Blogging and burnout

The New Neo Posted on by

Richard Fernandez reflects on the announcement by blogger Marc Danziger (former “Armed Liberal,” in recent years at Winds of Change, and friend of mine from some years back) that Danziger is taking a break from blogging.

Fernandez writes:

Once, at the first and only time I ever sat on a panel in New York City, I described the pressure that comes with having a modest readership. “When you’ve got ten visitors a day you can say what you like. When you have ten thousand, you become very careful.” The other rule, which Marc has probably discovered, is that at ten visitors a day you don’t give a hoot whether you write that day or not. When the site gets to a certain level of traffic, that luxury disappears. You have to show up every day because you know ten thousand readers will. The only thing worse than having your own business is having a moderately successful blog.

That made me smile.

I don’t have a readership of ten thousand readers a day, but I have considerably more than ten. This blog could definitely be described as “moderately successful,” and I understand the feeling of not wanting to disappoint my readers, many of whom come here not just to read me but to talk to each other.

A very successful blog, such as Instapundit, is more like a job, and probably a fairly lucrative one at that. Although money is hardly the entire impetus that drives it, and most likely wasn’t at the blog’s inception, it can mightily reinforce the desire to continue.

But a “moderately successful” blog can never be the monetary equivalent of a job, despite the wonderful efforts of readers (thanks again, all who have donated here!) to help out as best they can. So it will always be mostly a labor of love—or perhaps of OCD.

My friend and fellow blogger Dr. Sanity weighed in on Fernandez’s comment thread with this:

I keep taking vacations from blogging, always with the thought that I might never return. After a while I come back because I feel something inside compelling me to write about what’s going on. I suppose as long as I have something to say, I will continue. I will say this: it was liberating to get rid of the sitemeter and not worry about how many people were coming to the blog.

I share Dr. Sanity’s compulsion to write; it’s what drove me to blog in the first place. I had spent spent quite a few years with lots of opinions and few people to listen to them. I realize now I was often composing blog posts (even though I’d never heard of blogs), if only in my head, and wanting to discuss them with a group of people I hadn’t yet met but assumed existed out there. So blogging, for me, has had its own substantial rewards, not the least of which has been talking with all of you, and meeting other simpatico bloggers such as Dr. Sanity herself.

I haven’t yet freed myself of the tyranny of the sitemeter, although I don’t check it all that often and I’m not ruled by it. I still write pretty much what I please, although I don’t do a lot of personal stuff about other people in my life, in order to protect my privacy and theirs.

But it’s still hard to watch that sitemeter climb (for example, in the months before the 2010 election, when traffic in general was up around the blogosphere) and then see it drop afterwards. It would be so very nice if traffic just built and built and built, instead. I know life is full of ups and downs, but a sitemeter is so—well, so graphic about showing them.

For several months now news and traffic has been relatively slow. Yes, there’s the occasional big story such as Bin Laden’s death. But that doesn’t really change the fact that energy in general is low right now for politics, and that I’ve been doing this for over (gulp!) six years.

Don’t worry, I have no plans to follow in Danziger’s footsteps and quit blogging, although I might take a few days’ vacation here and there. No biggee. But I think I understand quite well what drove him to make that decision, and I wish him the best.

Social conservatives and redemption

The New Neo Posted on by

This Time article by Alex Altland about the Daniels candidacy and marital history contains the following curious passage [emphasis mine]:

In his rare comments about the couple’s reconciliation, Daniels has said, “If you like happy endings, you’ll love our story.” Indeed, although it may not mollify social conservatives who expect their presidential candidates to lead impossibly spotless private lives.

Social conservatives—who often, although not always, are deeply religious—are a group about whom much nonsense has been spouted. Whether the spouters believe what they themselves are saying I really don’t know, but the notion that social conservatives expect their candidates “to lead impossibly spotless private lives” is an absurdity.

First of all, it is possible to lead a fairly spotless private life. But secondly and much more importantly and relevantly, that’s not the demand that either fundamentalist and/or evangelical and/or devout Christians (or orthodox Jews, for that matter, who trend towards conservatism compared to their reform or secular fellows) make of their candidates or of their fellow men and women.

Ever hear of the idea of redemption, reform, repentance, forgiveness, and all that? It’s a rather powerful theme in religious thought, to say the least.

What is not admired or accepted is the hypocrisy of holding oneself out as one thing but practicing another. But sinners who return to the fold (Cheri Daniels, perhaps) and those who lovingly accept them back (Mitch Daniels, it appears) usually are accepted, understood, and even admired, as well as celebrated in song:

Each age gets the Tudors it deserves

The New Neo Posted on by

During my recent bout with infirmity, I dusted off some old videotapes of the 1970 BBC series “The Six Wives of Henry VIII” and watched it.

I had fond memories of it from my original viewing over forty years ago, and I was not disappointed. Yes, the production is fairly primitive, looking mostly like a play with cheap sets, although the costumes are pretty good. But the scripts and the acting are excellent (I’ve seen three of the six episodes so far), really quite superb. Subtle and yet clear, highly intelligent, and for the most part historically accurate.

The actors even resemble their historic predecessors—case in point, the real Henry and Keith Michell, who plays him in the series:

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Or the real Archbishop Cranmer and Bernard Hepton, who plays him in the series:

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I appreciate that sort of attention to detail.

Sex is in there of course, and violence, (this is Henry VIII, after all), but it’s suggested rather than shown graphically. Although the episodes are long, they move along rather nicely to their already-known and usually grisly conclusions. Death was a constant companion in those days, sometimes of infants and young women in childbirth, and often of diseases and infections that today would be child’s play, as well as that all-too-frequent cause: execution for treason, often on trumped-up charges. The nobility who were involved in power plays often met violent ends.

Interested in other depictions of the same period, I rented a much more recent depiction of the same period, “The Tudors.” It was a popular Canadian/Irish series that aired in 2007-2010 on Showtime, and I was curious, despite the trepidation I felt on looking at the photos on the cover of the DVD:

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Who was this smoldering (and non-redheaded) rebel without a cause, and all those bosomy torsos behind him (as opposed to the flattening and binding effect of real Tudor fashion)? And take a look at the images generated by a Google search for “The Tudors.” But I gave it a chance anyway; how bad could it be?

Plenty bad, it turns out. I could only take about twenty minutes of watching. Mainly scenes of simulated and unconvincing sex, and a script so chaotic and unclear that most of the time the viewer has no idea who it is he/she is watching doing what. Soft-core porn has its place, I suppose, but that’s not what I signed up for.

But the worst part of all was the character of Henry. Entirely unconvincing in conveying the magnitude of the historical figure—both good and bad—this guy was just an angry punk trying (and, IMHO opinion, failing) to be sexy, despite all the bare-ass flailing.

It strikes me that the difference between the two series is no accident whatsoever. Scripts and productions are tailored to the times, and the times they have a-changed.

Romneycare: it’s not the offense…

The New Neo Posted on by

…it’s the coverup.

The consensus is that Romney cannot possibly have it both ways. Either Romneycare and Obamacare are both a mistake or they are both okay, because the similarities between them are too great.

Romney’s main argument for the Massachusetts plan enacted during his governorship vs. Obamacare is that states are allowed to do many things (including having an individual mandate) that the federal government is forbidden. That actually is a logical point, but it’s one that doesn’t mean a whole lot to too many people, and in any case it avoids the very real problems Massachusetts has with its current health insurance system.

As the Republican governor of a mega-liberal state, Romney was in the position of having to work with a legislature and appeal to a constituency that was highly to the left of him. That surely must have been a factor, but he doesn’t seem to be exploiting that aspect of his history, probably because it would make him sound weak.

No doubt about it, he’s in a pickle, one that wouldn’t be so big a deal had Obamacare not become a major issue for 2012. Romney has the advantage of name recognition and executive experience. But he may be unable to get around the contradiction inherent in his spirited defense of his own record and his equally spirited condemnation of Obamacare.

It’s too bad, because his proposal for fixing Obamacare sounds pretty reasonable to me.

Food poisoning

The New Neo Posted on by

Perhaps I should have known better than to eat at IHOP, a place I hadn’t visited in years.

I ordered an omelet with cheese and spinach. Sounds healthful enough. And it was rather tasty, too. Came with mediocre hash browns of which I only ate the brown crusty part, and a couple of pancakes on which I poured some (fake) maple syrup and ate maybe two/thirds of a single one.

In addition, I had a bite of sausage link. Didn’t much like it, and didn’t have any more. And that was it.

A fairly modest dinner. But a couple of hours later…well, I’ll be merciful and spare you the details, except to say this is my third day of tremors in the GI force field, along with more-than-usual tiredness.

The good news is that I might lose a pound or two. The bad news is that I will most likely gain it right back. In the meantime, my energy level is lower than usual, and talk of food in general doesn’t evoke the same enthusiasm in me that it usually does. It’s pretty much been toast and rice lately.

The body’s normal workings are a wonderful thing that we often take for granted until they go awry. Fortunately, this latest disruption should be very temporary. I’m already feeling a great deal better than I did at first. Any home remedies of yours to share, to hasten along the recovery?

The Mitch Daniels marriage[s]: who cares?

The New Neo Posted on by

I can’t imagine why anyone would think that Mitch Daniels’s unusual marital history would be a problem with the electorate.

The story is that his wife left him and married another man in the 90s, leaving him to raise his four daughters (then ages 8-14) alone, and then returned three years later and they remarried. As Daniels himself told a reporter in 2004:

If you like happy endings, you’ll love our story. Love and the love of children overcame any problems.

I’m not so sure that’s all there is to it—it rarely is the whole story—but that’s certainly the way it reads. The prodigal wife returns to the noble husband, sadder and wiser. It sounds as though the only fault was hers, and she’s not running, and if he forgave her, who are we to hold it against either of them?

I have to say that for the most part first ladies don’t concern me, except for such highly superficial items as their fashion sense and a few random utterances. It’s not that I don’t have opinions, but they just don’t seem of great import to me compared to my opinions about the POTUS himself (and so far, it’s always been a himself rather than a herself). I doubt Mrs. Daniels will be any different, although I’d predict the press will try to rake the couple over the coals if Daniels chooses to run.

Obama the invincible?

The New Neo Posted on by

Obama may not be spiking the football—but ever since the Bin Laden killing, have you noticed how much the left has been doing so? I’ve also observed a general increase in visitors from the left to blogs or periodicals on the right, trumpeting the Bin Laden action and suggesting it has made Obama virtually invincible. The aim is to demoralize the right.

Today comes an AP poll that was probably designed to do just that. It shows Obama’s approval rating shooting up to 60%, with more than half of respondents saying he deserves to be elected.

That’s a substantial bounce. But when Ed Morrisey looked at the fairly well-hidden sampling data, he found that Democrats were way oversampled in the poll. That’s a transparent way to affect a poll’s results.

There is little question that Obama and his supporters are riding the Bin Laden death for all its worth, and we’ll be hearing a lot more about it until November of 2012. And yet anyone who really thinks about it knows that the real victory belongs to the military, the CIA and the Navy SEALS; Obama’s role was to give an order. Everything else was a culmination of many years of work that stretches back to its beginning in the Bush administration response to 9/11.

We can argue about the details: did Obama really give the order or was his hand forced? How much did enhanced interrogation matter? But even with those disagreements, it’s clear that Obama’s role was relatively small. And if the people of the United States are so susceptible to biased media spin and can’t figure that out on their own, then perhaps we do deserve another Obama term.

As far as demoralization on the right goes, I have to admit I’m not too happy myself. But it has nothing to do with Osama Bin Laden’s death and little to do with whatever bounce Obama may have received from it. It’s the sparseness and poor quality of the Republican field that’s got me down.

What’s going on with that? Are there really no decent Republican politicians willing to enter this fray? And if not, why not? Is it because Obama is so invincible (I doubt that)? Is it just chance that most of the best contenders are too new on the national scene to feel confident about winning (hey, it didn’t stop Obama from declaring)? Or is it that most good people will not enter the internecine world of politics these days?

Color me underwhelmed…

The New Neo Posted on by

…by the prospect of a Gingrich candidacy.

[ADDENDUM: And according to Jon Ward at HuffPo, Mitch Daniels also wants to enter the race, but his wife may be reluctant because of their marital history.

What is that history? A lot less controversial than Gingrich’s. The gist of it is this:

In 1993, Cheri Daniels left her husband with their four daughters and married another man in California. She returned a few years later, reconciled with Daniels, and the two were remarried in 1997.

Seems almost quaint to me.]

What’s up with the giant marshmallow?

The New Neo Posted on by

Maybe I’m late to the party, but I only recently noticed the arrival of the giant marshmallow.

They look like regular marshmallows, only bigger. Is bigger necessarily better? I don’t see why; I’d never found anything wrong with the size of marshmallows before. They seemed to be sized just about right for toasting. And at about 20 calories, the old style marshmallow was ideal for popping in the mouth uncooked when just a little sweetness was desired.

The new ones initially looked to me to be about double the size. But when I picked up the package and checked the calories, I saw to my horror that their count was a whopping 90.

Who would want to waste 90 big ones on a marshmallow? They’re just not that tasty. For that sort of total, you could have a cookie, or even three Pepperidge Farm Bordeaux cookies.

Is this guy on the left

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worth three of these guys?

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I think not!

But you can have fun with the giant marshmallow nonetheless, if you don’t mind abusing one:

Where did Sarah Palin go wrong?

The New Neo Posted on by

I’ve written a lot about the media and its vagaries and biases. So I suppose at this point nothing should surprise me.

And yet it does. I must still retain a smidgen of the respect I once held for reporters/journalists and their stated desire to discover and tell the truth.

So that’s why this extraordinarily strange Atlantic article about Sarah Palin by Joshua Green amazed me with its ability to be fair about some things and duplicitous about others in looking at the Palin resume.

Green starts out by asking what went wrong with Sarah Palin. How did she go from being an excellent governor who managed to work with both sides to find solutions for her state to a polarized and despised figure?:

What happened to Sarah Palin? How did someone who so effectively dealt with the two great issues vexing Alaska fall from grace so quickly? Anyone looking back at her record can’t help but wonder: How did a popular, reformist governor beloved by Democrats come to embody right-wing resentment?

In the course of trying to answer this question, Green writes nearly 6,000 words and yet manages to leave out any mention of the role of the press and its smear campaign against Palin in the 2008 presidential election and since.

That’s quite a feat of omission.

Initially Green seems fair and even sympathetic to Palin about her Alaskan record, and then seems utterly puzzled about what could possibly have gone wrong later. This is one of his efforts at an answer:

…[T]he qualities that brought [Palin] original successes””the relentlessness, the impulse to settle scores””weren’t nearly so admirable when deployed against less worthy foes than Murkowski and the oil companies.

Green also acts as though Palin made some huge partisan shift with her convention speech; he wishes she had run instead on her Alaskan record as a reformer who could work with both parties. But she did run on that record; her message was drowned out and lost in the libelous media din. That was purposeful on the part of the MSM, who set out to destroy her and have largely been successful.