Who’s just dyin’ to Meacham
It’s Politico, I know, but I highly recommend this piece on Jon Meacham. It captures a lot about current media, the chumminess and mediocrity of it all, the fact that the Pulitzer has become a joke, and the hostility of some observers (like us):
Vanity Fair media columnist Michael Wolff — well known for unleashing his sharp tongue at media personalities — called Meacham “a perfect example of media insularity and self-congratulation.” Then Friday he berated him some more for turning the magazine “ into a middle-brow thumb sucker, reminiscent of Norman Cousins’ Saturday Review—a magazine that went belly up several generations ago” and said he should have been replaced long ago by New York magazine’s editor, Adam Moss.
The New York Times’ David Carr said, “[B]eyond helping its editor, Jon Meacham, get on television and sell some books, it hard to tell what the brand is really worth at this point.”
[....]
“Whatever he does, he’s going to be a huge success,” said (Sally) Quinn. “He’s the smartest person I’ve ever met. ... People want to see him come down because they’re jealous. They’re envious. Nobody’s ever seen anybody like Jon before.”
[....]
Meacham also has the great fortune of being part of an elite club of journalists who take care of their own, and he’s adored personally by most everyone, including a handful of individuals who declined to comment for this article for that very reason.
“Within the fraternity and sorority that is the journalist corridor between New York and Washington, I think he’s fine,” said Peter Mirijanian, whose Washington public relations firm specializes in the kind of crisis communications Meacham has been engaging in.
This is why I find all the Bobo-inspired carping about elitism on the Supreme Court (Kaplan had another two pieces about this today, which I won’t like to) so ridiculous: it’s being made by the most insular, clubby group of people who have ever existed.
And things aren’t getting any better. I spent the last week with too weak a WiFi signal to post, comment, or do much of anything internet-related besides read the RSS feed on my phone. Obviously, it’s my fault for what I’ve chosen to put on my Google reader, but the entire fucking thing was Kevin Drum congratulating Matt Yglesias on how well he countered Ezra Klein’s point about Megan McArdle. And half the time the topic was how clubby SCOTUS had become.
Cokie is dead, long live Ana Marie Cox.
Is that a Rolling Stones nod in the title?
May 16th, 2010 at 12:53 pm
Jon Meacham’s not that bad. After all, he could be Mark Halperin.
May 16th, 2010 at 12:54 pm
I wonder how hard it was to keep the vomit from rising in Bill Moyers throat when he had to announce that John Meacham would be taking over his Friday night slot on PBS.
May 16th, 2010 at 12:54 pm
@MikeJ:
Yeah, I know it’s a stretch but I’m really jacked about the Exile re-release this week.
May 16th, 2010 at 12:58 pm
Rolling Stones reference, ftw!
May 16th, 2010 at 1:01 pm
Is the Rolling Stones line supposed to be complimentary to Puerto Rican women?
May 16th, 2010 at 1:08 pm
Nice title!
Does this woman do anything but project her own issues onto everyone else? Her thoughts on Meacham are nothing more than what she thinks about herself. She’s still feeling the burn from having her “It’s All About Me!” column taken out of the dead tree WaPo.
May 16th, 2010 at 1:17 pm
Sorry, man, but I think you stretch this “inside the club” business a bit too far. There’s a club that includes Drum, Yglesias, Klein, and McArdle . . . but not DougJ and the Balloon Juice gang?
You have met the enemy and it is you, my friend.
May 16th, 2010 at 1:18 pm
@scarpy:
Who in the Balloon Juice gang lives in Washington, D.C. and rubs elbows with all the other Villagers at insider cocktail parties? Isn’t that part of the job description of a Villager?
May 16th, 2010 at 1:20 pm
Any club that would have me…
May 16th, 2010 at 1:22 pm
@scarpy:
Yes, I’ve long thought that the influence over national political thought wielded by the cabal that is DougJ and commenters at Balloon Juice is just outta control.
Waaay too much power for one blog if you ask me.
There’s no question but that the club members reinforce each other’s thinking, and then before you know it everyone in the country is thinking that way too. It’s simply got to stop, this “inside the JuiceWay” thinking.
May 16th, 2010 at 1:25 pm
@DougJ:
actually I thought it was brilliant. I luuurves those old song refs of yours; they make me feel less ancient.
Yesterday the husband and I watched a recent interview with Mick Jagger about the re-release that was pretty good. Mick is looking old but he’s as full of energy as ever.
May 16th, 2010 at 1:27 pm
If one could die of boredom, Meacham would be convicted of murder.
He’s mediocre as well.
May 16th, 2010 at 1:28 pm
On another note, it seems that John’s channeling of Greenwald last week has attracted a new and particularly noxious species of troll to this blog.
May 16th, 2010 at 1:29 pm
@Bill E Pilgrim: They little know how much they should fear us. We’re apparently major major players in the bird seed market — we could take this economy down. Is my bonus in the mail yet?
May 16th, 2010 at 1:29 pm
I’m just disappointed that there wasn’t a “Gats in my holsters, girls on my shoulders” reference during any number of the (heterosexual) republican sex scandals.
May 16th, 2010 at 1:29 pm
One of the reasons I’ll never trust Ezra Klein is that he started and maintains some insider club called “joynolism” or something like that. Glenzilla talked about it once.
If there’s anything that makes my skin crawl it’s that I-am-social-master/manipulator, let’s make ourselves insiders and create outcasts for some self-superiority.
As for the internet club of Yglesias-Atrios-Drum-Klein, well, it certainly exists and I’m certainly sick of it. Especially Kevin Drum, who never met a wet noodle do-nothing status-quo kiss-ass solution he didn’t like, sitting there clucking at all the fighting, oh my god what a fucking reek.
I know a very personal hard story about linking that created a huge emotional uproar and very hurt feelings to this day. Fucking internet jockeys, they still can’t get past their ridiculous simian jockeying to see how tiny a band they are, the last thing they should be doing is creating stupid human exclusion zones.
I linked to anyone and everyone I could on the web. After stealing my ideas and diction or riffing on them not one major blogger ever linked to me. Not once.
I worked my ass for years, there had to have been one work that was worth somewhere, but simply nothing in return. Not surprising, really, in a world of geeks.
May 16th, 2010 at 1:33 pm
http://alicublog.blogspot.com/.....chive.html
Brian is/was Ezra’s roommate. Sommer is Matt’s friend. Ezra is staying with Matt here in NYC while we are all up here for the Clinton Global Initiative. Alex and I are friends, as are Alex and Megan. Matt and Ezra and Megan went shooting together on Yom Kippur (bad Jews!), along with Dave, who is throwing a joint birthday party with Brian later this week. Also, Megan and Matt work together. And I used to work with Matt and still work with Ezra. And I think we are all Facebook friends.
May 16th, 2010 at 1:39 pm
I really feel this is unfair to Kevin Drum. He brings up a lot of stuff that none of those other people would dream of caring about. He still lives in Orange County. He blogs for Mother Jones. He may turn a fond eye to the insider brat pack once in a while, but he is not a member.
May 16th, 2010 at 1:41 pm
@scarpy:
Yeah, I’ve considered that possibility. I’m going to try to link more broadly from now on.
But at the same time….we’re not that important.
May 16th, 2010 at 1:42 pm
But Sally Quinn’s approval doesn’t prove your isolation, it proves you’re the center of the world
May 16th, 2010 at 1:47 pm
Tazistan Jen,
Yeah. Don’t know how you could add Atrios to the list, either.
May 16th, 2010 at 1:49 pm
That is such a great post title. You could contract this ability out to other bloggers, Doug.
May 16th, 2010 at 1:53 pm
This just in: Newt Gingrich says Obama should withdraw Kagan’s nomination.
Now, did that take two minutes on the egg timer for him to come to that decision?
His main beef seems to be that she didn’t allow recruiters on campus. So, that logically follows that she’s anti-military!!
Christ, what a moronic blowhard.
May 16th, 2010 at 2:00 pm
@Maude: And don’t even start on the fact of Meacham replacing Bill Moyers. What was PBS thinking? Or not, I guess.
May 16th, 2010 at 2:00 pm
I loathe the Village but making Ezra Klein the problem when he is one of the only people to actually read bills and interview people who KNOW shit and who actually cares about fucking governance? I hate he takes Mcardle seriously but he destroys her every time he takes up her shit. And I am glad he does.
May 16th, 2010 at 2:03 pm
Meacham is replacing Moyers?! Aw, hell no!
May 16th, 2010 at 2:05 pm
“Inside the JuiceWay” .
Follow the Way of the Juice, grasshopper, for the Juice shall set you free.
May 16th, 2010 at 2:08 pm
Hey there.
How do you sign up for this joint?!
First of all, no matter how much a beltway insider Meacham is, I’d take him anyday over Michael Wolffe, who IMO, is unreadable with his parethesis within parethenses. As much as an insider snob as is Sally Quinn, doesn’t make her wrong. With all the other egregious “players”, why did Michael Wolffe single out the meek Meacham?
May 16th, 2010 at 2:09 pm
And the latest abomination from Kathleen Parker takes issue with Kagan not being an “ordinary
realAmerican”.May 16th, 2010 at 2:12 pm
Klein’s not part of the juicebox mafia, but really, does it matter that the other three know each other IRL? Would you expect a blogger paid by ThinkProgress to not link to a WaPo blogger who discusses an Atlantic blogger? Are we supposed to hate spackerman too?
I’d rather have WaPo bloggers shooting down widely read stupidity than just nutpicking blogs with readership in the dozens. While that’s entertaining, edroso and the sadlies have got it covered.
May 16th, 2010 at 2:16 pm
Since my last Newsweek subscription ran out in the 80s, Meacham means nothing to me. I have seen him on Charlie Rose and have never found him worth my attention.
Kevin Drum may be moderate in many things, but it is who he is. It is not calculated or manufactured. In fact, it seems to me he would have a higher profile if he would have been willing to spread rhetorical IUDs around the landscape. It’s just not him.
I may not always agree with his perceptions, but I respect him.
May 16th, 2010 at 2:32 pm
@Violet:
High praise from Sally Quin: Kiss. Of. Death.
May 16th, 2010 at 2:38 pm
Those are cousins to “I promise to pull it out”?
May 16th, 2010 at 2:38 pm
@MikeJ:
this exactly.
May 16th, 2010 at 2:39 pm
Are they sloppy Joe’s or are they Sloppy Joes?
May 16th, 2010 at 2:39 pm
@jeffreyw:
I was thinking the same thing. i think you meant, um IEDs KeithG.
May 16th, 2010 at 2:40 pm
oh good grief… so sorry to go off topic, esp when it’s a column bashing those who so richly deserve it. but this is so insane, it must be shared….
kevin costern(
) to the rescue:
Officials: Costner’s Oil Clean-up Machine Promising
Written by WGNO ABC26 News | Friday, 14 May 2010 08:00
Actor Kevin Costner is in town hoping star power and his oil spill clean-up machine will help in the gulf.
It promises to help clean up the oil spill. And it’s got some big backing. “Years before I got involved oil spills would come and, I would wonder why we couldn’t clean this up,” says Actor Kevin Costner. He’s invested in a company that invented a processing machine that turns oil into water. “It’s robust. Works at the speed that someone talked about, 200,000 gallons a minute. But it takes 99% of the oil.”
Using a small prototype of the machine, Costner demonstrated how it works for a group of stressed parish officials today. “We’ll take this any day over the black oil that’s covering south Plaquemines right now,” says Plaquemines Parish President Billy Nungesser.
The larger centrifuge model can collect up to 3,000 gallons of oil a day and right now, 31 are available. The response: There are no better options. “I think it’s a no-brainer to try it,” says Jefferson Parish Councilman John Young. Nungesser says, “I think we need to put it to work.” And St. Bernard Parish President Craig Taffaro says, “Let’s get this out there. See what it can do.”
http://www.neworleans.com/oil-.....ising.html
May 16th, 2010 at 2:43 pm
met Meacham once before at a speaking engagement. he is a smarmy bastard. that’s all I’ll say.
May 16th, 2010 at 2:44 pm
@QuaintIrene:
Someone’s getting ready to ruuuun.
May 16th, 2010 at 2:44 pm
Awesome.
May 16th, 2010 at 3:18 pm
@paradox:
You’re probably talking about Journolist, and your take on it is basically siding with Mickey Kaus.
Contemplate this on the tree of woe.
May 16th, 2010 at 3:19 pm
@QuaintIrene #24: Oh, this is splendid! Another Mapp and Lucia fan on Balloon Juice!
May 16th, 2010 at 3:35 pm
Today’s installment of “At the Feeder”.
May 16th, 2010 at 3:39 pm
BTW, didn’t get the Stones ref, but thought of the pixies “Hey.” is that just me?
May 16th, 2010 at 3:39 pm
@arguingwithsignposts:
raises hand.
May 16th, 2010 at 3:40 pm
@QuaintIrene: Sorry, I was making an assumption there (in my #43). I should have complimented you on your handle and then carefully asked whether you would by any chance be a fan of the Mapp and Lucia books and/or BBC TV series.
May 16th, 2010 at 3:43 pm
and i am commenting on DougJ’s displeasure with Drum’s comment about Yglesias’ comment about Klein’s comment about McArdle ! i have no fucking clue what any of it’s about, be i feel compelled to jump on the train.
so much meta it could make you cry.
May 16th, 2010 at 3:44 pm
No one has answered my question above. I think the Rolling Stones were stereotyping Puerto Rican “girls” as easy lays. Count me as someone who is not nostalgic about the Rolling Stones or their songs. I heard this song on constant radioplay as a little kid and didn’t understand what the RS were saying but got the distinct feeling that I was being treated as an “other”. I’ve hated the Rolling Stones ever since then.
May 16th, 2010 at 3:47 pm
@QuaintIrene: Yes, well we all know that Newt’s “Latina Woman Racist” talking point for Sotomayor really made her nomination so arduous. Oh wait, no it didn’t – no one of any importance on planet earth cares what Newt Gingrich has to say about anything.
May 16th, 2010 at 4:13 pm
@Rosali:
It may not be Shakespeare, but it’s certainly more complimentary than ‘Black girls just wanna get fucked all night’, which is from another Stones classic.
Of course, anyone wanting to decry Stones lyrics should really start with the song ‘Stray Cat Blues’, which was evidently written by Ron Wood for them.
May 16th, 2010 at 4:27 pm
In the absence of the open thread:
Go Celtics!
@Rosali:
Not a huge Stones fan, myself. My reason is that all of their songs sound the same, and it’s just not my taste. I even prefer Stones-imitators (like the Dandy Warhols on a few tunes) to the original.
But yeah, the racist stuff is a turnoff. Product of the times.
May 16th, 2010 at 4:47 pm
@Rosali:
whatever you do, don’t listen to “Some Girls” (from the same album as Miss You) ... unless you’re neither American, nor British, nor black, nor Chinese, nor French, nor Italian.
and i don’t think they’re saying PR girls are easy lays – after all, the girls are bringing a whole case of wine.
May 16th, 2010 at 4:49 pm
Haha!
/giggle
May 16th, 2010 at 4:51 pm
I’ll take “Unintentionally Revealing Quotes from Sally Quinn” for $500, Alex.
May 16th, 2010 at 4:52 pm
Memoirs?
Who we talkin’ ‘bout here? H.L. Mencken?
This guy is Fineman’s more boring younger brother.
May 16th, 2010 at 4:56 pm
@Rosali:
Couldn’t it also be that the Stones are just saying “Puerto Rican girls” are pretty exciting to bring around? The kind of “girls” that might entice a man away from the woman he “misses”? As in the title of the song, “Miss You”?
Being beautiful and sexy doesn’t automatically mean being “easy”.
Also, remember that it’s the friend of the protagonist who says they’re “dying to meet you”. That’s the kind of line a friend says when he is trying to get a buddy in a deep funk out of it. Quickly. I would definitely respond positively to a friend saying “some Puerto Rican girls just dying to meet you”. It doesn’t mean I automatically assume they will be easy lays.
To answer your original question, I think it’s just a compliment to Puerto Rican women. Evidently, the Stones think they’re pretty foxy.
May 16th, 2010 at 5:02 pm
@cleek:
I think it’s safe to say that “Some Girls” would be offensive to any female of any race, ethnicity or species that was inclined to take offense.
Likewise “Under My Thumb.”
But I’ve never been offended by any such Stones lyrics, because I really don’t think they were meant seriously. Actually I’ve always thought “Some Girls” was pretty funny.
May 16th, 2010 at 5:03 pm
@paradox:
As stormhit mentioned above, JournoList. And honestly, an incredibly dumb thing to be criticizing.
Let’s put it this way…do you bounce ideas off friends in your line of work? If so, you’re just as elitist as Ezra!
May 16th, 2010 at 5:26 pm
@bkny:
I swear I thought that was an Onion parody. We have now crossed the threshold where action movie stars may actually be our only savior…
May 16th, 2010 at 5:26 pm
OT, but headline of the day from ESPN
Gay breaks 44-year-old mark in straight 200m
May 16th, 2010 at 5:29 pm
@MattR: Gosh, I hope mark isn’t broken too badly.
May 16th, 2010 at 5:39 pm
@MattR:
if it’s the straight 200m, why was a gay guy running in it?
(sorry, it was just sitting there.)
May 16th, 2010 at 5:52 pm
Jon Meacham did have one good line. During the primary campaign, he called Bill Clinton “Lear with a Southern accent.”
May 16th, 2010 at 5:56 pm
@SiubhanDuinne:
Yes, indeed! Fell over the BBC adaption of Mapp & Lucia. From there, I devoured all the books.
How dare E.F. Benson die before he could explore how Lucia would deal with WWll ?
May 16th, 2010 at 6:04 pm
@paradox:
If there’s anything that makes my skin crawl worse it’s that I-am-lonely-voice-of-conscience, let’s all be outraged outsiders together for some self-superiority.
May 16th, 2010 at 6:04 pm
@jeffreyw:
IUDs….Gulp….shit…...its what I get for typing fast at work.
//Slinks away blushing//
May 16th, 2010 at 6:06 pm
@cleek: The social conservatives are always saying the Gays are trying to recruit.
May 16th, 2010 at 6:24 pm
Wrap up a snack.
May 16th, 2010 at 6:26 pm
@jeffreyw: That looks delicious. Do you watch Top Chef Masters?
May 16th, 2010 at 6:41 pm
@Violet:
Meacham is the smartest person Sally Quinn has ever met?
She needs to get out more and broaden her horizons.
May 16th, 2010 at 6:44 pm
@schrodinger’s cat: Nope
May 16th, 2010 at 6:46 pm
@arguingwithsignposts:
You’re showing your (lack of) age.
May 16th, 2010 at 6:48 pm
@burnspbesq: I didn’t have a chance to say it yesterday, but this Hopkins alum says GFY :)
May 16th, 2010 at 6:49 pm
DougJ
Videos of Plundered My Soul and Following the River (two of the found tracks on the EOM rerelease) can be found here
Looking foreward to purchasing the 8th iteration of my most favorite album. :)
May 16th, 2010 at 6:53 pm
@MattR:
Hey, it’s not my fault that you guys got into the tournament when you didn’t deserve to, and had your deficiencies exposed on national teevee. Pietramala needs to get out and do some recruiting.
May 16th, 2010 at 6:56 pm
C’mon you Delaware Fighting Blue Hens!
May 16th, 2010 at 6:59 pm
@burnspbesq: Well, we did have the #1 ranked freshman class this season. But the past few before that were rather putrid. Would be nice to have someone that can win a faceoff as well as someone who can beat a defender one on one. Minor details.
Now lets go Fighting Blue Hens.
May 16th, 2010 at 7:01 pm
Huh. This post kind of threw me for a loop. McArdle, definitely, and Meacham, ok (though I haven’t read Newsweek often enough to have an opinion, myself). But dissing Kevin Drum and Ezra Klein?! They’re 2 of my must-reads. Both of them think and research before they post, something I really appreciate. Is it really news that no one’s perfect? They’re sure as hell head and shoulders above most of the rest of the herd.
May 16th, 2010 at 7:03 pm
@QuaintIrene: Tom Holt has carried on the series for at least two books. Mr. Holt is the author of a book with one of my favorite titles— You don’t have to be evil to work here, but it certainly helps.
May 16th, 2010 at 7:05 pm
@arguingwithsignposts: Smarmy is indeed the word that comes to mind when I think of Meacham. Even if he’s channelling the word of FSM, I can’t get past how hard he tries to sound sincere and profound. Too bad, because he does seem like a nice guy.
May 16th, 2010 at 7:08 pm
@jeffreyw: If you get Bravo you should watch it, I think you might like it.
May 16th, 2010 at 7:28 pm
“Matt and Ezra and Megan went shooting together on Yom Kippur”
guns or heroin?
May 16th, 2010 at 7:31 pm
Yes, ‘Lucia In Wartime.’ Major Benjy running the home guard, which gives him ample opportunities to nip whisky. Lucia mistaking a Polish airman for a German. And dear Georgie becoming a celebrity on the radio, cooking austerity recipes.
May 16th, 2010 at 7:35 pm
Uhh – this might be my least favorite DougJ post of all time –
This is the SAME weak-ass “pox on both houses” crap we get from journalists all the time. Yeah the mainstream media sucks and is insular but…but…but look at this totally insignificant and unrelated counterpoint about some very respectable bloggers.
80% of the time Yglesias, Drum, and Klein discuss REAL policy and political problems and even acknowledge that their presence and discussion influences the process. Do some of their posts complain about the clubbiness of the media/SC/etc. Of course! So does this VERY post! Is DougJ jealous that he wasn’t part of the discussion? Because this just sounds like a long whine to me.
May 16th, 2010 at 8:22 pm
@Nellcote:
Thanks!
May 16th, 2010 at 9:03 pm
@paradox:
Yes, I agree with you.
May 16th, 2010 at 9:03 pm
@DougJ:
Seriously? I think I’m going to have to endorse the “DougJ is jealous” view.
May 16th, 2010 at 9:23 pm
@dougj
audio of four of the “exile” bonus tracks here
http://www.npr.org/templates/s.....#038;ps=rs
plus some musicans discuss their fave songs from the album
=========
new interview with keef here:
http://www.npr.org/templates/s.....=126829155
May 16th, 2010 at 11:40 pm
somebody tell dougj that he’s got the ‘good news for conservatives’ button stuck.
that or he’s just a moron.
May 17th, 2010 at 12:16 am
Rmember the days when people thought that the Intertubes would be the anti-media, the antidote. something better than the mediocre self-admiring crap on MSM?
Well, here we are. And the Intertubes have just become a place to obsess constantly about the mediocre, self admiring crap on MSM. And also on the Intertubes.
The crappile has expanded and invented new ways to gaze into its navel.
Whee.
May 17th, 2010 at 1:49 am
Best line of the day.
May 17th, 2010 at 3:42 am
@Brien Jackson:
Well, I don’t agree with all of it, but I really think Mickey Kaus’s qualms about Journolist are legit.
May 17th, 2010 at 7:59 am
Was turned off to Meacham after reading his review of Diarmuid McCulloch’s “Christianity” in NYTBR. Even given that “The Reformation” was a home run of a book, the review made it less likely that I would buy this one even if two-thirds of it was not actually about the book and was very smug.
Was relevant here: WSJ today on the Kagan nomination being one more sign of the decline of the WASP elite.
Has been kicking around brain for too long and divorced from its original thread: Think about the cliches about the Japanese university system that we absorb in the United States. Everyone who gets into that system works hard. But at least when their economy was good, once you have gotten into an elite university you didn’t have to work so hard. You could have any job that you wanted in the government or in the best companies in Japan. In fact, there is some slight parallel with Kagan because you could be one of the bureaucrats that the Democratic Party of Japan is going after for essentially running the country. Ross Douthat will testify that at Harvard he wasn’t particularly challenged but that’s one person. But the being courted by power and wealth at an Ivy League institution is definitely there. The being funneled into finance and law and consulting is there. I am trying to say that there is a difference between an elite institution and whether the graduates have elitist attitudes or how much money they had when they got there, because Alan Grayson is the disproof that “all Ivy graduates have elitist attitudes”. They are all elite once they walk through the door.
(Since the Times world university rankings has Tokyo University 22nd and Kyoto University 25th, about where Carnegie Mellon is, I fail to see how I insulted anyone’s education by comparing them to Japan.)
May 17th, 2010 at 10:24 am
@DougJ:
Why?
May 17th, 2010 at 10:40 am
Are the Rolling Stones racist? They’re English, what’s the difference really? The English pride themselves on their daring “unPC”opinions. By English standards, even modern ones, the Stones ae pretty progressive.
May 17th, 2010 at 4:59 pm