I Just Read About That…

SOUNDTRACK: ADELE-“Someone Like You” (2011).

I’ve been hearing this song in unlikely places–like on a radio station that plays The Foo Fighters and the Butthole Surfers.  So I thought I’d actually listen to it and see what the fuss was about.  It has been selected as one of 2011’s Best Songs (So Far) on NPR  (where you can hear it in full). 

It’s a sparse piano song, a pretty, desolate melody .  But the real selling point is Adele’s voice.  I had heard her described as a kind of Amy Winehouse (who I don’t like) or a sort of R&B siren,(which I wouldn’t like).  But she has a kind of husky voice that belies its power.  In some ways she reminds me of a more mature Fiona Apple.

On this song at least, it’s just her and her piano–no pretensions to genre or style, just an honest emotionally naked song.

The melody isn’t obvious–it’s not an immediate grab you by the lapels hit.  But it is haunting and her voice supplies the bulk of the tune.  She can carry the whole thing with ease.

I’m not sure if it fits on that radio station, but it is certainly a wonderful song.  I wonder what the rest of the album sounds like.

[READ: October 31, 2011] “One Year: Storyteller-in-Chief”

I am posting this review today because it is Election Day (in New Jersey, anyhow).  One can only hope we get some of the awful incumbents out of town, but we’ll see.  I’m also posting this now because I feel the need to vent about our current Presidential Candidates.  Not the men and woman themselves (who are all barely qualified to be in charge of their own car keys, much less the country).  What I’m venting about is the fact that we know these men and women are candidates at all.  Or the fact that so many prospective candidates have already dropped out.

The election is a year away.  A YEAR.  It’s bad enough that the media talks about everything the President does in terms of how it will affect his chances for re-election (again, A YEAR away) but that we have all of these bozos running around talking about what a bad job the President is doing as well is just dreadful.  And basically, instead of actually doing something about being President, he must do triage on the damage these loose cannons are causing.  True, Obama appears to be somewhat less than concerned with what they say about him, but the fact that everything that happens in Washington is foreshadowing the next election, it sure makes it hard for anything to get done.

Anyhow, in other countries, the citizens have a few months at most to decide who their candidates will be.  And a few months in our country would translate to much less expensive candidacies, much more opportunities for fringe candidates to be heard (for better or worse) and less candidate exhaustion (both them and us).  Why in the hell does it take eighteen months to run for President?  In what way are we served by having all of these people running for office for over a year?  And things are only going to get worse now that so many states have moved their primaries up so far (January 3, Iowa?  Really?  You want to narrow down the presidential choices ten months before the election?).

I know that my opinion won’t even cast a ripple in Washington, but come on.  I propose that people aren’t even allowed to declare their candidacy until the May before the election.  That gives them six months, which should be ample time to run an election campaign.  Have the primaries in August and September and then the general election in November.  That gives two months early in the season for primary debates and it gives a month and change after the primaries for general election debates.  This way the President isn’t distracted with running a reelection campaign and the populace (and the media) isn’t distracted for 18 months with candidates running or not running.  And seriously, if you can’t be organized enough to win an election in 6 months, you don’t deserve to be President.  How can I get this policy enacted?

This article from Diaz is a very good one.  It criticizes President Obama for not being a good storyteller.  He was an excellent storyteller before he became President (both as a campaigner and an author-Diaz cites Dreams from My Father in particular).  But since he has taken office his storytelling has lapsed.

And sadly, the Republicans have taken over at creating stories (death panels and Tea Parties–even Bush and his 9/11 narrative that he used for six years).

Díaz hopes that Obama can remember that he must be Storyteller-in Chief (hire fewer Ivy League policy wonks and bring in a couple of storytellers).  And I can’t help but think that Díaz is right. Politics may be complicated, life may be complicated, but a story can at least tell us what we are seeing in a less complicated way.

As he puts it, stories are the One Ring that find us, bring us together, bind us and yes, pull us apart.  But Obama has yet to tell the story of where our country is going and why we should help deliver it there  (and I dare say it’s even true in November 2011, or, if he has told it, he didn’t tell it with quite the power of the stories he told on the campaign trail).

Sadly, since this article is almost two years old, it seems that the President never read it.

Incidentally this is the first thing I’ve posted from a New Yorker blog.  It’s a habit I hope to not get into too often.  Because once you start writing about blog posts then there is no end in site (or sight).

For ease of searching, I include: Diaz