By Russ Smith
mug1988@aol.com

Left-wing political journalists, even the smart ones, aren’t very adept at humor. Why that happens to be the case, I’m not sure, but if you can name even a half dozen Bush-hating keyboard-punchers who are also witty, there’s a prize waiting at James Taranto’s Wall Street Journal office. The late Molly Ivins was an exception, even if she laid the Texas cornpone on a bit thick, and Vanity Fair’s James Wolcott is such an extraordinary writer that even though his valuable pop culture essays are peppered with Daily Kos/Atrios/Josh Marshall-like digressions, I read every word. Alexander Cockburn is another anomaly, since he pisses off people across the political spectrum, but with an impeccable sense of style and manners.

Can you say the same about Joe Conason (nice guy, but lacking a funny bone), Rick Hertzberg, Paul Krugman, Richard Cohen, Eric Alterman (the misanthropic foie gras devotee who, without irony, insists The New York Times is a conservative newspaper), Lewis Latham, Robert Kuttner, John Judis or the grand conspiracist Seymour Hersh? Of course not. On the other hand, the conservative stable of pundits is standing room only with guys and gals who can make a political point while making you chuckle at the same time. A partial roster: Mark Steyn, Howie Carr (who owns the Kennedy beat) James Bowman, P.J. O’Rourke, Matt Labash, Andrew Ferguson, Taki, John Tierney, Holman Jenkins Jr., Dorothy Rabinowitz and Cathy Seipp.

I’d been thinking about this odd phenomenon off and on for about 20 years or so, yet it took a March 8 New York Sun article by Josh Gerstein (“Could Edwards Become the First Woman President?”) to make it all sink in. Gerstein had the good sense to not even mention the avaricious cartoon character Ann Coulter in his piece, which was a relief since the tiresome Michael Moore twin (I’m betting those two get together for brunch on a regular basis, comparing notes on how they’ve exploited their respective left and right wing fans) has generated far too much publicity for her dumb antigay slur against John Edwards. Rather it was the comments from the strident and militant pro-abortion spokeswoman-for-hire Kate Michelman, an adviser to the former senator and trial lawyer’s presidential campaign that stirred the pot.

During a speech at the Berkeley campus last week, Michelman said, “As a lawyer, as a senator, as a husband, as a father of two daughters, [Edwards] understands the reality of women’s lives. He understands the centrality of women’s lives and experience to the health and well-being of society as a whole … He understands that on an extremely personal level.” Now, a skunk enduring Michelman’s rapture about one of North Carolina’s wealthiest citizens could’ve pointed out that Richard Nixon, too, was a husband—even though he had just one wife, compared to Rudy Giuliani’s three—father of two girls, lawyer, senator and unlike John of Arc, also a successful vice presidential candidate. And, considering Nixon’s extremely liberal domestic record as president, it’s likely that if he were young (and alive) today, he’d be a pro-choice politician.

So Michelman’s pretty funny, if deluded.

Not so for another Edwards fan, The American Prospect’s Ezra Klein, a prolific journalist who wrote on March 6 about the Democratic presidential “also-rans” for The Sun’s new political website. Klein takes the view, prevalent in the blogosphere, that centrists like Evan Bayh and Mark Warner (who, in reality, could win a general election against any Republican) dropped out of the race not only because of a lack of greenback-friendly charisma (Obama) or an immense and threatening machine (Clinton) but because today’s Democratic party has been transformed by Howard Dean. Sen. Russ Feingold, the odd duck leftie from Wisconsin, was a victim, Klein writes, of the Mario Cuomo affliction—taking too much time to make up his mind. “By the time Feingold was flirting with the race,” Klein says, “Mr. Edwards was already whipping up the base with calls for the immediate withdrawal of 40,000 troops.”

Anyway, that reminded me of a Klein back page piece in the American Prospect last fall, the space where the monthly’s writers are given an opportunity to kick back and write about something other than universal health insurance, the evils of free trade, Bush masquerading as Hitler and stale “Heckuva job, Brownie” jokes. Titled “The Man in Me,” Klein reflects on his relationship with two horrendous glossies, Esquire and GQ, and how the tips and tricks—on grooming, picking clothes that match, cooking and finding condoms that fit—have made him feel like an adult.

I’m fairly certain that at present Klein doesn’t make a bundle from his writing, but there’s no question which of Edwards’ “Two Americas” he lives in, regardless of income. And it’s not the one that the Times and Nation pander to. Klein says that after college, he realized at his first job that “schmuck chic” was “frowned upon” by his bosses. And so he turned to the glossies, which, as he concedes, are filled with advertisements for expensive clothing and accessories that only people like Arthur Sulzberger Jr., Robert Shrum, George Clooney, Thomas Friedman and, it goes without saying, all Republicans can afford. “I think I’ve got it now,” Klein lets on, telling the reader that he’s got “the hang of business casual.”

More: “I can also tie a knot [some of us men learned that at an earlier age while attending church or synagogue], make a fresh summer tomato sauce, mood-light a dinner party, fix a toilet, make the perfect bar snack, and smooth shirts without ironing by hanging them on the towel hook while I take a hot shower.” Klein “grew bored” by the generally “fawning” articles in GQ and Esquire (I completely agree, save the latter’s excellent Tom Carson), “But I did wish to eat well, dress sharp and figure out what a cuff link was. The men’s magazines have proven the guide to adulthood I always expected but never got.”

Not a word from Klein on how he feels when serving delish bar snacks at his mood-lit dinner parties about the paradox of him writing about increasing the minimum wage (with no tax breaks added on for small employers) by day, and networking at night, but he’s still learning. I recommend subscriptions to The New Criterion and Weekly Standard for a course in higher education: how to crack a decent joke.