Year: 2008

So Obama is in all kinds of hot water because he said that there was bitterness in the working class of Pennsylvania, saying that workers in Pennsylvania and elsewhere who have seen factories shut down “get bitter, they cling to guns or religion or antipathy to people who aren’t like them.” These sentiments are generating all manner of controversy, although since my understanding is that the remarks were made in private, I find the violation of confidences to be more alarming.
Clinton is blasting Obama, saying his comments smack of “elitism.” Newsday reported that one Democratic strategist in Washington, asserted, “Mistakes like this make superdelegates nervous. … You cannot be elected president of the United States if you think you’re smarter than everyone. People pick up on that.”
Here’s what I don’t get: Why is that a bad thing?
What’s wrong with a president believing he’s smarter than everyone? Or at least smarter than most people? What’s wrong with someone being elitist? Why shouldn’t the President of the United States be the best and the brightest, and know that he or she is and be proud of that fact? We’ve had a proud dunce for seven years now; does anyone REALLY think we’re better off for it?
It’s no wonder that people are distrustful of politicians, but really, we’ve brought it on ourselves. We have a situation wherein this country’s anti-intellectualism has become so pervasive, so suffocating, that we have multi-millionaire Ivy league graduates trying to pretend they’re just plain folks when clearly they’re not. And people know they’re not. This country was founded by men who knew they were the best and brightest, and the citizenry took pride and comfort in that. But television has put politicians into peoples’ homes, and now we just want someone we’re comfortable with. We don’t want men and women who come across like professors; we want the guy who sat in the back of the class and goofs off, as if life was a sitcom. To put it in “Fast Times at Ridgemont High” terms, we should want to elect Mr. Hand; instead we opt for Jeff Spicoli.
PAD

At I-Con, Harlan was talking about an Eddie Izzard routine about “Star Wars.” During the rest of the convention people kept coming up to me and saying, “You know, there’s a Legos version of that bit.” So here it is:
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We think the artwork speaks for itself here.

Spent the majority of the day at Mets opening day, courtesy of a last minute invite from convention guy Jon Manzo. The festivities were all great, and Citibank Park is coming along nicely. The only thing disappointing about the day was the Mets’ level of play as they dropped the final Shea home opener 5-2 to the Phillies. It’s bad enough when a team plays well and they’re outplayed by a better team. But the Phillies were thunderingly unimpressive, with dinky, unimpressive seeing eye hits. What won them the game was the Mets bullpen, handing bases to them courtesy of hit batsmen (well, one batsman, Utley, who kept getting plunked. Who the hëll did he pìšš øff, anyway?), walks, and sloppy fielding that, in one instance, turned a potential inning-ending double play ball into an error that resulted in a run scored and everyone safe. When you hand a team five outs per inning, you’re going to lose. Feh.
More cheerful was the evening spent at the screening of the Harlan Ellison documentary, “Dreams with Sharp Teeth” at Lincoln center. Present were Harlan, the doc’s director, Erik Nelson, as well as such luminaries as Josh Olson, Norman Spinrad, and others (as well as Kathleen, who met up with me in the city and looked QUITE fetching, I have to say). Harlan and Erik did a Q&A afterwards that easily could have done another hour if they hadn’t kicked us out. Good times.
PAD

Chris Ullrich interviews Peter for ComicMix, where he talks about She-Hulk, X-Factor, Stephen King and Dark Tower and online comics. Enjoy.

Had a good time at I-Con this year. How can you not when Harlan Ellison is in town?
Dire weather was predicted but fortunately held off, since I-Con (or, as I call it, Schlepcon) can be something of a drag in the rain. Held on the campus of Stony Brook University, you have to walk to various buildings for different panels, some of them practically on opposite sides of the campus.
Did a bunch of panels with such luminaries as Harlan, Bob Greenberger, Dwayne McDuffie, Murphy Anderson, Peter S. Beagle and Norman Spinrad. They were well attended and the fans were uniformly enthusiastic.
PAD