The 2012 presidential election is still 30 months away. But Republican challengers to the President already think that holding public office may be a liability. Are we heading into a campaign that's not at all about policy, or ideas or governing, but about anger at a changing society, played out in a multilayered media landscape. Matt Bai, contributing editor to the The New York Times Magazine, and one of our most astute political observers, thinks this might be happening. My conversation with Matt Bai about his article in The Magazine this Sunday:
has assembled 19 serious writers, including L'enfant terrible James Frey, to give their views on this genre that seems to have such a hold on so many.
, the story of one Palestinian family's struggle and survival. It's a story shaped by loss, by fear and ultimately forgiveness.
has deconstructed the Obama narrative and given us a new narrative of the man and the President.
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she comes to realize that her mother was part of a generation of post-war woman whose frustration and unhappiness provided the predicate for the woman's movement and whose contribution still shapes us today. Like Betty Draper in "Mad Men" and April Wheeler in "Revolutionary Road," Reichl's mother came of age at the worst possible time for woman: They were educated, they had time on their hands, but no place to direct their talents. Reichl's mother wanted to make sure that her daughter had a very different life.
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, is a kind of sampler of his work that, taken together, accentuates his love of politics, sports and the importance of timeless narrative non-fiction.
. In it, he documents not only the Cold War arms race, but the residual impact and the weapons of mass destruction that still imperil the planet.
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