Tom DeLay and the Tango

And Obama Won the Nobel Prize. And There Was Much Rejoicing And Use of And.

I’m sure there’s been enough said about the different pluses and minuses to Barack Obama winning the Nobel Peace Prize. What I’d like to talk about, briefly, is the speech he gave in accepting it — which was either extremely brilliantly written or well interpreted.

Put on your English Major hats, kiddies, and let’s look at this thing.

And I know that throughout history the Nobel Peace Prize has not just been used to honor specific achievement; it’s also been used as a means to give momentum to a set of causes. And that is why I will accept this award as a call to action, a call for all nations to confront the common challenges of the 21st century.

That’s just a sample from the 31-sentence speech, but you’ve probably already noticed something those sentences have in common. Sweeping, inspiring rhetoric? OK, two things. They both start with the conjunction and. In fact, 12 of the 31 sentences in this speech start with “And,” while another starts with “But,” bringing us very close to having half of the president’s sentences starting with words that would’ve earned his speechwriter a lecture and a poor grade in high school English.

Now, this transcript was taken from the president’s speech — so technically, it could be read as a piece that has, instead, 18 very, very long, complex sentences. The hypothetical speechwriter who put that together, though, was both a). a moron and b). not writing for Barack Obama, who pauses quite emphatically when he sees a period.

First, let’s do away with the idea that using “And” to start a sentence is a crime against English. Yes, it demonstrates a certain laziness on the part of many writers: really, a conjunction at the head of the train signals a conductor who should have just hooked his trains together, rather than pulling them awkwardly apart. Still, conjunctions can be used to start sentences for the precise reason they’re used here: they, and the period that breaks them from the preceding sentence, add emphasis.

Obama often leans on conjunctions in his speeches. In this speech, in particular, that’s an extremely valid habit. The cascading And And And helps build the same kind of momentum that the content of the speech tries to address. Every new problem he discusses could be the second half of this collection of statements in his first real paragraph:

But I also know that this prize reflects the kind of world that those men and women and all Americans want to build, a world that gives life to the promise of our founding documents. And I know that throughout history the Nobel Peace Prize has not just been used to honor specific achievement; it’s also been used as a means to give momentum to a set of causes. And that is why I will accept this award as a call to action, a call for all nations to confront the common challenges of the 21st century.

It’s nicely done. I credit the speechwriters, when it might just be a quirk of the president’s, but — well, I like to think professional writers are purposeful with their word choice. And that’s some nice work, guys.

Librarians, Man. They’re The Best

When I’m feeling blue, all I have to do, is take a look at OPB’s latest stories. There’s a particularly great (by which I mean up-lifting) one out of the national NPR desk today, about Olly Neal, a man who, as a teen, stole a book from a library. The librarians caught on that he’d stolen the book because he didn’t want his friends to know he was a reader, so they drove to Memphis to buy more books by the same author whose book had caught the boy’s eye, and kept making sure that when he came in, a new Frank Yerby book was on the shelf:

“You’ve got to understand that this was not an easy matter then — because this is 1957 and ‘58,” Neal said. “And black authors were not especially available, No. 1. And No. 2, Frank Yerby was not such a widely known author. And No. 3, they had to drive all the way to Memphis to find it.”

But the women’s efforts paid off: Neal went on to attend law school and later became a judge, retiring as an appellate judge of the Arkansas Court of Appeals.

When Grady died, her son asked Neal to tell everyone gathered for her funeral the story of how the librarian nurtured his reading habit as a teenager.

“I credit Mrs. Grady for getting me in the habit of enjoying reading, so that I was able to go to law school and survive,” Neal
said.

I offer that last part for my co-blogger in particular. Reading! It will save you.

Coincidence?

Addison Graves Wilson, aka “Joe” Wilson, R-SC.

How could he not be a Republican douchebag with a name that’s three diseases in a row?

Be sure you watch the WHOLE THING.

I’m going to find some brain bleach to banish those pelvic thrusts, now.

Bad Bloggers: No Cookie (Or Salads)

For reasons I can’t always remember, I subscribe to The Atlantic’s “Food Channel” feed, which is just usually a bunch of pieces about foods I’ve never heard of or can’t afford. In essence, it’s prime procrastination material, with the occasional tasty recipe thrown in.

Sometimes, however, they really annoy me, as they have done today. Under the headline “Beyond Iceberg: 13 Unique Salads” they have posted a photo slide show, each photo representing a new recipe. OK, not a bad idea — though perhaps it would’ve been a nicer package a month ago, before Mark Bittman’s tour de force 101 Simple Salads piece came out in the New York Times. But — fine. I clicked. I’m a vegetarian who doesn’t love lettuce, so I’m always fascinated to hear creative salad ideas.

This photo slide slow, however, does not consistently have pictures of the actual salads. Instead, it often has a nice picture of one of the ingredients of the salads being proposed. Since these salads are a bit off the beaten salad path (definitely Beyond Iceberg), it would be nice to see how they come together. For instance:

How does that become a “Gazpachi Salad” that stars, of all things, the unpictured ingredient of hard tack? I’m not sure — and to find out, I’d have to click to another page to get the recipe. So if I do that, I click not onto a simple recipe, but onto a two-page narrative of the history of the author’s experience with the salad, with Pensacola, Florida, with hard tack, and on and on and on.  Here’s a charmer from the second paragraph:

In honesty, it’s one of those foods I didn’t really pay a huge amount of attention to at the time, but when I got to thinking about a Florida menu, gazpachi came pretty quickly back to mind. And now that I’ve been playing with it at home regularly for the last few weeks, I have even more interest in it.

So… it’s a forgettable food that only came to mind “pretty quickly” when you had to complete an arbitrary assignment for your magazine? Mm, I can’t wait. After another two full paragraphs on the history of this author’s conversation with a Florida restaurateur about le salad forgettablé, he writes:

So let me finally get down to the dish. Basically it’s a saladified (not solidified) version of gazpacho. To quote Chef Jim Shirley, it’s clearly “a salad that goes back to the Spanish roots of Pensacola.” It’s not very hard to see how the cold Spanish vegetable soup could have morphed into this salad. As Shirley said, “If you stick hardtack in your gazpacho, what you get evolves into gazpachi salad.”

Having slogged through all that unnecessary repetition, if you’re expecting a recipe at that point, you’ll be very sad to see that the next two paragraphs delve into the American history of gazpacho, and that it’s only on the next page that you get the 10 paragraphs (!!!) that (sans ingredient list) explain both how to make the salad AND the history of hard tack (but no recipe for hardtack, just a suggestion that you mail-order it as the author did. Is there a link to where to get it? Oh ho ho).

This is exhausting.

I’m getting very tired of paper journalism companies in general who complain that there’s no money to be had in the Web and then seem to make a career out of creating Web sites that hurt my head whenever I visit. The Atlantic has some very slick content (though short of Andrew Sullivan, I’m often unenthused by their Politics Channel), but they sometimes hide it behind a maze of links, pictures, and broken dreams (that last part might be projection). I’m about to turn their Food Channel off.

Olympia Snowe, on the GOP

“I’ve always been a Republican, uh, for, um, the traditional principles that have been associated with the Republican Party since I, you know, became a Republican, uh, when I registered to vote. And that is, uh, limited, you know, limited government, individual opportunity, fiscal responsibility, and a strong national defense. Uh, so I think that those principles have always been, uh, part of the Republican Party heritage, and I believe that I, you know, reflect those views. And I haven’t changed as a Republican, I think more that my party has changed.”—Senator Olympia Snowe (R-Maine).

I know it’s not at all likely that she’ll party switch, but I really don’t see what’s holding her to the GOP anymore.

How Not to Write About Africa

I love Djimon Hounsou more than ever now.

Tabled

So, SCOTUS Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s granddaughter wanted to celebrate her 19th birthday with 5 friends at an exclusive Chicago restaurant.  Problem: the restaurant was booked.  Solution?  Call Kirkland & Ellis, a big-time law firm in the area, and see if anyone might know the owner.

From: [A secretary to a senior partner in Chicago]
Sent: Tuesday, September 8, 2009 2:19 PM
To: All Chicago attorneys

Justice Ginsburg’s granddaughter is having her 19th birthday on October 3rd and wants to celebrate with 5 friends at her favorite restauraunt — Topolobampo. Unfortunately, they are booked solid on that date. Does anyone know Rick Bayless (the owner of Topolobampo and Frontera Grill) who could possibly make a table available for her.

Topolobampo — good choice! When we did our series of open threads on summer associate lunch suggestions, back in 2008 — when law firms still had summer lunch programs — Topolobampo was mentioned frequently and favorably in the Chicago thread.

So, were the K&E concierges able to come through for the Supreme Grandchild?

Less than 24 hours after the original email, this message went around:

From: [A secretary to a senior partner]
Sent: Wednesday, September 9, 2009 1:34 PM
To: All Chicago attorneys

Very much appreciate all the emails and calls in response to my email below. Justices Ginsburg’s grandaughter will celebrate her 19th birthday at Toplolobampo thanks to you.

Above the Law (from where that’s quoted/ hat-tip ALOTT5MA) is quick to point out that neither Ginsburg nor her office were involved in making the request, though it’s possible that her husband called his friend and co-author at K&E for some help. What bothers me, though, is the expectation of help. What bothers me, as well, is that unless Topolobampo created a new 5-top from nothing, it seems very likely that someone else — possibly someone who was counting on a table to celebrate their own big event — was bumped off the roster for the evening. Maybe they just had to wait a little longer, but one guesses that their appetizer was a big plate of You’re Not As Important As Those Folks.

I do not like this kind of thing. Yes, I think it’s swell when friends can help friends out, but expecting them to make up for the fact that you didn’t book you table far enough in advance — what, did the birthday sneak up on you? — is crappy and smacks of classism. Also, how hard is it to make your own reservations? They even let you do it online.

A Justifiable Mambo: Sonia Sotomayor and Esai Morales

Coolest Supreme Court Justice ever?  If her recent karaoke outing (to celebrate taking the bench at SCOTUS, natch) wasn’t proof enough, here we have video of the newest Justice, Ms. Sotomayor, dancing the mambo:

I like. And I won’t ruin your fun by saying, “Now try and imagine Scalia doing that.”

Hat-tip: Dorinda Fox.