Redo Coney; Undo Cuomo
It's not economically feasible right now-unless a nostalgic philanthropist steps in-but when New York City is back from the brink a worthy project would be a complete renovation of Coney Island. Undoubtedly that would draw howls from artists, winos and historians of famous landmarks that've gone to seed, but the once-glamorous amusement park is a facility that's been badly neglected. I'm not proposing anything on the order of a Great Adventure or Disney World: that would be akin to tearing down Yankee Stadium and creating a retro-stadium on the order of Baltimore's grotesque Camden Yards.
But even in recent flush times, when Times Square was sanitized, for example, Coney doesn't register on the radar screen of city officials. Which is a shame. One of NYC's great delights is walking along the ocean there in the dead of winter, stopping for a dog at Nathan's and admiring all the hand-drawn signage that remains from past generations.
Two Sundays ago, on the occasion of MUGGER III's eighth birthday, the family drove to Coney-my younger son says it's his tradition to visit the "resort" every Aug. 25-and its state of deterioration is much worse than just a year ago. The listless "Freak Show" collared only nine customers-including the four of us-and though I love the gruff lady who doles out quarters at our preferred arcade, half the games malfunctioned and it appeared the floor hadn't been swept for two years.
The birthday boy loved his corn dog, but Junior took one look at the other food and refused to partake, except for a bottle of Hawaiian Punch. "I think I'll puke if I eat this food," he said, and settled on a sidestreet Taco Bell that was probably the country's scuzziest franchise of that chain. As he tore into a burrito I cautioned him, only half-joking, that most likely half a dozen dead cockroaches were included as filler. MUGGER III was on such a pre-teen high-George Tabb, his rock 'n' roll tutor, gave him one of Slash's guitars as a gift-that he was ready to empty the contents of his wallet for a fall-down drunk at the next table.
Worst of all is the hazardous condition of the rides. MUGGER III and I first went through the haunted house, which was innocuous enough and not very scary, and then proceeded to a tame-looking attraction called "The Blaster" or "Scorcher," something like that. As deafening rap music played, this series of cars with no seat belts whipped round and round for five minutes or so, with the operator yelling he was about to pump up the speed. "Hold on tight," I told my son, who was petrified, "it's almost over."
But then, just as we thought the ordeal was done, the cars reversed course and went backwards for another five minutes. Hey, now I was nervous, imagining that the two of us would wind up in the New York Post the next day as victims of an antiquated amusement ride whose gears had malfunctioned. We were lucky Mrs. M was off with Junior at a bowling game; she'd have had a coronary witnessing this adventure.
By now, all the camp value of Coney Island has been sapped dry. When was the last time the annual Mermaid Parade even piqued your interest? With a modest amount of money, Coney could be made safe and clean without sacrificing its volumes of New York City lore.
Andy Cuomo, Meet Mark Green
The run-up to New York's Sept. 10 gubernatorial primary has been dominated, at least on tv, by the unfocused advertisements by amateur politician Thomas Golisano, a distraction that must be driving Democratic candidate Andy Cuomo nuts.
The election wasn't supposed to unfold like this: Earlier in the year, it appeared that the obnoxious son of St. Mario would make short work of his opponent, and now leader in the polls, Comptroller Carl McCall. Andy's surrogates would do the heavy lifting of creating the perception that time had passed McCall by, and the notion that a longtime pol, at 66, even if he's black, didn't necessarily deserve the nomination as if it were a gold watch. Remember, the GOP erred badly by nominating the "It's My Turn" Bob Dole to run against Bill Clinton in '96, and that campaign was such a disaster that it's now a political footnote.
But then Andy blew it by suggesting that Gov. Pataki, who's whored himself by sucking up to unions, Hispanics, left-wingers and anyone else who has a vote, played a bad second-fiddle to Rudy Giuliani in the aftermath of the Sept. 11 massacre in Lower Manhattan last year. (By the way, even though Pataki's been shameless in shedding his conservative principles, it's smart politics in a state that's becoming increasingly Democratic. One hopes this is a temporary impersonation.)
And the younger Cuomo is in a real pickle in figuring out how to attack McCall without alienating the Democratic base of black voters. The endorsement of Princeton rap professor Cornel West, who characterized McCall as "a decent man, but he is a hesitant brother...a timid brother," was one Cuomo could do without. McCall has the backing of Sen. Chuck Schumer, who's probably more valuable than Cuomo's crew of celebrities like Russell Simmons, Giancarlo Esposito and Joe Pantoliano.
And then there were the comments of his brother-in-law, Douglas Kennedy, a Fox reporter who's one of RFK's sons. Buried in an Aug. 30 Times story on Cuomo's difficulties was this remarkable statement from the 35-year-old Kennedy: "I think Carl McCall's story would have moved my father greatly. I think the mix between his political and business experience was everything my father advocated. And I think Carl McCall's story would have touched him in his heart... I believe that if my father were alive, he would have asked Andrew not to run."
That's fairly harsh, and a breach of the Kennedy clan's legendary loyalty. In the week before the primary, after all, Bobby Kennedy Jr., Uncle Teddy and Caroline Kennedy will all be campaigning for young Andy. Maybe Doug Kennedy is a family pariah for working at Fox, but that's unlikely in a family that has stuck by junkies, alleged rapists, drunks, dimwit congressmen and "public servants" who treat women like dirt even as they preach the sacraments of the ERA and pro-abortion movement.
In addition, Cuomo can't even secure the endorsement of his former boss Bill Clinton. True, the busybody ex-president revels in his role of the country's first black/Hispanic/gay/cracker president, but you'd think he might have a few kind words about his HUD secretary who constantly defends his eight-year administration. But the twin realities that the Clintons never show gratitude to bedazzled subordinates and the plotting for Hillary's 2008 presidential campaign preclude any such favors.
On Sept. 1, The New York Times probably delivered the final blow to Cuomo's campaign by endorsing McCall. Typically, it was a mushy editorial, expressing the wish that an "amalgam" of the two candidates could take on Pataki this November. While praising Andy for his "dynamism and energy" in the race, and his professed desire for campaign finance reform, a pet Times cause, McCall's alleged expertise in "state finance" ultimately tipped the balance. Left unsaid was the daily's desire to choose the probable winner, who also happens to be black.
There was equivocation: "We also wish Mr. McCall would go beyond strong talk about campaign finance reform and immediately end his practice of accepting contributions from people who do business with the state. Although he might wind with up with less money for television ads, Mr. McCall would be doing something more important for his campaign than fund-raising. He would be demonstrating a spirit of bold initiative that voters have a right to look for in a candidate for governor."
Had McCall made a statement questioning President Bush's inevitable invasion of Iraq, I suspect he'd have won a more hearty endorsement.
An Impossible Scenario
Common sense is a rare commodity at the magazine division of the former Time, Inc., and I'm not even touching on the ill-fated, late-to-the-party merger with America Online, in which Old Media got snookered by Steve Case. Surely the skyscraper editors and publishers who print the fluffy, liberally slanted weeklies like Time and Entertainment Weekly every Monday read the list of bestselling books in The New York Times every Sunday. It galls the New York-Washington intelligentsia that conservative authors like Ann Coulter, Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, Bill O'Reilly and the late Barbara Olson consistently top the charts, alongside celebrity bios and self-help primers. Still, isn't there one Big Thinker who's figured out that a mass-circulation conservative magazine-with a circulation that would dwarf the likes of The Weekly Standard's and the National Review's-would capture those same readers who memorize every word that Coulter's written?
Silly question, I suppose, for anyone with the brains to suggest such a notion would be banned from Manhattan cocktail parties, semi-private audiences with Kofi Annan and the summer homes of top executives.
Occasionally, there are glimmers of contrary thought. For instance, "Hot Sheet" columnist Jim Mullen, an old hippie who usually collects a paycheck for his recycled reading of the country's "zeitgeist," to use a word that's still in vogue in Manhattan, actually ran a few contrary observations in the current Entertainment Weekly. On The New York Times: "They will start printing announcements for gay and lesbian unions on the wedding page. But only if they come from the best families." That obvious, but curious entry given the source, was trumped by the following item: "New York City mayor Michael Bloomberg wants smoking banned in all of the city's bars and restaurants. Hey, as long as we can still urinate in the streets..."
Donald Fehr Submits to Reality
Although fully expecting at least a short baseball strike last Thursday night-while fully enjoying seeing Roger Clemens get hammered by the Blue Jays-at dawn the next morning I had a feeling an agreement would be reached. This about-face started while chatting with my apartment's graveyard-shift doorman, an amiable fellow who nonetheless couldn't contain his hostility for the players. "I don't get it," he said, "these are the luckiest guys in the world. They earn enormous salaries, are celebrities and don't even work 12 months a year." He then laughed, and added a self-deprecating comment: "Hey, if Bernie Williams couldn't hit a ball, he'd probably have a job just like me and wouldn't have the money to watch a game at Yankee Stadium."
You can call this argument simplistic, and lacking an understanding of the complex labor issues involved (as if anyone could comprehend the absurd battle between the players' "union" and yacht-flaunting owners), but it was from the gut of a fan who struggles to make ends meet.
Then I read an Associated Press account of the Anaheim Angels' 6-1 win over the visiting Tampa Bay Devil Rays on Thursday night. A few spectators in the small (for a contending team) crowd of 18,820 threw foul balls back on the field while chanting "Don't Strike!" Scott Schoeneweis, the Angels' union rep, said: "You expect a little bit of that, but I would have hoped that our fans would have a little more class than what they showed tonight by throwing stuff on the field... When 4-year-olds are frustrated, they throw stuff. Grown adults shouldn't be doing that. It's disappointing. I know they're disappointed, but let us play the game. We're in a playoff race, we're your team-supposedly."
That sealed it: no strike.
In today's economic and political climate the players became the scapegoats for the hostility felt by Americans who equated them with the likes of Enron's Andrew Fastow and Sen. Robert Torricelli. "The Boys of Summer," and their commander Donald Fehr, could see the future: a loss of paychecks and lucrative advertising endorsements, abuse from the public and their livelihoods left in limbo.
It didn't matter that MLB commissioner Bud Selig's mantra of competitive imbalance was a scam: look at a century of baseball statistics and it's a fact that several teams have always dominated the sport. And it didn't matter-and I choke on these words-that the Yankees' George Steinbrenner was unfairly vilified by fans and other owners for having the drive to spend his money to field an extraordinary team for several years in a row. Finally, it didn't matter that no one forced the proprietors of also-ran franchises like the Pirates, Royals, Tigers and Orioles, for example, to enter the business.
Fans see a superstar like Jason Giambi touting a deodorant during a commercial break and they say: Fuck you.
Speaking of Giambi, the San Francisco Chronicle's Scott Ostler had a funny bit about the possible AL MVP on Aug. 29. He wrote: "'The owners want to change a lot of the dynamics,' Jason Giambi said. 'We're helping to protect Mr. Steinbrenner. He's the one [who's] going to take a beating.'
"That's as heartwarming as any episode of 'The Simpsons' in which Waylon Smithers defends his boss, Mr. Burns. Remember when Giambi was riding his Harley to a fast-food drive-up window on Hegenberger Road, the greasy-haired prince of the common man? Now he's a well-behaved, well-groomed foot soldier in King George's palace guard, probably riding a Lexus motorcycle to his own private drive-up at Elaine's. Now Giambi is the poster boy for unlimited baseball-player entitlement."
The country-club Red Sox, who squandered most of the season despite fielding its best team since 1986, weren't immune from dumb comments from its stars. Johnny Damon's one of my favorite players on the Bosox, but his comment to a Boston Globe reporter on Aug. 31 was plain stupid. Damon, the team's union rep, said: "Hopefully now the jealous fans who were calling us a bunch of names can take a step back and hopefully they will give us a little respect. They're tarnishing us lately. The fans should be happy now. There's no sign of another stoppage." (The Sox also have on board AL union steward Tony Clark, whose disastrous performance this year will no doubt cause his release after the World Series, which Boston fans will watch on the tube. Clark, who by all rights should've been confined to hitting fungos to teammates after Memorial Day, was probably given rally-killing at-bats merely because of his position in the union.)
And as much as I like Trot Nixon, the self-described "dirtbag" rightfielder who'd be more comfortable (if not financially) in an earlier era of the game, he was way out of line when he called ace Derek Lowe "weak" for admitting that his pitching was affected by the labor uncertainty. Lowe, who turned in a crummy performance against the Angels on Aug. 25, said: "I'm an honest person and it did have an effect. Just because you play a sport, it doesn't make you exempt from being a human." On the night the strike was called off, Lowe threw five shutout innings in a 15-5 romp over the Indians.
Finally, who can resist quoting the words of the Yanks' resident yahoo David Wells? The sorehead pitcher told a Daily News reporter: "[Selig's] a knucklehead. Man, he's a knucklehead. He's coming in and trying to break our union, basically. Just some of the things he's thrown on the table, you just don't understand. I don't think anybody has the balls [the News used dashes for that "expletive"] to say it. But I don't care..."
And no one cares what Wells has to say.
September 2
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