On America's Ongoing Low-Grade Civil War

My newest piece is up at Tropics of Meta. It's a distillation of a lot of the things I talk about on this blog, which is part of the reason I had to hack the first draft to pieces. I think the finished product is pretty darn good.

I talk about the low-grade civil war Republicans have been fighting since at least 1994, Herrenvolk nationalism, the end of Reconstruction, America's unexceptional history, and how the moral arc of history only bends when we force it to.

New Piece on Ben Sasse

I have another piece on the great Tropics of Meta. This time I wrote about Ben Sasse, the most prominent politician from my home state in many years. Here's a taste:

"Sasse’s take-away from his grueling summer jobs is the need for teenagers to “grow up” and build character. Mine, especially my time in the factory, taught me something very different. I learned that a lot of people work way too hard for too little money. I learned not to look down on people because they did jobs that did not require a degree. I learned that there’s no such thing as “unskilled labor.” That experience only increased my sense that all workers should be treated with dignity and respect. 

Sasse, on the other hand, sees this all in Reaganite terms. The youth of today, according to him, are to be seen with a sort of patronizing contempt. People who struggle need to work harder and learn the right values. The wealthy who violate moral precepts on a constant basis in their business and personal lives are mysteriously unmentioned.

People who work their fingers to the bone but stay stuck on the low-wage treadmill simply don’t exist for him. Hard labor is instead a proving ground for well-off children to build the virtues they need to climb the ladder, not a thing that millions of people must do to keep themselves and their families alive. If they do, they must be losers. Let them eat school vouchers. The saga of huckster JD Vance selling his contempt for the working class at every Barnes and Noble across the country and masking it as concern shows that this kind of attitude brings success and accolades from Very Serious People."

Nostalgia For Other People's Nostalgia

My generation is a sucker for melted cheese-face British rock stars in dad jeans

I've got a new piece up at Tropics of Meta called "Nostalgia For Other People's Nostalgia: A Gen X Disease." I consider why it is that Gen Xers like myself are so connected to the music made before our time. I see it as a larger symptom of our lack of cultural power. I am pretty proud of it, please lemme know whatcha think.

Works in Progress and a New Piece at Tropics of Meta

Last week the good folks at Tropics of Meta published my little essay on William F Buckley's "mission statement" for the National Review. Basically, I argued that despite what movement conservatives tell you, Trump very much exists in the version of conservatism the more erudite Buckley laid out.

I have not been blogging as much because I am working on some things I'd like to get published in more prominent locations. Here's a list, I'd appreciate any friendly help on how to make these essays better or where I should get them published.

• The Democrats need learn from LBJ. I wrote a draft of this already, basically about how LBJ's rough way of practicing politics (which isn't that far from McConnell's) is what the party needs, not West Wing niceties
• Ted Cruz as debater. I wrote this and it already got rejected from one place. I write about how as a former debater myself I can see how Cruz's liabilities and strengths as a politician can be traced to the weirdo world of college parliamentary debate. I also discuss how Beto could exploit the college debater approach used by Cruz.
• Nostalgia for other people's nostalgia. I am working on something now about how many Gen Xers like me are so connected to the music of the 60s and early 70s, before we were born or really conscious of the world. I trace this to the Boomer nostalgia boom of the late 80s, and how many of us who came of age at that time found the music and culture of the past more interesting than a lot of what was happening in our times. I plan on using this as a jumping off point for discussing the cultural and political weakness of Gen Xers compared to Boomers and Millennials. 
• From Blow-Up to Blow Out. This essay will discuss Antonioni's 1966 film and De Palma's 1981 homage. The fifteen years between the two basically mark the journey from the height of the 60s to the point where the cultural backlash against the sixties emerged victorious. Blow-Out was a huge inspiration to the "New Hollywood" directors who upended American cinema in the 1970s, and it is fitting that De Palma's film represents the end of the years when studios would give money to young directors to make artistic films. The journey between the two films tells the story of America's greatest cinematic era.

A Requiem For The Faculty Office

I have a new piece at Tropics of Meta, which as far as I'm concerned is the little scholarly website that could. Read their stuff, it's pretty fantastic.

My latest article is a response to a piece in the Chronicle about the attempts to replace faculty offices. My piece is both a defense of faculty offices, but also a call for professors to be aware of how their privileges (like offices) will not last unless they take collective action.

Lana Del Rey, "Brooklyn Baby"

Alex Sayf Cummings, internet buddy and proprietor of Tropics of Meta (where I often write) has made me a Lana Del Rey convert. He had talked so long with such great affection for an artist who I'd never really listened to, or just assumed was the usual vapid pop.

Oh no friends, far from it. Recently I was listening to a playlist I made of moody 90s pop songs, and was kind of shocked about how depressing so much of that era's top 40 music was. For example, Sarah McLachlan's "Adia" almost makes me cry every time I hear it, and it was the kind of mainstream "adult alternative" song you'd hear everywhere from the radio to the dentist to the bank.

So much pop music today seems like it's trying too damn hard to have fun. It's written entirely for fun loving teens, not sad sack depressives of an older vintage. It is perhaps fitting that when I sat down to listen to Lana Del Rey today, I did it while grading, a task that hardly fills my heart with happiness.

I have to admit I was transfixed by her voice, which can be both husky and fragile at the same time. It comes from a bygone world of torch singing, and reminded me of nothing less than Marlene Dietrich and Weimar Germany. This is modern day cabaret singing for a decadent society in decline. Her lyrics seem to revel in the decadence, but she also sounds like she's crying on the inside.

I often use pop music to make me feel OK about feeling bad. And these days I must admit that I am feeling bad all the time. This is not so much in my personal life, but in looking out at the hopeless situation my country is in. I have no faith in the future, and knowing that my children will have to live in that future fills me with an awful dread.

So instead I put on "Brooklyn Baby," a song about a hipster doing what hipsters do best: burying their own dread behind their tastes. This song and its torchy singer are made for these dark times. 

The "Ground Zero Mosque" Controversy Was A Harbinger Of Our Times

Hey folks, I've got a new piece over at Tropics of Meta, "The Ground Zero Mosque Was A Harbinger Of Our Times." It was inspired by an off-hand comment by Tropics editor Alex Sayf Cummings about that particular event. I happened to be present at the protest against the Cordoba House (which was not within site of the WTC, by the way) by accident. The hate-filled mob I witnessed on a  summer day in 2010 scared me. Back then they were called the Tea Party, now we call them "Trump supporters."

Read the piece, and tell me what you think.

"Gettysburg Address" At Tropics of Meta

The kind folks at Tropics of Meta have yet again given me a platform for my stuff. It's a new and improved version of the piece I did imaging Trump giving the Gettysburg Address. Check it out here.

Warriors, Rockers, And The Last Days Of Rebellion In The American Teen Film

The kind folks at Tropics of Meta have yet again allowed me to grace their wonderful website with my presence. This time I wrote about a troika of teen movies from 1979: The Warriors, Over The Edge, and Rock n' Roll High School. All showed teenage life in ways that were soon to be verboten in the 80s. In fact, The Warriors and Over The Edge were basically deep sixed by the studios that made them. I hope you enjoy, and also check great work by other folks on the site.

My Piece At Tropics Of Meta On Smokey And The Bandit

As loyal readers know, I am a contrarian in all things. This is why I am a Mets and White Sox and Everton fan. I just can't bring myself to embrace the bandwagon. So in a time when everyone is writing their hot takes about the political implications of the most recent blockbuster, I did my piece about a 40 year old trucker/car chase movie. At least the kind folks at Tropics of Meta were willing to publish it, and I am grateful for that.

I talk about how Smokey and the Bandit was an attempt to display a new, "post-racial" South to the country that had exorcised its demons, but had maintained its unique charms. Of course, recent events in Charlottesville and elsewhere show that the fraught racial history of the South, and the nation at large, refuses to be ignored.