By John Y. Brown III, on Tue Apr 2, 2013 at 12:00 PM ET
Yeah, c’mon. Don’t look confused. You know exactly what I’m talking about. And, yeah, I would be embarrassed too. In fact, I admit that I am right now.
Middle aged guys in business no longer play extreme sports or get into bar fights or even raise their voice in a combative way outside the home, the final domain of the toothless tiger. Remember the Will Ferrell SNL skit, “You should respect me because I drive a Dodge Stratus!”? That’s the mentality I’m getting at with the title above.
We are driving late today in the minivan and my teenage daughter and her friend are in the backseat and I get a business call I “have to take.”
It goes on and on and I’m thinking to myself, “I hope my daughter is listening to this. I’m on my game and sounding pretty darned impressive right now. Maybe she’ll finally appreciate how tough my conference calls and business meetings and PowerPoint presentations really are.”
And as an added bonus her friend was listening too and would surely reinforce this belief, I was sure, by later commenting to my daughter when I wasn’t around, “Wow, Maggie, did you hear all those acronyms you father was using? He must be really smart and important. I didn’t understand most of what he was saying. He’s a lot more impressive my other friends’ dads. You are so lucky.” (Or words to that affect)
As the call was winding up, I kicked it up a notch. Threw in some gratuitous “ROI” comment and a then long string of business acronyms that darned near made it sound like I was speaking an entirely foreign language that was so complicated it is made up entirely of abbreviations. I looked for an opening for the word “synergy” but had to settle for “coop-ition” which I kinda made up since I was already on a roll.
And then I calmly and smoothly hung up the phone and slipped it in to my cowboy-like holster. All the while knowing the ‘lil ladies in the backseat had just witnessed that there was a new sheriff in town.
I paused for a moment, and slowly swerved around to “apologize” for my important business call and, I admit it, see if they had any questions.
Both of them had put in their earphones and were listening to their iPods totally oblivious to the machismo heroics that had just occurred in the front seat of the minivan. That my wife was driving for me.
“All finished?” my wife asked with the tone I remembered hearing the first time my mom told me I was wearing “big boy pants.”
I felt like I should say “I’m playing cowboy.” But didn’t have the guts to admit it.
By Jonathan Miller, on Tue Apr 2, 2013 at 11:52 AM ET
Magic Johnson’s Son Goes Public with BF — Parents So Proud
Magic Johnson‘s 20-year-old son hit the Sunset Strip, hand in hand with his boyfriend … and his parents couldn’t be happier for their kid.
Earvin Johnson III — aka EJ — is one of Magic’s 3 kids. The Lakers legend tells TMZ, “Cookie and I love EJ and support him in every way.” Magic goes on, “We’re very proud of him.”
The feeling is mutual … ’cause EJ told us he’s been “hoping and praying” for his dad’s team, the Los Angeles Dodgers, ever since Magic and his business partners took over the franchise.
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Looks like The RP’s 15 minutes are going into overtime. Here is video of his apperance on CNN’s OutFront with Erin Burnett, talking about his piece for Newsweek/The Daily Beast about Ashley Judd’s aborted campaign for the U.S. Senate:
By Nancy Slotnick, on Tue Apr 2, 2013 at 8:30 AM ET
I’m going to make it official: communication is no longer linear. What do I mean by that? Linear communication is the tennis volley. You write a letter to a friend or lover. (Snail mail, anyone? I don’t think so.) You wait for a response. You email someone. They reply to your email. Your text bubbles are evenly matched and go back and forth in a relatively equal fashion.
What’s non-linear communication? Posting Happy Birthday on your friend’s Facebook wall and never expecting a reply. Texting someone multiple times because they never reply to your texts. (Not recommended in a dating context.) Needing to email someone a few times before they notice. Tweeting.
We have come to expect one directional communication. Is this human connection? Yes, it’s a form of it. Is it a good way to promote a cause, share breaking news or start a revolution? Totally. Is it a good way to make you feel totally popular on your birthday? Absolutely. Does it help you stay in touch with acquaintances and stay on their radar screen for party invites and the like? Yes! Is it healthy in the realm of dating and romantic relationships? Hell no. There’s the rub.
I am considered to be a dating expert (Well, Oprah called me one so that makes it so.) Yet I don’t have many hardfast rules in my arsenal. I’m not a Rules Girl in that way. But I have always had one rule in dating that is extremely useful:
“Don’t make two moves in a row.”
Useful until now, that is. The reason why it works is because you get to find out if the person is truly interested or not. The convention wisdom is that if they are interested, they will reply back. You can avoid a lot of wasted time this way. Rather than continually reaching out to someone who says they’re busy when what they are really trying to say is: “Not interested,” you just wait to see if they reply. Radio silence gives you your answer.
But these days it is pretty impossible to tell if someone just didn’t get the message. How many times do you get a little Facebook chat push notification on your phone and then it marks it as read before you even open it? And how many friends do you have that either never reply on Facebook, or only reply on Facebook, or will reply to a text but don’t read your email or vice versa? And then if you ever attempt to date someone 10 years your junior or your senior, you completely can’t synch up your communication methods?
In the words of Charlie Brown, “Argh!!” And speaking of Charlie Brown, it often feels like the people on the other end of all of my communication media are just like those grown-ups on the Peanuts: “wah-wah-wahwah-waaah!” I want to crawl under a rock. But that doesn’t play well in dating either. So what to do?
Always stay confident and think positive about the other person, whilst trying to keep the conversation as linear as possible. Notice what’s you and what’s them. (In other words- “Are your text bubbles HUGE and they reply: “K.”? But never never make assumptions about why the person isn’t responding in the way you’d like. You can have hunches, and certainly don’t hold off all your other plans while waiting for a reply, but don’t give in to getting paranoid.
I had some business dealings recently with a company that I found online. They make patches that iron onto uniforms and T-shirts. I couldn’t find a phone number on the website so I emailed them to ask if we could talk by phone for them to answer some questions for me. It seemed so much easier for me to deal with it by phone. But the very nice guy on the other end of email kept answering each question I had quite promptly. He never answered my question about speaking by phone. I resisted the urge to be annoyed with the fact that I couldn’t talk to him by phone and we got the deal done.
Read the rest of… Nancy Slotnick: Are you there, Buddy? It’s me, Margaret.
By John Y. Brown III, on Mon Apr 1, 2013 at 12:00 PM ET
Biblical interpretation. (My all-time favorite)
When my daughter Maggie was about 6 or 7 years old, I tried reading portions of the Children’s Bible to her.
The first story, of course, was Adam and Eve.
… Always multitasking and preoccupied, Maggie was only half-listening until I mentioned both Adam and Eve were “naked.”
“Naked?!” Maggie’s questioned incredulously as her head whipped around and eye brows furrowed.
“I know, right?” I said. And trying to teach her to think for herself added, “So what’s up with that? Why do you think they would be, you know, naked?”
Maggie squinted her eyes as she pondered the question and then shot back an answer I wasn’t expecting.
She shrugged, and explained, “Maybe they hadn’t invented looking down yet.”
By John Y. Brown III, on Mon Apr 1, 2013 at 10:30 AM ET
Justin Timberlake, Mila Kunis, and US Senator Mitch McConnell are teaming up for the sequel to the romantic comedy hit “Friends With Benefits” titled “Friends with Benefits and Super PACs”
Here’s a clip of a video from the new movie with a cameos from JayZ and Sen McConnell.
See if you can pick out which back up dancer is a US Senator.
By Erica and Matt Chua, on Mon Apr 1, 2013 at 10:00 AM ET
Going from the Middle East to Latin America was a breath of fresh air. While the sites and experiences of the UAE, Oman, Jordan, Israel, Egypt and Turkey were wonderful, the constraints of daily life wore on us. Here’s what it felt like to escape the Middle East.
HE SAID…
The Middle East is different. While China may be different because of people’s actions, or India different due to hygiene, or Brazil different due to liveliness, it’s hard to put a finger on what exactly is different in the Middle East. It’s not so much an attribute, but a feeling. Being in the Middle East feels different.
No matter where I went I couldn’t get over one thing: half of the population is imprisoned in their clothing. While some places were “more liberal”, almost everywhere we went women had to wear a burqa and head covering. Claim all the “cultural differences”, “religious” and “historical” reasons you want, but to me it is wrong. While the burqa’s fashion disaster itself is reprehensible, what it represents is worse: that women are second-class, they cannot make their own choices. Imprisonment in clothing and culture is the only way I can truly explain it.
Argentina is the polar opposite. Women and men alike are free to choose what to cover and what to leave exposed. Women are allowed to act independently, travel freely, choose their education, and responsible for the consequences of their own actions. While the Middle East is about limits, Latin America is about a life without limits. The attitudes, personalities and styles of Argentina were a much needed break from the Middle East.
All day, everyday, I’d rather be in Latin America, full of it’s infidels and fun than the Middle East.
Read the rest of… Erica & Matt Chua: Escaping the Middle East
By Jonathan Miller, on Mon Apr 1, 2013 at 8:45 AM ET
While my following piece from Newsweek/The Daily Beast is not an April Fools’ joke like my earlier post this morning, it is yet another exhibit of our our political system is constantly playing unfunny jokes on the American people:
“We’d like to have you join us this afternoon for a discussion on the Ashley Judd campaign,” the young national talk show producer chirped into my phone. ”We understand that she will be announcing her candidacy within the next 24 hours.”
“I’d love to join you,” I responded. A recovering politiciannever turns down 15 minutes.) “But, uh, I’m pretty sure, uh, she’s not announcing.”
I looked over to the left side of my desk, at the draft exploratory committee papers that Ashley had asked me to prepare, still missing several items that I had requested from her.
“Oh, no,” the producer responded. “Our reporter has it on good authority from Ashley’s people that an announcement is imminent.”
I thought I was one of “Ashley’s people.”
Before I appeared on the show, I asked another of Ashley’s volunteer advisers, whom I knew had spoken to her that morning.
“Not true. Just another fabrication.”
Another fabrication.
The past several weeks had seemed like a dizzying blur of false testimony, as the national media seized any morsel of news or gossip to sate its ravenous appetite for Ashley Judd stories. As the actress contemplated whether to move back to Kentucky and challenge Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, I was alternating with Congressman John Yarmuth as witness for the defense against a steady stream of salacious recriminations.
Click here to read my full piece from Newsweek/The Daily Beast: “How Kentucky Democrats Duped the MSM and Helped Elbow Out Ashley Judd”
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UPDATED NOON
Get me some antibiotics — the piece has gone viral. Check out the following pieces (h/t Jason Delambre):
An adviser to Ashley Judd said that the decision by the actress to pass on a challenge to Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) next year was the result of a calculated effort by a small group of Democrats to stifle her electoral prospects.
In a story published Monday in The Daily Beast, Jonathan Miller wrote that the “most egregious disinformation” about Judd and her would-be candidacy “came from entirely anonymous sources” and helped create an unfavorable narrative. Before she announced last week that she will not run in 2014, reports suggested that Judd told a group of supporters at a private dinner, “I have been raped twice, so I think I can handle Mitch McConnell.” Miller, who attended that dinner, said he “never heard her say anything remotely like that.”
He also highlighted the recent suggestions that former President Bill Clinton had lobbied against a Judd candidacy in the hopes of getting Kentucky’s Secretary of State Alison Lundergan Grimes to run instead. Follow up reports later confirmed that Clinton had no problem with a Judd bid, but Miller said the damage had already been done — and now McConnell may be the ultimate beneficiary of the conniving efforts by Democrats.
What happened to the Senatorial aspirations of Hollywood celebrity Ashley Judd? Some believed that she got chased out of the race after Republicans in Kentucky and the NRSC began launching attacks on her past statements, making her reluctant to spend the time and money. Others think that Kentucky Democrats changed their minds on a celebrity campaign after determining that Secretary of State Alison Lundergan Grimes became interested. Both may be true, but according to Judd adviser Jonathan Miller in today’s Daily Beast, the real proximate cause of Judd’s withdrawal was a dirty tricks campaign not from Republicans, but from Kentucky Democrats — aided by a national media that got easily “duped”:
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UPDATED 1:20 PM
More than 8 hours after its original publication, and the article is still the most popular posting at Newsweek/The Daily Beast. Check out this screen shot:
And as an added bonus her friend was listening too and would surely reinforce this belief, I was sure, by later commenting to my daughter when I wasn’t around, “Wow, Maggie, did you hear all those acronyms you father was using? He must be really smart and important. I didn’t understand most of what he was saying. He’s a lot more impressive my other friends’ dads. You are so lucky.” (Or words to that affect)
