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Mar

11

Carnival of Ohio Politics #108 now posted

Filed Under Blogging, Carnivals, Ohio, Politics, Writing | Comments Off

Thanks to all the great contributions this week for our Carnival of Ohio Politics, #108.

I know I’ve been accused of contorting my words, myself and who knows what else.  But let’s leave that to Eliot Spitzer and the Democratic presidential primary candidates, okay? (You’ll have to check out the carnival this week to see what I’m talking about.)

Have a great week, please keep contributing and reading and commenting, and feel free to pass along the Carnival’s existence to others who might like to participate.

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By Jill Miller Zimon at 10:17 pm March 11th, 2008 in Blogging, Carnivals, Ohio, Politics, Writing | Comments Off 

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Mar

11

Help kids: Make Dan Moulthrop bald (or balder, depending on how you look at him)

Filed Under Announcements, Cleveland+, Health Care, Ohio, Social Issues, WCPN/SOI | Comments Off

Dan Moulthrop, the WCPN host of the Sound of Ideas (among other roles he fills at Ideastream) is asking for help in raising funds for an excellent cause: childhood cancer research through the St. Baldricks Foundation. I can’t write the ask any better than Dan so here’s the latest on an effort that will take very little to help so much:

Hi, Friends,

I hope you don’t mind hearing from me again. If you do, my apologies. I know not all of you can give to this cause right now, but I’ve included you in this mailing because I consider you at least a close colleague, if not a close friend or good neighbor, and I thought you’d like to hear how things are going.

And here’s the update: Your generosity has been immensely inspiring. I started off with a goal of $1,000. I didn’t really imagine my shaved head could possibly be worth much more. Well, you basically destroyed that goal in a matter of hours. So, a savvy fund-raising friend of mine suggested changing the goal, which I did, to $5,000. And here’s the update: about 50 of you have put us just about halfway there.

I can’t say this enough: Thank you. You inspire me.

We have less than a week left to raise the next $2,500. Anything you can give—$1, $10, $100—is greatly appreciated and goes a long way towards helping to study, treat and wage an eventually very effective campaign against childhood cancer.

Some asked about an address to send a check, if that’s how you’d like to give, make the check out to the St. Baldrick’s Foundation and send it to me at ideastream, 1375 Euclid Avenue, Cleveland, OH, 44115. If you’re going to send a check, please print out the attached form and fill it out–it makes the record keeping much easier.

Now, if you’d like to laugh at me, please see this [a great piece in the Cleveland Scene's C-Notes section about Dan's efforts]

OK, thanks for your time and again, thanks for your support.

All the best,

Dan

[click on his name to get to the place where you can give and learn more]

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By Jill Miller Zimon at 9:43 pm March 11th, 2008 in Announcements, Cleveland+, Health Care, Ohio, Social Issues, WCPN/SOI | Comments Off 

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Mar

11

JMZ and a third Parenting Publications of America award, in different category

Filed Under Announcements, Blogging, Media, Ohio, Parenting, Writing | 11 Comments

Well, this was a surprise. As usual, I had no idea of being entered and I still don’t know what exactly was entered.

But learning of this great award for Wendy Hoke and her compatriots’ work reminded me to check the Parenting Publications Awards for 2007.

Sure ‘nough – after winning for Personal Essay Writing in 2004 (Gold) and 2005 (Gold, but in a different circulation level) and I can’t remember if I won anything in 2006 but I don’t think so, this year, it’s a Bronze in a different category:

E10 – Column: Humor

30,001-54,999 (circulation)
Bronze: Cleveland Family; Jill Miller Zimon, writer, Julie Hanahan, David Sullivan
Helpful hints mixed with carefree observations about parenting give these columns their flair. Dynamic writing that gives readers the sense they’re in the same room with the author makes for interesting reading.

Frankly, I’ve never been exactly sure how you distinguish between “humor” and “personal essay” – I know for sure that some of mine are definitely not humor, and most of them are personal. But that’s why we have editors, like Julie!

Thanks to them (and Frances Richards for giving me my start in 2003) for submitting my work, paying me for it and most of all, giving me the opportunity to do it for the fifth year. I can’t believe it.

You can find the Cleveland Family publications at NEOhioFamily.com.

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By Jill Miller Zimon at 4:21 pm March 11th, 2008 in Announcements, Blogging, Media, Ohio, Parenting, Writing | 11 Comments 

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Mar

11

Eliot Spitzer incident, Post Number 9 (ok, only Post Number 2): Is he a sex addict? Nope, just human

Filed Under Blogging, Courts, Crime, Culture, Elections, Government, Media, Parenting, Politics, Scandal, Statehouse, WH2008 | 9 Comments

You know, people say they are stunned, shocked. On and on. A close personal friend of mine who is a lawyer in NYC responded to an e-mail I wrote asking for an opinion on Eliot Spitzer’s alleged dalliances like this, “A topic better discussed off-line.” No doubt. No doubt.

How many times do I have to write about how “rising star” is the kiss of death? About how expectations outgrow human nature, as does our fantastical desire for there to be a mortal we can call perfect?

The rising stars fall not because our expectations are too high or because they lack the ability to rise as high as we need them to or wish they will or think they can.

Rising stars fall because no one, no thing, can rise indefinitely. And the plateau or the fall or decline is all relative. But it is also inevitable. And people just refuse to remember this and adjust their hopes and expectations accordingly.

This doesn’t mean you can’t have hope or hope for hope or believe in hope. It only means that you shouldn’t walk around saying how shocked and betrayed you feel. You snowed yourself if you thought it wasn’t possible.

Rich Harwood writes about this in a similar way here in this piece about Spitzer, leaders and leadership.

On one level, Spitzer’s story is similar to that of many leaders in our society. We become infatuated with them, even begin to worship them, believe they can do no wrong, assigning them qualities and expectations that too often are not humanly possible to fulfill. Meantime, the leaders themselves, mere mortals, begin to believe they actually hold mythic powers, at times exercising them with abandonment and hubris, often leading to their own demise. All this reminds me of sundry fables about young wizards, who when they finally embrace their own individual power, fail to understand its true use, and especially its limitations.

On another level, the Spitzer saga makes me think about notions of “imperfection.”  I often think that in our desire to ascribe mythic qualities to leaders, we forget — indeed, I think we actually seek to deny — the reality that we all, including our leaders, are imperfect.  Thus when imperfections arise, we are ill-equipped to discern their true meaning to us. We want people to grovel or put forth false modesty when caught, or we want their heads. Room to gauge our failings gets squeezed out; we try to ignore the reality that human imperfection exists, until once more it is staring us right in the face and cannot be escaped.

Now, if Ohio Governor Ted Strickland were revealed to have used the Emperor’s Club, that would shock me. Because his personality and Spitzer’s could not be more different.

Frankly, Spitzer fits the profile of someone who did what he’s alleged to have done and got caught precisely.

Here are some experts on that, thrown in with some other commentary that has stood out to me:

Is he a sex addict?

Why does someone in such a visible and responsible position act in this way? Over the next few days you’ll hear plenty of psychologists, psychiatrists, and other mental health professionals give their sage perspectives.

But for all intents and purposes, no one can know why Governor Spitzer acted as he did, except the governor himself. As a matter of fact, it is against my code of ethics to state what the governor’s problem might be.

That’s because the reason that people stray away from their marriages are complex. One person may use extramarital sex to get back at a partner, another to escape obligations, a third to experience a thrill.

Read more

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By Jill Miller Zimon at 1:40 pm March 11th, 2008 in Blogging, Courts, Crime, Culture, Elections, Government, Media, Parenting, Politics, Scandal, Statehouse, WH2008 | 9 Comments 

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Mar

11

Where the Hillary Clinton Bloggers Are

Filed Under Blogging, Campaigning, Elections, Hillary Clinton, Politics, Tech, WH2008 | 9 Comments

No, not at WLST.  But this most excellent post by Tom Watson lists a whole batch of bloggers whose posts support Hillary Clinton – you know – on purpose. Damn – I called his post excellent – maybe I am a Clinton blogger!

To be a Clinton blogger in the progressive blogosphere is to be hated, shunned, passed without notice in the street. We sit home on Friday nights, cursing at Chris Matthews and being censored by Al Giordano for commenting too often in a field of swaying Obama supplication. We’re not welcome at all the best dKos parties – if we show up, we’re cursed with the universal epithet of those who challenge the Obama hegemony: “troll,” they call us. Sometimes “f’ing troll.” We’re Rovian in our embrace of the monster, closet Bush backers and much worse – Lieberman types! Oh, the pain. The pure pain. I can’t stand it. Makes me want to quit, embrace that messianic goodness, and stand down – for the sake of the party, of course – from any pursuit of a Clinton presidency.

Okay – no – that’s not the good part.  Here’s the good part:

Looking over the (all-too-short) lineup of Clinton bloggers is enough to stiffen any political  spine. We don’t have numbers, but we do have quality. And with seven weeks to go till Pennsylvania, it’s worth a little time to look around the room. There’s Taylor Marsh, of course – unapologetic, in your face, deeply annoying to those who decry “the Clintons.” Why, her very name launches vast armadas of angry commenters, her very name has become almost synonymous with hard-fisted Clinton blogging. We like her out front, in other words.

And look, we’ve got James Wolcott - the intellectual equivalent, according to some recent Pew research, of a combined 14,392 DailyKos Obama diarists. (I must note: he’d probably disapprove of the label “Clinton blogger” but we have to stretch things on our roster at times and he did coin the memorable phrase: “so shun me, I voted for Hillary,” which has pretty much become our rallying cry – the T-shirts are on order). Then there’s Big Tent Democrat and Jeralyn Merritt at TalkLeft – absolutely fabulous analysts and media critics. We’ll include Lance Mannion, who has never named his choice but makes the always curious decision to actually defend Hillary Clinton in multiple posts – yes, he’s one of us. Blue Girl, of course, and in Ohio too – so very crucial.

Let’s not forget the prolific Riverdaughter, a feminist of wide-ranging abilities who always seems to nail what’s so important about the typical Clinton voter (hint: they work, and they work at hard jobs). Our circle is made richer by the addition of the indomitable Shakespeare’s Sister, a former Edwards blogger and all-around blog-whoring (her term, don’t shoot me!) maestro.

Who else? John Amato at Crooks and Liars – playing it fair these days makes you a Clinton blogger. Fred Wilson and Jeff Jarvis? Well, they voted for her and actually admitted it in public. Joe Gandelman? An always moderate voice who seems to lean her way (I could be wrong). Jon Swift? The rare righty who doesn’t hate Hillary. And I’m thinking Jane Hamsher leans our way. And Jessica Valenti. Digby too. And hey, maybe Tina Brown?

Well, there you have it – see? I am not on the list, therefore, res ipso facto or whatever – I cannot possibly be a Clinton blogger.

Told ya so.

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By Jill Miller Zimon at 1:06 pm March 11th, 2008 in Blogging, Campaigning, Elections, Hillary Clinton, Politics, Tech, WH2008 | 9 Comments 

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Mar

11

Eliot Spitzer incident: Who were Clients Number 1 through Number 8?

Filed Under Politics, Scandal, Social Issues | 11 Comments

From WCBSTV:

CBS 2 has obtained a copy of the wiretap transcript which allegedly has Spitzer asking a man named “Lewis” about a prostitute.

The transcript reads:

Lewis said that “Kristen” would go directly to room 871.
Client 9 asked Lewis to remind him what “Kristen” looked like and Lewis said that she was American, petite, very pretty brunette, 5 feet 5 inches, and 105 pounds.
Client 9 said that she should go straight to 871, and if for any reason it did not work out, she should call Lewis.

Doesn’t anyone else care about Clients #1 through 8, their families and the people they’ve betrayed?

Because at the heart of this very pedestrian pursuit by New York Governor Eliot Spitzer is a behavior pursued by people many perceived steps above and below him. If the Emperor Club is so exclusive, do you really not expect that others who matter used it too?

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By Jill Miller Zimon at 12:50 pm March 11th, 2008 in Politics, Scandal, Social Issues | 11 Comments 

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Mar

11

Sarah Lacy & Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg: sounds like she Capri Cafaro’d* him but others didn’t like it

Filed Under 'Roots News, Blogging, Culture, Marketing, Media, Tech, Women, Writing | 3 Comments

I wasn’t there, I don’t know either of them, but I did see the tweets.

This BlogHer post gives a good background on what was happening as Sarah Lacy interviewed the founder of Facebook, Mark Zuckerberg, at the SXSW conference a couple of days ago.

Thank you to Jen Lemen for posting a link to the video of the interview, now up at Techcrunch, in a comment at the aforementioned BlogHer post.  (Now, if anyone sees a transcript of it…I love those – but in this instance, video is probably better.)

Also recommended is this post by Brian Solis. It’s excellent.  I should be so lucky to be able to interview like Sarah Lacey.  Most people would be.

Watch and comment – how did Lacy do? How did Zuckerberg do? How did the audience do?

*Capri Cafaro-ing

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By Jill Miller Zimon at 10:19 am March 11th, 2008 in 'Roots News, Blogging, Culture, Marketing, Media, Tech, Women, Writing | 3 Comments 

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