Sunday, June 20, 2004

Quick TV Review

I didn't think much of this evening's 60 Minutes interview with Bill Clinton. Some of that was because Dan Rather so overhyped a rather unremarkable chat, both in his teases and an appearance the other night on Larry King Live. It mostly consisted of Rather seeing how many ways he could tell us we had to tune in and hear what Clinton says about this or that, while King kept reminding everyone over and over that Clinton will be on his show on Thursday.

But Clinton, as he so often has, left me disappointed. When he's "on," he's an incredible speaker and a very, very smart man. Tonight, perhaps because Rather confined the on-air exchanges to "headline" issues and asked the obvious questions, we got short, surface replies. It was almost like Clinton rehearsed speaking in quick sound-bites. I hope his book, which I intend to read, isn't like that.

• Posted at 11:13 PM · LINK

Meet Sam

It's fascinating how, via the Internet, you "meet" people all over the world and in different walks of life. It's been that way ever since I got my first modem and began logging onto 300 baud bulletin board systems. It happened more often as the speed of my connectivity increased, and took a quantum leap when I set up my own website. I now have a few dozen "friends" whose weblogs I check every day or every few days.

I just added Sam Johnson to my list. Sam lives down in Savannah, Georgia where he works as a disc jockey in a nightclub. His reflections on that, his life, his ongoing dialysis treatments and his general outlook on the world are well worth perusing. If you go there, you'll note that Sam and I just straightened out a little misunderstanding, which is fine since it led to me reading and enjoying his blog. You will, too.

• Posted at 10:52 PM · LINK

Comic Book Business

Comic book news sites (like this one) are reporting that Crossgen Comics has filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection.

I occasionally get messages asking me if the comic book industry is healthy, if it's rebounding from its major downturn, etc. There are many ways to measure that kind of thing, and certainly the fortunes of one company could be an exception. But I suspect this announcement tells us a lot that is not optimistic. As with an awful lot of previous crash-and-burns — anyone remember Tekno Comics? — the business model seems to have been to use the publishing of comic books not for standalone profit but to promote characters who might be made into lucrative TV shows or movies or toys. In theory, that is not a bad idea but if you're not at least breaking-even on the comics, it puts you on a very critical time limit: You have to get someone to make the movie or the toys before the losses from loss-leader publishing takes you down.

That's what has killed a lot of comic book companies and no small number of Internet Content Providers. Entrepreneurs look at the grosses of the Spider-Man movie, forget it took decades to get that thing made, and think they can engineer a deal before the money runs out. Some can but many can't, and Crossgen has apprently landed in the "can't" category, at least so far. One report says they've gone more than 30 million in the hole, which is a staggering amount to lose, given how relatively modest their publishing efforts were. (Last December, I reported that though I am pretty well-connected in comics, I had never seen one of their books. That has since changed. As of now, I have never seen one of their books unless a free copy was handed to me by the guy who wrote it.)

I have no idea if Crossgen will survive, though pessimism is probably not unwarranted. That's based on my observation over the years that when you hear that a company is not paying its artists and writers or is paying horribly late, said company is not long for the world. Marvel has recently announced that they've managed to retire the debt that drove them into bankruptcy protection so it's not impossible...but I don't think Marvel ever did miss a payment to its freelancers, which is one of the points of bankruptcy protection.

It is also important to note that Marvel did not crawl back out of the hole just by (or even largely by) publishing comic books. Movie, TV and toy deals were the big factor in their rebound. As I said, there are many ways to measure whether or not the comic book business is healthy but a good one might be to assess how many publishers are actually making a profit publishing comic books. Clearly, there are not enough of those these days.

• Posted at 11:51 AM · LINK

Voice-Thrower Scores Big!

Ventriloquist Jay Johnson is doing a one-man (plus dummies) show in New York that I hope he'll do out here, or still be doing next time I get to Manhattan. Here's some info about it. I met Johnson briefly at a party for the legendary Señor Wences on the occasion of his 100th birthday. Jay and his monkey puppet had done a very funny performance...and seated in the front row were his two heroes, the Señor, plus Paul Winchell. It clearly meant a lot to Jay to do well in front of that audience with those men seated there, and he had. Even the monkey puppet looked a bit emotional over the experience.

Anyway, it's nice to see him doing well off-Broadway, too. And nice to see that the show's co-director, Murphy Cross, is getting kudos, too. And just in case she blunders onto this website: Murphy, the neighborhood hasn't been the same since you moved away from here.

• Posted at 11:10 AM · LINK

Doubting Thomas

Back when Clarence Thomas was being nominated to the Supreme Court, a lawyer friend of mine said, "It's a shame they got involved in all that crap about Anita Hill and Coke cans and renting porn. They should have just refused to confirm the guy because he's completely unqualified and not very bright." That may have been a harsh judgment but I haven't seen anyone — even those who are happy when the majority votes their way and Thomas is in that majority — seriously argue that this man is a wise scholar of the law.

I just read over the decision in the case involving the mention of God in the Pledge of Allegiance. (Here's a PDF file of it.) I noticed a tiny, perhaps telling reference in Justice Thomas's opinion on the matter. It's in this sentence...

The Establishment Clause provides that Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion. [Amdt. 1] As a textual matter, this Clause probably prohibits Congress from establishing a national religion.

"Probably"? How much clearer could it be stated? There is absolutely no wiggle room in that language, at least with regard to Congress being able to establish a national religion.

Thomas goes on to state that it would be okay for the states to establish state religions since it says "Congress shall make no law..." Gee, that's just what this country needs to pull together. Let's start telling folks that in any given state, one particular religion is better than theirs. I mean, it's not like people in other countries ever fight bloody wars over such things.

• Posted at 1:05 AM · LINK