A Son's Farewell to Ed Bradley

As far back as I can remember, "60 Minutes" was a mainstay in my home on Sunday evenings. Except for the months during the NFL season, without fail the tic tic tic tic tic would start promptly at 7:00 pm EST.

60 Minutes was not a program that I appreciated right away, but I remember it as a time that I spent with my mother and father learning about important and interesting things going on in the world. The routine of our family viewing impressed upon me that there was something worthwhile to take away from the broadcast, and it was in this program that I developed an early appreciation for what quality journalism was.

During his tenure on the program, Ed Bradley was just as impressive as any of his colleagues, yet he struck me as significant because he was black. Diane Sawyer (when she was on the program) had a similar impression on me as a female journalist on the program. The news media then was even more so than now dominated by white-male faces, particularly among the highly-regarded journalists, so Bradley's place on "60 Minutes" carved out an important social, political, and journalistic space.

I don't remember his pieces standing out as better than his colleagues. Over the years, the program has been marked by consistent, quality journalism period. I do remember that his voice always seemed soothing and he had a cool suaveness to him. Those who are followers of "60 Minutes" will surely miss the man and what he brought to the broadcast. For me, I will remember him with fond memories of those Sunday nights on the couch with Mom and Dad, seeing an important man, reporting on important matters as part of an important journalist team with the familiar, comforting, and consistent tic tic tic tic ticking signaling the beginning and end of segments.

Will Republicans be Kicking Themselves November 8th?

Election Day is tomorrow and most political pundits agree that the Democrats will regain control of the House for the first time since 1994. What many did not foresee but what is now a very real possibility is the potential for the Democrats to also regain control of the Senate. Right now this chance still remains remote, but if it is a very good day for Dems, the possibility exists. Currently, there are really only two currently held Democratic seats at risk of being lost, Maryland and New Jersey. However, seats in Arizona, Missouri, Montana, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Tennessee, and Virginia are all currently held by the GOP and are all currently in play. If Democrats hold onto the seats in Maryland and New Jersey (which seems likely), they will need to pick up six of these eight red seats. If I were a betting man, I would predict that Dems only get four of these seats, leaving the Senate in GOP control 51-49.

But if on Wednesday morning it happens that Democrats have picked up the necessary seats to gain control of the Senate, Republicans may be kicking themselves, and it will not be over these aforementioned races. George Bush, Karl Rove, Ken Mehlman, and Elizabeth Dole will be wondering why they did not field a strong candidate for the senate race in Connecticut. Joe Lieberman looks as though he will pull out a close victory over upstart challenger Ned Lamont, though no one should count Mr. Lamont out until the votes are counted. However, if Lieberman wins, he will do so with a large percentage of Republican votes. In fact, if Republicans in Connecticut stay home in large enough numbers, Ned Lamont will pull out a win. This fact has not been lost on the Republican campaign strategists who have refused to endorse their candidate, Alan Schlesinger, who will struggle himself to get to 5%. The thinking goes thus. This is a difficult year for the three GOP House incumbents, all in tight races, and with a governor’s race that is not competitive, Republicans voters in Connecticut, like those nationally, are depressed about their party and may stay home in droves, which means a loss of three seats in the House just in Connecticut. However, Republicans may be inspired to come out to vote for Good Ole Joe, and while in the polls, vote for the familiar incumbents Nancy Johnson, Chris Shays, and Rob Simmons.

These three are facing tough challengers in Chris Murphy, Diane Farrell, and Joe Courtney, respectively, and may lose anyhow. But if the Dems take the Senate, Republicans may be asking themselves why they did not recruit a strong candidate to run against Joe Lieberman. This strategy is not without precedent in Connecticut. In 1970, Rev. Joe Duffey challenged, as an anti-war candidate, the incumbent Democratic Senator Thomas Dodd (father of current senior Connecticut Senator Chris Dodd). Duffey won the primary and Dodd subsequently ran as an independent in the general. The Republicans that year nominated Lowell Weicker who was a moderate representative in the House from Fairfield County. In the three-way race that year, the Republican, Lowell Weiker capitalized on the division among the Democrats to capture the seat that he held on to for three terms until he himself was unseated by one Joe Lieberman in 1988 (Weicker has come out in support of Lamont this year). Given this precedent, the GOP would have been smart to encourage a Republican like Chris Shays to run for Senate. How ironic would it be if Shays loses his House seat in a year that he could have possibly won his state’s senate race.

The Departed - Infernal Affairs on the Mean Streets of Boston

Martin Scorsese’s “The Departed” will surely provide an entertaining evening and is well worth the price of admission. In the American remake of the 2002 Hong Kong hit crime drama, “Infernal Affairs,” Leonardo DiCaprio plays Billy Costigan, a cop who goes undercover to infiltrate the organization of Boston crime boss, Frank Costello (Jack Nicholson). Matt Damon is Colin Sullivan, DiCaprio’s doppelganger, a Costello mole within the state police. Both Damon and DiCaprio do a fine job. The latter has perhaps truly found his acting stride with consistent performances – some, like in The Aviator, exceptional. Nicholson, however, is good for the sheer fact that he is one of the greatest actors in American cinematic history. There is nothing particularly wowing about his performance, if you hold him against his ability and past performances, but he does an adequate job as the sleazy, controlling, dirty-to-the-bone boss.

Scorsese’s version is not quite as good as the original. Its overall mood is a bit over the top when compared against “Infernal Affairs.” Nicholson perhaps deserves some of the blame here. That being said, William Monahan has done an exquisite job at translating the original from the streets of Hong Kong to the streets of Boston. And Scorsese adds his part. His movies are not typically about the places they inhabit like Los Angeles in Paul Haggis’ “Crash” or New York in any Spike Lee joint. In such films, the city becomes another character in the movie. Locations in Scorsese films, on the other hand, subtly imprint their meaning upon the films in a way that renders them both important and unimportant at the same time. “The Departed” could be set in any city, but then again it could only be set in Boston.

There are some tour-de-force performances in the movie. Mark Wahlberg and Alec Baldwin are tremendous. Though they play cops, they provide the aesthetic of Boston’s Irish streets. They exude swagger, profanity, and toughness overlaid with a sense (below the surface in the case of Wahlberg) of joviality. The other performance that is quite strong is Vera Farmiga’s so long as you forgive the moments where she appears to forget her Bostonian accent. In this testosterone injected film, she does not provide a counterbalancing soft femininity. She does, however, provide an interesting double for DiCaprio’s character in that they are only two in the film that really display any sort of genuine vulnerability. At one point she asks him if his is real. He could easily turn the question around on her. Farmiga’s bold beauty equals her talent and hopefully Hollywood will utilize her more in the years to come.

Large ensemble casts do not always yield strong results. You hope that film is greater than the sum of its part. “The Departed” seems to be just about equal, and it perhaps suffers from having an abundance of talent without an adequate supply of meaty roles.

The Lamont-Lieberman Primary Fight - An Analysis from the Field

For eight months starting in January and concluding in August, I was involved in a hotly contested Democratic primary in the state of Connecticut. No, it not was the senate race between challenger Ned Lamont and three term incumbent Joe Lieberman. I was working for the Mayor of Stamford, Dannel Malloy, who was vying for his party's nomination for governor. Sadly, our campaign came up just short losing by 1.5% after being down in the polls 20 points just a few weeks prior.

My work on the campaign gave me an interesting, insider if you will, perspective on the Lamont-Lieberman race, however, and what most media pundits have missed. The primary contest had been billed as a referendum on the War. Many liberals viewed it in more encompassing terms as a referendum on President Bush as well - hard to fathom that in a state where his approval rating hovers around 30% that a primary decided by three percentage points would fit that framework. Conservatives spun this as a fracturing of the Democratic Party and as a sign of intolerance toward moderate viewpoints within it.

What this Primary was, however, was all those things and much much more. First, it must be stated that Senator Lieberman's campaign was extremely poorly run from start almost until finish. Here is a quick lesson for any future senator: if you are the most vocal supporter in your own party of a war that is extremely unpopular in your party and your state, if you are additionally viewed as overly supportive of a president who is extremely unpopular in your party and your state and whose legacy hangs in the balance of the aforementioned unpopular war, and if you go so far as to write a scathing op-ed in the Wall Street Journal - that appears as though it could have been ghost written by members of the aforementioned unpopular president's administration - stating that those who criticize the war efforts undermine the troops, you may be susceptible to a primary challenge. The fact that the Lieberman campaign did not sniff the scent of a primary challenger in the air is totally unfathomable, but speaks to a perhaps endemic problem with the Senator that I shall get to later.

Joe Lieberman has not been in a tough Senate race in the state of Connecticut since 1988 when he first upset then three term incumbent Lowell Weicker. In 1994 he was easily reelected and in 2000, reelection came so easily that he did not have to take any days away from campaigning with Al Gore. And what happened between 1994 - the last year the Senator campaigned in the state - and now? He lost touch with his base. Those Democrats that are the party activists, who fill phone banks, who vote at conventions, who are the first point of contact for those who would like to run, Joe Lieberman lost touch with. They are the ones who lost faith in him, who were courted initially by the newcomer, Ned Lamont, who could have served as the first line - and perhaps only line - of defense necessary to turn back any would-be challengers. Instead, Senator Lieberman continued his tried and true strategy of staying in touch, visiting every day folks in diners across the state, doing nothing to repair the bond with his Democratic base.

Out in the field, the reasons why people were not supporting Joe were many. For many it was the War. But for others, they did not feel as though he had brought home the bacon. Others thought that he reveled in undermining Democrats in D.C. Still others thought that he took them for granted. And then there were those who he lost along the way through displays of apparent arrogance, a sense of entitlement, and his unwillingness to abide by the results of the primary. The dynamic that became apparent play was that the War emerged merely a catalyst that allowed Ned Lamont to become a viable alternative to Senator Lieberman. Once Democrats had a realistic choice, feelings and issues that had been stored up over many years for some came to the surface. Many felt that finally they had another option and they were going to exercise it.

This story is neither as sexy nor as black and white as the one the media pundits harped upon, but it is as I, someone working along side both camps in the other hotly contested state-wide primary, observed it. People supported Ned Lamont and opposed Joe Lieberman for a multitude of reasons. The Senator's campaign made many strategic errors along the way. They did not seem to realize they were in a fight until Ned Lamont's candidacy had already gained self-sustaining strength. But at the end of the day, you've got take care of your base. The Senate is a great institution in how it is buffeted from the people through six-year terms. Indeed, some like Senator Lieberman can stay away for twelve. But it is a rule that rings loud and clearly more often than not - you've got to take care of your base. It is fitting and not at all surprising that the greatest challenge that a Democratic Senator who is known for his moderate/conservative views has faced in his 18 years of service comes from a challenge not from the right or center but from the left. And it is not surprising that the Senator is relearning how to fight in his own state – he has not had to fight for 18 years.