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In this Nov. 4, 2008 file photo, Gov. Sarah Palin, R-Alaska, acknowledges the crowd during an election night rally in Phoenix. Oprah wants her, and so do Letterman and Leno. Fresh from her political defeat, Sarah Palin is juggling offers to write books, appear in films and sit on dozens of interview couches at a rate astonishing for any first-term governor, let alone a Hollywood star. (AP Photo/Elise Amendola, File)
Oprah wants her, and so do Letterman and Leno. Fresh from her political defeat, Sarah Palin is juggling offers to write books, appear in films and sit on dozens of interview couches at a rate that would be astonishing for most Hollywood stars, let alone a first-term governor.
The failed Republican vice presidential candidate crunched state budget numbers this week in her 17th-floor office as tumbling oil prices hit Alaska’s revenues. Meanwhile, her staff fielded television requests seeking the 44-year-old Palin for late-night banter and Sunday morning Washington policy. Agents, including those from the William Morris Agency, have come knocking. There’s even been an offer to host a TV show.
“Tomorrow, Governor Palin could do an interview with any news media on the planet,” said her spokesman, Bill McAllister. “Tomorrow, she could probably sign any one of a dozen book deals. She could start talking to people about a documentary or a movie on her life. That’s the level we are at here.” “Barbara Walters called me. George Stephanopoulos called me,” McAllister said. “I’ve had multiple conversations with producers for Oprah, Letterman, Leno and ‘The Daily Show.’”
[...]
Palin has sent unmistakable signals she is open to running for president in 2012, but to advance her political ambitions she must stay in the public eye in the lower 48 states. As with any celebrity, there is the risk of overexposure. At the same time, she’ll be under pressure to attend to governing her home state, which is thousands of miles from the rest of the nation.
“She has to deal with the perception that she bobbled her debut,” said Claremont McKenna College political scientist John Pitney. “She needs to stay home for a while. If she wants a future in national politics, her No. 1 job is doing a good job as governor.”
I’m inclined to agree. She’s already got name recognition in spades; the problem is the perception that she’s not ready for prime time. Of course, it’s going to be mighty hard to “do a good job” at this point, given that the job has become tremendously harder now that oil is back to $50 a barrel.
Actor and president of the Screen Actors Guild, Alan Rosenberg, poses for a portrait in this March 17, 2003, file photo taken in Los Angeles. The Screen Actors Guild said Saturday Nov. 22, 2008 that contract talks with Hollywood studios has failed despite the help of a federal mediator and it will now ask its members to authorize a strike. (AP Photo/Ric Francis, File)
In what seems an inauspicious time, what with a down economy, the Screen Actors Guild is threatening a strike.
“We have already made difficult decisions and sacrifices in an attempt to reach agreement,” the statement said. “Now it’s time for SAG members to stand united and empower the national negotiating committee to bargain with the strength of a possible work stoppage behind them.”
The statement did not specify what led to the impasse, saying only that “management continues to insist on terms we cannot responsibly accept.” A SAG spokeswoman said she would not comment further. A call to the movie producers group, known as the AMPTP, was not immediately returned.
It’s difficult to imagine a less sympathetic labor class — or one less in need of collective bargaining — than Hollywood actors. The horrible working conditions that could lead to the strike?
SAG is seeking union coverage for all Internet-only productions regardless of budget and residual payments for Internet productions replayed online, as well as continued actor protections during work stoppages. But the AMPTP said it was untenable for SAG to demand a better deal than what writers, directors and another actors union accepted earlier in the year, especially now that the economy has worsened.
The Chronicle of Higher Educationreports today that Bob Jones University’s current president has “apologized” for his institution’s racist policies, which persisted until the Civil Rights Movement finally made it to their little corner of Greenville, South Carolina in 2000. Per the university’s website:
For almost two centuries American Christianity, including BJU in its early stages, was characterized by the segregationist ethos of American culture. Consequently, for far too long, we allowed institutional policies regarding race to be shaped more directly by that ethos than by the principles and precepts of the Scriptures. We conformed to the culture rather than provide a clear Christian counterpoint to it. …
On national television in March 2000, Bob Jones III, who was the university’s president until 2005, stated that BJU was wrong in not admitting African-American students before 1971, which sadly was a common practice of both public and private universities in the years prior to that time. On the same program, he announced the lifting of the University’s policy against interracial dating.
As my fellow political scientist Jacob Levy points out this statement is rather pathetic and, shall we say, rather lacking in any sense of just how out-of-step BJU was with the rest of the nation for 32 of the past 40 years:
In short, Bob Jones University did not passively float along on the tide of American racism, and it was not racist only in its “early stages.” It was worse on racial questions, longer, than any other university in the country. And it was actively, determinedly, passionately worse. The University did not conform itself to a surrounding ethos. It fought to resist changes to that ethos; it fought hard, at serious institutional cost.
Now, resisting the surrounding culture is something one expects from religiously dissident institutions. Of course a fundamentalist Christian university views itself as being at odds with the surrounding world–for better and for worse. Passive conformity is no great virtue, and fighting hard for one’s beliefs is admirable. But if it turns out that your beliefs were grotesquely, abominably wrong, then it’s cowardice to suddenly plead passive conformity. That’s a vice of which Bob Jones University has never been guilty–and the lie that it has been strips its supposed apology of any moral force.
As Levy is perhaps too polite to point out, not only is the plea of “passive conformity” cowardly, it’s also factually inaccurate, unless the trustees, faculty, and administration of Bob Jones University were conforming to the norms supported by the Ku Klux Klan and few others.
While the university’s statement does recognize a failure of leadership by white Christian organizations during the segregationist era that was hardly unique to Bob Jones and his progeny, it fails to recognize the degree to which the university both served to legitimate values that today it acknowledges were fundamentally at odds with Christian teachings and acted as an exemplar of racial intolerance that bigots everywhere could point to as a legitimate institution that shared their warped sense that segregation and white supremacy were acceptable values in late 20th century society. While today’s mealy-mouthed statement may assuage those who seek political cover for their association with Bob Jones, it should not satisfy those who expect intellectual honesty from a purported institution of higher learning.
It appears that Barack Obama’s economic team is set, with Timothy Geithner at Treasury and Bill Richardson at Commerce.
President-elect Barack Obama has selected Timothy Geithner as Treasury secretary, charging the respected head of the New York Federal Reserve with pulling the United States out of an economic nosedive, NBC news reported on Friday. Geithner, 47, had been seen as one of two main candidates for the job along with former Clinton administration Treasury chief Lawrence Summers.
U.S. stocks soared on the news, pushing major indices up more than 6 percent. The Dow Jones industrial average closed above 8,000, an important psychological trading level.
“A fantastic choice to help lead the financial markets out of the wilderness,” said Chris Rupkey, senior economist at The Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi in New York, of Geithner. “A crisis manager par excellence who will hit the ground running as he has been on the case since the global funding crisis began way back in July 2007.”
That the stock market can jump six percentage points on the announcement of a political appointee is worrisome on a variety of levels. But there you go.
Barely rating a mention:
NBC also reported that New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson — who was one of a crowded pack of Democratic presidential early this year — could receive Obama’s nod to become commerce secretary. Richardson’s elevation to the cabinet would give the Obama administration its first high-profile Hispanic member as its main liaison to the business community. Richardson was a United Nations ambassador and energy secretary under former President Bill Clinton.
While discussions of tokenism are inevitable, I suppose, it seems odd in the case of Richardson. He’s superbly qualified. If anything, Commerce is something of a demotion for him.
Hillary Clinton has accepted Barack Obama’s offer to be his Secretary of State, NYT and numerous other authoritative outlets are confirming.
Hillary Rodham Clinton has decided to give up her Senate seat and accept the position of secretary of state, making her the public face around the world for the administration of the man who beat her for the Democratic presidential nomination, two confidants said Friday.
The apparent accord between perhaps the two leading figures in the Democratic Party climaxed a week-long drama that riveted the nation’s capital.
Mrs. Clinton came to her decision after additional discussion with President-elect Barack Obama about the nature of her role and his plans for foreign policy, said one of the confidants, who insisted on anonymity to discuss the situation.
Mr. Obama’s office told reporters on Thursday that the nomination is “on track” but this is the first word from the Clinton camp that she has decided.
“She’s ready,” the confidant said, adding that Mrs. Clinton was reassured after talking again with Mr. Obama because their first meeting in Chicago last week “was so general.” The purpose of the follow-up talk, he noted, was not to extract particular concessions but “just getting comfortable” with the idea of working together.
CNN and Politico are both reporting that General James Jones, chairman of the Atlantic Council, is the leading candidate for National Security Advisor in the Obama cabinet.
Two sources close to the Obama transition team tell CNN retired Marine Gen. Jim Jones has emerged as President-elect’s leading choice to become national security adviser in the White House.
The sources said Jones has been given the impression by the President-elect that the job is his if he wants it. But the officials said there are still private discussions underway and no final decision has been made. The discussions are focused on precisely how much power Jones will have in the staff job since he is used to being in a command role. Among his many posts, Jones served for several years as the operational commander for NATO.
In the third and final presidential debate, Obama noted that he deeply values advice from Jones, who has four decades of military service.
One person close to the transition noted Jones is a bipartisan figure who has warm relationships with both current Defense Secretary Robert Gates, who may stay on the job for at least a brief period, as well as Sen. Hillary Clinton, who is now on track to be nominated as Secretary of State after Thanksgiving.
I’ll demur on commenting on the merits of my boss’ boss for the job. I will, however, note that the chatter thus far on Memeorandum is quite positive.
Joe Klein (TIME): “General Jones is universally respected. He refused a series of major positions offered by the Bush Administration, presumably because he opposed the policies he would have been expected to implement. He did agree to study the security situations in Iraq and Afghanistan for the Bush Administration, and came back with reports that were embarrassingly candid. If appointed, he–not David Petraeus–will be the most important (former) general in the Obama Administration, which will help tilt power back toward the President.”
Spencer Ackerman (Washington Independent): “If so, it would be a good choice. [...] Also, Jones would be reflective of two huge Obama priorities. First, Afghanistan. As NATO Commander, Jones ceaselessly lobbied the European allies for greater assistance in the Afghanistan war. Second, energy security. Jones is widely known to be an advocate of alternative energy sources, and, as Politico notes, chairs an energy task force for the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. And of course there’s the good optics of such a well-respected general being Obama’s closest White House aide on foreign policy.”
Steve Benen (Washington Monthly) and Adam Serwer (American Prospect) seem favorably disposed as well.
I’ll be interested to see the reaction from the Right; thus far, there’s been none. [UPDATE: Tom Maguire's on board.]
As an aside, I’m always amused by the use of obviously outdated file photos. Jones retired from the Marine Corps two years ago and Michael Hayden retired from the Air Force over the summer. Yet virtually every story about them shows them in uniform.
Aside #2: So long as I can recall, the informal title of the Assistant to the President for National Security Affairs has been National Security Advisor. Over the last couple of days, however, I’m mostly seeing it spelled Adviser. Odd.
Aside #3: There have been several jokes about the name “Jim Jones” and “James Jones,” noting other famous people with those names, but none that I’m seen invoking the Rev. Jim Jones of Jonestown fame. This is truly disappointing, given all the “drinking the Kool Aid” jokes we’ve heard about Obama.
UCLA corporate lawprof Stephen Bainbridge has gone from thinking that the SEC probably had a case against Mark Cuban to thinking they probably don’t, largely on the strength of Cuban’s presenting his case publicly on his “Blog Maverick” site.
But that raises another question: Should Cuban be conducting his defense in public on his blog?
If Cuban’s point is to clear his name with the public, the answer would seem to be an unequivocal Yes. If, however, his goal is to avoid alienating the goons at the SEC, causing them to spend tax dollars ginning up a case — any case — against him as payback for making them look bad, not so much. We’ve seen time and again that armies of government lawyers with unlimited resources pretty much always find something to charge high profile targets with, even if it’s seldom the thing they started out investigating.
