Bookshelf update: Randy Pausch & Robert Crais

This will be quick. I'm 3/4 of the way through Randy Pausch's book version of The Last Lecture, and calling it inspiring is like calling grass green. The very act of writing it was inspiring; the end product could hardly help but be so. It really is a good read, though. Pausch emerges as a quirky, three-dimensional character for the ages, a self-professed recovering jerk whose intellectual arrogance is thoroughly undermined by his deep loyalty to his family and belief that some vital part of the secret of life lies in striving to achieve your childhood dreams. If Peter Pan had grown up to be a computer scientist with terminal cancer, he might have written this book.

The other thing that led me to post today was Robert Crais, whose Elvis Cole series is among my very favorite reads, and who just published a typically smart, witty, multilayered and purposeful essay about his own creative process, in the form of an imagined conversation between himself and Cole. If you aren't already a fan of this series and are curious about it, give this a read and see if it doesn't tempt you to pick up one of the books.

Life at warp speed

It's been some time since I blogged here, and -- fair warning -- may be some time yet. Somehow even in the most predictable of circumstances, life around the holidays assumes greater velocity. And circumstances today -- a new job starting January 5, three kids finishing finals this week and coming home for break, our good friends' annual Christmas party, etc., etc. -- include both the predictable and the life-changing. Where it's all heading right now is anybody's guess, but as usual the challenge is to stay in the moment and try to navigate your path with some element of grace and presence. When you're moving at warp speed, the laws of physics have a tendency to break down... but you're still making memories.

The Loving Decision

Back in May I wrote about the 1967 U.S. Supreme Court decision striking down laws against interracial marriage, the fortuitously-named case Loving v. Virginia. In recent days a number of commentators have noted the irony that in 2008 Virginia's electoral votes were won by a presidential candidate whose parents would have been thrown in jail if they had visited the state when he was a child.

In May I happened across and wrote about Mildred Loving's obituary just a week before the California Supreme Court delivered its decision striking down as unconstitutional a California state law against same-sex marriage. And now Anna Quindlen has delivered a column that puts it all in beautiful perspective. "The world only spins forward" -- yes.

Tim Lincecum and Keith Olbermann

Other than the fact that Olbermann used to be a sportscaster, those two subjects have little to do with one another outside my personal bubble. But today they come together because I have two items to offer. One is of course the news about Timmy winning the Cy Young Award at age 24 in his first full season in the major leagues. Watching this kid pitch is the most fun I've had watching baseball since October 2002.

Item the second is one of Olbermann's trademark special comments. Now, Keith can be a bit of a blowhard; in his own way he has assumed the mantle of the Bill O'Reilly of the left, utterly sure of his own correctness at all times. That said, this special comment is clearly heartfelt and genuine and confronts the viewer with compassion rather than brow-beating. Well done, Keith.

Strange days indeed

What a strange day dawned just now. On the same day the nation overcame a centuries-old legacy of discrimination by electing our first African-American president, the citizens of California -- who voted for Obama by a 61-37 percent margin -- also voted 52-48 percent to write discrimination into our own state constitution. Never mind questions of right or wrong, the simple cognitive dissonance of that act is staggering.

To the extent there is a bright side, it's this. In 2000, California voters enacted a statutory ban on gay marriage by a margin of 61 percent to 39 percent. Proposition 8 wrote that ban into the state constitution by a margin of 52 percent to 48 percent. All indications are that voters over 60 years old supported Prop 8 by a substantial margin, and voters under 30 opposed it by an even greater margin. In eight years, the numbers moved nine percentage points. Supporters of Prop 8 may have prevailed in this instance, but the tide of history continues to run in the direction of freedom and equality.

Proposition 8: The Last Word

The No on 8 campaign released this ad over the weekend. Well done.

Proposition 8: The Ring-Bearer's Question

Yesterday I promised a more personal take on this issue. Here it is.

When the California Supreme Court handed down its decision affirming equal marriage rights this May, I took the opportunity to repost an op-ed piece of mine that was published in the Sacramento Bee and San Francisco Chronicle fifteen years ago. That piece talked about my perceptions of various issues as a straight suburban parent whose kids have through their entire lives enjoyed the love and support of a godfather-figure who is gay.

Three years after that piece was published, I wrote another, similar one addressing gay marriage. I liked the piece but felt it made my grammar school-aged kids -- then 8, 6 and 5 -- vulnerable in a way I wasn’t comfortable with. So I put it in a drawer -- until today when, 12 years later and with their blessing, I am publishing it here for the first time. Thanks, guys.

***************************************************************

The Ring-Bearer's Question
by Jason Warburg

“Do you think Dave will ever get married?”

My eight-year-old son and I are splayed out on the family room floor watching a movie, the very portrait of late spring Sunday afternoon lassitude. I look over at him and see every dream I’ve ever tucked away reflected back at me, his bright face a prism glinting fresh hopes and opportunities across every wall of our home. Sometimes just a smile at the right moment from this treasure chest of innocent wisdom is enough to bring tears to my soggy, overzealous parent’s eyes.

“I don’t know,” I respond, stalling shamelessly.

I am trying to backtrack his thought process... his uncle’s wedding was just a few days ago, and he and his sister and brother each had speaking roles in the joyous, family-centered ceremony. Farther in the past, three years ago, he was the proud ring-bearer for a close cousin’s wedding. I try to imagine what he is thinking right now and see him dressed to the nines again, shoes freshly spit-polished following a tromp through the ivy after some interesting bug, beaming with the knowledge he is about to play an important role in his beloved godfather’s marriage.

My little man understands weddings well. The idea of two people declaring their love for and lifelong commitment to one another in front of their family and friends clicks on all his cylinders. He appreciates both the spectacle and, I honestly believe, the deeper meaning of it all. It is something, though he knows it lies far off in his own still-mysterious future, that he wants very much to experience for himself, and his roles in others’ weddings have been a kind of unconscious dress rehearsal aiming him toward a goal he has long since embraced.

At this point I decide to stumble forward with an answer rather than delaying further. “He might. I think he’d like to be able to, someday. But right now, even if he found the right person and wanted to, he couldn’t.”

My son looks over at me, eyes clouding, brow furrowing. We delve slowly further into the subject. I remind him of a couple of previous conversations we’ve had about his godfather, particularly the one in which we talked at some length about why “faggot” is such a bad word, even though some of his friends -- nice kids, otherwise -- use it occasionally.

“But why couldn’t he?” my son persists.

I answer as best I can, trying to keep my terms simple. “Because if he did get married, he would want to be married to another man. Remember?”

He remembers, we’ve talked this point through before, and yet he continues to protest, his unfettered mind clearly puzzled at the logic which allows people who love one another to marry only if they are of the politically correct genders. I listen with a concerned but mild expression; only inside my head do I let loose my own frustrated answers -- “Because a lot of straight folks don’t seem to comprehend that many gay people want long-term, committed, monogamous relationships, and because some so-called conservatives feel their particular interpretation of God’s will should overrule the Constitution when it comes to every American’s equal right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.”

What ends up coming out of my mouth instead is much milder -- a few words along the lines of “it’s just something that people haven’t done very much before, so some grown-ups aren’t comfortable with it yet” -- but it proves to be enough to tide him over for now. I won’t lie to him, but neither will I overwhelm him with a barrage of truths he is too young to absorb.

One piece of unfinished business from our conversation weighs on me, though. I have explained to my son why his godfather -- a warm and vital presence in his and his two siblings’ young lives -- could not today marry someone he loved and wanted to be with for the rest of his life. It has been difficult, but manageable. The moment I fear more may come later.

My wife and I have three children, two boys and a girl. Assuming somewhere around five to ten percent of our population is gay, there is roughly a 15 to 30 percent chance that someday one of my children may again ask me the question which launched this exchange. Except he or she won’t be asking it about a godfather, or cousin, or friend from school or work. She will be asking it about herself. My child will be asking me why he can’t marry the person he loves with all his wondrous heart.

And I won’t have the slightest idea what to tell him.

*
(c) Copyright 1996 Jason Warburg

Republicans just say no to Proposition 8

With Barack Obama poised to win “the largest California victory of any presidential candidate since World War II” and high-profile Republicans turning away from their party’s desperately flailing ticket in droves (let’s see, Colin Powell, David Brooks, Christopher Buckley, Kathleen Parker, Peggy Noonan, David Frum, Scott McClellan, Francis Fukuyama and the list goes on), it’s time for me to similarly turn away from the national stage and move to a topic that hits much closer to home: California’s Proposition 8.

Proposition 8 attempts to reverse the May 15 ruling of the Republican-appointed California Supreme Court in favor of equal marriage rights for all Californians -- rights now enjoyed in six Western countries (Canada, Spain, South Africa, Norway, Belgium and the Netherlands) and three states (Massachusetts, Connecticut and California).

Most Californians are aware of Prop 8 and have at least the beginnings of an opinion about it. What's less well understood is that Prop 8 has attracted opposition from all across the political spectrum, as both liberals and conservatives have objected to government restrictions on basic individual rights and freedoms.

A leading Republican voice in 2006 stated that the Bush Administration’s proposed constitutional ban on gay marriage "strikes me as antithetical in every way to the core philosophy of Republicans.” He added that the decision in Massachusetts to legalize same-sex marriages did "not represent a death knell to marriage." The words of Senator John McCain – or at least, the pre-presidential primary version of John McCain.

McCain may have been willing to shed his principles for the sake of appealing to the far right wing of his party, but traditional conservatives within the Republican Party -- who believe in individual liberty for all, not merely some -- oppose Proposition 8 by the thousands. Their site, www.republicansagainst8.com, identifies its sponsors as “concerned California Republicans who believe in limited government, personal responsibility, the maintenance of Constitutionally-protected rights and freedoms, and in protecting California’s business climate.” In addition to Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger and San Diego Mayor Jerry Sanders and a long list of Republican local officeholders and candidates, the site lists as supporters leading California businesses like Apple, PG&E, AT&T, Levi Strauss and Google.

Republicans Against 8 have also developed three simple, effective ads spotlighting their arguments against Prop 8. This one focuses on the backward-looking nature of the initiative, this one reminds voters that Prop 8 would take away rights from people all around us, and the one included below features three Republicans – a federal prosecutor, a missile defense scientist and a Vietnam Veteran -- speaking out against Prop 8.



Tomorrow, a more personal take on this subject.

Switchfoot confuses the pundits

Over on the Daily Vault, I’ve blogged several times in recent weeks about the various musical artists who have complained to and/or sued the McCain/Palin campaign over their appropriation of songs for use in campaign events and propaganda. Meanwhile numerous major acts (Bruce Springsteen & Billy Joel, Jon Bon Jovi, James Taylor and the list goes on) have performed benefit concerts or hosted fundraising events for the Obama/Biden campaign. It seems safe to say that, as a class, the majority of popular musicians prefer the Democratic ticket.

Unfortunately, it also seems safe to say that lazy stereotyping remains rampant all along the political spectrum, from Fox News on the right to MSNBC on the left. Today’s transgressor is uber-glib MSNBC.com columnist Dave White, who in the context of suggesting alternative music for the McCain/Palin campaign to use, indulged in blatant stereotyping to come up with this assertion: “There are some easy ‘gets’ though. Kid Rock’s ‘American Badass,’ or Toby Keith’s ‘Courtesy of the Red, White & Blue’ are probably fair game without consequence. And I’m guessing Reba McEntire, Switchfoot, Daddy Yankee and Trace Adkins are open to having their music co-opted.”

Toby Keith yes, that’s a no-brainer, and I can’t speak for most of the others because I don’t know their music or whether they’ve endorsed a candidate. But Switchfoot? The only plausible reason I can think of for White “guessing” they would support the McCain/Palin ticket is that they are a band that is both nationally popular and openly Christian.

And there’s your stereotype – oh, they’re a Christian band, they must be for the conservative Republican candidates. Let’s deconstruct the fallacy here.

First, Switchfoot has never publicly associated itself with any specific candidate or party. Look it up. The only overtly political song they have ever produced criticizes “Politicians” as a class without differentiating between left and right and promotes an anti-nationalist viewpoint (“I pledge allegiance to a country without borders, without politicians”) that seems way out of sync with the Limbaugh-loving, U.N.-hating crowd’s ideology.

Second, Switchfoot’s fans come to the group from all across the political spectrum, as evidenced by this lively presidential race discussion thread on the Switchfoot.com forum.

Third, Switchfoot’s political philosophy, to the extent it has ever expressed one, is distinctly anti-materialist:

“When success is equated with excess
When we’re fighting for the Beamer, the Lexus
As the heart and soul breathe in the company goals
Where success is equated with excess

I want out of this machine
It doesn’t feel like freedom

This ain’t my American dream
I want to live and die for bigger things
I’m tired of fighting for just me
This ain't my American dream

’Cause baby’s always talkin’ ‘bout a ring
And talk has always been the cheapest thing
Is it true would you do what I want you to
If I show up with the right amount of bling?

Like a puppet on a monetary string
Maybe we’ve been caught singing
Red, white, blue, and green
But that ain’t my America,
That ain’t my American dream”

The only thing you can really say for sure about Switchfoot’s political beliefs is that they clearly don’t believe that the materialism and greed that characterizes unfettered free market capitalism is the answer to our nation’s problems. It wouldn’t be much of a stretch to say they have some distinctly socialist leanings -- but then, it wouldn’t be much of a stretch to say the same about Jesus Christ himself.

Christian does not equal conservative, nor does it equal Republican. Some of the most politically liberal people I have ever known have been deeply committed Christians. The world is not black and white, but filled with shades of grey. The only way to see them all is to remove the glasses that render everything in easy stereotypes.

The new McCarthyism

The last couple of weeks have been a little dizzying, both for me personally and out on the campaign trail. Granted, it has to be tough when your core beliefs are being challenged by a wide swath of the American public, not to mention the global eonomy, but you can also tell a lot about people, both as individuals and as leaders, by the way they react under stress. And the reaction of some Republican candidates and public officials to their party's sagging poll numbers has been nothing short of alarming.

The gist of the response is "Real Americans agree with us." So where does that leave, say, the 56 percent of likely voters in California who plan to vote for Barack Obama? Do these Republican leaders really mean to say that anyone who doesn't share their views and/or vote for them is anti-American? It sure seems like they do. Which puts these folks in bed with Senator Joseph McCarthy and every other ideological fanatic who's ever proclaimed "you either believe everything I do, or you're evil."

Enough of my little rant, though... Jon Stewart does it so much better. [Usual warning here about adult language, content, etc. Jon does not pull punches. You've been warned.]

Best. music video. ever.

I realize all the cool people on the Internet saw this two years ago. I saw it for the first time myself several months ago. I don't care. I saw it again today and it made me smile. So there.



(P.S. The group is OK GO, the song is called "Here It Goes Again," and yes this really is one continuous shot. Don't ask me how many times they had to do this before they got the shot.)

Life (the series)

It’s not every day I find myself wanting to tell people about a TV show. Yes, I have my guilty pleasures -- Lost, 24, The Daily Show -- but unless the Giants are playing, my “must-see TV” list is a very short one.

It’s not every day, but it is today, and the show is NBC’s brilliant Life. British actor Damian Lewis plays LA homicide detective Charlie Crews who, after uncovering corruption within the department, was framed, convicted of murder and sentenced to life (thus the title). After 12 years in a maximum security prison -- thrown inside with the people he’d been putting away as a cop -- what does he do when a defense attorney finally gets his conviction overturned and gets him out? First, he files and wins a $50 million lawsuit against the city. Then, as part of the settlement, he gets his old job back and proceeds to use his position inside the department to try to unravel the conspiracy that led to his being framed.

That might sound a little contrived, a little bit too “Count of Monte Cristo inside the LAPD” Hollywood pat. And it could have been, if not for the writing – which snaps, crackles and pops its way through every cleverly constructed episode – and the superb Lewis, who invests every moment with meaning and, with the writers, brings his damaged character to life in perpetually interesting ways. Charlie learned to survive the brutality of prison life by studying Zen, which philosophy seeps into everything he says and does as he works homicide cases full of equally damaged victims and suspects. What did he miss most on the inside? Fresh fruit -- every episode he’s eating some different variety of it; on this fall’s premiere episode it was miniature kumquats. What does he do for fun? Pull over his now ex-wife’s hotshot second husband whenever he sees him. Oh, and his tightly-wound, by-the-book partner -- the superb and stunning Sarah Shahi -- just happens to be the daughter of the ex-cop who’s apparently at the center of the conspiracy that got Crews wrongly convicted.

Life’s first season was cut short by the writer’s strike, but NBC appears to believe in the show, having re-launched it by running two episodes a week last week and this week on Mondays and Fridays at 10, before settling into its regular Friday 10:00 pm timeslot. It’s one of the smartest and most entertaining shows ever to make it onto network TV, so catch it now before they decide that what civilization really needs is more episodes of Wipeout…

Palin's new chorus of critics: conservative pundits

The narrative of the presidential campaign the past two weeks has frankly been rather predictable. There's just one trend that's truly new and noteworthy here -- a developing groundswell of criticism of John McCain's choice of Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin as his running mate from an altogether unexpected source: conservative pundits. George Will, David Brooks, David Frum and perhaps most notably, early Palin supporter Kathleen Parker (see at right) have all expressed serious concerns in recent days about Palin's fitness to serve. Parker, who previously hailed McCain's "keen judgment" on selecting Palin is now actively calling for her to resign from the ticket "for your country." To quote from Parker's column of this morning, "Palin’s recent interviews with Charles Gibson, Sean Hannity, and now Katie Couric have all revealed an attractive, earnest, confident candidate. Who Is Clearly Out Of Her League."

Understanding the financial meltdown

The symptoms of the current financial meltdown are everywhere; what are harder to locate and explain in plain language are the root causes. That's why this column by Steven Pearlstein of the Washington Post struck me as being tremendously valuable in the straightforward and practical approach it takes to explaining the current financial mess. In a nutshell, America has been living the "I want it all and I want it now" binge-buying consumerist dream for the past decade, and now the party's over and the bills have come due. The folks with the biggest financial hangovers today are the ones who, when things began to slow down, "doubled down" on their debt rather than cutting back on spending -- and their ranks range from individual households to international financial giants.

This too shall pass, of course, but there are a couple of important lessons in here for those in the younger generation who are trying to understand what all this means.

One is that the financial markets, those avatars of pure and rational capitalism, rarely behave rationally. Rather, the markets run on a mob mentality that can veer from "irrational exuberance" to suicidal gloom in a matter of hours. And when they do, the only rational actor standing between them and self-immolation is (cue Darth Vader theme music) the federal government. Yes, sometimes government regulation is not just necessary, but essential.

Another equally important lesson is that everything in the economy is cyclical. There never has been and never will be such a thing as an economic expansion that goes on forever -- only a group of reckless people in every cycle who are willing to bet that this time it will. Make your own judgments and don't follow the crowd -- it's a good lesson for both economics and life.

Lies, damned lies, and the people who tell them

While the talking heads continue to buzz away in their endless spin cycle of manufactured hype, there appears to be at least one journalist in America -- the often-irascible Paul Krugman, seen at right -- willing to get right to the heart of the matter and tell it like it is. To wit: the McCain-Palin campaign lies. Again, and again, and again.

Of course, so does the management of the San Francisco Giants, which keeps mouthing the words "youth movement" while continuing to sacrifice the rookies' playing time on the altar of should-never-have-been-signed retreads like Dave Roberts. But they're in the entertainment business, not the deciding-the-fate-of-the-world business.

Giants go young, win big

In other news, the San Francisco Giants finally, on September 7, seem convincingly committed to a youth movement, fielding a starting lineup yesterday that consisted of eight players with less than two years' major league experience, and Randy Winn. End result? The Giants' first 10-run inning in over three years, and a resounding win. Yes, the defense and bullpen and even the baserunning was a little shaky at times, but here, at last, is a team that's exciting to watch...

The Sarah Palin pick: Republican women react

Never mind winning over Democratic and Independent women who disagree with Sarah Palin on key issues like choice and the environment and evolution vs. creationism, can the McCain-Palin ticket even hold onto Republican women? Apparently not UPI correspondent and longtime Republican pundit Georgie Anne Geyer, who in her column today describes the Palin pick as "the choice of a vice president whose inexperience is a slap in the face to serious Americans" and bemoans her personal view that "the Republican Party of Ronald Reagan is falling apart before our eyes."

The Sarah Palin pick: focus group

Without intending to, I seem to have convened a focus group. This occurred simply because a good friend of mine is in fact the spot-on demographic for the Sarah Palin pick -- a woman who grew up in a rural community as a lifelong Republican until the party's rightward tilt repelled her, whereupon she went independent. Now she's a suburban soccer mom / working woman, fiscal conservative, potential Hillary Clinton voter and student of both parties whose voting patterns can be quite unpredictable. So how did this perfectly targeted swing voter react to Palin's big-splash speech at the Republican National Convention last night?

And I quote: "Is this the best they could do for a female Republican candidate? She reminds me of a high school cheerleader making snotty comments at a slumber party. Smug, self-righteous and just plain obnoxious. I can't stand her."

Gee, tell us how you really feel...

Personally, I could only manage to watch a few minutes of the convention here and there. I just find the whole "anyone who disagrees with us must not love America" tone of the event too nauseating and offensive to tolerate. I love America and I disagree. Get over it.

The Sarah Palin pick: adding insult to injury

Well, Republican presidential nominee John McCain certainly reclaimed his "maverick" status with his pick of virtually unknown Alaska Governor Sarah Palin as his running mate. It's probably one of the kinder things people in the Republican party have been calling him after his selection of a person who almost no one outside of McCain himself seems to believe was his best available choice.

Watching McCain try to defend his pick might be comical -- "Alaska is our largest state" (unless you count the 46 others with a larger population) -- if it wasn't so frightening. Here is a person whose career highlight up until 18 months ago was serving two terms as mayor of an Alaskan town of 7,000 people. The only 3:00 am phone calls she's used to getting are demands for better snowplow coverage.

What's truly stunning -- and so very telling -- about this pick, though, is that McCain actually seems to think it was clever. He actually appears to believe that putting the arch-conservative Palin on the ticket will pull in droves of disaffected Hillary Clinton supporters despite the fact that Palin's record on every significant issue facing our country today -- war, the economy, the environment, civil rights -- is either non-existent or diametrically opposed to that of Hillary Clinton. The underlying assumption here is that the only factor that really mattered to all of those Hillary voters, the only reason they all supported her so passionately for so long, was her gender.

It's hard to imagine a more insulting set of assumptions being made about a group of supposedly intelligent and independent-minded voters. Leave it to Jon Stewart and The Daily Show to distill these assumptions to their rawest essence, i.e. "Sarah Palin may be the ideological opposite of Hillary Clinton, but she's her gynecological twin..." (Warning: link contains the usual irrevent language and razor-sharp humor.)

Baseball adopts instant replay; Piniella ready to throw down

I'm honestly pretty ambivalent about baseball finally following the lead of other major U.S. sports and adopting the instant replay. But quote of the day on this or any other subject clearly goes to notoriously explosive base-tossing manager Lou Piniella. "What's the format? I'd love to be able to throw a red hankie or a green hankie," Piniella said, referring to the NFL system in which a coach throws out a red flag to challenge a call. "Imagine being able to throw something on the field and not be ejected."