Blair's Ashes

Burning Down My Masters' House
Jayson Blair
New Millennium Press

If journalism is a religion, Jayson Blair is surely the Antichrist.

Most journalists have approached Blair’s new memoir, Burning Down My Masters’ House (New Millennium Press), as they might approach a leper whose sins have rendered him beyond redemption. Blair, who plagiarized and fabricated dozens of stories for The New York Times and subsequently upended the world’s most respected newspaper, is undoubtedly the most hated man in journalism.

In advance of the memoir’s release, top Times editors assured staff in a brief memo, “We don’t intend to respond to Jayson or his book.” Elsewhere, visceral contempt for Blair—the sinner and his sins—has clouded most attempts to assess the memoir. And in that sense, Blair’s otherwise-sleazy title rings true. The pain he has inflicted upon journalists is visceral. This heretic has momentarily shattered the house of worship.

For his own part, Blair says he is a “practicing agnostic” and clearly views himself as a throwback to an earlier era of journalism, when reporters seemed to type with one hand and sip brandy with the other, wiping away cigar ash from pages of fresh copy. Blair twice refers to the 1994 classic, The Paper, which is itself a throwback and perhaps the greatest newspaper film ever made. And as he recalls his reporting for the Times metro desk, Blair often assumes an annoyingly theatrical tone to mimic the gritty feel of The Paper. “I soon found myself deep in the woods,” he writes, “cutting a path through American and English elms as I walked toward the area where I saw the most police activity.” The memoir even dares to end where it begins, a rhetorical device which ultimately feels like a shameless ploy for movie licensing rights.

Any celebrity memoir, of course, is liable to allegations of self-promotion, but Blair’s story permits him one legitimate justification for publishing this nearly 300-page treatise: an apology. Blair does apologize, but he couches the mea culpa in so many excuses that he hardly seems repentant. Among his many rationalizations, Blair blames a hostile environment at the Times and an escalating addiction to cocaine. But readers would have more sympathy for Blair’s latter excuse, at least, if he didn’t seem to take pride in his vices. Responding to an editor who asked, “Was Jayson drunk when he wrote that?” Blair writes, “In fact, I was drunk and high.”

And so begins Blair’s descent into unending deceit, occurring simultaneously with his own mental breakdown—or so he tells us—and eventual suicide attempt, which Blair recounts in the book’s most powerful moment. “I looked up at the strong metal hinge in the bathroom and saw nothing but relief,” he writes. “I wrapped the leather around my neck. It felt cold and slightly sticky, but I did not jerk from it. I felt out of my body.” Given the strident title of Blair’s memoir, it’s hard not to view this scene as a potent self-lynching. Indeed, while the veracity of Blair’s account is necessarily dubious, he is still a talented writer: his memoir often succeeds even as fiction.

But while Blair purports to set his narrative in the larger framework of the black experience, as a work of African-American studies, his memoir is largely vapid. Most incredulously, he refers incorrectly to Ralph Ellison’s Invisible Man three times, adding an article to the title and therefore inadvertently—and inexcusably—alluding to H.G. Wells’ The Invisible Man.

When Blair proposes parallels between him and accused D.C.-sniper John Lee Malvo, whose shooting spree he covered—fraudulently—for the Times, Blair’s thesis is intriguing, but his analysis is weak. The only link Blair can muster is their shared slave ancestry, the potential starting point for an argument which requires far more space to unfurl than he allows. And, in a particularly ineffective passage, Blair goes after Gerald Boyd, the black managing editor who was forced to resign, along with Managing Editor Howell Raines, in the wake of Blair’s fabrications. 

Instead of launching vague assaults against editors at the Times, Blair could have quite legitimately dealt with the widely-recognized dearth of black reporters in American newsrooms, including the Times. Of the Old Grey Lady’s 25 political reporters, only one, Lynette Clemetson, is black, and she joined the team this January. And while the Times purports to maintain a finger on the pulse of New York, Brent Staples is the sole black person on its 15-member editorial board. These sorts of numbers would have bolstered Blair’s claims. Instead, he resorts to generalities upon which Ralph Ellison—or, hell, even H.G. Wells—would surely frown.

Blair’s more substantial allegations of misdeeds at the Times—including a serious charge of widespread dateline fraud—are not likely to raise the right eyebrows, given the source. But Blair’s memoir, though doomed from the start, is a surfeit of fascinating concepts and compelling narrative which displays the talent that once served him so well at the Times. Too bad, then, that the author is unemployed—and unbelievable.

[This review originally appeared Friday, March 12, 2004 in The Arts section of The Harvard Crimson.]

Media Anarchy

Sunday's Democratic presidential debate was absolutely atrocious, and the blame lies with moderators Dan Rather of CBS News, Elisabeth Bumiller of The New York Times, and Andrew Kirtzman of WCBS-TV. Robin Toner, writing the Times' in-house, postmodern coverage, called it "the most contentious Democratic debate in months," but the bulk of contention was clearly manufactured by the three questioners, whose reckless interrogation did little to help voters "make an informed decision," as Rather said they were attempting to do.

Bumiller, the Times White House correspondent, proved the most egregious offender. She effectively represented the recently-launched Bush campaign's phantom presence, inappropriately defending the president at various points in the debate. And her rude treatment of the candidates, most notably Al Sharpton, sparked much of the contention over the hour. Worst of all, while she tried repeatedly, Bumiller failed to maintain control over the proceedings. The candidates surely felt Bumiller's bullying justified their own unruliness.

Once Rather said at the outset, "There are no set rules," all bets were off. CBS and the Times chose a free-wielding format and could therefore only expect a free-wielding debate. In essence, the Times wrote the Monday political coverage for all of its competitors. The Washington Post called it "agressive," "snappish," and "sometimes chaotic." The Associated Press said John Edwards "shed his nice-guy approach." But it was Bumiller and her two colleagues who really shed their nice-guy approaches and came out aggressive and snappish to form a sometimes chaotic debate. Their "moderation" created the storyline of the debate.

The chief ailment in Bumiller's comportment Sunday appeared to be a question of medium. As a newspaper reporter, Bumiller is accustomed to private, off-camera interviews in which she controls the flow. But television is a quite different scene, one where the subject must star and the questioner must take a back seat. That by no means precludes tough questions in a televised debate, but Bumiller gets us nowhere by airing her own frustration with the candidates' answers and egaging in protracted arguments with them on live television. Bumiller even fought with her fellow moderators for airtime.

Bumiller's "contentious" style must have stemmed chiefly from her own reporting for the Times, where she has been a sometimes excellent but often too-friendly reporter in the White House press corps. Her most ridiculous line of questioning Sunday came when she turned the age-old "Are you a Communist?" query into "Are you a liberal?" Bumiller asked, "How can you hope to win with this kind of characterization in this climate?" You mean, this media climate?

Bumiller often felt like a Bush surrogate in Sunday's debate, turning each of the candidates against the president rather than each other. That's a dubious strategy unless Bumiller is convinced John Kerry has the locked up the nomination.

But, indeed, press presumptions played a strong role in the debate, with Sharpton and Dennis Kucinich effectively sidelined but for their own objections. After a discussion of Haiti which completely neglected the only man in the room who had spoken with President Jean-Bertrand Aristide, Sharpton stepped in with an astute observation:

What you're trying to do is trying to decide for the voters how we go forward. The voters need to hear this morning from four candidates—or say the media is now going to select the candidates.

The Times has repeatedly editorialized against including candidates like Sharpton and Kucinich in the presidential debates, and editorial editor Gail Collins recently weighed in with her own scathing rebuke of unsuccessful—or "marginal"—candidates. In a presumptuous dismissal of Sharpton, Collins wrote:

What we have here, then, is a candidate who is not serious, who cannot afford to be serious, but whose career depends on frightening people who know he's not serious into pretending they think he is.

Taking their cue from the Times editorial board, the three moderators cut out Sharpton and Kucinich, a decision which served in part to turn the debate into a raucus affair, with the trailing candidates clamoring for a voice. And while the devolution of the debate extended far beyond the issue of allowing Sharpton and Kucinich to speak, the decision to limit their time underscored the moderators' failure. You have to read the entire transcript or a watch a recording of the debate to get a true feel for the failure, but consider this particularly revealing excerpt:

BUMILLER: Senator Kerry—

KERRY: No, I insist on being able to finish.

BUMILLER: I want to ask a really important question here—

KERRY: This is important.

BUMILLER: We're all arguing—

SHARPTON: Wait a minute, if we're going to have a discussion just between two, in your arrogance you can try that. But that's one of the reasons we're running. We're going to have delegates so that you can't just limit the discussion. And I think that your attempts to do this is blatant and I'm going to call you out on it because I'm not going to sit here and be—

BUMILLER: Well I'm not going to be addressed like this.

SHARPTON: Well then let all of us speak. You said that I could state next. What I wanted to say on this issue—

KERRY: Al, I wasn't finished.

SHARPTON: I'm going to let him finish. But I want to be, I want us to be able to respond. Or then tell us you want a two-way debate.

RATHER: Here's the way we're playing this. Certainly want to hear. I think you will agree the voters have spoken.

SHARPTON: No, the voters have not spoken. We've only had— He's won one primary. He's come in fourth seven times—

BUMILLER: How many delegates—

SHARPTON: What you're trying to do is decide for the voters how we go forward. The voters need to hear this morning from four candidates. Or say the media now is going to select candidates.

RATHER: Reverend, we've heard from you and we're going to hear from you. I don't understand what the argument is.

SHARPTON: I had to fight to speak on Haiti. I had to fight to speak on trade. You've got a guy with one primary that you're pretending he's Gary Hart. Gary Hart won more primaries than Mondale. Let's have an open debate in going to Super Tuesday. Or say that you guys want to decide the nominee.

RATHER: Reverend, debate them, not me.

If Rather doesn't want the candidates to debate the media, then a debate is exactly what he's going to get.

[The above transcription of the debate is based on the Times' transcription with my own corrections for accuracy and style.]

Blair's Witch Project

The New York Times' postmodern scribe, Jacques Steinberg, reported excerpts from Jayson Blair's forthcoming memoir Friday. (Thanks for bloggonit for the heads up.) Now, will the Times Book Review step up to the plate? The New York Daily News, erroneously claiming an exclusive, also revealed portions of the book Friday. Editor & Publisher compares the two accounts, but here's my favorite passage from Blair's Burning Down My Masters' House, referring to Zuza Glowaka, his girlfriend:

Zuza took pictures of me prancing around the newsroom wearing a Persian head wrap that covered my face, Kermit the Frog on my shoulders and a giant fake fur coat. I did a full tour de newsroom in this peculiar uniform. It is hard to know what I was feeling, other than it was exhilarating to shock everyone. Perhaps I was crying out for attention.

Perhaps.

Update: The Times Book Review will, indeed, take measure of Blair's memoir in the March 14 edition, Editor & Publisher reports. On television, Katie Couric will do the honors with a Dateline NBC interview taped in January. [6:19 PM]

The Passion of the Readers

As a student of film criticism who recently saw The Passion of the Christ and a journalist who has received my fair share of hate mail of late, I was interested to read Jami Bernard's response to her detractors in the Daily News. Bernard panned The Passion in a gutsy review which was sure to draw the ire of some fanatics. But the extent of vituperative crap she received is disturbing, if not surprising. As Bernard recounts:

A few of them referred to my weight, because I've been chronicling my effort to shed pounds in another section of the newspaper. "Eat a donut!" read the printable part of one missive.

Other critics who reviewed "The Passion" received similar hate mail, although Gene Seymour of Newsday told me he has yet to be called a "ho."

I was recently called "dirty, sleazy and disgusting" by one reader and accused of "lowering journalistic standards" by another. Still another called my writing "worthy of the paper my hamster shits on." All of these insults came over e-mail in response to the Kerry article. Michael Wolff dealt with this phenomenon in New York magazine in January 2002:

The themes of the e-mails are surprisingly consistent. Anything liberal is bad—"you are a LIBERAL fuck!" is a sufficient accusation. People in the media ("quasi-intellectual, elitist snobs"), or what's thought of as the liberal media, are bad—"Little pee-ons like YOU are who make ME sick!!!!!!!" says one correspondent, adding "FU clymer," which I assume refers to the Times political reporter Adam Clymer (another e-mail adds, "please give dad clymer my best regards"; another says, J'accuse-like, "You are Maureen Dowd!"). Bill ("President Buttface, to many of us") and Hillary Clinton are bad; indeed, the presidency of Bill Clinton ("the perverted/treasonist that preceded President Bush") is one of the most grievous political calamities of the twentieth century.

But I suppose angry e-mails beat spam or yet another virus attachment.

Blair's Witch Project

Jayson Blair's memoir will hit bookstores March 6, whereupon Jay Leno will deliver the requesite joke about Blair's new novel, a handful of columnists will vent in 750 words or less, and the whole matter will be forgotten by April Fool's Day. But will The New York Times Book Review acknowledge their former colleague's work? Book Review editor Charles McGrath mulls the question for Editor & Publisher:

You are damned if you do and damned if you don't. If you don't review it, it looks like the Times is dodging criticism of itself and if you do review it, it looks like you are giving attention to something that looks like it doesn't deserve it.

For a publication which reviewed the memoir of Montgomery police chief Charles A. Moose, the standard of deserving attention seems fairly low. And regardless of precedent, the Blair tell-all—even if it tells far from all—is an important work. All the evidence one needs is contained within Monday's memo to Times employees (via L.A. Observed) from executive editor Bill Keller and managing editors Jill Abramson and John M. Geddes, which claims, "We don't intend to respond to Jayson or his book," but then does exactly that:

But after reviewing an advance copy we did want to convey something to the staff. Some of you may find the smears hurtful, even if they are utterly lacking in credibility. It pains us that, after all we have done together to put this newspaper right, any of you should be subjected to this.

My appetite is certainly wet. And note as well the memoir's title, Burning Down My Masters' House, which Maureen Dowd has already dismissed as "the most risibly tacky title in publishing history." With Times folk running scared left and right, how could the Book Review not review it?

Even from the standpoint of media studies, Blair's memoir is a significant work, both as an historical document and a current appraisal of American journalism. The Blair "debacle," as it is best known, raises some of today's most pressing media issues, including the "risibly tacky" topic raised in Blair's title. No, the rise and fall of Jayson Blair is not a case study in affirmative action, as so many chroniclers of the affair seem compelled to suggest. But the disgraced journalist is a significant reminder of the peculiar aversion to journalism felt by so many talented African Americans.

Blair appears to suggest Black journalists are fighting a losing battle in American newsrooms. That's a reasonable assertion. Some figures:

♦ Of the Times' top 25 political reporters, 23 are White. The only Black reporter, Lynette Clemetson, joined the political team in January and has written just four articles over the past two months. (Moreover, the top five Times political reporters are White males.)

♦ At The Washington Post, the political team has been described by Washingtonian as "an archaic male bastion." And yes, that would be an all-White, archaic male bastion.

♦ The Times editorial board, which purports to maintain a finger on the pulse of its city, boasts just one African American on its team of 15 writers. (Thanks to Eric Benson for this observation.)

African Americans tend to want nothing to do with journalism, and inspecting this trend ought be a top priority. Too bad, then, that the only journalist raising the issue at the moment is unemployed—and unbelievable.

Update: Chris Callahan, associate dean of University of Maryland's journalism college, is giving Blair the silent treatment, according the student newspaper, the Diamondback:

I received an e-mail on Friday that said it was from him, but I didn't open it. I saw the name, and I deleted it.

That sort of petty moralizing doesn't help anyone. And for a journalism professor, isn't deleting one's e-mail before reading it a grave journalistic faux pas? [9:48 AM]

Black Friday

Dana Milbank in The Washington Post reports:

The White House is moving swiftly to establish the administration's place in history as the Friday Night Presidency.

Last Friday afternoon, President Bush announced that he was circumventing the Senate confirmation process and appointing controversial judicial nominee William H. Pryor Jr. to the federal bench. It was the second such recess appointment to be made late on a Friday, following last month's appointment of Charles W. Pickering Sr. [...]

Indeed, Friday has become a Bush favorite both for dropping bad news and for making announcements that appeal to the president's conservative base, not necessarily the general public.

This could turn into a fun game. What will the White House unveil this Friday afternoon?

Errata

The Wall Street Journal ran this monstrous correction Friday:

CHAPMAN CAPITAL LLC didn't state in a 13D filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission that it had earned $1.4 million from trading in Footstar stock. The $1.4 million estimate in a Jan. 28 Money & Investing article actually was taken from an article on TheStreet.com and should have been attributed properly. Chapman Capital hasn't specified the correct number. The offices of Robert Chapman, head of the firm, aren't decorated with sharks teeth and he doesn't liken himself to the fictional characters Darth Vader and the Terminator, as incorrectly stated in the Jan. 28 article. The article incorrectly attributed certain comments to a representative of the firm who had been identified as Robert Lewis; after publication, Mr. Chapman said he had made those comments himself.

How does that happen? Has Jayson Blair been writing more than memoirs?

so you try to explain how, you see,
the ocean & the sky are in fact both colorless
but gasses in the air render the sky a faux blue
and the ocean reflects the ruse

Politics of the Absurd

Sometimes John Kerry has a hard time sticking to his talking points. Unlike his Skull and Bones compatriot in the White House, who has mastered the art of wash, rinse, and repeat, Kerry tends to go on forever in his public remarks like some elite, New England liberal. It's almost as if the man has something important to say. But, really, who has the time? Certainly not CBS News. The Boston Globe reports:

"Just a couple of days ago, the administration promised America several million jobs over the course of the next months, and I immediately said that those predictions would fall short based on the promises they made with respect to the tax cut, which was supposed to give a million jobs -- it lost a million -- and the next tax cut was supposed to produce a million jobs, and it lost a million," Kerry told reporters, going on to cite more statistics and insist that his plan is better than Bush's.

Kerry's remarks lasted three minutes, yet it left TV reporters without a soundbite until one CBS News producer asked the Massachusetts senator to try again.

"They don't know what they're talking about in their own economic policy," Kerry said of the Bush team. "Today it's one thing, tomorrow it's the next."

And with one polite request, CBS News turned a nüanced critique of White House fiscal policy into just another generic Bush barb. This will likely emerge as a perpetual problem with press coverage of the Kerry campaign, which has begun to unveil its general election strategy against the president.

The senator's positions on a number of key issues are particularly nüanced. He approved the war, just not this war. He voted for No Child Left Behind, but expected funding for the initiative. He voted for NAFTA, not outsourcing. But the frenetic press will only permit Kerry half of a position. And if the quote doesn't rhyme or at least employ crafty parallel structure, it won't make the front page. No wonder Kerry has boiled down his campaign to one crotch-grabbing taunt, "Bring it on."

The net effect of impatient media coverage is a peculiar void. Consider the socioligist Doc Searls, who writes, "There is no demand for messages." As he explains:

Let me see a show of hands: who here wants a message? Right: none. And who wants to shield themselves from messages they don't want? Exactly: everybody.

Searls' immediate reference is to television advertising, pro-messages with negative demand, but the statement also applies to political journalism, anti-messages with zero demand. That is, the Kerry campaign is forced to transmit one focused message on par with cavemen vernacular: No Bush. The Bush campaign is required to do the same: No Kerry. And so the media reports two anti-messages for which the voting public has no demand. Anyone, of course, could guess that each candidate is opposed to his opponent.

But here's the greatest absurdity of the whole situation: While kudos are in order for Patrick Healy at the Globe for noting the CBS News prompt, shouldn't he have given a heads up to his colleague Wayne Washington, also at the Globe, whose article of the same day quoted the fabricated Kerry soundbite? Hook, line, and sinker.

Press Corps Bites Man

The oft-mocked, oft-dormant White House press corps is getting feisty. John Marshall has been following recent exchanges between the press corps and press secretary Scott McClellan, and it's pretty intense. Of course, that's just good journalism, but you rarely see much of that in D.C. Here's some of the back-and-forth from Feb. 13 over allegations the president was forced to perform punitive community service while in the National Guard. The multiple questions are from different reporters:

Scott McClellan: Helen, if you'll let me finish, I want to back up and talk about this—

Q: Don't dance around, just give us—

Q: It's a straightforward question.

Q: Let's not put too fine a point on it. If I'm not mistaken, you're implying that he had to do community service for criminal action, as a punishment for some crime?

Q: There are rumors around, and I didn't put it in that way. I just—

Q: Could you take that question?

And here's an exhange from Wednesday over the prediction of 2.6 million new jobs:

Scott McClellan: It's an annual report, David. It goes through the usual—it goes through the usual—

Q: That's not the question. Was it or was it not vetted by the entire economic team?

McClellan: It's an annual report. It goes through the usual—

Q: So you don't know, or it was, or it wasn't?

McClellan: Can I get—can I finish that sentence?

Q: When you answer the question. Let's hear it. What's the answer?

McClellan: The answer was, it is an annual economic report and it goes through the normal vetting process. And if you would let me get to that, I would answer your question.

Q: —the full economic team vetted the prediction—

McClellan: It's an annual economic report. It's the President's Economic Report. But again, the President—

Q: Just say yes or no—

McClellan: —it goes through the normal—it goes through the normal vetting process.

Q: So the answer is, yes. I'm not done yet, I've got another one.

And then the press gaggle yesterday on the same subject:

Scott McClellan: John, I'm giving you the facts. It is what it is.

Q: And the meaning of the word "is" is?

Next week, Scott McClellan announces, You can't handle the truth!

Good for the White House press corps. The National Guard bit has really inspired them. But there's a risk here. An adversarial media is prone to those same old illegitimate, yet effective, claims of liberal bias. The Bush campaign could easily deflect some of its attacks towards the American media and depict the press as a conniving advocate for Kerry. Certainly, we've heard some of this already from Bush in reference to coverage of the war in Iraq:

There's a sense that people in America aren't getting the truth. I'm mindful of the filter through which some news travels, and sometimes you just have to go over the heads of the filter and speak directly to the people.

Now, of course, this is just the nature of the business. The media must be agressive, far more agressive than they currently are, and I'm not suggesting journalists alter their coverage to avoid attacks from the White House. But when those inevitable attacks are leveled, a sympathetic American electorate could buy the liberal media argument and defend their beseiged president at the polls. What a sorrowful thought, but I think it's a realistic concern.

The Following Section is On the Record

The silly Drudge-fueled rumor of Kerry's alleged infidelity appears to have devolved into a non-story, but I was struck by a tangential report in Drudge's "world exclusive":

In an off-the-record conversation with a dozen reporters earlier this week, General Wesley Clark plainly stated: "Kerry will implode over an intern issue." [Three reporters in attendance confirm Clark made the startling comments.]

Ryan Lizza at The New Republic says she heard differently:

Since it was off the record (sort of), I can't get into what Clark actually said (let's just say it was not his finest moment on the campaign trail), but I can report that the quote Drudge attributes to him—"Kerry will implode over an intern issue"—is not accurate. He never said that.

Fine, Clark may or may not have said what the media can't say he said, but it's still ridiculous. As a rule, I think there are at least two types of people who should never be allowed to go off the record with the press: the sitting president of the United States and candidates for elected office. A new Washington Post memo on anonymous sourcing doesn't go there, but I still think the press shouldn't protect candidates or the nation's highest leader.

Since We Last Spoke

So it's been quite some time since I last updated. A lot of stuff has been keeping me busy, but I think I'll be able to update weekly and sporadically (as the site's header now reflects). Since we last spoke, I've written a bit for The Crimson. The target of the MyDoom e-mail virus spoke at the Law School; the Massachusetts Supreme Court affirmed its support of gay marriage; a donor criticized the Harvard Management Company; John Kerry said something radical in 1970 (Howard Kurtz makes mention again today); Wesley Clark withdrew from the race while the Kerry campaign responded; Jesse Jackson spoke at the Kennedy School.

And my classes for the second semester:

Introduction to Afro-American Studies
Professors Michael Dawson and Evelynn Hammonds

Slavery in Western Political Thought
Professor Richard Tuck

American Film Criticism
Elvis Mitchell

Individual, Community and Nation in Vietnam
Professor Hue-Tam Ho Tai

Off to the Brattle. Bohemian. Solid.

Just finished watching the residents of Dixville Notch, New Hampshire vote in their traditional first-in-the-nation primary. Wesley Clark was the proud victor with eight votes. Watching the hooplah from home, I wish I were still there. My twenty-four hour stint in the Granite State was tremendous. Two Monday Crimson articles came of my efforts, one dispatch surveying the whole primary scene and the other focusing on student canvassers for John Edwards. (I suppose I should subject myself to same critical commentary to which I have subjected the major political journalists, but I guess that's really a job for someone else. Comments? I've already heard objections to my use of polling.) In any event, what follows is a diary from the campaign trail, written from my notes at the end of my 700-mile journey.

6:58 a.m.—Route 3, Entering New Hampshire
One would venture to describe the entire state of New Hampshire as bucolic if the description wouldn't so assuredly offend the residents here. Vermont is bucolic. New Hampshire is . . . independent. Indeed, while this state is home to more Republicans than Democrats, independents outnumber them both.

And while the political world focuses so much attention here in the week leading up to the primary, this is not a particularly political state. The staffers and volunteers who have occupied abandoned storefronts in New Hampshire's major cities appear to have landed here rather than arrived. Even the ubiquitous signage—the lawn signs, the banners, the buttons—bears a real temporary quality to it. And, you know, the signage isn't even that ubiquitous. On the tertiary roads here, a spattering of houses will declare their allegiance to Joe Lieberman or John Kerry or whomever, but most do not participate. The television cameras shoot images of Elm Street in Manchester, where campaign headquarters butt up against one another. (CNN has a particularly good vantage point from its offices across the river.) But Elm Street—and Main Street in Nashua—are anomalies.

To the vast majority of residents here, the biggest news story of the past twelve months was the collapse of the Old Man in the Mountain, not this primary. And while Clark advocates a "new American patriotism," most people are more focused on the New England Patriots. (One Edwards volunteer in Nashua, though, told me the New Hampshire primary season is "the Super Bowl of politics.") But on Route 3, the main thoroughfare between Nashua, Manchester, and Concord, I'm listening to Underworld's "Born Slippy" off the Trainspotting soundtrack and shuttling towards my assignment—to cover this whole phenomenon. The sun is up now (it wasn't when I left my aunt's house in Sterling, Massachusetts), and the temperature is rising to the low single digits.

7:19 a.m.—Fire and Police Station, Auburn, New Hampshire
As I pull up to the newly-renovated fire and police station here, I'm wondering what it takes to get a New Hampshire resident up and out of the house at seven in the morning on a Saturday. (The Kerry rally I planned to attend after Clark was pushed from 8:30 to 9:00, and I figured they were hoping to attract a larger crowd with a later start time. Turns out Kerry is the Clinton of this primary race, always arriving late to his engagements, so his staffers were probably just giving the senator some cushion time in moving the event back thirty minutes.) At this early hour, you have primarily the hardcore supporters. An Oldsmobile which parked right in front of me bore the New Hampshire vanity license plates, "WES WING." The driver, a veteran, told me Clark is "a good man, an honest man, a military man." And, as I found, that's about all anyone can say about the candidate.

Other people were surely there for the food, although the pancaked left something to be desired in the middle. This was no fine-dining experience. Half-gallon jugs of Aunt Jemima's, styrofoam cups, orange juice, coffee, non-dairy creamer. The focus of this sort of event is not the on-site entertainment, but the image for those viewers at home who stayed out of the cold on their Saturday morning. For them, Clark campaign volunteers brought "homemade" signs to be distributed among the attendees. "See these cameras?" one volunteer said to another. "We got to get these signs in front of them." When Clark's wife, Gert, began introducing her husband, a camerman yelled out and interrupted her so that she could be positioned more visibly for the folks at home.

As for the print journalists, I noticed Adam Nagourney standing in the back and wondered why he had made the trip to Auburn for a run-of-the-mill Clark event. Turns out he was writing a lead story on independent voters for Sunday's New York Times, but his Clark quote came straight from the former general's stump speech, so it's still not entirely clear to me why he was there. Other print journalists—and even more so this guy from NPR who I didn't recognize—have a nasty habit of interviewing "regular people" at these kind of campaign events. The ley quotes add color to their stories, I suppose, but they are of little service to readers. (One acknowledgement of the futility of this practice by reporters who engage in it is their tendency to shove such quotes at the end of their story, where journalists love to leave interesting or funny—but ultimately useless—nuggets.)

And I got this sense over the course of the day that some people at these rallies hang around a little longer after the candidate is finished, hoping they will be interviewed by a reporter in search of "the pulse of the street" or whatever. One man wearing an Edwards sticker at this breakfast was mobbed by three members of the press before Clark arrived. I must admit to interviewing and quoting a former Howard Dean supporter at the Kerry rally of later that morning. My defense: he was a Harvard graduate who recalled his college days campaigning for McCarthy in 1968, which made for a terrific—if unfair—parallel to Dean. (My dad, however, has already objected to my description in The Crimson of McCarthy's campaign as "doomed." That's a fair point, considering his arguable effect on the national sentiment towards the war, and I would say that certainly applies to Dean's seemingly "doomed" campaign this year. More than a few liberal pundits have given due credit to Dean for inspiring his opponents to fiercely challenge President Bush on the trail.)

When Clark arrived at the large firehouse garage here, the place was packed shoulder-to-shoulder. The fire marshal told me he was worried the event was in violation of his own capacity regulations. They had already moved out the town's only fire truck to accomodate all the people. I wondered what they would do if a fire broke out in town. The fire marshal assured me they were prepared. I breathed a sigh of relief for the residents of Auburn, although it appeared as though they were all here.

Clark, for his part, was either well-off his game or he doesn't have much of a game at all. His pancake-flipping skills were nonexistent. Truly poor skills. I know Clark says he's not a politician, but you have to know how to flip a fucking pancake. That's just a prerequisite for the campaign trail. So, in my view, the former general (although his staffers refer to him as "the general") began the event with a disappointing performance. Clark's stump speech was equally disappointing. He has an effective bit about family values, which he uses to turn on Republican failures on healthcare, education, and the like, but the speech is noticably lacking substance. This is true, for the most part, of all the Democrats and the incumbent president, but Clark's words ring particularly hollow.

I should have expected as much from a candidate whose events are adorned with signs which simply say, "Patriot." This is the Clark platform: a "new American patriotism" and a "higher standard of leadership." When I heard the same stump speech again at a fundraising dinner that night, I was viscerally perturbed. The man's campaign is exceptionally thin. No wonder Clark's only response to a questioner at the breakfast who asked him the difference between him and Kerry was that same bullshit about Kerry only having been a lieutenant.

Clark's chief speech writer, Josh Gottheimer, explained to me over the phone that his candidate's stump speech is based on Clark's most recent tour of the South. Hopefully, the other Democrats will not stoop so low in South Carolina. In New Hampshire, at least, the crowd appeared to only be partially buying the whole routine. And this was a group mostly of supporters. They seemed listless at times and certainly weren't into the whole cheering deal, which Clark's young volunteers tried to inspire on a few occasions. A husband and wife wearing matching yellow fleece jackets stood stonefaced throughout the entire speech.

10:16 a.m.—New Hampshire Technical College, Concord, New Hampshire
I don't spot any stone faces at the Kerry rally here, to which I arrive as the senator is just finishing his question-and-answer session. His supporters have less reason for gloom, certainly, and his advance team has done a superb job arranging the event. Compared to the Clark breakfast from which I have just left, the atmosphere is, in many ways, sunnier. Having missed his stump speech, I can't say how Kerry looked as he began, but he appeared comfortable answering questions and moved through the crowd well afterwards. 

The people I overheard and to whom I spoke were confident in Kerry's electability. Why? I understand the Newsweek poll has him defeating Bush in a hypothetical election, but Kerry seems like an otherwise poor choice for the Democratic nomination if one is considering electability. Out of touch? Northeasterner? French-looking? And what worries me most is the lack of any attack materials on Kerry via Matt Drudge, the favorite outlet for Bush-Cheney '04.

As Kerry starts drifting towards a back door through which it appears he will leave, I dart around the outside of the building to catch him as he leaves. While I'm hustling over there, I consider what I might ask the senator if I have the opportunity. On one hand, I'm there to cover the primary, and I should ask a substantial question, but what? What does one ask with one such question? And on the other hand, I'm there to cover the primary for The Crimson, and I should ask a Harvard-related question, not particularly relevant to national politics but interesting to readers. Doing so, however, just reinforces the perception of collegiate journalism as not particularly serious, or less serious than professional journalism.

"Mr. Senator, Zach Seward, Harvard Crimson. What would you say to Harvard students considering a vote for a Yale graduate like yourself?"

"We should focus on what unites us," Kerry said, chuckling. Solid answer. Troubling question.

As he leaves, Kerry hops onto the ABC News bus for an interview. The ABC bus pulls out of the parking lot and onto the highway, while the Kerry campaign bus follows in tow. This is a moderately disturbing scene, the candidate darting away under the wings of the major media.

11:51 a.m.—Dean Campaign Headquarters, Manchester, New Hampshire
Immediately upon entering the central Dean headquarters here, my criticisms of Dean's apparent derth of Black support are put to shame. The place is packed with African-Americans, all of them officials of the Service Employees International Union, which has endorsed the former governor. No one, mind you, is wearing a nose ring—as the stereotype goes—or looking particularly Internet-savvy. Indeed, I was often struck by the disconnect between the public perception of the Dean campaign as exceedingly modern and young and the reality of the Dean campaign as dependent on traditional techniques and older voters for success.

12:17 p.m.—Elm Street, Manchester, New Hampshire
I'm looking for Clark campaign headquarters. They've given me directions over the phone. Some street off Elm. And then another left, I think. Why isn't the Clark campaign on Elm Street like everyone else? Dennis Kucinich, Lieberman, Dean, and the former offices of Dick Gephardt are all within three blocks of each other on Elm. But the Clark campaign, is aloof, as always. Somewhere else. Somewhere I can't find. Fuck this. I'm going to Nashua.

12:42 p.m.—Edwards Campaign Headquarters, Nashua, New Hampshire
Edwards intrigues me. If you want to talk about electability, this is your man. And no one does a better job than Edwards in outlining the reality of Bush's "two Americas." Very engaging speaker. And his supporters can't stop raving about the guy. Here in Nashua, I'm following some Harvard students who have come to help out the Edwards campaign. Really, I want to answer the question of what could inspire someone to endure this brutal cold for any candidate. But the Edwards people seem particularly inspired.

The Clinton references are pervasive. Bill Barry, Edwards' Nashua chairman, reminds everyone how Clinton came through Nashua to great success on his way to securing the nomination. This is another way of saying Edwards isn't going to win New Hampshire, but it doesn't matter. Still, they want a good showing here on their way down South, and a calendar on the wall predicts boldly in the box for January 27, "JRE wins NH primary!" At lunch, Barry tries to inspire the troops of volunteers:

This is a war of ideas. And you are on the front lines right now. And in this battle, there is only victory or death.

This is said with a bit of irony, and some people laugh nervously when they see me transcribing Barry's speech. After lunch, the volunteers are high in spirits but not exactly acting like fierce warriors "on the front lines." (Look to my Crimson color story for more details on the Edwards volunteers.)

Before leaving Nashua, I stop at a pizzeria across the street for a slice and some time to type up some copy on my laptop and make a few calls. The chef is a Republican, and he "can't fucking stand" the Lyndon Larouche van which keeps rolling down Main Street blaring his propaganda. Otherwise, he doesn't much mind all the political hubbub. "I'm voting for Bush anyway," he says.

4:24 p.m.—Kerry Campaign Headquarters, Manchester, New Hampshire
"The students? Oh, they went to the field office. . ."

4:36 p.m.—Kerry Field Office, Manchester, New Hampshire
"No, they're at the volunteer office. . ."

4:47 p.m.—Kerry Volunteer Office, Manchester, New Hampshire
"Students? What students? From where did you say?"

6:10 p.m.—Sheraton Tara, Nashua, New Hampshire
The press is relegated to three viewing rooms via closed-circuit for television for the evening's fundraising dinner, where six of the seven candidates—sans Al Sharpton, sadly—are scheduled to speak. Journalists who have been on the campaign trail for a while now greet each other with a nice fraternity. The reporters near whom I sit are quite cynical about the whole political scene, and understandably so. The candidates stick to their stump speeches tonight, for the most part.

Dean begins, "I am so excited to be here that I could just scream." Poor Howard.

Clark reminds us, "We can't forget about the 35 Americans in poverty." Only 35? No wonder we've forgotten about them.

Edwards receives the only standing ovation of the night, but he ends with a Clitnonesque line which borders on complete-and-utter insincerity: "I believe in you, and you deserve a president who actually believes in you."

Kerry fumbles his signature line with a few too many adjectives: "It's not mission accomplished. It's mission not-even-legitimately-attempted. It's mission abandoned." It's mission thesaurus.

Lieberman extols the virtues of the late Captain Kangaroo—with a straight face.

And Kucinich enters and exits to a Dennis for President rap song: "Department of Peace instead of war / Will open up more international doors." Does anything rhyme with Kucinich?

9:36 p.m.—Merrimack 10-Pin Bowling Alley, Merrimack, New Hampshire
Edward's can't bowl very well, but his point—wanting to spend time with people who couldn't buy a $120 ticket to tonight's fundraising dinner—is well-taken. The management of the bowling alley is pissed, though:

Once again, folks, we apologize for all the delays tonight. We were not aware there would be so many people at this event. We didn't realize this would be an event. We were told there would only be a handful of people with Mr. Edwards to take pictures for a few minutes. We had no idea there would be this many people. We apologize to those who have been waiting for hours and hours. This is no way reflects upon Merrimack 10-Pin.

You win some votes, you lose some votes.

8:10 a.m., Sunday—Crimson Newsroom, Cambridge, Massachusetts
Writing up my stories, I am struck by the value of being there. In most respects, the primary campaign is reduced to abstract discussion in insulated studios with Washington pundits focused on words ending in "ity" and "ism." Being there, one discovers the situation is less reducible. People vote, not "isms." And when people discuss the election in terms of masses (Whom do the masses think is electable? e.g.), they are often merely creating a smoke screen for an issue which can not be simplified beyond its reality based in individuality. Who will win today? The candidate for whom the most people vote.