Citizen Mom

Time To Save The World, Or Whatever

Fellow members of Generation X: So, like, no pressure or anything, but it's time for us to save the world -- if we dare. Just, whatever you do, do not under any circumstances actually tell anyone this is what we're up to. Because, really, nothing says cheesy Baby Boomer hubris like declarations about saving the world and stopping the war.

This is the gist of a just-published book, X Saves The World: How Generation X Got The Shaft But Can Still Keep Everything From Sucking, by Jeff Gordinier. He's also an editor-at-large for Details magazine, a father of two and, like me, one of the 46 million Americans born between roughly 1961 and 1976.

Normally, a book like this -- with a title like that -- would send me running for the barf bag, and I will freely admit to rolling my eyes as I opened it. But Gordinier's intentionally overwrought, ironic title does make a point. Because if it seems like everyone -- and by "everyone" I mean the media, Madison Avenue and other cultural powers that be -- went right from waxing rhapsodic about the Age of Aquarius to pondering the burgeoning power of the Gen-Y Millennials, it's not your imagination. Gordinier told me he noticed it about two years ago, when he came up with the magazine essay that eventually became the book.

"We were in the midst of a media monotony, about the Boomers and the Millennials, -- it was either the Boomers are turning 60 and they're still sexy, or it was about the Millennials and Britney, Lindsay, Paris," he said. "I just kept waiting for the Newsweek cover story on Generation X turning 40, and I never saw it." My guess is that this happened because GenX began hitting the big 4-0 around the time Boomers decided 60 was the new 40, and Diane Keaton started shilling products to "redensify" your skin. By the time Nora Ephron deemed it OK to feel bad about her neck, it was pretty clear Boomers wouldn't be relinquishing their hold on middle age until someone yanked it out of their hands. After all, if we're middle aged, what does that make them?

Much to my relief, Gordinier's book not a polemic against our Boomer Overlords or their crafty Millennial minions. Instead, it's an only occasionally cynical call for us to stop waiting for someone else to legitimize our power and instead, to just start using it, and in the grassroots, DIY and other "alternative" ways in which we're most successful. Except how do people raised to reject authority, with suspicion seemingly threaded into our DNA -- a generation now led by exactly the kind of geeks and square pegs who never really cared about changing the world at large -- now come together? And beyond that, how do we make sure we're using our powers for good, not for evil?

READ THE REST AT MCCLATCHYDC.COM

(Note: No, my editors will not make that my new Confetti Betty column sig. But like Wooderson says, "It'd be cooler if you did!")

CONFETTI BETTY: Michelle Obama And The Hundred And Ten Percenters

"First and foremost, I am struggling every day to try to keep it together."

This was Michelle Obama, current embodiment of "put together" woman, chatting with a group of suburban moms in an Episcopal church in a well-heeled Philadelphia suburb on Thursday, part of a daylong swing across southeastern Pennsylvania in advance of the the state's all-important April 22 primary. Around her sat five women, all working moms of preschoolers, all with fresh hairdos and nice handbags and, it must be said, all white -- though not all Democrats. Their children's class had just been treated to a reading of Dr. Seuss by Mrs. Obama, who then came upstairs for a little girl talk.

[Obligatory Michelle Obama fashion report: Gray wide-legged chalk-stripe pants, white scoop-neck top with wide black belt, with a black cardigan. Call it Daytime Fierce.]

Carla Van Winkle said the Child Care Tax Credit is nice and all, but seems unrealistic given what day-care really costs. "I pay a lot more than $5,000 a year," she said. High school teacher Michelle Daniszewski talked about how she was torn over whether to return to work after the birth of her second child, now 20 months old, but "it really made sense just for the benefits." The flip side? "I'm spending over $40,000 a year in day care," more than half her salary, she said.

Maria Spahr, whose job at 3M means frequent travel away from her young daughter, said without family members nearby to help out, her own delicate domestic balancing act would fail.  Obama talked about how fortunate she was to have her mother alive, available and willing to help her care for Malia and Sasha while she and Barack are out campaigning, saying "She is helping me raise my girls, which is allowing me to breathe." At this point even I couldn't suppress a knowing smile, thinking about how my mother would be greeting my son's school bus that afternoon.

Read the rest at HERE! [McClatchyDC.com]

Photo by Jonathan D. Niemerfroh/Main Line Times

CONFETTI BETTY: The Other Women

Cindy McCain totally just had a Hillary Clinton moment.

There she was, wearing that same expression, eyes locked on her husband as he denied having an affair with a different (though, not dissimilar-looking? ) blond and trashing those who would besmirch his honor, in this case, The New York Times.

We've seen that look before, just as we've all watched this entire drama before, even down to the part where his staff tries to make the woman buzz off. Monica Lewinsky was shipped over to the Pentagon, supposedly Vicki Iseman got a stern talking-to at Union Station.

Instead of from a couch in front of a "60 Minutes" camera, the way the Clintons did it back in '92, Mrs. McCain's moment happened in front of a bank of journalists, her every blink and smile setting off a spray of photo flashes and whirring shutters. And this in a week where the GOP frontrunner's wife had already not-so-subtly called out Michelle Obama on her remark about being proud of the U.S.A. for the first time in her adult life. Pardon my French, but this lady's got balls.

READ THE REST HERE!

CONFETTI BETTY: Fattest Tuesday Ever

Hey, Happy American Super Idol Fat Tuesday, everybody!

As I write this, the polls here in New Jersey are still several hours from opening for their Super Tuesday vote-a-thon. This is handy, as it gives me yet more time to torture myself as I decide whether to vote for Barack Obama or Hillary Clinton in the Democratic primary, picking between two historic choices presented to me in this fifth presidential contest in which I am eligible to cast a ballot.

It's funny, though. Perhaps naively, I thought the choice would be easier when the time came that I had the opportunity to cast a meaningful, non-symbolic vote for a woman in a presidential contest. Maybe I underestimated Obama, though it's possible I overestimated my own feminism; clearly I wasn't prepared for the amount of Clinton Fatigue I'd feel at this point in my life.

If it's OK to vote for Obama because he cast a rookie vote against the war, or because that will.i.am video made me weepy, then isn't it OK to vote for Clinton because she makes me feel . . . historic? Should I be making decisions based on who's winning the celebrity endorsement draft, or does it really mean something that so many actors and musicians feel strongly enough this year to really take a stand this time around? It sure isn't like '04, when it was Bruce and Ben and Curt Schilling and most everyone else still too afraid of being called unpatriotic.

My aha! moment during this whole primary fight came during the Democratic Super Tuesday debate, when a Politico reader gave voice to the doubt that's been nibbling at me for months now:

"I'm 38 years old and I have never had an opportunity to vote in a presidential election in which a Bush or a Clinton wasn't on the ticket. How can you be an agent of change when we have had the same two families in the White House for the last 30 years?"

Follow You, Follow Me?

Are you Twittering? I am. Check me out here.

(I know, that feed on the left-hand side is pretty fug. Might be time for a site overhaul, anyway.)

CONFETTI BETTY: Don't Let It Be Forgot

Well, it only took 38 years, but it seems The Sixties are finally over. A new Camelot has been declared, by the only people truly qualified to do so: The old Camelot, or what's left of it.

On Sunday, Caroline Kennedy endorsed Barack Obama in an emotional and eloquent New York Times Op-Ed, and on Monday her uncle, Sen. Edward Kennedy, followed suit with a blustery endorsement speech at American University, thunderous and full of high-flown liberal gravitas.

"It is time again for a new generation of leadership," the Massachusetts senator said, in a public repudiation not only of Hillary Clinton's campaign for the Democratic nomination but of her husband's vision of himself as the party's elder statesman.

Such was the immaculate conception of Black Camelot: a re-birth announcement followed by an urgent invitation to join them on the New New Frontier. The Kennedys are talking to you, Baby Boomers, telling you to forget that grinning young man with the brush-cut, the one shaking JFK's hand. These people actually knew John Kennedy, and Bill Clinton, they are saying, is no John Kennedy.

In her Times endorsement, Caroline Kennedy argued that with all the Democratic contenders' positions on most issues being so similar, it's then appropriate to choose based on intangibles -- in Obama's case, his ability to inspire and his potential to be, in her words, "a president like my father."

Forget Oprah. In gaining not simply the political approval of the Kennedy clan but their emotional embrace, the stamp of "the symbolic Kennedy family thing," Obama now irrevocably wears the crown of Camelot, and people who grew up swallowing the Kennedy myth like Tang will hear Caroline Kennedy's op-ed like a message from the Boomer Planet. She does everything but remark as to how cute Malia and Natasha will look trick-or-treating in the Oval Office.

So why, in all of this talk about President Kennedy, can I not stop thinking about Michelle Obama? I can't help but wonder what Mrs. Obama is thinking today, since she reportedly has no desire to star in any fairy tales. It's important to remember, at moments like this, that Mrs. Obama is 43, like her husband too young to remember Kennedy's much-fabled 1,000 Days. And while he seems to have grown up happily basking in the popular portrayal of the Kennedys as American royalty devoted to public service, her attitude seems to be much more akin to that of a GenX cynic like me, who hears "JFK" and thinks "Marilyn Monroe" before "Peace Corps," or "advisers to Vietnam" as quickly as "ask what you can do for your country."

Never one to mince words, the potential First Lady has displayed a distinctly post-Boomer tendency to reject the Kennedy mystique. In a USA Today article last year, she cautioned against turning Barack into a political messiah, saying it's "important at this time for people to feel like they own this process and that they don't turn it over to the next messiah, who's going to fix it all, you know? . . . And then we're surprised when people turn out not to be who we've envisioned them to be."

"Camelot to me doesn't work," [Michelle Obama] says. "It was a fairy tale that turned out not to be completely true because no one can live up to that. And I don't want to live like that."

In so many words, the woman Caroline Kennedy just tapped to be the next Jackie is on record saying she'll pass, thanks. Maybe it's because we all know far more now about what JFK, his family, his sexual predilections, his mob ties, and the complications of his marriage than anyone did when the original Camelot was formed, or that she's bought into that unfortunate, but ubiquitous, "no black man will make it to the White House" meme.

More likely, it's because Michelle Obama isn't so swayed by the misty water-colored memories of the way the Kennedys were that she forgets how Camelot ended: With a First Lady in a blood-stained pink suit, crawling across the back of a limousine. Don't let it be forgot.

From McClatchyDC.com

Mitt Romney Takes The Pledge

Plural marriage?

Sketch by Jessica Hagy, alt.campaign

BY AMY Z. QUINN

So Mitt -- while you're all in a sharing mood, which is it? Boxers, briefs, or Magic Mormon Underpants ?

Yes, it's Mormon week out there in primary land, and on Thursday, Romney took The Pledge, declaring Jesus Christ his Lord and Savior and saying that freedom and religion can be, like, friends with benefits but can't actually be a couple-couple . . . or something like that. Actually, what he said was that while the government can't, and he wouldn't, pre- or proscribe a specific denomination, everybody should get religion. The quote was that "freedom requires religion," and that's a bold statement, even coming from a guy who was for abortion rights before he was against them. I'd argue that Romney got it exactly backward: Religion certainly can exist in the absence of freedom -- ask one of those monks in Myanmar, or a Catholic in China -- but it flourishes when it is freely expressed and shared. And while the Founders certainly gave "their Creator" his propers, the problem is in deciding whether his existence in their lives equals not just an endorsement of, but the requirement of, religion -- not just God -- in this country. On that point, the candidate couldn't have been clearer.

It was an important speech for Romney, and with so many people either suspicious of or clueless about Mormonism, it was an address he was going to have to deliver -- and absolutely nail -- at some point. But after weeks of putting it off, why serve it up now, when the question itself isn't even new?

It's not just about allaying the fears of those who think Mormonism is kooky and suspect, or that leading an LDS life is all about "the garment" and toothy Osmonds, or that the faith is really some quasi-Christian cult, like Scientology with braids. Besides, many Catholics would say you've got to go a long way to beat crying statues and stigmata when it comes to kooky and suspect. And for all but the most extremist Christians, Romney's clear testimony of his belief in Christ, and his declaration that Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints wouldn't interfere with his governance is something people are either going to trust him on, or not. So why now?

Well, let's just say it's a long three weeks until Jan. 3, caucus day in Iowa, and Romney's speech opens up just the kind of debate to ignite conversation at holiday dinner tables during the long news cycles until then. Former Arkansas governor Mike Huckabee had been sucking up all the airtime since positively killing it at the CNN/YouTube GOP debate with a combination of down-home clarity and more one-liners than a Borscht Belt comic. And the resulting press coverage -- a solid seven days of it -- delved far more deeply into Huckabee's former flab and how he delivered those zingers than it did into how he believes the earth was created in seven days or his Willie Horton problem. Clearly, the far more precious aim of Romney's speech at the George H.W. Bush Presidential Library was to wrest the spotlight away before "Huckamania" becomes the story of the Iowa caucuses.

In the hours since the speech, however, the consensus seems to be that while Romney finally delivered an address so obviously polished as to leave threadbare the elbows of his jacket, he didn't really say a whole lot. Certainly, it wasn't for Romney to give the  country a primer on his church's history -- there are plenty of Mormons who'll be glad to do that for you, though -- but a peek into his heart might have gone a long way. Romney invoked John F. Kennedy's own "finger of suspicion" religion speech from back in 1960, a time before TMI , in which the first Catholic president spoke about broad religious acceptance, but specifically not about what impact Catholicism had on him as a person. (Though given what we now know about JFK's personal history, count on guilt playing a role.) Less than 24 hours later, they're already calling it Romney's "JFK speech," and maybe that's appropriate, because like Kennedy, Romney touched all the political bases while not actually telling us anything about himself or his religion.

Confetti Betty: As Good As It Gets?

In the midst of all the one-liners, Hillary Clinton insults and oblique references to George Dubya Who? during Wednesday nights' GOP YouTube debate, some of the night's more pointed queries -- all on social issues -- came from questioners since found to have -- gasp! -- ties to Democrats.

Openly Gay retired Army Brigadier Gen. Keith Kerr, asked the "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" question; he's also been a member of a Hillary Clinton steering committee for LGBT issues and supported John Kerry. Another questioner, a college kid named Ted Faturos, munched an ear of corn while asking about farm subsidies. Cute, right? Except Ted worked as a high school intern for a Democratic legislator. A woman who asked the abortion question, is on her MySpace page in a Kerry T-shirt, and the black dude who asked the gay question is known to be down with Obama. Even the Pittsburgh mom who asked about lead-poisoned toys from China, has Democratic leanings!

Frankly it's all very "The Hills." But does it actually matter?

Some are calling it another example of CNN's liberal bias. Maybe it was just the influence of "slobbering Anderson Cooper fans," or part of A.C.'s is-he-or-isn't-he "gay agenda." The whole thing certainly wasn't the apex of transparent journalism, but I'm not sure the non-disclosures were important enough to negate the value of the questions themselves. What I'm saying is that it hardly seems necessary, and even less likely, that the Clinton campaign would have had to plant the gay general. For one thing, after all the hubbub over the "diamonds or pearls" question in Las Vegas, they surely wouldn't have tried it again in such a high-profile setting.

And with the Democratic party's latest DIY venture, FlipperTV -- an online pool of raw footage of GOP candidates shot by Democratic "trackers" and available for re-mixing, setting to music, or homemade ad-making -- getting off the ground, it a no-brainer that the Republicans are doing the same. Planting questions seems hardly worth the effort, especially after "How do we beat the bitch?"

But really, who else was going to ask those questions? Obviously, they're being asked within the party itself. There's a reason that some socially liberal Republicans are either switching parties or thinking about voting Democratic in November, and that's because they feel pushed out of their party. These are folks who might have been willing to vote for pro-choice Rudy Giuliani -- but wait, he's got another scandal, so maybe not.

If you ask me, those questions are just more evidence that Republicans suck at YouTube. Yes, that's a broad generalization of a kind I don't usually make, but come on -- did you watch this thing? People throwing shotguns, a dude waving a Bible, the Stars and Bars, people. And the videos made by the candidates themselves weren't much better.

 

One of the highlights of the Democratic version of the CNN/YouTube debate were the short videos produced by each campaign in that "edgy" style the Internets love so much. You remember, the one with Bill and Hillary playing like the last episode of "The Sopranos"? Or the John Edwards one, where he makes fun of his hair? Man, they were awesome. There was nothing that juicy to be found among the GOP offerings, (save for the exchange between McCain and Romney on waterboarding) but commercials you can see on network TV -- which is sort of the opposite of YouTube.

Only Fred Thompson's old-school negative attack ad, in which he calls out Mitt Romney and Mike Huckabee, stood out, and not just because everyone was figuring he'd do some kind of "Law and Order" thing. Other candidates did highlight reels, or ignored the primary race entirely and focused on the real enemy, Hillary Clinton. Only Thompson's spot stayed on message -- Fred's gen-u-wine conservative principles -- and on mission -- the race he's in right now. This makes him either a genius or just really old, but probably not both.

In the whole two hours, the best of the bunch came from a guy named Nick Anderson (and he's not really even an average citizen, but an editorial cartoonist for the Houston Chronicle) and that involved an animated Dick Cheney with a hunting rifle. Not exactly Robert Smigel, but I guess with the Hollywood writers still on strike and "Dancing With The Stars" over for the time being, this might be as good as it's going to get.

CONFETTI BETTY: The Two Kuciniches

There's a moderately entertaining Brazilian electro-pop band you've probably never heard of called CSS, which is short for Cansei de Ser Sexi. That's Portuguese for "I got tired of being sexy," a quote attributed to a Beyonce grown weary of her bootylicious image.

I'm thinking of this Tuesday night as I watch Elizabeth Kucinich, the leggy redhead whose husband (you may have heard) is running for president, being swarmed by cameras. She's a few feet from me in the "Spin Alley" area set up in the student center at Drexel University after the Democratic debate, where campaign officials stand in front of placards bearing their candidates' name and wait for reporters to show up for the post-game analysis. Dennis Kucinich, with the wife in tow, is the only actual candidate in the room, unless you count Gen. Wesley Clark, who dropped out early but now arrives sporting a grin and a Hillary button.

Anyway, Mrs. Kucinich is looking as if all the gawking is getting on her last nerve -- maybe she saw "The Daily Show" Monday night and caught that "FLILF" segment. It's not new that Mrs. Kucinich is a stone hottie with a tongue stud and hair that appears longer than her hubby is tall; she's been on the campaign trail with the Ohio congressman for months now. But the latest rash of stories comparing and contrasting her hottitude vs. that of Jeri Thompson, also labeled a "trophy wife," has made her far more a rock star than Barack Obama seems lately.

(And how is it that Michelle Obama, a public relations professional with beauty-queen looks, has managed to remain gorgeous yet is still taken seriously by the same people who can barely contain wolf whistles while they gaze up at Kucinich? Can it really just be because Mrs. Obama married a guy her own age?)

Lucky for Mrs. Kucinich, when the media grows bored of this latest cycle of goddess-worship, they'll be able to switch easily back to the other preferred Kucinich storyline, though this is unlucky for the hubby. That's the one about Tin-Foil Hat Kucinich, the one who says the president needs his head examined, the one who claims (like 14 percent of Americans) to have seen a UFO.

This is the Kucinich the reporters default to when they tire of Elizabeth, because -- duh -- journalists are generally fairly lazy, and Kucinich is polling behind Stephen Colbert, and the sooner he drops out, the easier it'll be for everyone to keep track. What complicates this otherwise never-fail plan is that Kucinich isn't actually a loon, but a six-term congressman who shows up fully prepared and ready to articulate his positions, even when they're wacky. Contrast that to Obama, whose candidacy seemed to be shriveling before our very eyes as he fumbled his way through several key exchanges on the debate stage.

Yet, for a third-tier candidate with little chance of winning, that clip of Kucinich talking about flying saucers is the one you're all YouTubing this week. For that you can thank Tim Russert, who asked that inane question after admonishing the audience against applauding their candidate, lest they take precious time away from the serious business of political debate.

***

BETTY BONUS!

There's a new Apple commercial on TV, I'm unsure whether it's for the iPod or iPhone, where the song playing has lyrics like, "Music is my boyfriend/ music's my imaginary friend." Three guesses who the artist is -- ding! Cansei de Ser Sexi doing "Music Is My Hot Hot Sex." Dig it.

[From alt.campaign]

Photo by Jonathan Valania

Caution: Democratic Spin At Work

Dennis and Elizabeth Kucinich

Mike Nutter, one week before his own Election Night

DNC Chairman Howard Dean

[photos by Amy Z. Quinn]