All Action and No Talk
Dear Jodi,
Washington may be the spawning ground of talking heads and the prime target
of right-wing talk radio, but when it comes to magazines, D.C. remains a
no-talking zone. Wandering the streets of this provincial backwater, I
discovered yet again that Washington is all action and no Talk . Not a
copy of the Tina Brown doorstop has arrived at any newsstand I checked. "Maybe
tomorrow," said the only news vendor who had even heard of it.
So about all I can do is wonder if Harrison Ford's weary stare would have
been as weary if he reversed his word order and intoned, "Success is the pox of
celebrity." Or maybe, "Celebrity interviews are the pox of glossy magazine
journalism."
Jodi, is it possible that we're all supposed to return from our "hard
adventure" exploits with scabby knees? A full body cast seems more probable,
but that's one way to combine today's Wall Street Journal with
Talk's "Hip List."
Seriously, I think the dirty secret that helps explain the upsurge in
adventure travel and other forms of risk-taking is that Americans are bored
with prosperity. Where is the grand adventure in politics when the only choices
on the table in Washington are an unneeded tax cut or squirreling the surplus
away for baby boomers' golden years? What's the point of getting rich and
flaunting your wealth through conspicuous consumption if everybody on your
block is collecting vintage wines and building oversize vacation homes?
Nantucket, according to Sunday's Times , is fast being despoiled by
parvenus who are tearing down historic houses and replacing them with soulless
mansions because of loopholes in the local zoning laws.
(Of course, as a recent summer renter on Martha's Vineyard, I represent a
classic case of the raise-the-drawbridge-we're-here syndrome.)
In short, who wouldn't crave a little adventure in their lives at a time
when the political leaders of both parties are hellbent on giving us a
yawn-inducing electoral choice between Al Gore and George W. Bush? Which, of
course, brings us back to Ron Klain's departure from the Gore White House
staff.
A major reason the Gore campaign is so garrulous is that they are top-heavy
with armchair generals who want to retain their credibility with the press in
case the vice-president loses. A parlor game among political journalists these
days is to see how many of Gore's half-dozen "communications directors" you can
name. In contrast, the lean and hungry Bill Bradley campaign managed to keep
the biggest secret of all last December--Dollar Bill's surprise entry into the
presidential race.
One last nugget for the afternoon comes from Lloyd Grove's "Reliable Source"
column in the Washington Post . Bush, it seems, has become an Austin
Powers fanatic, enlivening his contentless campaign travels with dead-on
imitations of Dr. Evil. But, according to campaign spokesman Mindy Tucker, the
Texas governor is "more partial to Mini-Me than to Dr. Evil." How fitting that
Bush the Younger so deeply identifies with the pint-size offspring of an
illustrious father.
Happily yielding to you for the final word, I am already salivating over
tomorrow's breakfast.
