The most stupefying story I’ve had to cover this year is the Democrats’ internal debate over the presidential primary calendar. Here is how I would explain it if you and I were stuck together at a BBQ:
Democrats want to drop the Iowa caucuses because the local party keeps making ruinous vote tabulation errors, and because the state is no longer winnable in November. Many of them also resent that a mostly-white state votes first, and have been agitating for a mostly-not-white state to skip the line. That argument, which comes more naturally to modern Democrats, led to the passage this year of a new calendar in which South Carolina votes first, even though it’s even less winnable for Democrats in November than Iowa and because the local Republicans run everything and won’t move it up. Iowa’s cooked, but New Hampshire’s in a staring contest with the national party, and because Joe Biden doesn’t want to compete there while there’s a chance of passing the current schedule, there is a chance he could lose a primary that wouldn’t count.
You probably excused yourself and went back for a Lone Star halfway through that, but now you know the story. Democrats created a mess for themselves; Republicans are sticking with their post-2008 calendar in which Iowa votes, then New Hampshire, then South Carolina, then Nevada. (Democrats swap the last two, but I’d love to stop talking about them right now.)
There’s always news that happens out of public view; the important news, usually. But eight years ago, when both parties were holding competitive primaries, they were everywhere, and they were always talking. Hillary Clinton’s infrequent press access came of as aloof, which it was. If you ran into Jeb Bush, you’d usually get to ask him something, and for a while, if you covered Donald Trump, you could shout something at his frequent press conferences and he’d either answer you or berate Jorge Ramos.
Republicans need the media much less now, and Democrats have a confounding primary that they’d rather not even talk about. It’s a strange year to be doing all of this. I want sometimes to quote Tony Soprano to the network embeds, who have to tail every candidate: “You came in at the end. The best is over.” (Remember Melfi’s response: “Many Americans feel that way.”)
Am I still on this trail? Obviously. Went to South Carolina for Tim Scott’s launch, drove a bit, caught up with Asa Hutchinson, went home, went to New Hampshire, followed around Nikki Haley and Scott again. As soon as I get to any early state I appreciate just how differently people approach their candidates from place. And anyone who’s covered campaigns knows that New Hampshire gives you the most material.
This happens in several ways. These people see candidates constantly, constantly, and they vote all the time. Tens of thousands of them have met presidents. How many people do you know who met an eventual president face to face and argued with them? This is just standard with the sort of New Hampshire people who show up to meet candidates. Sometimes, they will share the story of their lives, and the people they’ve met across it, before they ask questions; the point here is to let the candidate know that they’re addressing someone who picks talent. An army of Michael Ovitzes, outfitted by L.L. Bean.
I love this, genuinely. Much of the country will, if it meets a candidate, look at him/her as they deliver a speech. If you just show up and give speeches in New Hampshire, word gets out. Did he take questions? No, he just gave a speech. In office, a president doesn’t have to risk gotchas from people called on randomly because they got to one of the good seats in an un-screened event. But to run, he does, and it’s still fun to cover.
South Carolina doesn’t have this same tradition, but Hutchinson got a good crowd when I saw him in Tega City. He keynoted a country club meeting of the Reaganites, a crowd whose members, when I talked to him, were mostly deciding between Trump and DeSantis. “You vetoed a bill that would have made it illegal for minors to receive hormone treatments or surgeries to change their gender,” said the moderator at one point, and the members dug in deeper, asking how he’d stop “the sexualization of children” and end “wokeness” on campus.
I collected everything I could, then got the weekend off. We spent the most time out on Sunday, at a friend’s house twenty minutes away, by the car-sized offset smoker where he seasons four chickens, two racks of ribs, a pork butt, and brisket that was harder to quantify because it disappeared instantly. The backyard filled up with kids, armed with dollar store water guns, and then it rained hard enough for the kids and their peaking stamina to let loose inside. A Texas sheet cake appeared as the most beleaguered parents started to head out. As did we, so I could come home and write this.
The Best Thing I Read: The competition included “Meditations” and “Candide,” and I’ll give it to “Candide,” which like so much of the canon I’ve been working through was funny. You get the laughs two ways: from the actual jokes (“When a man is in love, jealous, and just whipped by the Inquisition, he is no longer himself”) and from squinting to recognize Voltaire’s targets. By now I know a lot of people who stopped rationalizing events, logged off, and cultivated their gardens.
Other reading was pretty light. I’m halfway through “Killers of the Flower Moon,” and can see the movie projecting on my closed eyelids already. In a waiting room, I burned through “Disciples,” a throwback crime comic about a murderous cult, illustrated by the pulp artist Benjamin Marra. He’s come a long way since I picked up “Blades and Lazers” as a goof at the Small Press Expo, and his ungainly, violent style is the best thing about a story that’s half dramatic twists.
The Best Thing I Saw: “The Umbrellas of Cherbourg,” another category-killer. What else is going to hold up after you’ve seen one of the two or three most romantic films of the 1960s? “Morvern Callar” came very close, another Lynne Ramsey banger, seen after I realized it was streaming on Kanopy. My fiancé noticed a neat trick: The sequence when Morvern is frolicking around Spain with Lanna has a sloppy queasiness that vanishes when Morvern flees and meets with the book agents. Enjoyed Jan Švankmajer’s “Alice,” trying to channel the inner child who’d find his marionettes terrifying, and “Body Double,” which made the next category easy.
The Best Thing I Heard: “Telescope,” the theme from “Body Double,” a smooth synthesizer composition that initiates the film’s second act as Craig Wasson stops being a claustrophobic actor and lets himself be driven by obsession.
After that, I had a lot of fun with the new “Video Archives” podcast, in which Quentin Tarantino, having expanded his “Once Upon a Time in Hollywood” universe with a novel, expands it with a tribute to his fake star Rick Dalton (Leonardo DiCaprio). Last week, Tarantino’s New Beverly Cinema, which displays some posters for Dalton’s phony movies inside, put up a marquee announcing the actor’s death. Then came this pod episode, with Tarantino and Roger Avary discussing the Dalton movies they’d “seen” in the detail that friends use to riff on real TV westerns and real cult films.
Back to Iowa tomorrow. I’ll finish listening there.
The train scene in "Umbrellas of Cherbourg" brings me to my knees. So good.