June 25, 2019--Biden's Sister Souljah Moment

As is his propensity, last week Joe Biden stepped in it.

But then again, perhaps he didn't. 

This flap, significantly taken out of context, was from something he said when Vice President, in a commencement address at Yale in 2015. Among many things he spoke about how when he was in the Senate he attempted to work directly with even other senators who were avowed segregationists and racists to advance important legislation.

Some of his current rivals, though acknowledging he is not himself a racist, claimed he minimally showed insensitivity to people of color who do not look back to that Jim Crow era with any sense of nostalgia or bipartisan clubbiness. Among others, sensing a political opportunity, Cory Booker called on Biden to apologize.

That really got under Biden's skin.

He fired back, "Apologize for what? He knows better. I don't have a racist bone in my body."

I suspect the old Joe would have tied himself up in knots of contrition and squeezed out a version of a self-righteous apology. But not this Joe. He doubled down. Tripled down. And in at least two regards this may have been the politically smart thing to do.

Voters this time around are looking for feistiness not wimpiness, confrontation not nuance. Even many liberals who pride themselves on being measured and understanding--never hot under the collar, no drama--more than anything want their candidate to be able to go toe-to-toe with Trump and take him down. After that, we can get back to seeking dialogue and reasonableness in the hope that maybe we can get a few legislative things done. Like fixing Obamacare and Social Security. Like doing something about our collapsing infrastructure. Like rebuilding our standing in the world.

For any of this to happen, assuming the Dems capture the White House and retain their majority in the House, it will be essential to figure out ways to work across the aisle with at least a half dozen Republicans. Biden by insisting on his ability to do this is boldly putting the spectrum of his political history out for review. Admittedly, some of it is on the compromised side.

Related, but more complicated, if he is to recapture some of the white, blue-collar vote that last time went overwhelmingly to Trump and more than anything else put him in the White House, he needs to demonstrate that though he is responsive to voters of color and progressive in other ways, he will not allow himself to become their agent. 

So this current flap could turn out to be Biden's Sister Souljah Moment. The original was in 1992 when Bill Clinton was the Democratic nominee. He was at risk of being perceived as pandering excessively to black voters as part of his strategy to win at least a few southern states, but in the process he risked alienating enough moderate white voters to lose to incumbent George H.W. Bush.

For those of you who do not recall what Clinton audaciously did, here is the best definition of a Sister Souljah Moment I have as yet come upon--

It is a critical moment in a campaign when a candidate takes what appears to be a bold stand against certain extremes in his or her own party and offers a calculated denunciation of that extreme position or special interest group. 

Such an act of repudiation is designed to signal to centrist voters that the politician is not beholden to traditional, and sometimes unpopular, interest groups associated with the party, although such a repudiation runs the risk of alienating some of the politician's allies and the party's base voters.

In 1992 popular African-American hip hop artist and social activist, Sister Souljah, provided Clinton with the opportunity to criticize her extreme views about race relations and thereby demonstrate he was not beholden to any special interest groups.

In a Washington Post interview Sister Souljah was quoted as saying (in response to a question regarding black-on-white violence during the 1992 Los Angeles riots):

Question: Even the people themselves who were perpetrating that violence, did they think that was wise? Was that a wise reasoned action?

Souljah: Yeah, it was wise. I mean, if black people kill black people every day, why not have a week and kill white people?... White people, this government and that mayor were well aware of the fact that black people were dying every day in Los Angeles under gang violence. So if you're a gang member and you would normally be killing somebody, why not kill a white person? Do you think that somebody thinks that white people are better, are above and beyond dying, when they would kill their own kind?

Speaking to Jesse Jackson's Rainbow Coalition in June 1992, Clinton responded both to that quotation and to something Souljah had said in the music video of her song "The Final Solution: Slavery's Back in Effect" ("If there are any good white people, I haven't met them").

Clinton said: "If you took the words 'white' and 'black,' and you reversed them, you might think the KKK's David Duke was giving that speech." 

This elicited a storm of hot debate but most dispassionate observers concluded that Clinton won the political battle and that helped him do better than expected, like it or not, among disaffiliated white voters.

I said "like it or not" because I do not like any of this. But politics is an ugly business and if Biden roughing up Booker will help him defeat Trump I will find a way until the day after Election Day 2020 to live with it.

October 1, 2018--Brett Kavanaugh: Wasted

If allowed by Republicans to do their work what the FBI will discover about Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh in their now resumed background check will turn out to be quite simple--back when he was accused of sexually assaulting Dr. Christine Blasey Ford and other young women he was a habitual drunk.

That would explain almost everything, including that he might in fact not remember the hideous incident. He may have been that blotto.

If they interview just a few people who knew him at the time would it surprise anyone who listened to Kavanaugh stumble through his testimony Thursday that he had a serious drinking problem? It even looked, as he rambled incoherently, that he still is a drunk.

The FBI should begin by interviewing his Yale College roommate, James Roche, who has written: 

"It is from this experience [as his roommate] that I concluded that although Brett was normally reserved, he was a notably heavy drinker, even by the standards of the time, and that he became aggressive and belligerent when he was very drunk . . . I remember Brett frequently drinking excessively and becoming incoherently drunk."

This is particularly condemning since anyone who has had a roommate knows that roommates know everything about each other.

And of course there is Mark Judge, one of Kavanaugh's prep-school drinking buddies, who was a self-admitted black-out drunk and wrote revealing books about that, including one, Wasted, that included a semi-fictional character who was habitually inebriated, "Bart O'Kavanaugh." Sound familiar?

Next the FBI should look closely at the entry Georgetown Prep senior Kavanaugh wrote about himself for the school yearbook. According to the New York Times--

"There is lots about football, reports of plenty of drinking, and parties at the beach." Among the reminiscences about sports and booze is a mysterious entry: “Renate Alumnius.”

The word “Renate” appears at least 14 times in Georgetown Preparatory School’s 1983 yearbook, on individuals’ pages and in a group photo of nine football players, including Kavanaugh, who were described as the “Renate Alumni.” It is a reference to Renate Schroeder, then a student at a nearby Catholic girls’ school.

Two of Judge Kavanaugh’s classmates say that mentioning Renate was his coded way of boasting about his and other classmates' sexual conquests.

“They were very disrespectful, at least verbally, with Renate,” said Sean Hagan, a Georgetown Prep student at the time, referring to Judge Kavanaugh and his teammates. “I can’t express how disgusted I am with them, then and now.”

And then there was last week's bizarre free-associative ramble of an answer to Senator Amy Klobuchar's questions about his apparent love for beer.

In his answer he mentioned "beer" and "brewskis" 29 times and at the end, seemingly drunk in the witness chair, bizarrely pressed Senator Klobuchar to talk about her own drinking habits--

"I liked beer. I still like beer. But I did not drink beer to the point of blacking out, and I never sexually assaulted anyone . . . We drank beer."  

Asked if he had ever suffered memory loss during a time that he had been drinking, Kavanaugh said no, and returned to his beer soliloquy-- 

"We drank beer, and you know, so . . . so did, I think, the vast majority of . . . of people our age at the time. But in any event, we drank beer, and . . . and still do. So whatever, you know."

Within the window of the week the FBI has to do its investigation they should be able to come up with a pretty complete picture of Kavanaugh's drinking history. Many things he lied about in his sworn Senate confirmation hearing.

If he was such a serious drinker and drunk during those years, to disqualify him it will not even be necessary for the FBI to get to the bottom of what actually happened the evening Dr. Blasey was nearly raped.

If this truth about his alcoholism is exposed Kavanaugh will either be compelled to withdraw or be pulled by Trump. We can't have another Clarence Thomas on the Supreme Court. What Thomas got away with 27 years ago can't be allowed to happen again.

September 30, 2013--The 99th Percentilers

As the Occupy Wall Street protesters reminded us last year, there is the one percent and then the rest of us who make up the 99 percent.

Also in New York--in Manhattan--there is another 99 percent. Actually, 99 percentilers: those 4-and 5-year-olds who score in the 99th percentile on the exam that determines whether or not (mainly not) one's toddler is admitted to the city's most competitive and prestigious private schools. Places such as Dalton, Trinity, and Horace Mann. Schools that from this early age significantly determine if junior 12 years later will be admitted to Harvard, Yale, or Princeton. And after that, who knows, the Supreme Court, Wall Street, and even the White House.

New York is the town that Lake Wobegon envied--where every kid is not just above average but way, way above average. Some are even 99 percentile scorers on the Early Childhood Admission Assessment exam that up to now has been the filter that separates the anointed from the just OK.

And if your child is among the anointed, that of course means you are as well. Nothing is more affirming than that--it means you passed along your superior DNA and all the tutoring and chauffeuring from chess lessons to French lessons, from peewee soccer to peewee field hockey paid off. One's foundational work is done and all that remains is resume-building for college applications.

And bragging.

According to a report in the New York Times, here's how it feels among the wealthy in Manhattan if your child does not score in the 99th percentile--

Justine Oddo is just such a mother whose twins got into "only" the 95s. She opined, "It seemed like everyone got 99s. It was demoralizing. It made me think my kids are not as smart as the rest of the kids."

Maybe yes; maybe no. It could be that Ms. Oddo did not shell out the $200 an hour it costs to have one's child tutored for the private school admissions test.

Well aware of all the coaching and prepping, the Independent Schools Admissions Association recommended to its 140 members that they no longer use these exam scores. What to do with applicants is another story--using numbers and percentiles makes life easier than having to rely on interviews and letters of recommendation.

Yes, they do require these letters, though what a recommender would write about a youngster just out of diapers is hard to fathom.

"He's a good eater."

"She knows how to use a smart phone."

"He knows his alphabet and can count to 100."

"She can take off and put on her own snowsuit."

In the meantime, the parental celebrating continues. One couple whose daughter is a 99 percentiler threw a big catered bash for her and her dozens of best friends at their Hamptons cottage.

One guest wondered what they will do for an encore when she gets into "their school of choice."

Maybe a long weekend in Paris?