Monthly Archives: October 2010

I have no idea what's going to happen with the election next week except that no matter how many contests Republicans win, they'll claim it's proof that America hates Obama and the Democrats and that both will be gone in one more election. They'll probably also claim that any election they lost by less than 5% was stolen via vote theft. In the meantime, Democrats will say, "It could have been worse" — and of course, it could have been worse. I mean, 9/11 could have been worse. My Uncle Nathan used to say that about every bad thing that ever happened. If you'd lost both arms and one leg in a car accident, Uncle Nathan would have told you to look on the bright side and focus on the limb you had left. I loved him but he was pretty useless in those moments when sympathy might have been appropriate.

I also expect Democrats to learn no cohesive lesson from anything that happens next Tuesday. The ones already inclined to move to the right will say, no matter how the vote goes, "This shows we need to move to the right." The ones who yearn to move to the left will head in that direction. And the Tea Party crowd will claim credit for every defeated Democrat and proclaim a new era and a giant step forward in taking back their country from that Muslim Commie in the White House. It'll be some time before any of them realize any candidates they help elect will either (a) link up with Republicans to push tax cuts for the wealthy and more corporate giveaways or will (b) accomplish absolutely nothing.

You get the feeling I'm not really rooting for anyone next week? Well, not really. I do like Jerry Brown, who looks to be our once and future governor in California. I always thought Brown was pretty annoying and arrogant in front of a camera but pretty good at managing a hard-to-manage state…and these days, I'll settle for that trade-off. I also thought he got a bum rap when people started calling him "Governor Moonbeam" for proposing some ideas that now, in hindsight, don't seem that bizarre…like the state launching its own communications satellite and leasing access to private industry. People acted like he was proposing we colonize Saturn. (The actual name "Governor Moonbeam" came from Chicago columnist Mike Royko, who was using it in a riff about how anyone in California had to be a bit of a mental space cadet. He wasn't criticizing Brown specifically and he eventually apologized for the nickname and asked people to stop using it.)

I guess the main thing I hope is that the election results teach the lesson that a candidate has to go out and give press interviews and answer tough questions instead of hiding from the media. Which ain't gonna happen. In fact, we'll probably see just the opposite — folks saying that the election shows that the way to win an election is to control the narrative around you and to only surround yourself with supporters and softball questions. That makes it a lot easier to lie. Ah, well. It's only the future of the country at stake…

Robert J. Elisberg welcomes back the man that both Democrats and Republicans would like to forget.

Kevin Drum lists five political memes that deserve to die because they ain't true. But that won't stop those who want to believe them from believing them.

Here's a one-day-only (I think) deal on Amazon: All eight seasons of The Andy Griffith Show on DVD for $94. Usually, it goes for more than twice that. In fact, tomorrow it'll go for more than twice that. So don't miss out, Goober! Click here to order.

Fred Kaplan bids a fond farewell to the Walkman. Many years ago, I attended a lecture by Akio Morita, its inventor and a very wise man, indeed. He explained that everyone had arguments why his idea of a personal cassette tape player was a bad idea and why all sorts of market research said it wouldn't work. The way he told the tale, he said, "Well, I think it's a good idea" and went ahead anyway. I'm not sure that's always a commendable way to do business but it sure paid off in this case.

Matt Jumps was nice enough to send me a link to this article about plans to renovate and upgrade the last remaining Clifton's Cafeteria. Clifton's was once a small chain with several outlets in Southern California. I went to the one in the big Century City mall and it had terrific food and it was always packed…so much so that its closure came as a shock to many. I suspect it had something to do with it being the wrong restaurant for the demographic of the shopping center. The complex there (now a Westfield mall, as all malls will someday be) was full of upscale stores that didn't cater to the kind of folks who'd eat in a cafeteria. It would not surprise me if a profitable business was squeezed out for just that reason…though more likely, their low-priced meals simply couldn't sustain the rent there.

There were other Clifton's but we're down now to the last of its kind, the one in Downtown L.A. That's the one that's about to get a makeover as part of a general attempt to refurbish that whole shabby, homeless-filled area. In fact, the old Clifton's was the perfect commissary for that vicinity. Food there is cheap and the cafeteria has a policy of feeding those who can't pay. The new owner says that he'll retain that policy and that his new hires will come from the ranks of the local homeless. (The plan seems to be to upgrade the downstairs cafeteria but to keep the meals inexpensive, and to add upscale dining on the second floor. It's a pretty ambitious endeavor…and some or all of it, they say, will be open 24/7.)

Urban renewal of those blocks down there would seem to be too great a task but I'm no expert on the kind of math that would be involved. I can tell them this, though: My business doesn't take me often to that area but around six times in the last decade, I was in the vicinity and thought I'd stop in at that Clifton's for a meal. Like most folks with lots of food allergies, I prefer cafeterias to sit-down eateries and I also had fond memories of the Clifton's in Century City and an earlier chain in Los Angeles called the Ontra Cafeterias. Only one out of my half-dozen attempts to patronize the downtown Clifton's was successful. That is, I only actually got there once and the food was quite disappointing. My sense was that management was keeping the prices down by using the cheapest-possible ingredients…and also that they weren't doing enough business to have much turnover of the food, which all seemed to have been sitting around for a while. The Century City location did such volume that the chow was always being freshly-prepared, which was one of its appeals.

All of that will be corrected if the new proprietor does what he says he's going to do. Still, if he wants to make a go of the place, he really has to fix the problem that kept me from going there the other five times. I literally could not find a place to park. After circling the block so many times I should have been registered to vote there, I thought of other, easier places to dine and drove off to one of them, instead. The one time I did dine there, I pulled into a lot where I paid — I am not exaggerating — about twice what the meal at Clifton's cost me. Just to park. The article linked above notes how much Ray Bradbury loves the place. Well, he would. He doesn't drive.

Like I said, I love cafeterias and I lament how few and far-between they are. If I wanted to go patronize a place with loads of freshly-made selections like the old Ontra chain or the Clifton's in Century City, I literally do not know where that would be…but I bet I'd have to travel quite some distance. If they can rejuvenate the downtown Clifton's and solve the parking problem, I'm there.

Not that you aren't well aware but this needs to be emphasized: Everyone in our American way of life is saying that we (meaning, "the government") needs to cut spending and move towards a balanced budget. No one is willing to say what they'll cut beyond some minor suggestions of things that don't matter to them. In fact, a lot of them seem to think that they've done the hard, perceptive part by saying "We have to cut" and then someone else can easily figure out what…and oh, yes: All the big categories are off the table. As meaningless gestures go, saying we need to be fiscally responsible — and then not moving on to actual, specific proposals — is pretty meaningless. And no, I don't have any specific proposals either but I'm not pretending I've done anything to solve the problem.

The folks at Esquire have taken a stab at it. They convened a group of former legislators…and it's not insignificant that these are folks who are not running for public office. No one who was would dare try to actually solve the problem but these men did. Read here how they approached the problem and how they haggled and compromised…and these weren't the current kind of Washington "compromises" where you give up nothing and expect the other side to capitulate. These men actually tried to meet in the middle and here's their proposal that would, they say, erase the annual budget deficit by 2020 and maybe even leave us with a surplus.

Would it work? I don't know. It sure wouldn't help any of them win election in today's political climate and maybe that's the depressing part; that the people we send to Washington to do this kind of stuff don't do this kind of stuff.

Dick Van Dyke appears on NPR's Wait Wait…Don't Tell Me!

In a debate Thursday night, GOP Congressional candidate Mike Kelly was asked to name "specific" cuts he would make to the federal budget. His reply, which promised to name some and didn't name one, was a masterpiece of acting like you're answering a question when you're not. Take a look. And the frightening part is that this guy will probably win.

Here's an easy way to save yourself a billion dollars a year. Only catch: You have to be Google or a company of about that size to make it work.

I don't know why big corporations are always complaining about taxes. I mean, it's not like they're paying them or anything.