of the durability questions surrounding Pedro Martinez and Orlando Hernandez, and the uncertainty of youngsters Mike Pelfrey and Phil Humber.

I couldn't agree more. I know some Mets fans taken to calling him "the Manchurian Brave" since his last terrible outing. But he was an extremely consistent pitcher throughout the past two and a half seasons. There is little downside in re-signing him and just waiting to see if their young prospects can develop into starting pitchers. I also just like seeing him pitch. He is a stock-character in baseball: the crafty, corner painting, struggling, aging and stoic veteran.

Unbelievably, Delcos doesn't suggest the Mets go after Johan Santana who is in a contract year and wants to stay in the NL and have a big stage as he hits his prime. The Mets starting rotation should be: Johan Santana, Pedro Martinez, Tom Glavine, John Maine, and Oliver Perez. Humber and Pelfrey ought to be trained as long-relief pitchers and used to fill in when the veterans on the team fail, or (as is likely) find themselves injured.

And remember, Glavine will be the last 300 game winner. As reported by the Onion,

"Make no mistake, after me, there will be no one else to win this many games as a pitcher. Ever," said Glavine in tones that froze the blood of all who heard it. "Randy Johnson will not recover from his injuries. [Mike] Mussina will not play, and perhaps not live, long enough. And C.C. Sabathia, I beg you—you are so young, with so much to live for. Do not dance with the devil by attempting to win 300 games now that Glavine has done so."

Do we really want this man to retire as a Cardinal, Red or (shudder) Brave? 

Why Am I Campaigning with a Democrat?

Because cheap gimmicks are the last thing you attempt before you declare a moral victory and return to the Senate. What do I win?

 

 

He started out using "pencil puppets" in his dorm room, then he interviewed Ron Paul and Mike Gravel there. Now James Kotecki is doing video work for Politico right down the street from me. He also looks surprisingly like my girlfriend's younger sister's boyfriend. His preview for today's Republican debate on CNBC is really fantastic, check out the picture they use to demonstrate "torture."

 
The hand movements are a little distracting- but it's fine work.. Check out his video-blog bio. I can't help but think he was using Michael Cera as a model. (Yes, that Michael Cera from Arrested Development and Superbad.)

Kanye West's blog is awesome. He owns David Byrne in the visually-oriented-pop-musician blogs category. (Though, they are both tip top celeb blogs.) Kanye digs the Leica D-Lux - so do I. Also, if I had his cash, I might comission an artist to do portraits of the Jetsons, too. (Check out his pad in Interior Design magazine) Basically I think Kanye would like to hang out with me.

Annie Wilson has a great collection of GQ covers in her post celebrating GQ's stylish half century. The 50th anniversary issue itself features some of the regrets of the magazine, notably its dogged promotion of "one-piece suits."

Men's magazines have been in a funny place for some time. Maxim exerts tremendous pressure on the the Esquires and GQs. My ideal for a men's magazine is, of course, classic Esquire. A shot of daring literary content (which should now be geared mostly to mid- to long form journalism), a dose of throwaway features writing and profiles, some cheesecake photos, and good "service" (i.e. product recomendations, manners writing).

I may try to write a long form article on the history of men's magazines, from Esquire to Playboy to Maxim.

Check out the estimable David Weigel on Ron Paul's third quarter fundraising coup. No one could have predicted that Paul would be raising half as much money as a frontrunning Rudy Giuliani. It guarantees that he will be in the debates until the organizers begin cutting out candidates based on poll numbers. Paul has to work on raising those as well.

But let's be honest: What had started as a quixotic run with an unpolished candidate and a following composed of the a few paleo-libertarians, anti-war conservatives, and the last gold-bugs is now a serious campaign. While it is unlikely that Paul is drawing votes away from any of the top tier candidates, his ability to raise money will translate into television ads in Iowa and New Hampshire.  His campaign has ambitiously set a goal of raising twelve million dollars in the last quarter. He may well do succeed in that. But he has a problem: Paul has one week to do his damage.

If his support is the motley crew of libertarians and anti-warriors we think it is, then the Paul campaign has less than a week to make sure his people register as Republicans in New Hampshire, the state where he can have the best showing. The Granite state is closing its primary and the deadline to register is October 12th. The same goes for New York.  

Hey, did you know Ron Paul has an election year book? I didn't, until Jeremy showed it to me today. (Jeremy has also  written a cool piece on Paul recently )"A Foreign Policy of Freedom" is a collection of Paul's foreign policy speeches and writings dating back to his first term in Congress in 1976 - with some notes. Check it out.