Bush Should Take Nomar's Lead and Crank It Up in August

Cornpone Texan Molly Ivins is one the country's more deranged journalists?along with her buddy Jim Hightower?but I did get a kick out of her August 6 Time column about President Bush. She wrote: "For years I have been trying to persuade people that George W. Bush, although no Einstein, is not stupid. Now comes word he is returning to Texas for most of

August. He could have gone to Kennebunkport, Maine, instead. I give up. If you put his brain in a duck, it would fly north for the winter."

I like ducks; watching them in the water and served up for dinner. But here's a bone I have to pick with Mr. Bush: Why in the world, sir, would you waste an entire month talking to cows and clearing brush when all your enemies are playing golf, taking taxpayer-provided international junkets and holding the occasional town meeting in their home states?

Work while the rest of the world naps. Bush, rather than tuning down, ought to embark on an extensive tour of the United States, pushing his political goals to tremendous crowds. Lash out at Tom Daschle for holding administration nominees hostage. Attack the trial lawyers who dictate much of the Democratic agenda. Explain your vision of tax and Social Security reform. Raise money?both hard and soft?to help Republican candidates who can help take back the Senate and increase the GOP majority in the House. Own the front pages of daily newspapers.

A massive blitz of presidential appearances would not only give Democrats the jitters, it would set Bush up for the contentious autumn he faces.

1. All McCain, All the Time. In Slate-ville, number-two editor Jack Shafer plays Boo-Boo to Michael Kinsley's Yogi Bear. Shafer must've committed some heinous sin in a prior life to arrive at this station; still, the ex-Washington City Paper chief has qualities that are unique to the Microsoft-owned website: a midsize set of balls and a biting sense of humor. Even when Shafer completely misses the mark, he's good for a laugh or two.

On July 27, Shafer completely blew it in his short piece "The Return of McSwoonery," a stab at Newsweek's Matt Bai for his July 30 "heart-shaped pillow" delivered to that magazine's model of everything that's noble about politics in particular and the United States in general. Making fun of Bai's over-the-top story about John McCain visiting Teddy Roosevelt's boyhood home here in Manhattan, which read more like the sycophancy of his colleagues Howard Fineman or Jonathan Alter, Shafer wrote: "Any guy who's fallen in love will understand Bai's double-standard: My girl is red-hot, your gal is doodly-squat. When other politicians take the press on visual field trips, they're photo-op whores, but when McCain does it, he's America's Sweetheart."

Rib-tickling, but I don't know where Shafer's been living the past year if he thinks that the media's star-struck glorification of St. McCain has been in remission. He writes: "The New York Times' tendencies toward McSwoonery were charted twice in this column during the campaign, but after a year of cooling, the embers of the press corps' love glow once more."

Flat-out wrong, Jack: maybe you ought to get your beak out of the Timothy Leary and Aldous Huxley bios and pay attention to the crimes against the Constitution in DC. "A year of cooling?" Uh, no. Was Shafer in Costa Rica last spring when McCain was deified, day after day (most flagrantly by the Times), during his successful stewardship of a campaign finance "reform" bill in the Senate? Didn't he notice, after sexagenarian James Jeffords discovered his true political gender, that journalists immediately turned their attention to McCain, who was pouting for lack of attention? McCain entertained Tom Daschle in Arizona, setting up a guaranteed spittle over whether McCain'd be the next Republican to switch parties.

And there's been an embarrassing paper trail of stories wondering if McCain will challenge President Bush for the GOP nomination in 2004, or more likely, emulate T.R. and launch an independent bid. The Keating Five Mavericks would be a fitting name, although I wouldn't rule out the predictable lift of the Bull Moose Party.

Newsweek's Bai doesn't even rate in the Top 10 of McCain ass-smoochers: aside from Alter and Fineman, he loses out to Time's Margaret Carlson, the entire staff of The New York Times, Slate's Jacob Weisberg, Salon's Jake Tapper, The Wall Street Journal's Al Hunt, NBC's Tim Russert, Hardball's Chris Matthews, The Washington Post's Dana Milbank, E.J. Dionne and Richard Cohen, and The Weekly Standard's Bill Kristol and David Brooks.

2. Uncle Teddy's Using His Rebate Check for Electricity Bills. Matt Bai is actually one of the better mainstream reporters. His July 15 New York Times Magazine article?"Running from Office: Why Max Kennedy's Congressional Run Never Took Off"?was a terrific read, offering more than the cursory brush-off the rest of the media gave RFK's ninth child. The standard take was that Max just didn't have it; he was goofy, too fond of Hawaiian shirts and yoga, and unable to embrace the decades-long boot camp a Kennedy has to endure before starting a campaign.

Bai charts the days before Max Kennedy was set to announce his intention to seek the Massachusetts House seat vacated by the late Joe Moakley. One of his tutors was Doug Hattaway, a loathsome spokesman for Al Gore last fall (although not a patch on the oily team of Chris Lehane and Mark Fabiani).

He writes: "The speech Kennedy held in his hands had been written by Bob Shrum, the fabled wordsmith who had served Max's uncle, Senator Ted Kennedy, in every campaign since 1980. Shrum had also been a key adviser to Al Gore, and this, Kennedy decided, was the problem with the speech. 'I sound like Al Gore,' he sighed. 'I sound like a caricature of Al Gore. Look, I love Al Gore. I worked my tail off for him. I like his whole family. But I don't want to sound like him.'"

Deeper into the story, Bai recounts conversations with Kennedy before the potential candidate's miscues piled up. "Max knew the campaign would take all his energy, but he seemed to approach the idea of running with his usual breezy style. 'I've just got to be myself, bro,' he said. 'It's going to be fun.' He and I had become friendly, and I asked him how he gauged his chances for winning. 'Lately, I've been getting into astrology,' he said thoughtfully. Then he exploded into laughter. 'It's all about my horoscope, baby!'"

I'm not a fan of the Kennedy clan's despicable noblesse-oblige politics, but if Max decides to run again at a later date, without the baggage of millionaire hacks like Shrum and the inevitable interference of First Hagiographer Arthur Schlesinger Jr., he might be the most interesting, if flaky, public servant the family has produced.

On the subject of Camelot shills, The Washington Post's Mary McGrory unloaded a corker in that paper's July 29 edition. Ruminating on Bobby Kennedy Jr.'s 30-day stay in a Puerto Rican jail?a result of his protesting the U.S. Navy's bombing tests on Vieques Island?Mary was brimming with pride. She wrote: "Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who will be released from Puerto Rico's Guaynabo federal prison, is not the first man with something on his mind to find that jail is a great place to get it down on paper." True, there was Hitler, but as Katie Couric might say, "I won't go there." Think of the fascinating book Teddy might've written (or at least a rough draft for Ted Sorenson) had he been jailed, like an ordinary citizen, for his Chappaquiddick adventure back in '69.

But there's more! The Chicago Sun-Times reported on Sunday that William Kennedy Smith?the alleged Palm Beach rapist?is mulling a run for Congress from Chicago's North Side. I'd concede that race to Democrat Smith just to have him next to cousin Patrick "Patches" Kennedy in the House of Representatives.

3. What's So Bad About August? Here's a sample of the more traditional Slate-think?complete with a hate-thought in the first sentence?from David Plotz, who no doubt moonlights as a stand-up comic. He writes on July 27: "August is the Mississippi of the calendar. It's beastly hot and muggy. It has a dismal history. Nothing good ever happens in it. And the United States would be better off without it.

"August is when the atomic bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, when Anne Frank was arrested, when the first income tax was collected, when Elvis Presley and Marilyn Monroe died. Wings and Jefferson Airplane were formed in August. The Sonny and Cher Comedy Hour debuted in August. (No August, no Sonny and Cher!)"

I do appreciate the income-tax slam (even though it's certainly insincere), but are we still debating the merits of Harry Truman's decision to save thousands upon thousands of American lives by forcing Japan into submission back in '45? Besides, Jefferson Airplane (later, Starship), which sputtered in the 70s (with the exception of Marty Balin's "Miracles"), was a great period band, with songs like "Lather," "Crown of Creation," "White Rabbit," "We Can Be Together" and "Today." I'm not sure of Plotz's age, but if Wings is even in his memory bank he can't be past 40, and this silly essay puts him in the company of the very young and naive New Republic staff (I'm thinking about Franklin Foer here), a print publication that, of course, is the model for Prof. Kinsley's earnest Slate.

And, let's not forget that Plotz last year wrote one of the most galling articles on the Web: a celebration of The New York Times' Gail Collins. Without irony, the Washingtonian wrote on Oct. 13: "Collins is a New York treasure... [Maureen Dowd and Collins] are remarkably similar. The only two women on the [op-ed] page are both Irish baby boomers. Both write political columns that treat politics as an absurdist drama. [I'd like Plotz's evidence of that "absurdist drama" claim.] Both prefer giving a politician a sulfur bath to analyzing position papers, and neither has Walter Lippmannian ambition to drive national policy.

"But Collins actually writes a different kind of column than Dowd does. Dowd plagues Democrats and Republicans equally? Collins favors death by a thousand mocks. Dowd's voice is merciless. Collins' is more humane: She doesn't bully her readers. (It reflects her own personality: Collins sounds like a mensch because she is one.)"

I do give Plotz credit for his prescience in predicting that Collins "will have a glorious career at the paper": after all, few would've thought last fall that the Times would stoop to tapping the featherweight Collins as editorial-page editor to replace the odious Howell Raines.

4. It's Witchcraft, Los Hombres! I'm superstitious. Won't walk under a ladder, open an umbrella inside, I skitter away from black cats and pick up pennies for good luck. I believe in Jesus, Elvis, the Beatles, Zimmerman, Tony Conigliaro and the Curse of the Bambino.

The boys and I were strolling in the financial district last Saturday, looking for birds other than pigeons, and wound up at Chameleon Comics on Maiden La. It's a pretty cool store: Junior and MUGGER III pawed over comics and Spider-Man balloons while I sifted through the rack of baseball merchandise. I picked up a Ted Williams bobbing statue?the only Red Sox star available?and searched in vain for a Roger Clemens model just so I could knock his block off with a pair of cherry bombs.

After attacking the Rajah for a couple of years, I do have to admit that his 15-1 record at age 38 is phenomenal, and even though he should've insisted on pitching at Shea Stadium in June, at least he faced Mike Piazza during the All-Star Game in Seattle. On Saturday, Clemens left a one-hitter in the sixth inning with a groin injury. Do I hope he calls the disabled list his home for the rest of the season? Of course.

But my favorite pick-up was several packs of Fleer's 100th Anniversary Red Sox trading cards. While flipping through my luck of the draw, the following players appeared: Jim Rice, Yaz, Mo Vaughn, Rico Petrocelli, Dick Stuart, Tony C., Freddy Lynn, Bernie Carbo and Jim Lonborg. The gem, however, was the visage of that fat slug Don Zimmer, who blew the '78 season for the Sox with his inept managing. Boston fans out there: You say Bill Buckner, I counter with The Gerbil. Losing the '86 Series was hell on Earth, but '78 was the year of the Sox, the season when the Curse was destined to be lifted. I watched in silence 15 years ago when the Mets?a very obnoxious team that year, with Gary Carter, Ray Knight and Nails Dykstra leading the charge?improbably took the championship. But that was small spuds compared to the Yanks-Sox playoff game in '78, when I spilled a full bottle of National Premium at Long John's Pub in Baltimore after Bucky Dent hit that homer in Fenway.

So I'll keep this card of Zimmer, reproduced above, as a hope-against-hope lucky charm that the Sox can somehow get past the Yanks in 2001. All's not doom & gloom: even as the Bombers won their eighth straight game on Sunday?thanks a bunch, Blue Jays, you Canadian losers?Nomar Garciaparra, in his first game of the season after a wrist operation on Opening Day, drove in three runs, sparking Boston to a come-from-behind win over the White Sox. The juju was so overwhelming that even closer Derek Lowe returned to form.

Now, maybe Carl Everett can finally get a hit.

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