Myles Brand Gives College Presidents Carte Blanche To Screw Up

College presidents consist mostly of phony, disengeneous, Orwellian cowards. Yes, I know I'm laying it on thick. This is a blog after all. But back to the point. I don't know how it happened that universities started to consistently hire slime for their presidents, but they did. It happened sometime after the Vietnam era. And it has had an awful effect on higher education.

Let me introduce prime example of the sad state of the college presidency number one, Myles Brand. Mr. Brand, currently the president of the NCAA, has been president at two universities. He was a typical college president full of himself and full of Owellian gobbledigook. As NCAA president, he hasn't changed. He talks a big game about reform. He delivers nothing.

As a former college president, he knows full well the drill of what university leadership is about nowawadays. It's about begging for money from wealthy benefactors and protecting the "brand name" of the institution no matter what, even if it means you have to ruin a few lives along the way.

Now let me introduce prime example of the sad state of the college presidency number two, Richard Brodhead. Last year, Duke University was the focus of an event precipitated by a mentally disturbed stripper who accused three lacrosse players of rape. The media descended - hungry for a juicy, lurid story facts be damned - upon Duke. Richard Brodhead - a typical spineless college president - did what most presidents would do to protect the brand name of the university. He cut all ties to anyone associated with the lacrosse team and cancelled the season.

But lo and behold, the rape charge was phony. And in hindsight, it's clear that Richard Brodhead screwed up badly. He panicked. He showed no conviction whatsoever. He won't ever admit to screwing up, but he knows it, his board of trustees knows it, his alumni know it, his faculty know it, his students know it, and everyone who has read about this affair (and given its press coverage, I'd put that number at about 100,000,000 people) know it. His is a very public failure.

While Brodhead won't ever admit to failure - to do so would be bad for his inflated ego and for the "brand name" of Duke - he does need to try to fix his mistake. What does a cowardly college president do? Get help from cowardly friends of course.

Let me introduce prime example of the sad state of the college presidency number three, the group of college presidents of the ACC. Duke is a member of the ACC. The college presidents of the ACC were most recently famous for collectively deciding to expand the conference in the name of revenue despite the hardship it would place on student-athletes in terms of travel time. In essence, they sacrificed students for money. It's not a group of people anyone can respect.

Brodhead asked this ignoble group to back him in his effort to fix his mistake without ever admitting he made a mistake. He asked them to sign a petition to get another year of eligibility for the lacrosse players he treated like dirt. Given that these presidents would have done the same cowardly thing as Brodhead if they had been in the same situation, they of course signed the petition.

The petition went to the NCAA. And given that Myles Brand would have done the same cowardly thing as Brodhead had he been president of Duke, he of course approved the petition.

Implicit in the process of creating this petition, getting signatures, and getting NCAA approval is the fact that Brodhead made a mistake by cancelling the lacrosse season. Why go through the effort unless you have done something wrong?

But more importantly for college athletics is that the approval of this petition sets a nasty precedent. It means that in the future when college presidents screw up and cancel a season for the sake of public relations, Myles Brand and the NCAA will cover their behinds. The NCAA is supposed to be a regulatory agency. Instead, it has decided to get in bed with college presidents. It isn't the first time. It won't be the last.

Living Life Backwards

There’s a wonderful novel I read a couple of years ago, The Confessions of Max Tivoli. In that book, the narrator ages backwards. At birth, he starts out small and pruney. At death he has the face of an infant. But what he does do normally is psychologically and emotionally mature over the years.

Over time, we change psychologically and emotionally in many ways. And one aspect of our development is that we become cautious and risk averse. It seems odd to me that people in their teens think they are immortal and engage in all kinds of risky, almost death seeking behavior when they have the most to lose. They have a future ahead of them. They have families to raise to promulgate our species. It would seem that in terms of the success of our species, we’d want them to be cautious. That way fewer of them would die crashing cars into bridge barriers at 110 mph, etc.

And it would also seem advantageous if older people would become thrill seekers. They’ve already outlived their biological purpose. Modern medicine keeps them going for decades longer than they once lived. They are a kind of dead weight on the social system in some ways.

So it would seem best if this aspect of our lives was lived backwards. We should be having old folks staying up all hours of the night (they don’t need much sleep anyway), buying all kinds of new junk (they’d have all kinds of dough if they were cautious when they were young), racing motorcycles on dirt tracks, and parachute jumping out of airplanes. They should be irresponsible and unpredictable. After all, they have one last decade or two at pure joy. Why not?

And then young adults could cautiously hoard their dollars, drive Volvos, sleep nine hours a day (which they actually need), listen to NPR and watch PBS. There would be no Britneys ignoring their young ones needing to go into rehab.

Our psychological evolution, hasn’t quite kept up with our ability to prolong lives. We are a bit behind the curve.

Of course, the risky behavior associated with youth means that young adults tend to impetuously hop into bed with whomever they lay their eyes on. And that too, helps promote the species. If they were risk averse, we just might have lower birth rates.

So it’s probably true that my modest proposal for reversing human behavior as a function of time would not be the best for species success. And it’s probably true that I’m just plain full of it. The ability to b.s. also seems to come with age as well. What biological purpose it serves is unknown to me. ;)

The CD RIP

When Amazon announced a week or two ago that they would start selling mp3s without copy restrictions, they put the final nail in the coffin for CDs. The album format, a collection of about a dozen tunes from an artist, is now officially dead. It’s a singles market now.

I’m old enough to remember the era before the album format took hold. When I was a tiny – and I mean tiny – kid obsessed with pop music, the single was everything. Albums were the stuff of jazz and classical music. Those pop singles – written by people like Carole King and sung by some hunk or pretty girl – were pieces of complete ear candy, three-minute chirpy meditations about girlfriends and boyfriends. It was kids stuff. And I loved it.

You could buy a single for 59 cents. I was very young and 59 cents was a lot of dough. I’d buy them used for a quarter from the owner of a soda fountain when the single went out of rotation on his jukebox.

But then things changed. Bands like The Beatles started to get serious and think of more than just a single. They started to make concept albums like Revolver. FM radio, which was a poor sister to AM radio at the time, started to take hold by appealing to the album market. Bands and singers followed the lead of The Beatles and Dylan and developed artistic pretensions (whether they met their lofty artistic goals is debatable, but they did try); the music wasn't just about girlfriends and boyfriends anymore. Record companies knew that selling full-length albums was a lot more profitable than singles so they pushed the album format big time. For the next 40 years the album – first in vinyl, now in CD/digital format – was king.

Nothing lasts forever. The public has a shorter attention span now. Listening to an entire album by one band is not what people want; they just don’t have the patience anymore. Digital downloading has made it possible to just snatch the one or two catchy songs from an album that a fan wants. It’s not surprising that CD sales have plummeted 20 percent this year. For the CD, whose sales peaked in about 2004, there’s no place to go but downhill.

The implications of having a singles market for music are significant. First off, it means that every song that a band or singer puts out better be as catchy as anything. Those quirky tunes on an album that used to delight weird folks like me and drive mainstream fans nuts are a thing of the past. Like the singles market of old, it’s all hits all of the time now.

Second, there is no real money to be made from sales of recorded music anymore. Forty years ago you could buy a single for 59 cents. Now you can buy one for 99 cents or download it for free. Even ignoring free downloads, the economics are not pretty. Forty years ago, you could buy the equivalent of a new Honda Accord for 2500 bucks, gas was 21 cents a gallon, and starting salaries out of college were around 5000 dollars. The price for a single has not at all kept up with the cost of living. Trying to make money selling singles at 99 cents is the equivalent of trying to live on 8000 dollars a year. In both cases, you starve.

So with the death of the CD and album format, the pop music business needs a new model. And not surprisingly, it’s very similar to an old model that was in vogue well before the creation of the CD or the album. It's all about live performance. I might talk more about that next time.

Memorial Day 2007

This country has lost over one million soldiers in its wars. Over 80 percent of them died in the Civil War and WWII. We are not involved in a just war right now, but without US involvement in WWII, both Germany and Japan would have conquered much of Europe and Asia and billions today likely would be suffering from their dominance.

I’d like to take this day to honor those who have died in battle for my country. It is the ultimate sacrifice. But I’d also like to take this day to make some effort to promote the idea that we shouldn’t engage in wars without purpose.

We are currently fighting a purposeless war. Over 3000 American soldiers have died in Iraq. They should be honored for their patriotism. They and their families deserve and get my utmost respect.

Since WWII, this country has engaged in combat in a number of wars. Korea, Vietnam, Panama, Granada, Kuwait, Iraq, with increased frequency we have tried to use combat to further our political objectives. By my counting, we have fought in as many wars in the last 50 years as we fought in the previous 150.

Few of these recent wars have had reasonable objectives. If a soldier sacrifices his life for this country it should be for a just cause. With increased frequency, that has not been the case.

My own view is the reason we have chosen to go to war with increased frequency is not that the world has become more volatile, but that we have the resources to do so. We spend so much money on weapons and troops that sooner or later we feel compelled to use them.

It was not always so. For example, just prior to WWII, our nation was so poorly ready for battle that training for our inevitable participation in that war involved the use of broomsticks instead of guns.

I’m not advocating that we shrink our military budget down to pre-WWII levels. But we do need to ask ourselves whether the foundation of our economy should be built on military expenditures. A nation that invests so heavily in its military is bound to want to use its force. When you’re a carpenter every problem looks like a nail. When you’re a country with a military-based economy every problem looks like a battlefield. It would be desirable on days like today when we honor those that died for our country that we know that they died for a real purpose.

Being Ripped

It didn’t take long. Just two weeks after being released my new CD is now available for free through a Chinese file sharing service. This is so ridiculous. It’s not like I’m Gwen Stefani or Good Charlotte, folks. This is one very obscure CD by a very obscure act. That someone in China actually went to the trouble of ripping it and putting it online I suppose I should take as a compliment.

But I don’t. This is crap.

A few weeks ago, I was at a concert of some obscure blues musicians. None of them were on a record label. They barely make any money at this. After the show (and they put on a good show), they sold CDs. I heard some older guy in a polo shirt and khakis talking to another older guy in a polo shirt and khakis, “If you buy the CD, I’ll copy it, OK?” “Sure, buddy.” I looked at these two fiftysomethings, both well groomed and clean, typical Silicon Valley engineers probably making six figures easy. They are too cheap to each buy a fifteen-dollar CD. They’d rather let a starving musician starve some more.

I don’t make CDs for money. I’m way too old. I do it for fun. I’m thankful that I have a little money that allows me to do this. It’s a lot better and healthier than blowing money up my nose.

But there are people who are trying to make a living from their music, very talented people. They struggle like hell to put together a CD, get gigs, etc. The public should treat these people with at least a modicum of respect. But instead, they treat them like dirt.

It’s a crying shame.

I’ve heard all kinds of excuses from people about why they rip other people’s CDs and download for free. Before iTunes, it was the “the CDs only have one or two songs I like and the rest is filler” excuse. Now that you can download those one or two songs for less than two bucks, it’s the “why should I support those greedy record companies” excuse. These are lame excuses folks. They are rationalizations for being too cheap.*

They remind me of those lame excuses people use for cheating on their lovers/spouses. “They don’t understand me.” “I feel so lonely.” “They don’t give me what I really need.” Cry me a river. These are rationalizations for just being a greedy sex-head who wants fresh nooky.

But actually it’s more akin to people who stiff waitresses because “the owners should just pay them more.” Cheap is cheap. And it ain’t pretty.

I’m not going to tell people to stop being cheap bastards and stop downloading music for free. The cow is out of the barn. Nothing the RIAA does is going to make people suddenly pay for music again.

I’d be much happier, though, if when people downloaded for free, they had to click an “agree button” first. And that agree button would say, “I agree that I’m a cheap bastard that wants something for nothing.”

We’ve gone to a new model for music, folks. It’s essentially the same model that printer companies use. They basically give away the printer, but make up for it by charging an arm and a leg for ink and laser cartridges.

We’re giving away music. And what you are seeing is that major acts are making up for their loss of sales revenue from CDs by charging an arm and a leg for ticket prices for live shows. So the next time you pay 150 bucks to see Billy Joel sing Piano Man for the 12,293rd time (why people want to see this is a mystery to me, but they do), you’ll know why. Oh and for those twentysomethings reading this and snickering over Billy Joel, mark my words you’ll be doing the equivalent in the name of nostalgia: in twenty years a stadium full of you will be paying an arm and a leg to see Coldplay sing Yellow for the 12,293rd time.

Where this leaves middle size and smaller acts is easy to see. As of about 2005, those acts could no longer make money selling recordings because people stopped buying CDs. As of about 1990, they could no longer make money from live shows because people’s taste in live music significantly narrowed and they were happy to dance to DJs. What this means is that musicians have no revenue stream. They are all starving like never before.

*Oh I should show a little nuance and note that there are the “Explorers” of the world. They download for free to check some music out before they buy it. That makes sense to me. You used to be able to listen before you bought at record stores. But now, well there are hardly any record stores are there?

Allergies

My immigrant parents loved this country. But they didn't love its people. In their eyes people born in America were soft, lazy and didn't think very hard. Sure there were exceptions, but that was their starting point with anyone who was born here. For instance, after every big snowstorm or heat wave, they would laugh at the people wearing clothing that said, "I survived the so and so." What did Americans know about "survival?" Put them in a war, and they wouldn't last a week.

My mother, in particular, was dismissive. Americans were neurotic by nature in her opinion. They would get all kinds of psychosomatic illnesses. According to her, allergies were one of those things that only Americans got. "In Europe, no one had allergies," she said. "It's a craziness."

I didn't believe her about the allergy thing, but I got the drift.

This dismissiveness toward Americans was always worrisome to me. After all, I was American born. Was I soft, lazy and neurotic? There was always a tension about this point. The underlying current was no I wasn't, but I could easily fall. They were keeping watch on me so I wouldn't turn into one of those no-good, lazy Americans.

For instance, I always knew that if I ever developed an allergy, it would be taken as a sure sign that I was in free fall. The next thing you know, I'd be wearing a "I survived the blizzard of '79 t-shirt." I was thankful that I managed to avoid any sensitivity to pollen.

This week, though, I developed some sniffles. It's peak allergy season. And I smiled as I thought, "Oh my, what would my mother think if she were still alive?" It seemed odd though. How could I develop an allergy this late in my life? Maybe she was right. Maybe it was all in my head.

But today I had my answer. I woke up with a cold. My mom would be so happy to know that her boy isn't the allergy type.

Now of course, if I woke up with a cold or a fever or my leg somehow was broken in five places when I was a kid, my mom would kick my butt and make sure I went to school. Staying home from school was something no-good, lazy Americans did when they were sick. We were better than that.

The Aging Musician

You can and do get away with a lot of immature behavior when you're young. A child can cry and wail away when they are in their single digits. But somewhere around 10, it starts to look unseemly. People stare at 12 year olds wailing in public.

Similarly, when you're a teenager it's a rite of passage to blame your parents for all that has gone wrong in your life. But sometime in your 20s, it gets old. We actually have a rule in my family, the 28 rule. Up until then, you can blame your parents for everything and anything. But make a mistake at 29 and it's yours. You're an adult. It's your job to figure out how to deal with the fact that you are a mere mortal with imperfections.

I think a similar rule applies in music. For the most part, the world of music is very much a young person's game. If you're over the age of about 35, haven't made it big, and still have aspirations to a career as a performer, you are delusional. But if you did make it big in your twenties or teens, there's a chance that you still can go out there and perform for many years and not just as a nostalgia act.

There is a caveat, however. It's cool to write songs complaining about your girlfriends or boyfriends when you're in your teens and twenties. But when you're in your thirties, it just doesn't work. Whining about your rotten luck in love and life in music is a young person's thing.

Joni Mitchell was probably the greatest whiner in pop music in the 1970s. But she was young and beautiful with a gorgeous voice. When you have that kind of talent and beauty you can sing about anything and people will flock to hear you. They want to feel your pain.

In the 1980s Kate Bush did the Joni Mitchell thing. In the 1990s it was Tori Amos. When you're young and beautiful, whining can be very cool.

But somehow, whining in your music in your 30s starts to look unseemly. It's best to show some maturity and growth, maybe even show a glimmer of satisfaction and happiness. If your audience leaves you because of it, well they'd probably leave you anyway for the next new act.

And what about the musician in his or her 40s, 50s or my oh my 60s? It's even more imperative that they show some emotional growth. A case in point is Mick Jagger. When he dances on the stage and sings about the fact that he "can't get no satisfaction" it's very creepy. What's he complaining about anyhow, his prostate? With age should come at least a modicum of wisdom.

Give Me a Poseur Anytime

We live in a funny time for entertainers. The public expects them to be “authentic” and in using that term I borrow from Lionel Trilling. We expect them to show their true inner self. And we want the details of their personal relationships, their fears, and their desires. But this expectation of the public is in conflict with the nature of entertainment, which expects the entertainer to strike a pose. When they hit the stage, sing a song in an arena, or are on the screen, we don’t want a regular guy or gal. We want someone who is larger than life, someone who can transport us to a world beyond the day to day.

So the entertainer of today has two choices. They can show two sides of themselves, one on the stage, bigger than life, and one during interviews, the regular guy or gal who puts his or her pants on one leg at a time just like everyone else. Or they can be a full-time poseur, create a pose for themselves for the camera and never deviate from that pose even when they are being interviewed on Larry King or wherever; when they are asked to expose their inner self, they instead show the inner self of the public character they portray. It’s key, however, for the public to believe that pose is authentic.

Given the choice, I’d rather have a poseur anytime. This is especially true for me when it comes to music. Johnny Cash was the “man in black” every time he stepped out of his house. What he was really like who knows and who cares? Bob Dylan, Tom Waits, these are people who never show their true inner self to the public. They strike a pose and they keep to that pose. They create a character and as far as the public is concerned, that character is who the public thinks they are. They create a myth and the public suspends disbelief and follows the life of that myth.

My preference for poseurs doesn’t stem from a desire to believe the myths these people create about themselves. It’s that I believe these people are entitled to a private life. I personally don’t want them to be “authentic” before the public. What they do inside their own homes with their own families – their authentic selves – should be their own to keep. The man in black should be allowed to wear whatever color he wants while he’s watching football on TV. Tom Waits should be allowed to talk as if he wasn’t born in the Bowery in 1936 when he walks into his house and talks with his wife. I don’t want them to be “authentic.” All I want them to be are great entertainers.

I was recently at a concert where the performer went on and on about his rural background, saying he was born “off a back road, off a back road, off a back road.” I know for a fact that the “back road” he was born on is a suburban subdivision in a city of about a half million. As he extolled the virtues of rural life, I just smiled. He was playing a role. He was striking a pose. Go get ‘em! Authenticity is overrated.

Sophomore Slumps

There's a band out there, Arcade Fire, that I kind of like. If I were twenty two years old, I'd like them even more (their lyrics are a bit childish). They're brash, exuberant and have a rich sound full of surprises. The first time I listened to their first CD, Funeral, I was smiling.

I listen to a lot of CDs. Most more or less sound like so many other CDs that after just a few minutes they end up ejected out of my car CD player and thrown into the back seat (where they, at the end of the drive, get collected and put into a pile to send off to be recycled).

Funeral was different. I listened to the whole thing straight through. I even sat in my driveway so I could get to the end.

This year, Arcade Fire put out their second CD, Neon Bible. It's been getting a lot of buzz mostly because many people missed out on the first CD. But when I talk to twenty somethings they all say the same thing: it's not as good as Funeral.

The second is rarely as good as the first in people's eyes. And I wonder if that's really at all true objectively. Are almost all second books, movie sequels, and CDs really all that bad? And the answer is, I don't think so. We just want something fresh. So we go on to the next new "brilliant first" this or that and leave the former golden boy artist behind. It's not so much a sophomore slump as we're fickle.

I've listened to Neon Bible. Just like those twenty somethings I've talked to, I'd have to say it's "not as good as Funeral." But if I hadn't listened to Funeral first, I'd have probably listened to Neon Bible straight through in my car and found it interesting and innovative pop music. I'm as guilty of being fickle as the next person.

Sometimes in fact, the second is much, much better than the first. We the public, however, are still resistant to embrace that sophomore work. Many moons ago, Rickie Lee Jones followed up her debut album - a solid piece of pop music - with the best thing she has ever done (and probably will ever do), Pirates. I still listen to that CD twenty five years later, which is rare for me for pop music. It didn't go anywhere in terms of sales or airplay. People had their one dose of Rickie Lee Jones with her first album. They were ready to move on.

Staying interesting in the public eye is a very tricky business. I don't know why some artists continue to have success year after year while others - who are still producing wonderful work - fall by the wayside. Much of it I think is just plain dumb luck.

Ludmir

I've been doing research on my father's home town, the Ukrainian/formerly Russian/formerly Polish village of Ludmir aka Vladimir Volinsky. The town has changed hands so many times that it is said you could have had four passports over your lifetime without ever leaving.

I recently read a memoir of someone like my father, a Jewish war survivor from Ludmir, Janusz Bardach. It was strange and intriguing to read something from someone who was my father's age. While Bardach came from a wealthy family, he writes about playing soccer with kids from the poor part of town. That might have included my father, who was a very good soccer player.

Like my father, Bardach was conscripted into the Russian Army during WWII. Unlike my father he was arrested for turning over a tank and sentenced to hard labor in a Siberian gulag. It might have been the same gulag my grandfather was in on my mother's side (the details I was given about my grandfather's gulag were fuzzy, just that it was close to the Bering Strait). So this fellow might have crossed paths with both my father and grandfather. Who knows?

Bardach survived the gulag by b.s.ing his way into a position as a physician's assistant. But he knew nothing of medicine. He didn't know how to even inject patients. So here was a man who survived the war through pure selfishness, inflicting pain and providing poor care to needy prisoners. My father has similar tales of how he survived. The will to live can make you do awful things.

Bardach was a remarkable person. After the war, he b.s.ed his way into Russian medical school. He developed new techniques for surgery on cleft lip and palate and eventually came to the US to become head of surgery at the University of Iowa hospital. This kind of ability to b.s., mixed with resiliency and drive is present in most of the war survivors I knew, including my mother and father. Survival was partly luck there is no doubt. But many of those survivors had inherent skills to withstand almost anything. They survived for a reason. They were both lucky and remarkable.

Oh about these cartoons. I have no idea why I suddenly feel the need to doodle like this. I doubt I'll keep it up. Who knows?

The Queue

I went to Las Vegas for a music convention for a couple of days. It seemed that every step of the way, I was dealing with long queues. I waited in line to get my boarding pass. Again I waited to go through security. Since I was flying Southwest, I waited to board. I got off the plane and waited to catch a shuttle bus to the rental car. I went from there to a charity motorcycle ride where I waited in line to pick up my rental cycle and then my wrist band. Finally, I got to my hotel and I waited in line to register.

You could sense the agitation in the queues. We don't like waiting. We don't like the way the lines have been created willy nilly using chrome plated poles strung together by black nylon straps.

It all seemed so makeshift. Nothing seemed to take into account the human element. And then I thought about cattle. And then I thought about Dr. Temple Grandin.

Before Dr. Temple Grandin, lines for sending cattle off to slaughter were makeshift affairs. The cattle were panicky as a result. There would be injuries. Dr. Grandin changed all of that.

Somehow Dr. Grandin, who is autistic, was able to design cattle handling facilities that took into account the psychology of cattle. She was able to get inside the head of livestock and make designs that kept them calm. Her designs are used throughout the world. In North America almost half of all cattle are handled using a system she designed for meat plants. The cattle are calmer. The whole process is more humane.

If we put this much thought into queues for cattle, we should be able to some thought into queues for humans. It would be interesting to see what Dr. Grandin would come up with for airport security queues. My guess is that her designs would make people feel better about what is currently a very dehumanizing experience.