Alaska has lately had its share of visits from the right-wing commentariat. I count three in recent months: Rudy Guliani, talk-radio host Michael Reagan, and now Jonah Goldberg, the author of Liberal Fascism: The Secret History of the American Left, From Mussolini to the Politics of Meaning and an editor at National Review online. Sponsored by the University of Alaska Anchorage and the Alaska Press Club, Goldberg will speak 7:30 p.m. Tuesday at the Wendy Williamson Auditorium on the UAA campus.
The title of his talk is, "The Media is Dead, Long Live the Media." I'm on a panel to ask him questions. It would be nice to get an idea of what the talk is about so I could, you know, prepare a little. And then maybe shout out to readers to get some advice. But as of Monday afternoon, when he arrived into town and as I write this, Goldberg isn't having any of it. His handler at UAA said he's not to be bothered until tomorrow.
The media is dead tired. Long live the dead tired media.
My father, John R. Coyne Jr., was a staff writer at the National Review in the 1960s and '70s, so I'm fond of the magazine, or the memory of it. I was too young to read it back then, but rumor has it that it was the intellectual bastion of the right. It was William F. Buckley Jr.'s baby, and he brought to it all of his fierce intellect, curiosity and love of language. Buckley invited all sorts to come on in. I look at the National Review now and what I see are lots of sharp elbows and partisan rants. (Goldberg is at least very sharp and smart.)
He's also a prolific blogger for the magazine. Here's something that he posted today, for instance, under the title, "I ... Love ....It!":
I just think it's beyond hilarious that Acorn gets their dream president, the guy who swears they'll have a seat at the table, and largely because of the heightened profile the shady group got as a result of Obama's election, the super-majority Democratic Senate just voted overwhelmingly to deny them government money. Maybe Pelosi will ensure this is just for show by killing the move in the House. But still, what an awful week for Acorn and what a great week for cosmic comeuppance.
So I guess Goldberg won't be sharing in Atlantic Monthly writer Mark Bowden's lamentation of the demise of journalism and the rise of "political operatives" who are in it not to "educate the public but to win."
Oh! I see he just posted from his hotel room in Anchorage. Here's what he wrote: "I'm finally at my hotel in Anchorage. If you're in the area, come on by my talk tomorrow night."
The blog clocks the entry at 7:57 p.m. EST. That's 4 p.m. in Anchorage.
When he told his handler that he didn't want to be bothered, I don't think he knew I wrote for an online magazine. So, if this were a print publication, tomorrow would be too late. So maybe on the panel tomorrow I should ask him how available newsmakers should make themselves to the media. Particularly when they're visiting our little city. Particularly when a state-funded (socialistic!) institution is paying for it. Particularly when they are members of the media themselves, who are giving a talk about the death of journalism.
Am I making too much of this when the whole fate of journalism is on the line?
Maybe I should make more of that fact that Goldberg was one of the early boosters of Sarah Palin. How in a column he described the way Palin talked as a "native Alaskan's accent/speaking style," which he reckoned would play well in Peoria.
Maybe I should ask him if he's ever been to Peoria. I have. They're pretty smart in Peoria. Smart enough to know that the way Palin talks has nothing to do with Alaska and everything to do with the Yooper accent she decided to use so members of the elite East Coast media, like Goldberg, would think she would appeal to people in Peoria.
Surprise, now Goldberg's wary of Palin and her Peoria-style populism. He recently wrote an epistolary column telling her this. Among other things, he informed our former governor that although she has charisma, she has a lot of catching up to do in the area of, well, book learning.
But fear not. "What you lack, you can learn," he told her in his column. "If knowing how to describe the situation in Pakistan or explain the 'doughnut hole' in health-care coverage was all you needed to get elected, an intern with a subscription to The Economist could be president."
But a woman who in her 40s learned that the The Economist was not just the nickname for the muttering man at the Mugshot Saloon, and who has charisma? Well, that's something all together different.
Maybe I should ask Goldberg if, based on Palin's resume alone, he would have hired someone like her out of college as an intern for The National Review, to be part of a vanguard that would protect the dead- tired media.
She'd keep him hopping, that's for sure. Palin would lead him by the ear to Wasilla, and show him the strip-mall of a town that she's really from, the place that she helped create, the place she believes should be a model for the rest of the country.
For Jonah Goldberg, by golly!
That might wake him up and get him interested enough to help save the dying media.
A warm welcome to Alaska, Jonah. See you tomorrow night.
Contact Amanda Coyne at amanda@alaskadispatch.com