Of Course You Realize, This Means War!

Yesterday I was reading Frank Rich’s op-Editorial in the NYTimes. It is something I try to do every week because he is consistently right on target – or right on target for me, since I agree with most of what he says. I also try to read the editorial page of the NY Post and the Washington Post and Washington Times – although I do not agree with a great deal of what is written. But it is important to understand the differing opinions in order to craft an argument, because not everyone in the United States agrees on everything. However, unlike other people who write editorials, Frank is not mean spirited about his views. And he’s a good writer.

I only mention this because yesterday he wrote about Sarah Palin and to tell you the truth, I am sick of conversation by and about the former candidate, Mother and Grandmother of the Year, and now ex-Governor of Alaska. It is unlike me to be intolerant but let’s face it. She is irrelevant in my life right now, and hopefully forever. The only difference between her and Ann Coulter is that Sarah was elected to do something (which she has abandoned) and Ann never did anything, but was trained to compose right wing rhetoric (and found it quite lucrative). What they have in common is that they both thrive on the media attention they receive and have no moral core about whether or not what they say is truthful. This, and the fact that they both get so much media attention is disturbing, but not surprising. In my opinion, I think it says more about the media than about their victims. (And I mean that in the nicest possible way.)

What I’m finding lately, is that I am also tired of liberal organizations that send e-mails where, usually in the first paragraph, they choreograph an ‘us and them’ scenario usually about important issues – like heath care and the economy. This is usually followed by some scare tactic that predicts the end of the world and then asks for money to support whatever their effort. Examples from MoveOn.org and Truthout follow:

“Skyrocketing health care costs have resulted in thousands of unnecessary deaths, and are driving many thousands into poverty. And the outlook is not good. Truthout needs you to help give these people a voice. We need you to join with us to hold professional politicians accountable to the people, not just the lobbyists.
Meanwhile, right-wing teabaggers and corporate lobbyists will be left demoralized and in disarray.” Moveon.org 11/23/09

And From Truthout.org “But we could still lose this fight. And if we do, we won't get another chance: Democrats will conclude that bold, progressive initiatives are too risky. President Obama will be forced to scale his agenda way back. And the Sarah Palin/Glenn Beck wing of the Republican Party will be on the rise headed into the 2010 and 2012 elections. The next few weeks will determine whether we face a dream or a nightmare. Can you contribute, right now, to make sure that nightmare never comes to pass?”

Why is all the material that both Parties send to their constituencies always couched and described as if we were fighting a war. As if there is no common ground. As if the health of the nation (literally and figuratively) has to be decided in combat rather than diplomacy. Maybe I am naïve (ha ha ha!) but it seems to be that conversation and compromise, in order to achieve a common goal (other than supporting lobbyists on both sides), would be much more productive. And the likelihood of leaving only the spoils of war would diminish considerably. We’re just sayin’....Iris

Just a Little Disappointment

Am I the only person in the entire universe who thought that the stock market was directly connected to the health of the economy? Clearly it is not. It is just worth noting that in “Slate” this week, they did a cool little piece which addressed the number of jobless and the number of foreclosures in America.. And those are the real indicators of the health of he economy and the nation. They also did a terrific spread (front page I might add) about David Burnett’s book “44 Days” about the Iranian revolution in 1979. Oh that guy!

The question is, did the Obama administration think that no one would notice the promises made and not fulfilled. As many of my gay friends in the military are still asking, what happened to getting rid of “Don’t Ask, don’t tell”. Many will remember when Bill Clinton decided that this policy was the best way to address that closeted issue. It wasn’t. The best way to address the issue is to say being gay, just like being black, a Muslim, a woman (pick any of what we Democrats call ‘special interest’ groups) who want to serve the nation they love so well (well enough to want to risk their lives for it), will be welcomed with open arms. This would make good political sense to the “Obama” constituency. And rather than making sure the rich get richer (which I always thought very Republican) he might be concentrating on Human Rights, and, dare I say Women’s rights. Just take a look at the Stupak amendment, which, although written in the ‘new’ health care reform package, reforms abortion back to about 1960. Rachel Maddow, a liberal but not a Democrat, on one of her shows asked “what would happen to the Democratic party if pro-choice women decided not to vote?” Those of us who understand how important women are to the party, can certainly answer that question.

Maybe, the Obama Administration thinks that women have no place else to go – but we don’t have to go anyplace. If I might digress for a moment and comment on this ‘rich get richer thing.’ A few years ago I co-founded a women’s small business internet loan fund. We realized, when we looked at to whom the banks were giving money, women were not a big percent. Women did not have the same credit scores as men. Women live and put priorities on different things – often things like family instead of career advancement. We redesigned credit scoring so it reflected the way women live. It then became possible to make reasoned decisions about which women would be able to pay back their loan and make a success of their business. Traditional lenders (banks), thought women were not a good risk. Just like Democrats think women have no place else to go. Boy, (you should excuse the pun) are they mistaken.

Let's not forget the drug companies, who have decided to raise the prices of their drugs before there is a moratorium on price gouging. Are you wondering what the Obama Administration or the Congress is going to do about it? Apparently the same thing they did about exorbitant bonuses for the people who work for big bailed-out banks and in stock market related jobs. Absolutely nothing.

Do you detect frustration in my tone. Maybe not, because writing doesn’t necessarily have a tone, but I am the same kind of upset as I was when Bill Clinton pointed his finger and said "I did not have sex with that woman." We waited so long to have someone who understood the 60’s struggle and values, to make a real difference in the world. And ultimately, he embarrassed all of us because he couldn’t keep his fly closed. The circumstances are different with President Obama. He is a loyal devoted husband and father, but we feel the same disappointment. He had a vision and seemingly, a way to make it a reality. But when we compare the rhetoric to the reality, there appears to be a big gap.

When just plain folks ask, “I have lost my home and my job, why can’t the President bail me out?” You often hear from the powers that be, “Because a person who has lost their home and their job is not a good investment. But who put those people on the street. The same companies that were bailed out by the government.

Oscar Wilde, who would not have been allowed to serve in the military – because he was incapable of not telling, said, “It is absurd to divide people into good or bad. People are either tedious or charming.” And what does that have to do with anything? Nothing it's just one of my favorite quotes and I wanted to share it with my loyal readers. We’re just sayin’…Iris

Sisters in Fish

When I get one of those e-mails about women as a ‘sisterhood,’ I usually gag and hit Delete. The bulk and somewhat impersonal notes, that often end with ‘send this on or lightning will strike you dead,’ are worth ignoring. But that is not the same as having a few women who are such an intimate part of my life, that I consider them Sisters. Here are examples of just a few. Tina, has been part of my life since before we were born. Our mothers were best friends and it was almost as if we had no choice. Tina has not had an easy time of late. Her husband died, their business went bankrupt and what seems like an impossibility, financial struggle, has become her reality. Despite all this, Tina remains one of the funniest people in the world—maybe in the universe.

Then there are my high school friends, Joyce and Pam. Actually, Pam has been part of my life since nursery school but that’s almost too far away to remember. We shared so many incredible experiences as children, like I was tossed out of Brownies because the leader was anti-semitic, and Pam’s mom, in protest, took her out of the troop. That was really something. It was a statement I would never forget. I met Joyce in Home Ec (I wanted to take car repair and wood shop, but they didn’t let girls do that). I was forced to take cooking and sewing. Cooking was bearable, but sewing was beyond my comprehension. Joyce, seeing my struggle, decided it was easier to complete my projects, than to teach me how to complete them myself. There is Soozie, who I met freshman year in college. We have laughed through good times and bad and have continued our mutual adoration society for oh so many years. She and her husband Jeff were Jordan’s Godparents. Sadly, Jeff died over twelve years ago and we still miss him everyday. Happily, Soozie introduced me to Jane, who lives pretty close to us in Va., and has become the person I call every time I need a laugh, a meal, a confidante, or company for the theater.


Then there are the women I met in politics, Kim, (who was actually my student before she became my political protégé) Marthena, Sidney, Deborah, Sarah, Sara, and Kat. They are all totally unique. When you meet people in campaigns or politics, you form the same kind of relationships you do in camp.— they are fast, furious and forever. Even when you don’t see one another for years, you remain connected by something unexplainable, almost magical – and part of that has to be the shared desire to make the world a better place to live.

My newest of these sisters is six feet tall and not Jewish, except in her sensibilities and her heart. And what a heart she has. I have only known her for a few months. When we met, however, it was like we had known one another all our lives. As part of the story, you need to know my husband and I produced a documentary called "The Gefilte Chronicles.” (yum, maybe) It's a remarkable film and you should take a look at the website www.gefiltefishchronicles.com

Anyway, there I was at a Public Diplomacy conference at White Oak in Florida. It is a gorgeous facility, but unlike most other conference centers, this one has a wildlife preserve attached. There I was scoping out some big ugly lizards, and my phone ran out of film --or power or whatever it is that allows your phone to document your day. "Oh, Crap!" I said. And this tall beautiful woman (also scoping the reptiles) said, "What is it?"

I shared my camera woes with her and she took a picture for me, and that led to a discussion of fish. (Don't ask it just did). I spoke about gefilte fish and she about lutefisk (she being of Scandanavian extraction from the northern mid-west.) Jews aren't privy to information about lute's, and Scandinavians aren't usually conversant about gefiltes but that was soon remedied. I told her about combining the White and Carp fish and she told me about the best way to make lutefisk.

The most important thing to know about gefilte fish is that you have to 'hock' (like chopping) until it becomes so glutinous that it doesn't require any bread or matzo to hold it together. The most important thing about lutefisk is "it important to clean the lutefisk and its residue off pans, plates, and utensils immediately. Lutefisk left overnight becomes nearly impossible to remove. Sterling silver should never be used in the cooking, serving or eating of lutefisk, which will permanently ruin silver. Stainless steel utensils are recommended instead."

No need to go on and on. The most important thing to know about these amazing women is that despite our cultural, religious, age, and physical differences, we are all ‘fish’ sisters in our souls. We’re just sayin’…. Iris

Die Mauer ist Kaput

This seems to be a month for anniversaries. Last week (the 4th) marked the 30th anniversary of the taking of the US Hostages in Tehran, an event which spun out of control of both the Americans and Iranians, each feeling obliged to plant feet firmly in the ground and not give the other side an inch. What should have been solved in hours (as it had been in February 1979 when militants took over the Embassy for a few hours) went on till relations had soured between the countries well beyond what anyone had thought possible, Jimmy Carter had taken his Presidency down the path of not return, 8 military guys died in a failed rescue attempt, and above all, the chance for any civil dialogue between Tehran and Washington was totally ruined. It wasn’t till Reagan had taken the oath of office, 444 Days into the depressing chapter, that the hostages were finally released. I had been for almost two months in Iran the previous winter, during the Revolution, having arrived there on December 26, 1978 fresh from a story in Pakistan. I’d heard of unrest, and protests against the Shah building for that previous year, and thought I’d spend a few days checking it out for myself. Within hours, I realized that it was a story which was not going to quietly go away. There was a degree of energy in the street demonstrations I’d rarely seen, and I decided to hunker down and see for myself what was going on. In front of the eyes of our cameras, the Revolution played out day by day. Following it was something like being in a race in which you didn’t know where the finish line was. You just followed the events from one day to the next, and like the Iranian people themselves, tried to make sense of it every night. By mid February the newly returned Ayatollah Khomeini had consolidated power, and the Shah had fled. With rallying cries at nearly all the political events primed with “Death to America,” the stage was set for what would be come, in November. As it happened, the day the hostages were taken I was in Thailand, waiting for a departure to Burma. I’d managed to get a one week visa for a trip there, in the days when you could still spread 30 rolls of film through your luggage, and be relatively sure of not being seen as a “professional” photographer. Bags were not routinely x-rayed yet, and with a bare bones set of 2 AE-1 cameras (see the ad I did with John Newcomb for CANON shortly there after) and a few lenses I spent a visually enticing week in that mysterious country.

While waiting for that final visa, I secured a pass from the Thai military, and drove into Eastern Thailand where thousands of Cambodian refugees, fleeing the killing fields of the Khmer Rouge, were being kept in refugee camps. I only had a visa for a few hours, but the impression those faces made on me has never gone away. Now, years later, we can speak of the Killing Fields as if we knew all about it at the time. But once the Khmer Rouge took over in 1975, little information got out of the country.

At the time the US, still smarting from the ignominous departure from Vietnam in 1975 still had the feeling that the Vietnamese could do no right. Yet it was finally the Vietnamese army which in 1979 actually invaded Cambodia (following previous Khmer attacks on Vietnamese border towns) and defanged the Khmer Rouge, ending the regimes tenure. I remember feeling at the time – after I saw the faces of the Cambodian refugees, that as odd as it might sound the Vietnamese army should have been given the Nobel Peace Prize. It was too little and far too late for the millions of Cambodians killed after the 1975 take over.

This week, Monday, is the 20th anniversary of the opening of the Berlin wall – the sudden decision by East German authorities to finally give passage to East Berliners, letting them travel freely to the West for the first time since the Wall was built in 1961. Looking back on it now, it’s hard to relate just what a huge breakthrough this was. As a child of the cold war, who remembers the palpable fear of those confrontations in the late 50s and early 60s with the Soviets, to see the end of the Wall, and all it represented, was an enormous surprize. It all happened so quickly. After years of having come to accept its leaden and stultifying presence, in just days the world changed. In response to the news of things seeming to bubble along, I’d planned to leave Washington for Berlin on 8 November, which would have put me there at just the precise time when things broke. But at the request of a good pal, Doug Kirkland, who was having an opening exhibition in DC that night, I put my trip off for a day. (It was in the days when you could actually change an airline ticket without losing the whole value of it…) On that Thursday afternoon, as I was packing, I received a call from Stanley Kayne, then TIME”s photo chief in Washington. “The East Germans are giving visas… “ he said.

“What does that mean?” I asked.

He summed it all up,”the East is opening up.”

I felt that I’d once again missed a key moment in something going on in the world. (You know, you always feel like you’re missing something.) But it was with even more excitement that I packed my bag that afternoon, and headed to Dulles to catch the plane. The next morning, arriving in Frankfurt to grab a plane to Berlin, I called Lennie Heinen, the TIME picture coordinator in Bonn. In one of the very few moments of my life which reminded me of a John LeCarre novel, she gave me the following shipping instructions. “By one o’clock you need to go to Check Point Charlie. On Friedrichstrasse, look for a large red S on an office building. Under that S will be someone holding a red TIME Magazine envelope. Give them your film.” Somehow it seemed so appropos for my first shipment from Berlin to be so shaded in that mysterious cloud that the Cold War had given us. Once there I made my way to Check Point Charlie, shot for an hour, and shipped under the red S. Then I headed to Brandenberg Gate, that enormous 18th century structure which is one of the real marvels of the city. Hundreds of young people were there, standing on the wall, having played a large game of tag with East German soldiers the previous 24 hours.

I reloaded my cameras, stepping over the cables which anchored a TV crane near the wall. As I did so, there was a tap on my shoulder, and I turned to see Tom Brokaw tell me those words which no journalist ever hopes to hear: “You should have been here last night.” Of course he was right, but the story continued to undo itself over the next week and those weeks turned into months. It was a new world, and not only the Germans but the rest of us beheld it all with amazement. In the months to follow, the regimes in Czechoslovakia, Bulgaria and Romania will fall as well, and that time we knew as the Cold War would slowly morph into that new world which we now live in. Sometimes, I have to say, it’s almost with nostalgia that I think back to the simple days of the Cold War. No IEDs or “asymmetric warfare,” just the basic worry that at some point, potentially, a giant phalanx of tanks and planes would roar across Europe as the Soviets would conquer all. Never happened. Didn’t make sense for either side. But it was the nightmare you could almost live with. The new world isn’t as pretty or orderly, but to paraphrase Don Rumsfeld, you “look at the world the way it is, not necessarily the way you want it.”

I can’t begin to describe the joy that those few days of liberation felt like in Berlin. The sparkle of discovery in the eyes of the Osties was something I’d never seen before. None of us really could believe it was happening. But as sometimes happens, the pictures of this most momentous event are uniformly less powerful than the memories of those dark and cool Berlin nights. The cries of German revelers still rings in my ear: “Die Mauer is Kaput”…. “ the wall is finished…” Often as a photographer, you make great pictures at an event of little significance. But the opposite is possible too, and when it does, when those pictures just don’t match the power of how you remember it, you just have to take it to heart that the satisfaction of having been somewhere at the right time is reason enough to have been there. Sometimes just being there IS reason enough. We’re just sayin’…David

The Lament of Art

Perhaps the most telling comment about the state of things was the often lampooned statement by New York Times editor Bill Keller on "The Daily Show" this summer that "the last time I was in Baghdad I didn't see a Huffington Post Bureau, or a Google Bureau or a Drudge Bureau." While there are plenty of things The New York Times and the rest of the daily and weekly press don't get right, if we are stuck without them, going forward in this time of economic upheaval, we will soon discover that there are plenty of things they do get right. I have never worked for a daily paper or a wire service, but I certainly appreciate the role they play in trying to inform the public. There are lots of things to bitch about when talking of the "press," but in the end there is a desire to inform, a need to investigate, which is paramount. And at the point where these things become less feasible – money and manpower constraints chief among the villains – the society we like to think we live in will change radically. The idea that journalism can flourish merely by the aggregators aggregating is so flawed. Eventually, with nothing produced by the actual producers, there will be no content available to aggregate. And the bloggers can have all the opinions they want, but it will be based on little that is real. The economic collapse of the last few years has proven several things. That without some kind of active reporting to keep things in check, there will always be people – in government and business – who will take the shortest of shortcuts to make a buck.

This week there are said to be yet another round of cuts at the Time Inc. magazines, cuts numbering in the hundreds. Part of the ongoing bloodletting that the press as a whole has endured over the past five years. The spiral shows no sign of ending: advertisers moving away from traditional sources (in this case, magazine ads) to either the Internet or nowhere … the fall in revenue, causing the magazines to try and rethink how to be relevant … said relevance nearly always falling short, and leaving the company with much reduced budgets to spend on content. Less money spent on content (photography = content) produces a magazine which fewer readers find interesting. And so it goes as the swirl around the bowl catches more and more of us.

In the end, one wonders how it's possible to even put out a magazine anymore. When I think of what we used to do, the budgets we had – and they never felt extravagant at the time – were essentially an investment in excellence. The overall tone of every conversation with every editor was about coming up with something better than before, something which the readers would react to, and keep bringing them back week after week. That quest for excellence is what drove many of us. It made us want to find those qualities in our own work that would round out a story, and provide something refreshing and compelling to the readers.

In the fall of 1973, the "Kippur" war between Israel and Egypt and Syria was a case in point. I remember sitting in what was then the cramped Gamma office (I'd just joined Gamma after Life folded) in New York, listening to the bidding war on film by Jean-Claude Francolon, the photographer covering the war on the Israeli side. Robert Pledge – then new to the world of photojournalism – was fielding a battery of unending calls from Time and Newsweek, and each call that afternoon upped the ante considerably. For just one photographer's work that week, the bidding eventually reached something like $12,000 for first rights. In 1973 that was enough money to buy two cars with something left over for a good bottle of wine. Today, I suspect the entire photo budget for a complete magazine is something less than $12,000 on an average week.

So what will become of those bodies of work that we used to refer to as "photojournalism?" Will there eventually be a retrenchment that will feed more money back into a system that has broken so badly? We have so much potential now, though at times the new technology seems to be of questionable value. I have been on big-event shoots (political conventions, for example,) when magazine editors, instead of trying to make their own calls, spend their time sifting through the wire service pictures which end up on Yahoo News Pictures, and keep haranguing their own photographers about why they don't have a particular picture. That seems to be one of the lesser virtues of this world of instant communication. (On the other hand, let's face it, copying information from a caption off a wire service picture and using it as your own at least gives you a reasonable chance to get the subjects' names spelled correctly.)

We are facing what will no doubt be a continued period of uncertainty, and the major challenge remains our ability to feed photographers enough to let them do their work and pay their rent. Many photographers work on their own projects, self-supported or funded, or at the very least, self-motivated. These are often the most interesting work of all. Yet at some point, when the budgets that have been cut a dozen times already finally trim off the photography altogether, what in the hell do we do? Where does society find the value in our work? What will be the new venues where photography in general, and photojournalism in particular, might find some kind of rebirth? Will it be strictly on gallery or museum walls, or will some new form arise which can take the vision of photographers, rather than just aggregate? I am convinced that the power of the still picture remains a vital force, all the more so now that our daily lives are so inundated with bad video. At some point, perhaps that magic formula will arise, and photojournalism can be profitable again. It would be a pity if, at a time when so many good photographers are producing so much good work, there would be no place for it to be seen, save for a corner of an aggregator's screen. We're just sayin' … David B.

A Plethora of Unfinished Pastry

Here’s the question of the day – other than who will win the World Series which may be more important, at least in NY and Philly. Was yesterday’s election a referendum about Obama’s leadership? My pal Laura says it was more a referendum on the wealthy – in particular Corzine and Bloomberg (who despite spending 100 million dollars, almost lost to someone whose name next to no one had ever heard.) It’s possible that the rich still get richer but can’t always buy an election. However, I’m not sure it was as much about Obama as it was about the Democrats and Republicans having a party and no one came. There were so few voters that they were serving pastries at the polls and most everything was left over.

The good news is that the Democrat from the 23rd district in NY won, with the help of Ms. Scozzafava, the Republican who dropped out of the race and endorsed the Democrat. It certainly was not because Joe Biden threw all his support that way. And if you want to talk referenda, the fact that Sarah Palin and the right wing conservatives lost, is a sin the Republicans should not ignore if they want to win elections when more than seven people vote.

The bad news is that the people who voted in Maine repealed the law that permitted Gay marriage. It’s clear that there was a well organized campaign to make sure this happened, but I would have thought the vote would have been closer. I don’t know why I thought this. Silly me. I also thought that Obama would eliminate “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” and as uncomplicated as that would have been, he didn’t do it. He should have had a serious conversation with one of our great generals, Wes Clark, who said anyone that wants to serve their country should be allowed to do so, no matter sex, color, religion or sexual orientation. There’s something to be said about electing people who are courageous human rights advocates.

Exactly what is it about single sex marriage that frightens so many people? Clearly it’s good for the wedding industry. And the economy. More jobs making wedding gowns and bright blue tuxedos for purchase or rental, more catering jobs, more hairdressing needs, and more magazine sales—they could use some help they are all in such trouble. “God is opposed to gay unions” doesn’t work for me because, as far as I know, none of the anti gay activists has a direct line to the big G or his son. And further, plenty of respected religious leaders and medical experts, think it’s just fine. Really, when you check out the majority of perverts in this great nation, most are heterosexual.

I think it’s all about THE sex act. They don’t want to think about two people of the same sex having sex. But I wouldn’t be surprised if they watch pornographic movies where you can see plenty of this.

My mother always said “live and let live”. She always said that as long as your actions don’t hurt anyone else, they may be stupid and insensitive, but they probably aren’t dangerous. My mother told us we needed to marry within our religion. My brother didn’t, my son didn’t and who knows what my daughter will do. But she learned that my sister in law is fabulous, as is my daughter in law and now my mother admits she was wrong.. Now she says, people should make their own decisions about how they want to spend their lives and everyone else should mind their own business.

If all the people who spend oodles of money and energy advocating against the freedom to choose a particular way of life, spent their time looking for Osama Bin Laden, they probably wouldn’t find him but at least, they wouldn’t have time to stick their noses into other people’s lives – especially their bedrooms. We’re just sayin’.... Iris

Murt the Blurt

Gee, I wonder which genius decided that Joe Biden should ”take on” Sarah Palin. What a stupid mistake. A mistake that only “one of the guys” would make. Because they think Biden’s arrogance is smart. Here’s the breaking news: It’s not. Just in case you can’t hear the tone of my words in this blob, let me fill you in. It’s a combination of irritated and incredulous. Here’s what Biden said yesterday at a campaign rally for Bill Owens.

“Notwithstanding my former opponent, and by the way I like her, I really do--not a joke this is not a cheap shot--the fact of the matter is Sarah Palin thinks the answer to energy was 'Drill, baby, Drill.' No, it's a lot more complicated, Sarah, than 'Drill, baby drill.”

Let’s dissect the sentence in terms of what he said and what women heard. (Despite ignoring women generally, women will still determine the outcome of most future elections.) First of all, Biden doesn’t like her, he thinks she’s a dope. His humor, “Palin thinks the answer to energy…” which whoever wrote the remarks thought was clever, maybe even funny, was nothing more than smug. Smug and arrogant doesn’t become the office of Vice President. It is unattractive, especially coming from someone who has a tendency to be a political bully. Women hate a bully.

In response to this attack, Palin, who is campaigning for Doug Hoffman the third party right wing Republican candidate for Congress from New York, gave her response on her facebook page (I wonder if Biden even knows what the impact of this “peoples” social network has become -- doubtful.) But among other things, what appears to be factual information about Biden and domestic drilling she said:

“There’s one way to tell Vice President Biden that we’re tired of folks in Washington distorting our message and hampering our nation’s progress: Hoffman, Baby, Hoffman!”

Sarah Palin is not someone I would pick as a pal, or as an elected official, but she seems to have some personal charisma that is attractive to even people who don’t agree with or respect her opinions. The general public loved her spirit and good humor on Saturday Night Live. She was good humored, able to poke fun at herself, and absolutely charming. Biden, has none of these qualities. He is especially incapable of poking fun at himself because he mistakenly thinks he’s too intelligent. Remember when Gore publicly needed to prove he was the smartest kid in the class. People found it disconcerting. No one ever liked the kid who had all the right answers and let everyone else know it. Then, when he realized it wasn’t working, he went back to just being Al and used self deprecating humor as a tool and we all liked him much better. OK, he didn’t win the election but he did get a Nobel Prize – which is not a popularity contest but being popular never hurts.

It seems to me that the more things change, the more they stay the same or get worse. Democrats think they can get away with being dismissive toward women because we have no place else to go. This is incorrect. If we go nowhere the Democrats will surely lose. Their victory is dependent on getting us to the polls. And here’s the bottom line, (as political people so oft say), we may not like Sarah Palin. We may think she is a jerk who is totally irrelevant. But we do not like it when a bully disses any woman publicly. Especially when the man is an elected official who is supposed to know better. Someone should tell Joe to stop blurting and start acting like the Vice President of the United States. At this moment his rhetoric and behavior is nothing less than embarrassing – everything he says does read like a script for Saturday Night Live. We’re just sayin’...Iris

The Capsules of Life

Does it strike you as sexist that insurance companies cover Viagra and other products that help men to have an adequate sex life, but it doesn’t cover birth control pills or any female contraceptives to prevent pregnancy? And if you think that's not sexist, how would you explain it. Is it possible that insurance companies are really human and they just want the products they pay for to result in a good time. It is not my job to try to explain how insurance companies make decisions, but I bet that most of the people making them, have either a penis or penis envy.

And speaking of medication, which we weren’t – exactly, but it’s such a contemporary and pithy subject that we should. There is hardly anyone I talk to or about who isn’t medicated in some way. Most of the people I know take a combination of little pills and some like calcium, big enough to choke a horse. Among the assorted goodies are often vitamins to supplement those things that we can’t eat, because they are unavailable or bad for us. For example, we take fish oil capsules because the fish sold in stores is “farm raised” and that is, supposedly, like eating poison. Or we take vitamin D because we don’t get enough sun. And we don’t get enough sun because if we do we’ll get skin cancer.

We take pills to cure ills, and tablets to prevent infections, headaches, and babies. So with all this medication available, why is it that so many friends are dying so young – many from cancer and many from heartache. My guess is that it’s either the environment, whatever we’re ingesting, or our daily routine. I guess we should be eating organic, absolutely stop breathing any air, and stay away from people who are aggravating. It doesn’t make sense. Our parents are living longer than we are and throughout their lives they never exercised and additionally, ate tremendous amounts of butter, white flour, meats with all kinds of crap, and heavy cream. That would be my kind of diet if I weren’t consumed with being OK –just OK.

The most amazing thing, however, is the number of people who are on “happy” or “crazy” pills –some prefer to call them anti-depressants. If the 60’s were the Age of Aquarius, the late 90’s and early 2000’s are the age of much Weariness or Wariness. Yes, we have become apathetic, disillusioned and suspicious. Yech!!! Not a particularly appealing way to live. In the past, when we greeted our friends we said “How are you?” Now we say, “What’s the dosage you’re on?” Where once our conversations revolved around jobs, or tennis, or restaurants, now they are about symptoms and consequences.

What is it about the way we are living today that makes us yearn for the “Leave it to Beaver” or “Ozzie and Harriett” days. How did everything get so stressful? Do we yearn for a simpler time? Is there an absence of role models who don’t try to do everything. Is the music we listen to over complicated? Is the television we watch over stimulating? Have we become a society of people who chose the internet over more comforting interpersonal relationships? Are we, in the sandwich generation, simply responsible for too many family members? Is there just too much information to digest in a single lifetime, or a single day -- and so we feel like we are failures or stupid?

The answer to these and many other questions is Yes. So what is there to do about all this turmoil? I don’t have an answer that is realistic or universal. I guess the best answer is to get your doctor to write a prescription for a magic pill that dulls the pain and eases the anxiety. I think I’m at .75mg maybe tomorrow I’ll up it to 100.

Fighting for Halloween

Last night I was walking back to my apartment . It was raining—pretty hard. If I walk on 54th street I have to pass St Peters Church, where there are always any number of homeless people making their home. Usually , their home is a few cardboard cartons and maybe some plastic to keep them dry, if it’s raining. I was in a good mood and as I passed by the church, doing a tuneless and hopelessly unbalanced (yes I was dancing clumsily down the street), version of “Singing in the Rain”, I noticed that there were four people length cartons on the steps to the entrance of the church/York Theater. (The York is in the basement of the church and they share and entrance.) When there is a show, management clears the way for the paying customers, but if there is no performance or church activity, the cartons are not, like the people, displaced.

So very tragic. I wondered what had happened in their lives that put them in this impermanent place. It was hard to dance past this incredibly lonely and, especially of late, a much too frequent scene. Then for whatever reason, I flashed back to the previous day when the touring company of “Seussical” the musical, descended on our old homestead in Arlington, Virginia. Twelve young actors who were so excited about everything. The juxtaposition of the people who live on the steps of a theater, and young people so enthusiastic about their lives and the future in the theater, hit me in unexpected ways.

First of all, I stopped dancing. The people in the boxes couldn’t see me, but still my happy little two step seemed irreverent in front of the boxes. Then, as walked past Citi Corp, which is adjacent to the church, theater and boxes filled with people, I thought, why isn’t the government bailing out these unfortunate souls. What would it cost? Certainly not as much as it cost to bail out all those rich Wall Street companies – who are already back to their old tricks. And certainly not as much as escalating a war in Afghanistan. Nope, it would be pennies in comparison.

Then I thought about the non stop political commercials—it doesn’t matter which one. They are all the same. They are not about what their candidate will do, they are about what the other guy won’t do. The professionals call it negative advertising. I call it a pathetic attempt not to deal with the real issues. There is another thing that is consistent with all these commercials. Every candidate says something like, “We are fighting for your rights, future, jobs, families,"(pick anyone or all of these.) How exactly are they fighting –with boxing gloves, guns, wet towels (pick any or all of these)? But the better question is, why do we need anyone to fight for anything. Just the word ‘fight’ is an indication of what campaigns have become – war zones. They are no longer organizations which look to make life better for the general public. They are battles with words as their weapons and the truth hard to find or even irrelevant. In other words, you don’t have to go to Iran, Iraq or Afghanistan to fight. All you have to do is put your ethics away and sign on to a political campaign.

Back to singing in the rain. It’s actually raining right now and worse, it’s Halloween, my least favorite holiday. There was a time when I loved decorating the house, putting on my witch attire and scaring the little children when they came to the house. For many years, as a concerned about health parent, I gave little toys instead of candy. Sure the kids could choke on the little pieces, but at least they wouldn’t get cavities. Now I don’t care if they get cavities or go into sugar shock. There are so many more important things to worry about. Wars, people starving, people without jobs, children dying in foreign places and the definition of health care. It would be terrific if we could, like the young troupe of performing artists who stayed at our house, feel great about the world they were about to encounter. Or it would be nice just to sing in the rain without having to think about much else. We're just sayin'.... Iris

Message to Myself

Once you pass 30 (remember "Don't trust anyone over 30?" ) its often difficult to get from the 'idea' stage to the 'remembering' stage. I have all these little ideas in the course of a day, things which would make a great blob topic, the kind of things you relish being able to share at cocktail parties and the like – but which, like the water streaming over the just cooked pasta in a colander, race out the little escape holes, and down the drain before you can write the damn things on paper. I’ve started to try and remember these items by sending myself a text message immediately, with a couple of words, confident that at a later moment, I’ll be able to reconstruct the idea as if I’d written it right then. Two words: “Doesn’t work!”

Going through my emails and texts I find all kinds of little clues which now seem as distant as spot quiz French tests in the 11th grade. I have a vague memory of them, but it remains truly vague. There is one called “Just Keep Breathing.” I think it must have had something to do with figuring out how to live a long life. I guess I’d read something about longevity. And you think about these things when your friends, particularly your younger friends pass away. That breathing thing was key… If you wanna be here at 47 years old, 55, 63 or 71.. you gotta keep breathing. It’s a key element in the overall scheme of things. When you read the obits, and more than half the people are younger than you are, it takes an extra moment of consideration. You kind of think you’ll never really end up in that world of the gone. I mean, don’t we all feel (by ‘we all’ I mean anyone able to buy Senior Fare tickets on Amtrak) like we’re 32 or 28 or on a bad day, maybe 40. I wonder sometimes if my folks felt that way as they grew older. My dad passed away at 88. He played golf regularly until the last couple of years of his life, and always lived with a very youthful gusto. I wonder, though if he had the same kind of feeling – comparing himself to his dad (his mom died when he was a child) all through his life. It’s a natural thing to do, and the older you get, I suppose the more philosophical you become about it. There was a great poster in the subway I saw today, showing the eventual rise of man, and the stops which it took to arrive where we are. (It must have been for the Smithsonian Natural History museum in DC) Worth thinking about..such that it started with these neo ape-like characters (yes, your great(167 power) grand dad) who began making small talk. Small talk. Small. Talk. In a cave, under a tree, 50000 years ago. Small talk indeed. And it probably didn’t have anything to do with getting Kindergartners into the right school, or wondering how to fix a Magic Bullet Express with a frayed wire. No, that small talk must have been pretty small: “Fire?” “Water?” “Buffalo” Imagine the first guy who made a tool. Took the tooth from a dead sabretooth tiger, and started to carve things like mad. Did he think Patent was a good idea? He probably wanted to share it, understanding that what was better for all was also better for him.

Some of the other little messages I send myself are intriguing enough to actually follow up on. (Besides the standard stuff like Airline reservation codes, and Amtrak departure information.) The latest came from Melanie B., a photog who recently moved from Texas to the City and was stuck with the NewYork problem many people face: how to get your sofa inside the apartment. Sounds simple, as if you can just measure a sofa and measure a door or hall way and see if it fits. Which of course, if you ever tried it, you have discovered that it's not a proper method for measuring anything. The concept of volumetric space and how it relates from one shape to another, is something that in this age you’d need a pc and some great software. In the 30s and 40s they did it with a slide rule and a pencil. I kind of like the old version myself. There was something attractive about a slide rule, which gave you a real sense of being in control of the math, instead merely a pawn to it. Thus was created a wonderful new vocation. That of Couch Doctor. Those two words were immediately sent to myself when Melanie told of how she and her befuddled boyfriend had to finally call in the Couch Doctor to handle things. What does the couch doctor do? He either “disassembles” or, in manner befitting that 95 year old house next to the new library in your hometown, he cuts it in half, moves it through the pesky hallways and door ways, and once back in place, reassembles the two parts so that the impossible is accomplished. I guess it’s kind of akin to building a sailing ship inside a glass bottle. If you troll on Youtube I’m sure someone has given that secret away by now. But the couch doctor, I mean, he’s not even listed in Wikipedia yet. That IS cool. I guess if there is a lesson to trying to follow these little ideas onward to their natural end, it’s that you can’t ever really know where they will lead you. They remain rather like a race with no finish line. In those little two and three word gems are hidden (at least from my mind) all kinds of wonderful possiblilties. And while you may not be able to reconstitute the idea which led you to write the message in the first place, they may lead you somewhere else, to yet another place where ideas grow. Fire? Water? Buffalo ? We’re just sayin’… David

That Audience of One

Is Obama lost? He’s flying around hither dither, doing fundraisers and giving speeches about which no one gives a damn. It makes no sense to me. If I were advising him, I would suggest that he need to give the appearance of working hard to make change, thereby making a difference and fulfilling his promise to the nation. Note I said ‘appearance,’ because we all know that in Washington, as in most places and professions, it’s all about the perception. Perception is reality and if you can create the ‘smoke and mirrors’ necessary, whatever is your reality will be the public perception.

Hope that’s not too complicated to understand which explains why, of late, the only person to whom I have been confessing my inner core thoughts, about things like politics and life, is me. It happens quite unexpectedly. I will be walking down the street and the next thing I know I’m talking about one issue or another. Yesterday, when I saw the President in fundraising mode, I said, “What is he thinking? People are unemployed and starving, an additional 40,000 young men and women are going to have to serve in Afghanistan, the health care negotiations continue with limited success. What is he thinking?”

When I realize I’m doing this, I pretend I have a Bluetooth in my ear so strangers who pass by don’t think I’m nuts. In a routine I heard lately, Robin Williams said, “It used to be that we locked up people who talked to themselves. But now it’s hard to tell the sane people from the crazy ones since everyone who has a Bluetooth is walking down the street talking to themselves.” It seems to work and I remain free to blurt wherever.

A few days ago I was on the treadmill watching TV when there was an announcement about the police finding the body of a seven year old girl missing from Florida. I was at a fitness facility so I wasn’t alone. And when I looked away from the TV I noticed that people were staring at me. I had apparently had quite a discussion with myself about the cruelty of the kidnapper, and the pain the parents must have been suffering. When you wear earphones, it’s hard to moderate your volume—and mine was obviously turned up to ‘high.’

There are times when I am writing, or working that I find myself commenting on the value of my own work. Usually something like, “your spelling is not very good anymore – thank God for spell check”. Or, “That makes absolutely no sense, what happened to your ability to think like someone with a brain.” And even, “Where is the memory you used to have for people, places and things?” If I am cooking, I converse with the ingredients to inquire about whether or not I used enough of them. “Hello Mr. Salt, I want to use you sparingly because too much of you is not healthy.” There are even times when I pretend to be my mother or a friend and I talk as though they had inhabited my body and mind for those few minutes. I’m not sure if I change my voice to replicate theirs, but it is still done out loud, as opposed to in my mind.

Last night, we went to see Anna Deavere Smith in “Let Me Down Easy”. It is a one woman show where Anna, as 20 different characters (based on real people), reflects about death. It is clear that Anna has interviewed the people and at times they speak to her –being them. Although it is performed, as opposed to real life, it is the closest anything has come to mirroring my vocal behavior. The biggest difference is that she gets paid for her dialogue and I simply reprimand myself for acting like a dope. OK, there are other differences like her talent, ability to be creative, and prominence, but you get the point. Enough about talent, let’s get back to me. When I realize I am having this conversation with myself and maybe one or two inanimate objects, I say to myself, “Who do you think you are talking to?” Then I answer myself out loud and say, “Does it matter. She is clearly agreeing with me.”

How unfortunate that we are all reluctant to express opinions about anything sensitive. For example, I respect the President and his ability to remain calm and thoughtful in the face of national hysteria about many things. However, I would like to see him use the power of the Presidency to do simple things –like eliminating ‘’don’t ask don’t tell.’ It would be nice if we all felt some movement forward. He has become an easy target for opponents, elected or otherwise. But this is not something I talk publicly with anyone but me… and, as of now, my trusted following. We’re just sayin’… Iris

It Ain't Just "Say Cheese" Anymore

DB by Dustin Ross/Contact (iPhone and some wacko kewl software)

Don’t look back. They are definitely gaining, no ifs, ands, buts or maybes. This is the weekend of the PhotoPlus exhibition at the Javits Center in New York. It you like cameras or dig anything to do with photography, then this is the “Santa’s Workshop” of the photo crowd. All the new announcements by the big companies are timed for one or another show similar to this one, and this year I’m sure will be no exception. Canon and Nikon, the big dogs are doing their collective things, but the way things are evolving, the fact is that software and ‘post’ production products are becoming as big a deal as the “taking” end of things. So now it’s not just a question of having a D3x or a 1D Mark 4. At one time (a few years ago, before digital took over the known world) your average photog would have loved nothing better than a new box in which to shoot tri-x or Velvia. In fact one of the great ironies of the ‘digital age’ is that at the time when 35mm film cameras were achieving the ultimate in speed, quality, and useability, an incredibly expensive, not very capable digi cam became the king. The one thing it could do was send a picture NOW. And NOW is what it was all about for those in the press. Now, a decade later the emphasis now seems to follow the “processing” side of the creative process. We have turned “photoshop,” the name of a wonderful and very capable editing program, into a concept, a view of photography which now assumes (“ah.. he must have photoshopped that!”) that far from being true, most pictures are suspect from the moment they are made, as to what they actually represent. I’m sure there are a few post-hippie types who would be able to tell me about what its like to trip on LSD, that festival of color and light. (I was always afraid of getting caught.) I suppose it probably looked, occasionally, like an overdone HDR picture (High Dynamic Resolution.) HDR is one of those processes which were originated to try and get photographs to more correctly replicate the human eye. It attempted to capture not only the shadows of s scene (the dark bits..) but the highlights, too, and everything in betwixt and between. We are used to looking at pictures which have come to look rather like how our eyes see the world. The new cameras go well beyond that range, and when you use an HDR workflow (isn’t that a sexy word?) it brings out all the detail in both the darkened shadows, and the bright highlights. God help you if the world really looks like that. But it is a “look” and one which can indeed be very eye catching. Sam Kittner, a Washington photographer has created a stunning set of HDR panoramas, of mostly DC subjects.
photo: Sam Kittner (kittner.com)
They arrest your view, and make you want to linger as you look. It’s as if we have taken photography and made a new painterly tool out of it. As someone who spent most of his life in the documentary/photojournalism world, I find myself torn: on the one hand there is something very captivating (or potentially so, when well done) and at the same time bothersome that we are messin’ around with ‘reality’ a bit too much. Of course you could also say that a 600mm lens with its sense of compression, creates a view of the world which is nothing like what you can see with your own eyes. In essence, it is an extension of that eye, a funneling of the vision into a very small cone, isolating the areas around it.

I’m actually glad the rules exist (such as they do) for my kind of work. It’s not that I don’t have a fanciful notion now and then to blast a picture with the latest software grooviness, and see what it yields. Certainly if you’re working in the realm of commercial or strictly artistic photography, pretty much anything goes. But at times it’s tough to turn that “Honest view of what I see” button on and off. I have often, however, loved quoting Bullwinkle, who was once portrayed in a smock and beret, with a palette of paints and canvas at hand: “I paint what I see…. And THIS is what I see…” camera panning to an absolutely incomprehensible Kandinsky-like bowl of artistic mush. Well, I DO shoot what I see. But it’s what happens to those images afterwards which is changing the world of visual communication as we know it. Credibility is often lost as pictures which were cheated along the way chip away at the essential believability of every image. I guess I am over that, already. I mean, who actually believes what they see anymore? The latest thing to pop me in the head is the software version of a photo techique which I have been working with for a few years. Using a lens which is slightly angled to the film plane (or the chip plane) you can create certain narrow fields of focus which basically let you emphasize what you want your viewer to see. Well, you could, I suppose say that this is as unreal a representation as something “done in post…” Maybe.. but I still feel there is something a little more holy about what we do in the camera. That may eventually lead to some wonderful little things which you can do to your camera, adjustments which would give you some other kind of ‘creative’ way of putting that image onto a chip. Today, Dustin Ross, the digital whiz kid at Contact wow’ed me with the new “Tilt Shift” program on his iPhone. Damn… its amazing what they can stuff into something the size of a ½ pack of smokes. In a few seconds he shot the picture, pulled it out of his “photo album,” worked it for all of about 30 seconds, and then emailed me the picture. Had I just dropped in from say, 1978, and seen that, my jaw would have dropped to my sneakers. We are already becoming so blasé about these amazing new tricks, that they have to keep getting reinvented, every month or two, just to keep one’s attention. I worry long term about the ability of the free press to exist, and should it exist, and maintain some modest level of credibility from the public. And of course there will always be questions about manipulation of images in ways which potentially go from creative artistry to propaganda. Wouldn’t those guys who spent their careers taking people out of Stalin and Mao’s pictures have had a field day with this stuff.

The only thing we know is that it’s not going back to those simple days of Velvia and Tri-x. But meanwhile, have a great time at the PhotoPlus show, push it one stop, and call me in the morning….We’re just sayin’… David

The Grown Ups are MIA

Last night we were out to dinner with two dear friends, both of whom are progressive Democrats. (Thought it was only fair to share all the information.) Dinner with these two smart and articulate people, is always fun and sometimes even rollicking fun The political conversation began right away with Billy asking me what was going on with Obama. I told him that when Barack called me yesterday, he said there was nothing new. “You’re not kidding, and nothing is the key word.” The discussion continued and I refused to take responsibility for this Administration’s actions, or inaction as it would seem. Billy said that when he listened to Obama speak he was always moved. But he wanted to see something accomplished beside the Justice Department deciding that you can no longer be arrested for using legal medical marijuana – if it is legal in the state where you are smoking.

It’s been ten months since Obama was sworn in and the question for most people is, has he accomplished anything? We are still in a war, health care is still pending, and even “Don’t ask don’t tell” remains military policy. Oh, except there is this ongoing ridiculous battle with Fox. This particular battle is a bit petulant for my taste. The White House says that Fox is an arm of the Republican party and so they should be treated like an enemy. There is even a Move On e-mail to rally the troops. It is a total waste of time and energy. The content is juvenile and preposterous, but worth sharing because it is what the people who drank the Kool Aid think makes sense:

"Democrats should support President Obama's effort to call out FOX. Please stay off FOX for as long as he does."
Dear MoveOn member,
All year, FOX has worked 24/7 to block President Obama's agenda—repeating lies about "death panels," promoting Tea Party protests, and whipping up fake political scandals. Now, President Obama is fighting back. The White House communications director said FOX is a "wing of the Republican Party...let's not pretend they're a news network." To draw attention to its biased coverage, President Obama will not appear on FOX for the rest of this year. It's about time Democrats stood up to FOX! Can you sign this petition asking Democrats to support President Obama's stance by staying off FOX as long as he does? We'll deliver it to Sen. Warner and Sen. Webb and Rep. Moran

It is hard to imagine what these people are thinking. The White House simply looks foolish trying to say FOX is not a network. By all the definitions, of course it is a network. Maybe the White House doesn't like it but there are many people who listen to it. Further, as my mother said, honey is much more palatable than salt when you are trying to convince people that you are right. Or was it "You get more using honey that salt". Who cares, you get the point. Why not appear to be open to every opinion and make them look short sighted and without credibility.

Today I went to a memorial service for a dear friend, Anne Wexler. She was the premiere Washington lobbyist – hard working, concerned, principled and tough. But she always got what you needed to do to get things done. Her firm, Wexler Reynolds was bi-partisan. There were incredibly talented people from both parties who she employed. They were successful because they understood that continued conversation was much more effective than refusing to talk. I think the problem for this Administration is that they have not transitioned to governing instead of campaigning. And there is a big difference, both in attitude and philosophy, between the two.

Anne probably would have said that an unsuccessful transition from political campaign to running the government is like being a cigarette girl on the Hindenburg. You are just passing time until there is an explosion. That’s what we are seeing now. The ship of state is trying to stay afloat with a commander who seems directionless despite his eloquent rhetoric.

It looks like he will commit more troops to Afghanistan, health care probably will not have a public option, and the media will remain the enemy. As Anne always said, “Talk to the press, tell the truth the first time, and move on”. She would have seen the FOX thing as an opportunity instead of a battle field. All I can think when I look at this kind of behavior from the White House is, where are the adults when we need them. When will there be another Anne to insist that the White House use a little common sense. We’re just sayin’… Iris

Where Did It Go?

Whether you are 20, 30, 40 or 80, there is a time when you look back and say, “Where did it all go?” Obviously, it is different when you are twenty, and looking forward to the rest of your life, than when you are eighty looking at life in a rear view mirror. But people do, on occasion, try to figure out where their life has gone and what they want to do with the time they have left – no matter what age.

Some people (like professional Presidential political people –what a mouthful), measure their lives in increments of four years. And when they reflect they think about what they did in between campaigns. Other, like photojournalists may look at their lives in terms of the important stories they covered. Artists, like painters or sculptures, probably measure their lives by the art work they produce. I have no idea what lawyers or bankers do.

One of the ways we measure our lives is by our families. Usually the measure is the age of child or a parent. You will often hear a parent say, “My God, how did the kids get so old?” Or, “Can you believe I’m the same age as my mother when she learned to drive.” Or “I just had to take my mother’s driver’s license and keys away.” And you might hear a kid say, “When you were alive, what did you do for a social life?” If you are twenty, you can’t wait until you are 21. It opens so many doors, including to the local tavern. But you still look back at the way you spent your childhood, and you think about the things that were most important or had an impact that might be ever lasting – a first kiss, a last dance, a celebration of some academic achievement. Yet another kind of measurement.

We also measure our lives by our successes or failures. Sometimes that involves personal achievements and sometimes it is the achievement of a loved one. Like when our children have children. Who, as a parent, hasn’t said, “You should only get back double from your kids what you gave to me.” (You don’t have to have said it with a Yiddish inflection, but guilt usually works better with an immigrants accent.—Yiddish Italian, Chinese, it doesn’t matter.) Then when the kids have kids and you see their children acting out, something inside you makes you want to smile and say, “Thank you God.” But of course you don’t because then they would blame your curse for all the child’s bad behavior.

On occasion, when I’m feeling mortal (which happens infrequently), I think that everyone would be better off doing exactly what they want to do —no matter how unrealistic. For example, I never intended to work in politics or the government. My love was always the theater. But at someplace along my road of life, I took a left instead of a right and became a “political operative” instead of Cecil B.DeMille.

I have no regrets about the professional time I spent in academia, public relations or the Washington bureaucracy. I traveled all over the world, met unbelievable people, and made fairly sound policy. Actually, I have no regrets about anything but waiting a little too long to do the thing I most wanted to do – something on the production side of the theater. But, I believe, that as long as you are still breathing, it’s never too late to follow your dream. And whether you become an expert, rich or famous, as long as you are spending each day in a way that makes you happy, you cannot ask for more.

Anyway, when we talk about our memories and start with something close to “Do you remember…” -- the first day of school, the first day of camp, the first job, the first disappointment, graduating from college, when you fought with a dear friend, the passing of a parent, or the first day of your child’s chosen career, those are also a ways to measure how much of your life has passed.

As my mother would say, “Measure, Schmeasure.” What it really comes down to is how you want to be treated, remembered, and yes, measured by people on whose life you might have had some impact. We’re just sayin’… Iris

Off With His Knife!

There was a time when I carried an elaborate Swiss Army Knife everywhere. It was not used for protection. From what was there to need protect? Nope, I used it whenever I was doing a political event and usually it saved my life – but not from a terrorist.

This week, a six year old child was caught in school with something similar and simpler—a Cub Scout knife. Yes, First-grader Zachary Christie was well on his way to a Delaware reform school for 45 days. There is a zero tolerance at his school and he was in violation. Yes, Zachary is a model student and not a troublemaker, but you can’t accommodate a student when the system has rules. Are they kidding? Is there no common sense anymore.?

Maybe if Zachary was in the parking lot shooting up, or shooting at someone. Or if Zachary was riding around in a stolen vehicle, I might get to that place where I would understand a punishment like reform school. Never mind, I wouldn’t ever put a troubled kid in reform school instead of therapy, but that’s not the point.

I’m not saying that because someone is only six, they are not big enough to be disruptive or dangerous. My friend Joyce works in a first to third grade urban school in Philly. The kids do have to go through a magnetometer before they walk into the school. But this is a way to avoid problems rather than send them elsewhere. Teacher and principals and grownups dealing with disciplining children should have to pass a common sense test. Forget English or math. Kids need to have role models with a brain.

I’m no big fan of the Boy Scouts. (I think their homophobia is inexcusable). But I guess Cub Scouts are still young enough to be OK. And although I think the cookies the Girl Scouts sell are overpriced – they are cute in their little outfits with their hard earned badges. I never made it to Girl Scouts. Nope, I didn’t fly up from the Brownies because Mrs. Sturtevant, (the Brownie leader), was anti-semitic and hated my family. But that’s another blob.

Anyway, in order to become a Cub Scout, Zachary had to take an oath and a pledge and swear things to God. just in case you don’t remember yours:

Cub Scout Promise
I, (say your name), promise
to DO MY BEST
To do my DUTY to GOD
And my Country
To HELP other people, and
To OBEY the LAW of the Pack

Law of the Pack

The Cub Scout follows Akela.
The Cub Scout helps the pack go.
The pack helps the Cub Scout grow.
The Cub Scout gives goodwill.

(The pack stuff makes me nervous and who the hell knows what Akela is but nevertheless…)

And the piece of resistance (forget the French) the -- Cub Scout Motto
“DO YOUR BEST”

Who in their right mind would send a kid who did all that swearing to God, to reform school. Put on your big girl panties, people, and act like you have the ability to think like a reasonable adult. You just might be able to pull it off. We’re just sayin’…..Iris

That Peace Prize

“It’s Bo’s birthday” was not the way I expected the President to acknowledge receiving the Nobel Peace Prize. Maybe he, like the rest of us, was so shocked he just tried to put it in perspective and starting with “It’s Bo’s birthday” made as much sense as his receiving the prize. I know, it’s not fair just to leave it at Bo’s birthday. The President did say that he didn’t view it as a recognition of his own accomplishments. Which is good – since there aren’t any yet. And I mean that in the nicest possible way. He has only been in office for 8 months. I think the country has disappointed expectations because they expected too much. George Bush did eight years worth of damage. So this President has to help the country recover as well as move forward. Not an easy task.

Ok. We are all wondering that the Nobel committee was thinking when they awarded him the prize. Many of the cable pundits thought it was because they were hopeful that he would work to deserve it. Like, instead of committing more troops to Afghanistan, he would realize that; 1. we can’t win there and 2. it is clearly becoming his war, rather than Bush’s war. If I lived in Oslo, and was on the Nobel selection committee, and I was desperate to find someone who actually did promote peace—but couldn’t, I might try to nominate someone who might do something to promote world peace. But that is kind of a stretch.
http://www.thaindian.com/newsportal/world-news/record-205-nominees-for-2009-nobel-peace-prize_100160737.html

Let me share that this is not the first time I was surprised about the Nobel Peace Prize. Former Vice President Al Gore shared it for making a movie about Global warming. The movie/seminar was incredibly informative, but I’m not sure it deserved that big prize. And speaking of Al, (who, when living at the VP’s mansion, threw a wonderful Halloween party every year which we happily attended in colorful costume), he called Obama's win, “extremely well deserved and an honor for the country.” And he cited Obama's “UN speech on abolishing nuclear weapons, his shifting of the missile defense program in Eastern Europe and Russia, and joining other countries to confront Iran on nuclear nonproliferation.”

I could be wrong (we know it happens infrequently), but one of those things sounds like a vision, one an intention and one an action, but nothing that merits the Nobel Prize for Peace.

But seriously folks, there are more important things to consider than who won the prize. There’s the party. Jada Pinkett Smith, and her talented husband Will are going to host the Nobel Peace Prize party. Did you even know there was going to be a party? Not to worry, it’s not until December, and I’m sure all our invitations will be in the mail.


Let’s start that sentence again. But seriously folks, what was the committee thinking. There were a record 205 nominees this year. Other than Sarkozy, surely there must have been someone who has actually done something to promote world peace. How about the US exchanges programs, or Seeds of Peace But who am I to pick a winner. So let’s start that sentence one more time. But seriously folks can you imagine how pissed off Bill Clinton must be. We’re just sayin’…Iris

In Retrospect....

In retrospect, I think that the President’s trip to Copenhagen was shameful. There would have been absolutely no need for the President to make the trip (as the Senator from Illinois), had he had a good advance team and advisors who proved to be boys playing with sports toys.

Not that every campaign I worked in was perfect, nor were they without screw-ups but at least we knew that you never send the principal into a place where you don’t know what’s going to happen. It’s politics 101. Never leave anything to chance. Especially if you know that there are simple ways to avoid embarrassing situations. For example, when you took a candidate to a neighborhood to go door to door asking for support, you made sure that every door he/she knocked on was already a supporter. The last thing you want to see on the news, is a candidate getting a door slammed in their face. Which is basically what happened to Obama.

It seems that everyone in the world (except the President, his staff, and the people who live in Chicago), knew that the Olympics was going elsewhere. So, if they didn’t know, why didn’t they ask. (Not everyone in Chicago because that would have been too large a crowd, and probably would have made the Olympic Committee nervous.) This White House trip turned out to be more fodder for the right wing talk show hosts.

It is terribly disappointing for those of us who had such high hopes, to think that this President and his staff may just have bad judgment about the message and the media. During the Bush years, the President’s staff was careful to keep him under wraps because you never knew what he actually knew, or what he would say about it, that at the least was grammatically and structurally correct. But this group can’t wait to put Obama on as many TV shows as possible, without I might add, a message that resonates with the people. Do they not get who the people are? Do they not understand the concept of overexposed—even if you have your clothes on.

On one hand they throw him out to be devoured by the Sunday Talk shows, and every possible media outlet but Fox. And on the other hand, the only photographer that has access to the President is his personal photographer. This means that everything you see is what the White House wants you to see. You never get a sense of the man unrehearsed. Everyone who is allowed into the Oval office or gets access to an event, is so controlled that there is no perspective beyond the White House. You may think “who cares about White House photos”. But you should care, and the staff should care because the public has no idea who this man really is. If they did, they might be more willing to offer support for programs with which they not yet unimpressed.

So what can he do to regain the momentum and start to operate with positive rather than negative aspirations. The first thing I would suggest is to stay home and govern. Give the public the sense that he is actually working on health care, unemployment and the economy. Sure the stock market is up and the rich are back to getting richer, but he will never get anything accomplished if he doesn’t start to think about the consequences of his decisions, as well as what the pundits are going to say about what they have determined are his failures. Just stay home. We’re just sayin’…Iris

Now THIS Is News

Don’t you love it when the issues of the day are so ridiculous that they provide entertainment rather than worry. When you can reflect in the realm of stupid rather than the reality of the economy and the war –wherever it is now. Such was the case this week with Obama’s trip to meet with the Olympic Committee, (who, anyone that has ever dealt with them knows, they are corrupt and obscene). And the Letterman revelations about having slept with a number of women who worked for him. These are so good, I hardly know where to start.

Let’s first talk about the President and why he made the pilgrimage to Copenhagen. I wish I had known he was going because my boyfriend from third grade lives there and would have given him a more genuine welcome. Never mind, maybe they’ll meet some other time. My guess is that the Olympic committee, having received more payoffs from Rio, had made their decision well in advance of the President’s arrival. So the trip was a waste of time, except to provide fodder for the right wing and additionally, humiliate the President (who happens to be an American regardless of what you’ve heard) because no one really likes Americans anymore. At least they are not supposed to on TV.

My only objection to the trip was that he is the President of the United States and not the Senator from Illinois anymore. He needs to be perceived as having a world view, rather than advocating for his home state. Some would say that the Olympics are an important world event. This is true. I doubt however, that he would of made the trip if Fargo, N.D. was vying for that sport’s prize. I could be wrong, but not usually.

The fact that Chicago was at the bottom of the list is no surprise and moot. The facilities available right now could not compare to the other places. They would have had to rebuild the city (it’s a livable wonderful city now), which is easy in Beijing, because you just tell people to pack and go, but which is certainly never going to happen in an American city – unless there is a hurricane or an earthquake. I just wish the White House “thinkers”, would stop thinking photo op and start thinking about what makes sense in terms of the President’s time.

On to Letterman. Let’s be honest. Who really cares about who Letterman slept with. I wanted to hear juicier, maybe even perverted stuff. In these times of “get over it”, when our elected officials are unfaithful, who cares about consensual sex. And what was this totally stupid CBS producer thinking? Why would you try to blackmail a celebrity with nothing to blackmail them about. You can be sure if Letterman had done anything unforgivable, like raping a thirteen year old girl, he would have paid the guy big bucks. (I also love that this was the third most important story of the week and I’m sure there will be more to come.

While the economy is in the toilet (despite the good PR), and there were more job losses this month again, and the health “care” issue seems to be on the back burner or, at least, not on the front page of every newspaper in the country, it is almost a relief to read and hear about stuff that is truly entertainment, rather than pretending it’s news disguised as entertaining. We’re just sayin’.. Iris

Hurricane

If you were going to invest your time, or dare I say money, in a unique new musical, I would bet on Michael Holland’s “Hurricane” now at St. Clement’s theater, as part of the New York Musical Festival. The subject of the show is the 1938 freak hurricane that decimated parts of Long Island and Connecticut, and totally destroyed Napatree, Rhode Island.

The book is an intricate series of personal stories about the people who lived and died during the storm. It is surprisingly easy to follow the story lines, despite the complexity of the people and their relationships. And the music is quite simply gorgeous and extraordinary.

The simplicity of the set combined with exquisite costuming all help to enhance what are already authentic and stellar performances by a gifted ensemble cast. And despite the opening night technical glitches, the combination of words music and talent show provided the audience with an overall incredibly moving experience.

But don’t just take my word for it. Mike Cohen of the Public Theater said:

“HURRICANE's serious intent and high aspiration and musical complexity...?
I thought the performance as is communicated extraordinarily.

The choral work was stunning -- musical direction and the young man at the
piano were tremendous -- and I remain particularly haunted by "Norm's"
character and performance and the delivery of his numbers (I don't have
the program at hand right now. The actor's last name was Watt(s), I
think...?) His soldier solo and Boogeyman song and his handling of the
musical/dramatic scenes re: the loss and death of the children was
particularly moving and memorable, I thought/felt. Among many other
moments, of course.

I'm already looking forward to seeing the piece again in the future -- I
have no doubt it will have one -- and can't wait to see how it continues
to grow and develop.”

Well known producer, Ken Davenport, who has yet to see the show said:

“Hurricane has almost 30 castmembers. I often tell festival producers to produce small shows, because they come off better. Well, in true "embrace your flaw" fashion, the Hurricane producers have come out saying they are proud to present a show with "the biggest cast ever seen on a NYMF stage." There are Broadway vets, kids, and even a couple of ghosts. Oh, and I've gotten three unsolicited recommendations to see this show. There's some sort of storm brewing . . . and I want to see what it is.”

Yes, there is a buzz about this storm. The show, which was to have 6 performances, added two additional shows and still the entire run is sold out. Let’s hope it has life beyond NYMF, so many people can share the experience. This definitely gets a Sadie 3.
For more info http://www.hurricanethemusical.com

And Just How Long Will You Be Parking With Us?

It has been a bit of a wait since my last blob. It’s not that I don’t have something to say (just ask Iris!) it’s more like, there are so many things scattered in my head that trying to make some sense of it all becomes challenging. At least once or twice a day I say or think of something which “would make a great blob.” But unlike my dad, Ted Burnett, master of the note written on an envelope, I don’t write these things down, operating under the misplaced assumption that it’s so OBVIOUS, of course I’ll remember that when I have to write. And of course I don’t. Remember that is. But we can catch up just a little bit. I have been musing of late, trying to figure out just what the hell I’m going to say at the upcoming events related to the publication of new book ( 44 Days: Iran and the Remaking of the World) about the Iranian Revolution of 1979. The book was officially published yesterday (hooray! And shout out to all the folks at Contact who really made it happen, inspite of my well-meaning interference!) and last night I did a ‘launch’ event at the Barnes and Noble in Bethesda, Maryland. Being the DC suburb that it is, the most important thing on the mind of the Bethesda elders these days is scrounging every dollar that they can find (and some they can’t) from the poor hapless souls like me and my audience of last night. (Did I mention it was a terrific group of people, and they bought lots of books?)
cr: Chris Usher/BKSC

At the shopping area on Woodmont Avenue, what was once a free parking garage designed to make it attractive for outsiders to come visit (and spend their money) has become a tiered “Public Parking” facility, in the same way that the IRS is a “Public Do Gooder” organization. The tiering is craftily designed to maximize annoyance. The lower levels are all meters which are good for two hours. If you get up to level two, the meters vary between four and five hours (wow, that five hour parking, just what I need), and the meters are the kind that take 10 seconds to determine what coin you have put in, before reading back to you the amount of time you have just purchased. You have to really drive up the levels to find something for a whole day (I didn’t go that far), but even at 620pm when I finally found the place, there was a lone figure wandering like a lost peddler in search of a sell, who turned out to be the enforcement guy, the one who joyfully writes the tickets which bolster the Bethesda town coffers.
Me, in the childrens' section: Of course! cr: Chris Usher/BKSC
Parking is not unlike the ‘dope’ in Tom Lehrer’s classic song “The Old Dope Peddler.” “.. he gives the kids free samples because he knows full well, that today’s young innocent faces, are tomorrow’s clientele….” They built up the area with handy parking ten to 15 years ago, created a demand for the Austin Grill, and Jaleo (both fine cafes..) and the like, and now they just jack those meters up and wait for you to stay a minute longer so that you can be tagged for thirty five bucks. At the B&N event last night, I know of at least two people who fell into the clutches of the Bethesda parking vampire. It turned a nice little evening, bordering on one of culture and history, in to an excruciatingly painful trip to the burbs, and quite like my friends who were tagged last night, I don’t think I’ll be going back for anymore of their hospitality anytime soon. I realize there are pressures in these newly flush areas, to try and keep traffic moving, and keep new people coming in because the first people to arrive eventually spend all their money. And you need to keep the pump churning. But whatever sense of community, and warm and fuzziness might have ever so briefly been illuminated last night was drowned out by the dread of walking back to the car to see, even from a distance, the ticket on the windshield. Yes, in these days of falling housing values and skyrocketing public service costs, you need to find more and more and more. But the truth is that Bethesda, quite like Arlington (where I habitate) felt absolutely no restraint in the last ten years, upping budgets for pet projects every year without ever being reminded of the Alan Greenspan line of a decade ago: “I’m unaware that they have cancelled the business cycle.”

Anyone, especially someone with the power of the purse, should remember that the keys to fiscal management are 1) not spending more than you take in, and 2) get ready for the rainy day. Safe to say that 1 was not really on anyone’s agenda, and 2 wasn’t even a glint in the eye of the community elders. There is no secret to the fact that in walking through Manhattan now you are struck by the new, bold, and very upfront presence of a ‘new’ bank in town. TD bank, building big branches all over the city, re-acquiring wonderful two story, half block long locations in mid-town, has created quite a splash. TD is Toronto Dominion. One of those “Canadian” banks. You know, the ones that didn’t over do it, that didn’t get themselves in way over their cumulative depository heads. It is astonishing to see in this market someone arriving in the banking world who seems to be quite untouched by the last two years debacles. Maybe their geniuses are just a bit smarter, a bit more in control, a bit more reasoned that our own geniuses. Our geniuses didn’t really do such genius work, did they.

I guess I remain in favor of some of the development going on these days, but I wonder whether there is really such a need for the unimpeded onslaught to keep the public treasury full and rich. So much of what municipalities do these days are simply about keeping the money flowing. It doesn’t do much to make one either proud to be a citizen, or pleased to be contributing to such a lousy downturn of the public trust. We’re just sayin’….David

A Tale of Two Challahs

Yesterday I baked two challahs that were bigger than Chicago. It was the first time I have baked in my NY oven and it was almost painless. There was so much bread that I delivered one loaf to the cast of “Hurricane”, which opens tonight –good timing on the part of the NYMF. Someone should have told them that it’s too late to pray for the people in Napatree,Rhode Island who die in the hurricane of 1938.

Anyway, we decided not to buy tickets to services in New York. Maybe it’s me but I have real issues with having to pay to pray. In addition to which, if you don’t pay enough, you probably won’t get to see anything. David and I have always attended services with a group called Fabrangen (which means ringing together is joy). The services had no Rabbi and no hierarchy. Just people getting together to express their love of God in a ways that were joyful – like singing the prayers and (rather than have the President of the Sisterhood marching up and down the aisles), passing the Torah from congregant to congregant. We always made a donation to the group but tickets were not required. This year we decided (because we are part of the next century), that we would watch a service online.


It turns out that the Jewish Television Network broadcasts a service much like Fabrangen, but from the west coast (http://www.jewishtvnetwork.com/). The service, which is not Orthodox, Conservative, or Reformed, is performed (and I have carefully chosen this word), mostly in Hebrew but with an inordinate amount of music. The music and enthusiasm for their prayers, helps you forget about how hungry you might be. There is real heart and spirit in this congregation and even on a day when you repent for your sins, this is just fine.

Yom Kippur is a day of reflection, repentance, and remembering. Here are my two favorite memories:
When we were growing up our parents spent most of the day in Temple, which meant we were unsupervised. One year, knowing that we could do pretty much what we wanted and too young to consider that we were not supposed to do stupid things, especially on the highest of all Jewish holidays, we (Tina and I) took the keys to my Uncle Charlie’s car. The decision to practice our driving skills on his vehicle was totally without thought – eight year olds never ponder before they act. Things were going pretty well until Tina decided I wasn’t doing well enough and she drove the car into the kitchen wall. Luckily, no one was hurt, but you can only imagine the screaming and yelling, after we broke the news and they knew we were both alive and uninjured. I’d like to tell you we learned a lesson – not a chance. We just found other less dangerous ways to circumvent their rules.


My other favorite memory is one that reoccurred yearly. Aunt Sophie was never good at fasting and by 3:00 in the afternoon she had a terrible headache. I can remember her lying on the couch with a washcloth over her eyes, insisting that she was fine, while at the same time moaning softly about how awful she felt. Her sisters, (my mother, aunt Helene, and aunt Fritzie), were not very sympathetic but tried to make her feel better by saying things like “Eat something, God doesn’t want you to die –yet”. And, “You know, you’re not the only one who doesn’t feel so great.” Yes, they had an unusual way of expressing their love. But that banter is so clear in my mind, that I could do the two or three hours until they broke the fast, almost verbatim,

Aunt Sophie is gone now. as is Aunt Fritzie, Helene, Betty, Sarah, and Uncle Jack.. But the time we spent together as a family will never leave me…. The dinners every Friday night, the dancing to the Barry Sisters music on Sundays, the Passover celebrations, and the kvetching about not eating or drinking on Yom Kippur, are all a part of who I am and who I’d like my children to be.

Have a happy and healthy New Year, and you don’t have to be Jewish to do that. We’re just sayin’…. Iris

No Bags on the Bed

The other day, I got home and was relaxing when Jordan came racing in to remind me that there was a “No Bags on the Bed” rule. When you live in New York the rules for the way you live are a little different – and mostly germ related. The ‘no bags on the bed’ rule has to do with the fact that you put your bags on the ground and on the floor of the subway (where there is no shortage of filth – I won’t go into detail), then you go home and put those very same bags (the ones you dragged through the muck of New York), on your bed, introducing the vile elements to the place you rest you head at night. It’s a good rule and one I have reminded the world traveling (imagine the crap on his bags), photojournalist on more then one occasion.

The rules for living in New York, unlike the rules for living in Washington, do not include being patient while you are inconvenienced by a Presidential motorcade or two. In Washington people are used to having to drive miles out of their way when the President leaves the White House and all the surrounding street are closed. So this week was enormously stressful for New Yorkers because they were inconvenienced, not only by our President’s motorcade, but by line of cars for every Head of State in the world, maybe even the universe.

In addition to the motorcades, the police presence, which is usually not pervasive in NY, was really in your face – with machine guns and battle gear. I don’t know how the prospective terrorists felt but the rest of us were scared to death.. It brought back memories of times past. Like the first time I went to Eastern Europe, before we got on the plane, we were taken to the middle of the tarmac, and surrounded by soldiers with serious looking weapons. We were told to pick out the suitcases we had put through baggage. We moved all our bags from one pile to another and it was clear that no bags were going to get on the plane that were not identified by a passenger.

That was the first time I noticed that there were well armed military dealing with the ordinary public in a hostile way, as opposed to an treating them like they were the enemy. But I digress, (what else is new). The police were everywhere – intentionally visible. And I guess it worked, because there were no terrorist incidents during the UN General Assembly (other than, of course a few speeches in the General Assembly.) On the other hand, there were a number of abuses of power in Pittsburgh. World politics – the G20 --moved to Pittsburgh after New York – I know, world politics and Pittsburgh is an oxymoron. My favorite story was about the woman who was riding a bike and when she happened to ride by the protests, she was assaulted by a police officer. She was so angry about this attack, that she threw her bike at him. So naturally, this 300 pound thug in blue, beat the 120 pound biker, to within an inch of her life, and arrested her.

What does any of this have to do with the “No Bags on Beds rule”. Nothing specific, but it does have to do with how we accommodate to the places we live. In Virginia, I hardly ever take my shoes off when I walk into the house. In NY I would never think of walking into my apartment without taking my shoes off –and we ask everyone who visits to do the same. Again, this has to do with dirt and germs (and the white rug I stupidly purchased when we bought our apartment). But there are also other issues, some about safety, eating out, driving, and the social schedule. Not that one is better than the other, there are just different rules.

When we were growing up my mother said things like “you never move on a Tuesday,” “you must bring salt, sugar, and a broom into the place where you are going to move. “ “You never throw things at a pregnant woman (because the mice would eat your clothes).” And no hats on the table –ever. These were superstitions as opposed to rules but, at the very least, they were incredibly entertaining. And, in a strange way they were not much less sensible different than no bags on the bed. We’re just sayin’…. Iris

The Book of Life

Every time there’s any kind of award show there is, at some point, an ‘in memoriam.’ And it always makes me cry. This week is Holiest holiday in the Jewish religion. It is Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur –the week God decides whether or not you will be written into the Book of Life for the next year. It is a time when we reflect about those people who have died. For the last few months there have been an extraordinary number of passing of dear friends like Anne Wexler and Jody Powell, and those I never met.

In honor of those people and the Jewish New Year I would like to share some names with you and let you reflect on what they brought to your lives. La Shana Tova my friends. May you have a sweet and healthy New Year and thanks for sticking with us another year.

Natasha Richardson (actress) -- Dead. Following a head injury suffered during a skiing accident. Died March 18, 2009. Born May 11, 1963. Tony-winning actress (for the 1998 revival of Caberet), starred in The Handmaid's Tale, appeared with her mother Vanessa Redgrave in Evening, was married to Liam Neeson for nearly 15 years. Make memorial contributions to: amfAR - The Foundation for AIDS Research

"England" Dan Seals (singer) -- Dead. Lymphoma. Died March 25, 2009. Born February 8, 1948. Part of the duo England Dan and John Ford Coley, best-known for "I'd Really Love to See You Tonight".

Irving R. Levine (newscaster) -- Dead. Died March 26, 2009. Born August 26, 1922. NBC newscaster for 45 years.

Maurice Jarre (composer) -- Dead. Died March 29, 2009. Born September 13, 1924. Won Oscars for the scores for A Passage to India, Dr. Zhivago, Lawrence of Arabia, also scored Ghost and Witness.

Dave Arneson (game creator/teacher) -- Dead. Cancer. Died April 7, 2009. Born October 1, 1947. Co-creator of Dungeons and Dragons with Gary Gygax.

Marilyn Chambers (model/adult star) -- Dead. Died April 12, 2009. Born April 22, 1952. Appeared on the Ivory Snow detergent box in the early '70s before starring in the porn classic Behind the Green Door, was married to Linda Lovelace's ex-husband for a while.

Bea Arthur (actress) -- Dead. Cancer. Died April 25, 2009. Born May 13, 1923. Maude, The Golden Girls.

Marilyn French (writer) -- Dead. Died May 2, 2009. Born November 21, 1929. The Women's Room

Dom DeLuise (comic actor/cook) -- Dead. Died May 4, 2009. Born August 1, 1933. Blazing Saddles.

David Carradine (actor) -- Dead. Reported asphyxiation. Died June 3, 2009. Born December 8, 1936. Kill Bill, Kung Fu, many other TV Westerns, and a surprising number of movie bit parts in the years before he died.

John Houghtaling (inventor) -- Dead. Complications of a fall. Died June 17, 2009. Born November 14, 1916. Invented "The Magic Fingers," a coin-operated vibrating bed later installed in motels across America during the '50s and '60s.

Ed McMahon (announcer) -- Dead. Pneumonia/cancer. Died June 23, 2009. Born March 6, 1923. The Tonight Show announcer during the Carson years, famous for greeting him with "Heeeeeeeeeeeere's Johnnny!", later, a spokesperson for American Family Publishing.

Farrah Fawcett (actress/model) -- Dead. Cancer. Died June 25, 2009. Born February 2, 1947. Charlie's Angels, subject of a huge poster craze in the '70s, many made-for-TV movies, longtime companion of Ryan O'Neal, ex-wife of Lee Majors.

Michael Jackson (singer/songwriter) -- Dead. Cardiac arrest. Died June 25, 2009. Born August 29, 1958. Wildly eccentric performer, youngest member of the Jackson 5, major pop icon of the '80s ("Thriller", "Billie Jean"), married briefly to Lisa Marie Presley, acquitted child molester.

Gale Storm (actress) -- Dead. Died June 27, 2009. Born April 5, 1922. My Little Margie, The Gale Storm Show; her autobiography was called I Ain't Down Yet.

Billy Mays (pitchman) -- Dead. Heart disease. Died June 28, 2009. Born July 20, 1958. The spokesguy for OrangeGlo, Oxiclean and dozens of other products, starred in cable's Pitchmen.

Harve Presnell (actor/singer) -- Dead. Pancreatic cancer. Died June 30, 2009. Born September 14, 1933. The Unsinkable Molly Brown

Jan Rubes (actor) -- Dead. Died June 30, 2009. Born June 6, 1920. The grandfather in Witness
July

Karl Malden (actor) -- Dead. Died July 1, 2009. Born March 22, 1912. On the Waterfront, A Streetcar Named Desire, The Streets of San Francisco and many commercials for American Express.

Robert McNamara (secretary of defense, war criminal) -- . Died July 6, 2009. Born June 9, 1916. Secretary of Defense during the Viet Nam war, subject of A Fog of War.

Walter Cronkite (newscaster) -- Died July 17, 2009. Born November 4, 1916. Longtime CBS evening newscaster, worked on reporting the Kennedy assassination and the first moonlanding.

Frank McCourt (Writer/teacher) -- Dead. Meningitis. Died July 19, 2009. Born August 19, 1930. Angela's Ashes
August

Corazon Aquino (Former Phillipine president) -- Dead. Colon cancer. Died August 1, 2009. Born January 25, 1933. Became the first woman president of the Phillipines after the assassination of her husband, Benigno Aquino.

John Hughes (writer/director) -- Dead. Heart attack. Died August 6, 2009. Born February 18, 1950. Wrote/directed Ferris Bueller's Day Off, Sixteen Candles and Planes, Trains and Automobiles, retired from Hollywood youngish to be a farmer.

Eunice Kennedy Shriver (philanthropist) -- Dead. Died August 11, 2009. Born July 10, 1921. Founded the Special Olympics, Maria Shriver's mother.

Les Paul (guitar legend/inventor) -- Dead. Died August 13, 2009. Born June 9, 1915. Invented the electric guitar, had a TV show in the '50s, performed into his 90s, inducted into multiple musical halls of fame.

Don Hewitt (TV news producer/director) -- Dead. Pancreatic cancer. Died August 19, 2009. Born December 14, 1922. Creator/producer of 60 Minutes, produced shows for Edward R. Murrow, director of the 1960 presidential debates, author of Tell Me a Story.


Edward M. "Ted" Kennedy (politician) -- Dead. Brain cancer. Died August 25, 2009. Born February 22, 1932. Last surviving Kennedy brother, served in the Senate for many years, often fighting for improved health care, ran for President, involved in a car accident that killed a volunteer in 1969.

Dominick Dunne (writer/celebrity watcher) -- Dead. Bladder cancer. Died August 26, 2009. Born October 29, 1925. Novelist (The Two Mrs. Grenvilles, A Murder in Connecticut) who became an obsessive trial-commentator after the murder of his daughter, Dominique, father of actor/director Griffin Dunne.

Ellie Greenwich (songwriter) -- Dead. Heart attack. Died August 26, 2009. Born October 23, 1940. With her ex-husband Jeff Barry, she co-wrote classic songs like "Leader of the Pack", "Da Doo Ron Ron" and "Chapel of Love".

Sheila Lukins (chef/food writer) -- Dead. Brain cancer. Died August 30, 2009. Born circa 1942. Creator of The Silver Palate shop, a series of Silver Palate cookbooks (with Julee Ross

Eunice Kennedy Shriver (philanthropist) -- Dead. Died August 11, 2009. Born July 10, 1921. Founded the Special Olympics, Maria Shriver's mother. IMDb Obituary

Les Paul (guitar legend/inventor) -- Dead. Died August 13, 2009. Born June 9, 1915. Invented the electric guitar, had a TV show in the '50s, performed into his 90s, inducted into multiple musical halls of fame.
And in September 2009

Mary Travers, folk singer, war protestor. Part of the famous trio, Peter, Paul and Mary..

Henry Gibson, Comedian. Best know for his dirty old man on the wonderful entertainment show “Laugh In”.

Jody Powell, Press Secretary to President Carter. They met at a shopping center, Jody became his chauffeur when Carter was Governor, and went on to be the White House Press Secretary, a lobbyist and an all around great guy.

Patrick Swayze, Actor, dancer, delightful person. Best known for his roles in “Dirty Dancing” and “Ghost”.

How sad to have lost so many superstars in so many different professions during the last six months. I will remember how they enriched my life and will hope that there is an afterlife in which they can continue to entertain one another.

The Infomercial Wins!

There are only two things that we saw on TV this week. One is an infomercial about the “Bullet Express” which prepares an entire meal in 30 seconds. The other is Barack Obama making his case about Health Care Reform, or as I prefer to call it, (because it really that’s what it is), Health Insurance Reform.

Many of the television pundits have declared that Obama is overexposed. That the President of the United States, making a television appearance, is supposed to be a big deal. But he has been seen on so many shows, saying pretty much the same thing (change is good), that people, even those who are interested in what is going to happen to them if “health anything” is reformed, have begun changing the channel.

This is not the case with the Bullet Express. Yes, it is hokey and yes, the guy who is selling the product is an abrasive Brit, (or maybe a Scot, he’s so abrasive it’s hard to listen). And yes, there are six or seven annoying people who have been invited for ‘dinner’ and are appalled when they arrive and there is nothing to eat – they don’t know what we know, that they will eat in 30 seconds or however long it takes to sell the product.

Nevertheless, for those of us who have busy lives but like to eat, we are interested in how the thing works. Who wouldn’t want a gourmet meal in 30 seconds. (No they don’t say it’s gourmet, but I had high hopes.

Anyway, the host of the infomercial explains and shows us, with simple clarity, exactly how the machine works. “Here’s some dough,” he says, “Let’s make a pizza. You all like pizza don’t you?” And the next thing you see is a smiling young woman patting the tummy of her over weight hubby (doesn’t she know that at that size, the last thing he needs is a high cholesterol meal?). Never mind, this blog is not about the meal, it’s about the way things are explained. It’s about the way you sell a product, an idea, or dare I say, health insurance reform.

What was really interesting was that, even after all that television time, his numbers never moved. His presentation didn’t work, even though hosts like George Stephanopoulis quoted Merriam’s dictionary and appeared silly in the give and take with the President.
I was thinking that maybe all that time making jokes with Letterman, and points with Schieffer, would have been better spent making phone calls to Congressmen and women. When Tip O’Neill, who was a successful Speaker of the House, wanted to get Congressional business done, he worked the phones. He started with the A’s and went all the way to the Z’s, until he got what he wanted. The reality of a bipartisan effort is that it’s never going to happen with this Congress, so the President and the Speaker need to work the phones. Some would call that old fashion politics. I would call it a more likely way to get done what you want to get done. And wasn’t the reason Rahm Emanuel was appointed Chief of Staff to the President was because he knew how to get “stuff” through Congress? After all my experience in Presidential politics and government, I just don’t get it.

So here’s what I would suggest. The President needs to watch the Bullet Express infomercial with his speech writers and senior staff. They need to take copious notes about how to get something done. There is a certain charm in grating a pound of mozzarella in 10 seconds. They all need to learn a lesson from the abrasive chief (those can be found in the White House) and his talent-free dinner guests (also no shortage of these on the White House staff). Then they need to toss all the notes they’ve been using in the circular file, rethink the way sell this very important change, and use the President’s time. We’re just sayin’…. Iris

Seems Like Yesterday

I know I probably go on and on about certain things having to do with the passage of time in a way which, for someone whose life-work has been stopping time for an instant, must seem a bit like a broken record. (Editor's note: to those of you under 35 a "record" was a 12" vinyl [plastic] disc, with grooves on it, and when twirled on a 'turntable' and played with a 'needle,' would produce a sound roughly equivalent to the sound made when the plastic was cast. A "broken" record keeps playing the same noise, as the needle is unable to escape the a certain groove. Trust me on this one: it's annoying as hell.) Yes, time, no longer available in a bottle, just seems to fill the air around us rather like a mist which has been colored so as to be visible. Time gets into all the cracks and crevices. The corner of the sofa where all those old coins end up, the edge of a wooden drawer, the tines of your toothbrush. Time is unrelenting. In spite of really bad sit-coms, you should understand that time only moves one direction: forward, the same direction as the steam-roller which is about to flatten you -- so hop out off the way.

In the next couple of weeks, my new book "44 Days: Iran and the Remaking of the World" is going to be published by the Focalpoint division of National Geographic. It's quite exciting for me, really. In the era that finds magazine assignments drying up at an alarming rate (the scenario is something like this: internet steals advertising money from print media, magazines and newspapers in particular.. resources begin to dry up in magazine photo departments; economic downturn exacerbates the effects of this resource wipe out, causing many magazines to produce only a fraction of what they did even a year ago...) books and exhibitions, while a bit clunkier to produce and manage, provide a very different way to get the intent of those photographs -- to tell stories -- out to a viewing public. The fact that the photographs in the book were made 30 years ago (some, actually 36 years.. the Shah's visit to see President Nixon in 1973 was actually considered a "News" event) and have been cared for in that three decades, gives me great pride and pleasure. The toughest thing having to do with keeping a photos in an archive, is actually keeping them and maintaining them. It gives you the same appreciation that you might have seeing a library maintain its books for the public over a long period of time. It's very easy for things to disappear, fail to be returned from clients, to just fall behind a desk and remain there forever. So, when we (Contact Press Images) started to put it all together, it was satisfying beyond belief to see that the very nearly the entire archive was available and ready to go. So many of my friends, particularly those who worked for wire services (AP, UPI) over those same years, have virtually nothing of their own archives. Traditionally, the wire photo editor would look through a roll of film, mark the 'keepers', and cut one additional frame on the right and left of it, and often just toss the rest into the trash. Horrible to think about, particularly in light of the fact that what is important now on a roll of film, could very well be something which had no obvious meaning when it was shot, but was part of the photographer's vision.

The Digital Journalist, one of the longest running web'zines dealing with the press and photography, did a wonderful gallery in this month's issue. It includes a text I wrote to try and describe what it was like to produce the work, and eventually get it published at a time -- now -- when there are new rumblings in the streets of Tehran. In many ways it is not without irony, that many of the people in the streets I photographed 30 years ago, are now on the side of those who want to stifle dissent in those same streets. They may have outlawed demonstrations, but they cannot outlaw irony. The book is a collection of black-and-white (ode to Tri X!) and color (ode to Kodachrome!) and I'm very happy with the way it's turned out. (Shout out to Jeffrey, Jacques and Robert..) Available on Amazon and other fine stores... We'll be doing a number presentations on the east coast and (hopefully) the west coast, discussing the work, over the next couple of months. Check this site for book events... and remember. It not only seems like 30 years, it IS 30 years. Nearly half a lifetime. We're just sayin'... David

p.s. If you know any one at a Middle East Studies (for example) department at a great metropolitan university or other institution of higher learning, and think they might benefit with an evening of discussion on Iran.. please be in touch!

Walking to School

Last week I wrote a blog about being “civil” and I said that Cong. Wilson behaved badly and additionally, was a racist or at least, he didn’t like the idea of a Black guy in charge of the nation so he felt entitled to call the President a liar regardless of venue. I received a number of comments about how that made me a racist. I maintain that being from the South doesn’t make anyone a racist, “some of my best friends are Southerners” – none of whom are racists – but all of whom think Wilson is. And so does Maureen Dowd (who wrote about it long after I did.)
And so do any number of other people who have been civil rights advocates. And yes, I am particularly sensitive to this because I have spent a lifetime trying to promote understanding for individual differences. Amen

Changing the subject—I hate to linger on things that are merely repetitive. There seems to be yet another major national question, with which all parents are struggling. At what age should you allow your children to walk to school. As far as I’m concerned, parents never want to let their children walk to school. And yes, I am using “walk to school” as a metaphor for life, but isn’t a creative metaphor what all of us, who think we can write, search for every time we sit at the computer. The point is that most parents try to protect their children for as long as they can. And when they no longer get to dictate what a grown child can do, they still worry about their safety. It’s an ongoing and relentless consequence of the decision to give birth. Having been the kind of parent who followed her children when they walked to school (an infrequent event), and having secretly followed my daughter when she took her first subway ride , I can honestly say, I would still follow them (just to make sure they look both ways when they cross the street), if I could be assured they would never find out.

And speaking of children, recently on the “West Wing” (to which I am addicted, even though I have already seen most of the shows twice), the President’s daughter was kidnapped, returned and in therapy. She was not crossing the street, she was in a nightclub surrounded by people. Yes, that’s only a TV show but kidnapping children is a full time profession for far too many scum bags. And then there is Annie Le, a Yale graduate student who was murdered at her Lab the week before her wedding. They have a suspect in custody – another student. Annie was not crossing the street.
Or http://www.wxii12.com/news/20926127/detail.html Shapiro who was struck by Dr. Raymond Cook, an assistant professor at the UNC School of Medicine in Chapel Hill and a doctor at WakeMed Hospital. Elena was just driving along, maybe thinking about the kind of career upon which she was about to embark.

When you have children you automatically think you should be straining the air with chicken soup, so they don’t get a cold. You want them to be healthy, safe, secure, and wise about they way they face the world. You cannot be with them 24/7 so mostly you hope for the best. Walking them to school until they are 23 may be the answer to the question about when they should walk alone, or it might be 5 or 8 or 10.
There was a time when this wasn’t even a question because, unless you lived in a city, you were expected to get yourself to school by the time you were in first grade. Maybe, in retrospect, I am imagining things were gentler than they were. Maybe, as a consequence of the immediacy of the media, we are able to hear about more horrors more quickly. And just maybe, we have become a nation where, because there is no such thing as safety, (or civility), we can no longer let our children “walk to school” at all. We’re just sayin’….Iris

Never to be Forgotten

The contractor had just broken through the wall, and two small bedrooms were about to become one gracious space. We were trying to create the perfect room for a child who had a million friends, was incredibly social, but had no play space that could accommodate a large group of kids yearning to be free from parental oversight. There was a great deal of banging and knocking which I tried to escape by sitting downstairs in the kitchen, in front of the TV.

It was a peaceful, beautiful day and I was torn between looking out at the garden and watching some insipid segment on the “Today Show.” I’m not sure what drew my full attention to the TV. Maybe it was Katie, clearly upset, switching from the studio to a shot of a plane flying into the World Trade Center. I watched it replayed again and again. As is oft the case, the networks think more is better. And while I usually find this incredibly boring, in this case I was horrified and, at the same time, fascinated by what I was seeing. It was like a movie. And I remember thinking that it had to be a hideous accident.

But then the second plane flew into the other tower. It was so frightening that I ran upstairs to the contractors, yelling about what I had seen on TV and insisting that they come and look at what was happening. For whatever reason, I needed confirmation.

Two of them came downstairs. I could have turned the TV on upstairs, but it was like the event was only happening in the kitchen. We all watched the first plane and then the second fly into the Towers – over and over and over. And then we heard what sounded like an explosion followed almost immediately by sirens and the contractors cell phone. He answered it, seemed a little shaken by what was being said, and hung up. “It was my son”, he said. “He’s an Arlington fireman and he’s on his way to the Pentagon. Another plane just flew into the Pentagon. He’s going to call back when he knows something.”

We all continued to watch the coverage and still couldn’t believe what we were seeing. After about two hours of gruesome photos and reporting, I remembered that my dear friend Sidney worked at Battery Park, which was right next to the Towers. It wasn’t easy to get a call through to New York. But I was relentless and she finally answered her phone – at home.

“Are you OK?” I asked stupidly because of course she wasn’t OK. Among other things, she was exhausted from having walked from Battery Park on the West side to her apartment in the East sixties. “You cannot believe what it was like,” she said. “I was on my way to work and stopped for some coffee. There was a wall of windows and when I started out the door, the sky got black. It was blacker than night. Then a police officer came running in and said it was too dangerous for us to stay there, and we needed to get out of the area. We all walked outside into what turned out to be ash and metal and God knows what else was in the air. And when I looked up there were people falling out of the windows. Maybe not falling, maybe throwing themselves out the windows. It was something I will never forget. The officer moved us to another building but I just wanted to get out of there. I just wanted to make sure Howard (her husband) was OK so I left and walked across town. I had to walk. There were no cabs, no subway, no cars, nothing. I just kept walking.”

There was nothing I could say to console her. We exchanged endearments and hung up. I sat back down in front of the TV. By that time, another plane had crashed in Pennsylvania. There were reports that this plane was aimed at the Capital or the White House. There were other people in NY I tried to reach to make sure they were OK, but by that time it was impossible to get a call through.

At about 4:30 Jordan came home from school. There was an Arlington County decision that all the kids would be kept in school until it was certain that they would be safe outdoors. People forget the Pentagon is in Arlington. Eight years ago today, we drove over to the Pentagon (there is a road that runs right by where the plane crashed). We pulled over and joined hundreds of other people just staring in disbelief, at the giant hole in this historic building.

There are those events, like the first walk on the moon, the Kennedy and King assassinations, or the election of the first Black President, about which we will remember every detail. And, one about which, I will try never to forget. We’re just sayin’..Iris

We Ain't Got No Civil

You may have heard that the President of the United States addressed a joint session of Congress yesterday. You may also have heard that the Congressman from South Carolina (and it wasn’t Jesse Helms, may he rest in peace as long as he rests no where near me), called him a liar and then apologized by saying "This evening I let my emotions get the best of me. While I disagree with the President's statement, my comments were inappropriate and regrettable. I extend sincere apologies to the President for this lack of civility." The Congressman, Joe Wilson, (not related to the great Senator Charlie Wilson), and whose legal name is, Addison Graves Wilson, Sr.-- lost me right after “the best in me”, because clearly, there is no best in him. In addition, and only because it is so offensive, if I didn’t know better I would say this “good old boy” is more than likely a racist and he didn’t feel like he needed to respect the Black guy, regardless of position.

What has happened to civility and decorum in the Congress. Or for that matter, in the world today. David says we don’t know how to be civil because civics is no longer taught in school. But I disagree. I think it’s because bad behavior has become acceptable, almost everywhere in this country including the forums where our elected officials gather to have bipartisan discourse. And, not surprisingly, just like there is no civility, there is also no bipartisanship anymore. There seems not to be any “let’s make it work for the good of the country.” Nope, there is only, “Let’s defeat anything the President wants to do for the benefit of the Republican party.”

Back to being civil. People no longer speak in hushed tones in a movie or the theater. They put their cell phones on vibrate and if they get a call during a performance, they answer and carry on a conversation – who cares that it may interfere with their neighbors enjoyment of a performance. Parents no longer insist that their children have good manners. The children are entitled to act any way they want, regardless of venue. So kiss an expensive meal in a nice restaurant goodbye if you happen to be sitting next to a six year old – who will not sit at any table for longer than a minute. Drivers don’t yield the right of way. They feel wherever they are, the right of way is theirs. Television shows promote the worst of human nature on hour after hour of reality show. There is a lack of respect for life, or at least consequences, which is why there are magnetometers at elementary schools. Children bring knives and guns and all kinds of weapons to school. And forget giving up a seat to an elderly person on the subway or a bus.

None of this may have anything to do with Joe Wilson’s unacceptable behavior last night, or maybe it did. An elected federal official does not just blurt at a joint session of Congress. They may not stand, or cheer, or agree, and they may snicker or smirk, but they don’t shout out things like “You lie,” in the middle of a Presidential speech. So what am I saying? Addison Graves Wilson Sr. made a calculated decision to disrupt the President’s speech. Addison didn’t want people to listen intently to what the President had to say. The interruption was not emotional, it was intentional. Addison didn’t want the headline to be “Obama Makes Sense”. He wanted people to hear that the President was a liar – at prime time.

There is no question that there was a need for the White House to be clearer and more forthcoming about their plans for “health insurance reform” – which the President finally did last night. And maybe it wasn’t all we wanted it to be, but it was certainly more on target than what has been said in the past. I’d say, a good start and some movement in the right direction. Positive constructive conversation is always preferable to shouting and disruption, unless your motive is just to interrupt or choreograph a scenario where you imply that the President of the United States is so devious that he will not tell the truth. Regardless of venue or audience.

There is no way that Addison’s Mama didn’t insist on civility. And I know that’s a double negative, but there is still no way. And if his Mama had been in the Capital last night she would have smacked him soundly on his Southern Republican bottom. We’re just sayin’…. Iris

Photo Guy In a Middle Seat

I’m sitting in a middle seat in coach, that place in hell which Dante, had he been obliged to regularly shuffle between Florence and New York, would have instantly recognized as a sort of flying version of Limbo (Hell is any seat on a small sailboat in the ocean, out of site of land.) On my left is a member of the band Blue Oyster Cult, heading home from a gig in Amsterdam and whose arm seems not to see the imaginary dividing line between our seats, on my right a winsome lady from Hamburg in the fashion trade. I wasn’t even supposed to be on this plane but for reasons known only to the master computers at Air France, I was “liste d’attente” for the flight home to Newark. That morphed into an actual seat (said 22K) to JFK at about the same time, and though I waited until literally the last two minutes before the door was closed on this 777, nothing on the aisle or in Business opened up. I know the ticket agents were on my side: two extremely helpful and hopeful Air France agents kept monitoring the list of available seats, especially the small group of travelers from Rome who were at risk of missing all the New York bound flights due to a late arrival in Paris. In what ought to be the Senior Thesis of some Management Consultant, I noted for the first time ever (as someone usually boarding earlier than later, I seldom am around at the check in gate this long) that presumptively illogical socio trend that the very last people to board international flights are the coolest and calmest of all. Without missing a beat, each of the last dozen check-ins, with literally 3 to 4 minutes to go, were cool as a cucumber, walking with intent but nothing that would be considered even a brisk step. It was as if each of them (and they were all in Economy!) felt it was their personal airplane, one which would only leave upon their actual placing of tuchas in a seat. The frantic and excited ones were those who had been trying to board early, looking more like escaped convicts trying to go unnoticed in a small town after a well publicized jail break. Looking around every direction, looking at their boarding passes (how much is there you can learn from it?) looking at their cell phones, glancing back at the departure announcements. They are surely the ones, if you were a Freudian master of airline security, who you would think had something to hide.
A street corner in Perpignan
So we actually will make it to New York now, and in light of the ‘compression pants’ I’m wearing (full length black stretchies that look like bikers pants but go to your ankles) I’m even hopeful that my legs won’t puff up like they often do, like cantaloupes, on such long flights. I keep doing those isometric exercises – point and flex and point and flex – but I ll only know once I’m home and can disrobe. Travelling does takes it toll, though no doubt those rampages are less felt in more stretched out locations – Business and First to name two that immediately come to mind. But I guess I’ll live.
Derek Hudson armed with Tri-x: Stand back!!
Callie Shell's show on Obama in the big church
The small but dedicated crowd who came to walk through my "44 Days" show
Annie Boulat and Jerome Delay celebrating 30 years of Cosmos
the opening panel for my 44 Days show
The reason for my trip in the first place was to attend the Visa Pour l’Image in Perpignan, the 21st version of the festival of photojournalism which takes place in this Pyrenees/Mediterranen town every September. It’s really the perfect place for such an event. Aside from one trip to the beach for a seaside buffet lunch on Saturday, I didn’t’set foot in a vehicle for 5 days. While the windy narrow streets take several days to become confidently comfy with, not one of the exhibitions, and there are some 40 of them, is more than a ten minute walk from any other. The venues are uniformly fetching: former convents, centuries old chapels, and assorted other larger spaces which once no doubt housed either wealthy merchants, or a large contingent of their horses. The pictures are usually 16x20 or 20x24, hung very elegantly, and beckon the viewing public to spend time on a slow traipse to see the work. (My expo, taken from my soon to be published book “44 Days: Iran and the Remaking of the World” was in a beautiful little chapel. I felt it a rather ecumenical experience: the Jewish kid from Utah photographs a Shia Islam Revolution, and has a show in a Catholic Chapel in France. Hard to beat that !) The exhibitors are equally divided between the well known (ahem!) and the newly discovered, though virtually all of us are experiencing the same malaise in our business.
the 2am schmoozefest
another red building in Perpignan-they're everywhere
lunch at a farm outside the city (the only time youre in a car!)
a 1am encounter with old friend and colleague Henri Bureau (Sygma) who was one of the greats-now a country farmer
a guestbook entry at the 44 Days show
The shows continue to remind one of the power of photography to tell stories, to emote, inform and sometimes frighten. But the naggingly overriding theme for this year, aside from the work itself, was the ongoing sickness in the publishing industry, and its fallout on those who have for decades traditionally funded their work (and their rent) by payments and assignments from magazines. With the additional market slide of ad revenue in the general interest magazine world, budgets for photography (and writing as well) have plummeted. There are no longer huge sources of money available to spend on photographers chasing their visual dreams (whether they be unspeakable acts in Congo, or pursuing candidates for the White House.) In the end, hundreds of photographers and editors gather in a week long celebration of photojournalism, though this year is was more like the gathering one might attend for a very much loved recently departed uncle who draws the family together at his passing. We don’t yet know for sure that, as some optimists claim “ things are coming back!” anytime soon. I, for one, don’t really see that rebound. Once downsized, a department is loathe to immediately reinflate itself. In parallels to historical moments like the buggy whip makers who thought there would always be buggies (the horseless carriage didn’t need that whip) or railroads (who didn’t understand they were in the transport business, not the railroad business) we, the storytellers find ourselves wondering what will be the next platforms for telling stories. The internet is the obvious answer, and all its possible varieties: Facebook, Kindle, LinkedIN, all of which are making millions for their inventors, yet don’t really answer the question: how will we find ways for viewers, ultimately, to pay for and support the producers of the work? Ay, there’s the rub. My personal choice for Jolting Social Engagement would seem something like the following: (and this is of course based on that curious concept that everything on the web is FREE, except porn and the Wall Street Journal.)

Sometime in September, the colorless and basically ineffective United Nations Secretary General (a Starbucks Iced Coffee if you can name him! Oops, too late) Ban Ki Moon, would announce in a few weeks at the opening of the annual General Assembly meeting that as of the following Tuesday, all news reported on the net by firsthand sources (those who are picked to death by bloggers and aggregators) would begin charging for their product. Not huge amounts, please --- for example the New York Times would charge you ten or twelve bucks a month, something you could easily live with –so that it wouldn’t completely shock the public into abandoning its need for information and reporting. But if everyone did it at the same time (a critical point) we would all have to figure out what was important to us, and end up supporting the beast that way. I don’t really think there is a desire to remain ignorant in society, just a preference (and who hasn’t felt that way at one time or another) for that which is given to you gratis. I am hopeful that at some point in the not too distant future there will be a way for viewers to actually support the people whose work they view and admire. It would make sense, even though we’ll probably never be back to where we were five or ten years ago. The wheel turns, and now its time for that wheel to turn in our direction.
the bus station in Paris/Invalides
a Paris moment, from the airport bus
Every evening there is a projection, a combination of topical themes, and often, additional work which compliments an expo that is already on display. A series of awards are also sprinkled throughout the week. Hundreds gather in a large amphitheater-like space, and four blocks away, a few thousand more in a large café covered square, to watch the proceedings over a glass of rosé. Later on, well into the night in Perpignan, we’d gather in one of several locales where wine and beer flow freely, and discuss not only the annoying bits (you know, getting paid, that sort of thing) but the more elemental aspects of the business. Having been a photographer for 42 years, I have collected a large retinue of pals, some of whom are very outspoken about what they like and what they loathe. And true it is that we all try and find, in our work, some kind of personal look or style which not only adds to the visual power of the pictures, but helps us find an audience which is inclined to adore us. The lines of acceptability are ever thinning: and Friday night, with two English friends, I was subjected to a bashing of the current trend and habit of camera tilt as a way of engaging the viewer. There are a number of photographers now who for one reason or another seem to have lost their gyroscopes – or at the very least, their bubble levels. Every picture looks like it could have been shot from a small dinghy, one which is pitching side to side in a force five gale, and forcing the photographer to shoot pictures without anything resembling a flat horizon line. I know I’m old fashioned but I had to agree with this one. And its not as if now and then, in some kind of visually desperate moment you took a picture, the perspective of which was to plunge towards the subject, but when it becomes the norm, and standard, then we have definitely traded the idea of using the elemental empathetic power of the photograph for something more studied and in the end, not only more stylized but perhaps more suspect. In a world with too many photographers, a personal look or style is something you need to emerge from the pack. I suppose there is room for all kinds of taste, and maybe I’m being harsh. We live in a very different world from the world of the Iran Revolution (shooting film, shipping film out of the country with passengers, never knowing for days whether or not you actually had a picture) to, 30 years later, the post election unrest of this summer (pictures shot with cell phones or point&shoot cameras, popped into laptops, and sent within minutes all over the world via the internet.) That which was the craft of shooting, when you actually had to remember to focus, expose properly, and rewind your film before shipping it – has pretty much gone by the wayside. The advances have let many people into the world of photography who might not have had much of a career in the old days. But the future is not going away, and the immediacy of transmission is a fact of life. (When typing up captions on a digital job where others were present, who doesn’t just copy the information from a Yahoo News picture… same faces, same order, same situation.. its already OUT there.) Going forward I hope there is at least the smallest regard for what it is that professional photographers do; everyone owns a camera these days, and pretty much, everyone is a photographer. And were it only so that “the picture never lies……”
getting connected is never as easy as they say
as always, click on a picture to see full size