Catching Up: Books.

As the clown said, if you’re halfway decent at something, don’t do it for free. So, while it’s been quiet around here, and with the ginormous dissertation finally behind me, I’ve been focused on a few other published writing projects in recent years, either coming to or already on an Amazon website near you.

Prime Minister for Peace tells the story of Milan Panic, a California businessman who’s lived a Zelig-like life of sorts. As a child, he fought with the partisans against the Nazis in his native Yugoslavia. As a young man, he became an Olympic cyclist, and used that opportunity to escape Tito’s Communism and defect to the West. He then started a pharmaceutical business that made him a millionaire several times over.

This book focuses on his experiences in the 1990s, when he went back to the then-fragmenting Yugoslavia to serve as Prime Minister, and, in trying to bring peace to the Balkans, went toe-to-toe with Serbian dictator Slobodan Milosevic, not to mention cynical Western diplomats and sundry other ethnic nationalists.

Buyer’s Remorse, my sixth collaboration with Bill Press since 2001 — he writes; I research, outline, edit, and fine-tune — covers, in a nutshell, all the many ways Barack Obama’s presidency let progressives down. If you’ve swung by here at any point in the past, you’ve already heard me go on about this at some length, so no need to belabor it here. (This book came pre-researched, in that regard.)

Interesting sidenote: This has been the biggest-selling book I’ve been involved with since the Carville/Ken Starr one in ’99, in part because the Clinton campaign tried to bash Bernie Sanders with it in the early primaries. (Clinton is apparently Obama’s biggest fan, except when she isn’t.)

And The Past and Future City, coming out this October, is what I’ve been working on this past spring, with NTHP president and CEO Stephanie Meeks. It makes the case for historic preservation in the 21st century and argues, in effect, this isn’t your grandparents’ preservation movement anymore.

All over America, historic buildings are helping make cities more desirable, and urban residents happier and healthier. They are spurring economic growth, nurturing start-up businesses, and creating jobs. They are reducing energy costs and environmental impact, and encouraging healthy living practices like walking and cycling. They are helping to provide solutions to challenges like affordability, displacement, and climate change. And they are turning diverse neighborhoods into communities, and helping us come to terms with the difficult chapters in our history. And the best part is, they’re already there — they just need smart, forward-looking policies to unlock their power and potential. On sale soon!

It’s Toxic, We’re Slipping Under.

Ever since 1987 and the end of the Fairness Doctrine, which freed station owners from having to provide any balance on the air, conservatives have dominated talk radio. To the point where today, according to a 2007 report of the Center for American Progress, there are at least 10 hours of right-wing talk for every one hour of progressive talk. And that’s a real problem. Not simply because this torrent of hate is unpleasant for most people to listen to. But because it also debases the level of political discourse in this country, at a time when we need it the most.

Personal plug: Bill Press’ Toxic Talk: How the Radical Right Has Poisoned America’s Airwaves, which I worked on in a research and editing capacity last year, is hitting bookstores today. (As longtime readers may remember, this is our fifth book together, along with Spin This (2001), Bush Must Go (2004), How the Republicans Stole Christmas (2005), and Trainwreck (2008).) In any case, I suspect regular readers here — all ten of you! — should be sympathetic to its central thesis: Right-wing talk radio is bad for our politics and for our country. (And hat-tip to Media Matters, a key resource for this book, for watchdogging these blustery carnival barkers on a full-time basis.)

Celeb-Spotting at Invesco.

Hey y’all. After a crack-of-the-morning flight out of Denver (which included a spry Mickey Dolenz and a tired-looking Hayden Panettiere), I’m back in VA now, have rested up, and have put up the rest of my Invesco pics over at Flickr. In case anyone’s interested, here are a few more thoughts about the milieu surrounding Thursday event:

Imagine the DC Nationals playing Game 7 of the World Series at home, and you may get somewhere close to the strangeness that was the stadium environment at Invesco Field. It was definitely a NFL or NBA stadium atmosphere, with all the usual concessions open. But, amid the pretzel vendors, lines for hot dogs, and Obama t-shirt stands, the place was also obviously teeming with DC-types — pols, journalists, celebrities, and of course their many, many handlers. So, if you walked around the concourse a few times (as I did during the Sheryl Crow set, for example), you were bound to see tons of notable people waiting anxiously in the condiment queue, and/or one of the gaggle of C-level talking heads “trying not to be seen,” hoping to be seen. It was all quite bizarre.

In lieu of a list of all the random people I saw wandering around, I’ll just give a few general impressions:

  • For whatever reason, I saw members of the MSNBC crew (Howard Fineman, Chris Matthews, Floyd Abrams) floating around a lot more often than the CNN gang, who seemed to stay ensconced in their assigned news-ghetto. (Matthews in particular was ubiquitous. He and Ron Brownstein seemed to live at The Tattered Cover.)
  • Gov. Ted Strickland had the exact same awkward look on his face in front of the Denver Broncos store that he did while Clinton harangued Obama a few months ago. Must be his tic.
  • Richard Dreyfuss was holding court over at the Air America nook, and — since someone had passed out promo cards for Oliver Stone’s W while we waited in line the requisite hour to get in — I asked “Vice-President Cheney” to sign it. I guess this shouldn’t be surprising, but he hadn’t seen the teaser poster image at all. (I sometimes forget that for the people involved, movie making is just a job — They don’t feel inclined to follow all the ins and outs of the pre-release like we do.)
  • Y’know, I guess I owe Washington a bit of an apology. I was complaining the other day about the careerist myopia and general rudeness of DC politicos, but in the end it was a NYC-based historian who most exemplified District-style asshattery to my face. I went up to say hi to a (non-Columbia) academic who writes for several progressive publications, and with whom I’ve shared many a dinner over the past few years, as part of a 20th Century Politics & Society Workshop that I served as rapporteur for. (“Rapporteur” is basically the three-dollar way in graduate school to say “The One who Brings the Food.”) When I said hello and held out my hand, he looked me up and down, gave me the cut direct, and — in true DC form — just turned away to find somebody more important. I guess such behavior comes with the territory sometimes…still, I thought it was pretty goddamned rude.
  • Word on the street was a lot of A-lister celebrities were out and about: Charlize Theron, Jessica Alba, Jennifer Garner, Oprah Winfrey, Brad and Angelina, and the like. I didn’t see anybody of that sort, but then again I didn’t go anywhere near the skyboxes.
  • I did run into Jim Clyburn, my old representative, and got in a shout-out for Flotown. (Florence, SC — his beat, and the place where I grew up.) He seemed nice, as always.
  • I also ran into Bill Press, the democratic pundit with whom I’ve worked on four books over the years. We got to catch up for a bit, as it turned out our seats were really close to each other.
  • Nothing against Sheryl Crow, but her set was the time I spent walking around to soak up the ambience. That being said, seeing Stevie Wonder perform “Signed, Sealed, Delivered” was great fun. And, if you’d had told me that one day I would willingly join a crowd of 80,000 to sing along with Michael McDonald, I’d never have believed you. Never say never, I guess. (I was very glad to hear we Dems roll with “America the Beautiful” rather than “God Bless America,” which we can expect in heavy rotation at the RNC next week, I’m sure.)
  • And, finally, the moment when I was probably the most starstruck at Invesco was when I was edging back to my seat and none other than Wendell Pierce, a.k.a. The Bunk, flew past me. Now, there’s a pic I’d like to have gotten (and I’d love to have picked his brain about David Simon’s forthcoming Treme, but ah well.) Denver ain’t Aruba either, I guess…but Thursday night, it sometimes felt pretty darned close.

  • End of an Era.

    A personal plug: Also out in stores this week, my fourth collaboration with Democratic pundit Bill Press (1, 2, 3): Trainwreck: The End of the Conservative Revolution (and not a moment too soon). If you couldn’t guess from the title, it basically argues that, just as the New Deal era lasted from 1932-1968, the Age of Conservatism that began in ’64 with Goldwater, hit its stride in the 70’s and 80’s, and gave us the likes of Reagan, Gingrich, and, of course, Dubya, has now hit the proverbial, inevitable, historical brick wall. So let’s survey the wreckage: On one hand, from Katrina to Abramoff and Ed Meese to Alberto Gonzales, right-wing attempts at governance over the past thirty years have usually degenerated into dismal experiments in cronyism and/or incompetence. On the other, conservatism has strayed so far from its ideological roots in the Reagan and particularly Dubya eras that the likes of Robert Taft, Russell Kirk, and William F. Buckley would never even recognize it. (Case in point, the Ron Paul candidacy, wherein a traditional Taft conservative ended up being treated by his esteemed Republican contemporaries in every debate as either a fringe joke or a terrorist-sympathizing dupe.) Either way, the right-wing ascendancy is over, and it’s our time again now (and, though it’s not reflected in this tome, I think y’all know who I’d prefer to be carrying our progressive standard into battle in 2009 and beyond…)

    That Old-Time Religion.

    Speaking of politically partisan reading material, a brief plug: If you’re looking for a stocking stuffer for the politically inclined, How the Republicans Stole Religion (formerly How the Republicans Stole Christmas), a book I worked on last year with pundit and former seminary student Bill Press, is now available in paperback at a bookstore near you.

    With God on their side.

    Personal plug: Bill Press’ How the Republicans Stole Christmas, which I worked on earlier this year, was released today. As I noted last April, its basic thesis is “The Religious Right are neither religious nor right” (discuss amongst yourselves), and it aims to put the lie to the fundies’ constant invocations of Jesus to justify their greed, intolerance, and hypocrisy. (And, along with being a long-time Dem campaign manager and pundit, Press also spent a decade in the seminary, so he knows of what he speaks.) Now, as they say, in bookstores everywhere.

    Of Books and Bears.

    A couple of navel-gazing notes from the past few weeks:

    * I’ve successfully defended my dissertation prospectus, currently and very drably titled “The Legacy of Reform: Progressive Persistence in National Politics, 1920-1928.” So, now I’m really ABD (All But Dissertation), and all systems are go for my upcoming writing year.

    * Although it won’t be out until October, and will require some minor last-minute revisions right up until then (to account for new developments such as the Pope’s probable passing), I’ve spent the past fall and winter researching and editing — and have now finished up — a third collaboration with Democratic commentator Bill Press, entitled How the Republicans Stole Christmas: The Republican Party’s Declared Monopoly on Religion and What Democrats Can Do to Take it Back. In a nutshell (and as you probably guessed from the title), its very timely argument is “The Religious Right is neither religious nor right.” At any rate, since the book is basically in the can and the book cover has made it to Amazon, it seems as good a time as any to tell y’all about it.

    * “If you go out in the woods today, you’re in for a big surprise…Steve Belcher, a high school friend of mine who recently finished a stint at the NY Film Academy — he’s the fellow I was making a few short films with over the winter — has sent along “Sleeping In,” his first very short project, in fabulous Quicktime. Just goes to show, pretty much can anything happen in Central Park these days.

    The Dubya Decimal System.

    Still quite busy over here -- The megalithic history freelance project I mentioned here is finally drawing to a close, and orals reading is now consuming the bulk of my time. I know that portion of the site hasn't been updated lately, but I do plan to finish it, even if I have to post much of the content after my orals date, which should be sometime in the first two weeks of March.

    In the meantime, I've also recently begun helping Bill Press finish up another book project, Bush Must Go. (We previously collaborated on Spin This! together in early 2001.) And, in keeping with the book's subtitle, Press has asked for "Top Ten" submissions, your Top Ten reasons why George W. Bush has to go down as a one-termer like Papa, over at the DNC Blog today. So, if you're feeling creative or have to get a particular Bush vent off your chest, leave your list over there. As he says, your ideas may very well be incorporated into the book.