Emily writes:
You can’t always get what you want, as this extra-chilly December is teaching us so ruthlessly. Sometimes, though, you can still post on your nearly four-year-old blog. Yes, four this very month! Happy birthday month to us!
Five things I admired today:
1. From Inquirer.net (“the official news website of the Philippine Daily Inquirer, the Philippine’s most widely circulated broadsheet”), a reminiscence by Corazon P. Ong whose headline says it well: “I wrote E.B. White and he wrote back.”
2. David Remnick quoted in the Observer, answering the New York Times‘s Joe Nocera (who, as the Observer puts it, “asked how each of the them could be so sanguine about the future”) at a panel held by the Newhouse School of Communication:

“Joe, no!” he said. “(A), we’re not sanguine. Or blithe. We think about it all the time. There are meetings about it all the time. We’re each thinking about this. Constantly. The quesiton that Ken asked was ‘Do your magazines have a future and are they in any way different than newspapers? I think magazines that mean something are going to find a way to have a future. … Sanguine or blithe about it? That’s not the way to describe it, Joe.”

God bless you, David Remnick. That is exactly what it is like. And magazines will find a future. We won’t go down so easy!
4. Speaking of people with a sense of humor and diverse musical tastes, here’s LP Cover Lover.
5. Hillary Chute—whose Art Spiegelman interview we’re featuring all week on Print‘s website—interviewed the radiant and irrepressible Lynda Barry for the current issue of The Believer. Buy the issue; get a taste of the interview here. I was so happy, amidst the doldrums of fall, to witness Barry and Matt Groening being delirious together during the most recent New Yorker Festival. The magic of some occasions really does make up for the bad times.

_The New Yorker_’s Jane Mayer was presented with the “John Chancellor Award”:http://www.cjr.org/audio/on_the_importance_of_cultivati.php for Excellence in Journalism last week. Mayer was honored for her reporting on the use of torture by the Bush administration. (Andrew C. Revkin of _The New York Times_ is the other recipient, for his coverage of climate change.)
Mayer and Revkin spoke at Columbia’s Graduate School of Journalism, and we’ve got “audio”:http://qtstreaming.jrn.columbia.edu/CJR/2008/mayerrevkin1119.mov. After some minor A/V difficulties, it’s a very interesting discussion about reporting from two people who know a great deal about it.
Also, “Floyd Abrams”:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Floyd_Abrams gets mentioned. Floyd Abrams rocks.

Ricky Gervais famously ended his two successful TV series, _The Office_ and _Extras,_ after the second season, “saying”:http://www.musicomh.com/theatre/ricky-gervais_0207.htm of the third instance of anything successful, “It’s going to get criticised whatever isn’t it?”
Ah, very true. Starting today, Malcolm Gladwell’s third book, _Outliers,_ is “available”:http://www.amazon.com/Outliers-Story-Success-Malcolm-Gladwell/dp/0316017922/ to the public. The early outlook is that he will survive his “difficult third” intact.
It is rare for a nonfiction book to enjoy this level of advance interest. Indeed, rival publishers are watching it carefully for signs of the health of the industry. In Jason Zengerle’s “profile”:http://nymag.com/arts/books/features/52014/ from “last week,”:http://emdashes.com/2008/11/malcolm-gladwell.php a competing publisher was quoted as saying, “I don’t care that it’s Little, Brown’s book. We all desperately need some good news.”
Most of the reviews are positive, but nearly every reviewer makes a point of noting that Gladwell’s thesis flirts with the obvious. Overall, interest and enthusiasm are high.
You can buy the book today, or, if your portfolio has taken a hit recently (I’m told such things happen), you can point your mouse at the following online resources.
_Time Magazine_ “profiles”:http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1858880,00.html the author (profile pic is “rugged”).
_Newsweek_ won’t let _Time_ monopolize that sweet sweet “hype”:http://www.newsweek.com/id/169196.
_The Guardian_ (UK) “looks at”:http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2008/nov/16/malcolm-gladwell-interview-outliers “the man who can’t stop thinking.” (I remember an old Kurt Russell “movie”:http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0065566/ like that.)
_Slate_’s Book Club “takes up”:http://www.slate.com/toolbar.aspx?action=read&id=2204398 the book. (John Horgan likes this one more than _The Tipping Point,_ of which he was notedly critical.)
_Entertainment Weekly_ “gives”:http://www.ew.com/ew/article/0,,20239689,00.html it an A. (The Tipping Point got a “B+”:http://www.ew.com/ew/article/0,,275755,00.html.)
_Reader’s Digest_ offers two “brief”:http://www.rd.com/your-america-inspiring-people-and-stories/malcolm-gladwell-on-outliers-the-story-of-success/article104648.html but “illuminating”:http://www.rd.com/your-america-inspiring-people-and-stories/malcolm-gladwell-on-outliers-the-story-of-successexclusive-extras/article105061.html interviews. Gladwell says that he would not want his child to try to become the next Michael Phelps; I wish more people would say this sort of thing. Profile pic = “pensive,” in front of a bizarre hand-drawn gallery of facial hair.
_The Wall Street Journal_ has “three”:http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122671211614230261.html “items”:http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122671469296530435.html, including an “excerpt”:http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122669767358429369.html with a baffling typo in the headline.
Other profiles:
“_USA Today_”:http://www.usatoday.com/life/books/news/2008-11-17-gladwell-success_N.htm
“_Independent_”:http://www.independent.co.uk/news/people/profiles/malcolm-gladwell-wise-guy-1019537.html (UK)
Other reviews:
“_New York Times_”:http://www.nytimes.com/2008/11/18/books/18kaku.html (Michiko Kakutani; reg. req’d)
“_Boston Globe_”:http://www.boston.com/ae/books/articles/2008/11/16/the_topping_point/
“CNET News”:http://news.cnet.com/8301-13505_3-10098237-16.html
“_San Francisco Chronicle_”:http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2008/11/14/RVPT13T9T7.DTL
“_Los Angeles Times_”:http://www.latimes.com/entertainment/la-et-book17-2008nov17,0,2764025.story
“_Salon_”:http://www.salon.com/books/review/2008/11/17/gladwell/
“_Financial Times_”:http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/6c0342b6-b40e-11dd-8e35-0000779fd18c.html (UK)
“_NY Daily News_”:http://www.nydailynews.com/entertainment/arts/2008/11/16/2008-11-16_once_again_malcolm_gladwell_explains_it_.html
There have been lots and lots of “tweets”:http://twitturly.com/urlinfo/url/aa4cf0f35ea6f120b531e592678ca9ca/ recently.
And finally, now seems a good moment to revive two enjoyable New Yorker Conference videos: “2007”:http://www.newyorker.com/online/video/conference/2007/gladwell “2008”:http://www.newyorker.com/online/video/conference/2008/gladwell.

Frank is a New Yorker senior editor whose most recent book is the novel Trudy Hopedale; you’ll want to read his winsomely annotated playlist of songs Frank’s two narrators would find “music they’d think was meant just for them.” (My friend Lilit at Save the Assistants interviewed him when it was published, and wrote: “I’m happy to report that, fancy credentials nonwithstanding, Jeffrey Frank is a really cool guy. He’s also an incredible boss.”) The New York Observer reports that Frank is leaving The New Yorker at the end of this year in order to properly research and write it. (Via MediaBistro’s indispensable Daily Newsfeed.) —E.G.

Scott McLemee has asked some smart folks to help him compile a “reading list”:http://www.insidehighered.com/views/2008/11/05/mclemee for the new president. The suggestions include Thucydides, Henry Adams, my dad’s old boss Herman Kahn…. so _ponderous_! I think President Obama will be in need of some good beach reads to let him unwind, so I’d recommend Kate Atkinson or Tim Powers.
And “Behind the Candidates”:http://behindthecandidates.com/ is a brilliantly designed website that will help you follow who’s influencing the new leader of the free world. Sure, half the site (McCain’s half) is obsolete, but the pink and blue layout is very soothing.

David Kurtz of “Talking Points Memo”:http://talkingpointsmemo.com/ interviewed David Remnick last night, apparently at almost the precise moment that it was becoming manifest that Obama was truly going to win. It’s fascinating footage—it’s the kind of moment when the magnitude of events tends to outstrip all of us, and yet Remnick remains as eloquent as ever. He also discusses his near-exclusive interview of earlier the same day with William Ayers.

_For a more thorough look at the Digital Edition, look “here”:http://emdashes.com/2008/11/the-new-yorker-digital-edition.php. —M.C.S._
I just received a message in my in-box announcing that “the first issue of _The New Yorker_’s digital edition is now available.” This feature is available to anyone who has a subscription, so if you want to check it out, you should hasten to “register”:https://admin.buysub.com/pubs/N3/NYR/entry.jsp?cds_page_id=3638&cds_mag_code=NYR&id=1225745193819&lsid=83081446338013005&vid=1 at the _New Yorker_’s subscription fulfillment website.
It doesn’t seem possible, but apparently anyone with a subscription not only can read the current or recent issues in the digital reader but can also “access any issue”:http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/digitaledition/faq/ from the magazine’s 83 illustrious years of existence. Now that’s what I call added value! If that isn’t a powerful incentive to subscribe, I don’t know what is. _The New Yorker_ is, of course, now well past its four-thousandth issue.
For those of us who bought _The Complete New Yorker_ when it first came out, it’s almost not comprehensible to see the entire archive so prettily available in my browser—but I’ll get used to it! And the reader application does look very snazzy.
More on the interface and accessability as we learn more about it. In the meantime, we congratulate _The New Yorker_ on this bold new era!

Did you see Colin Powell’s “endorsement”:http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/21134540/vp/27265490#27265490 on _Meet the Press_ yesterday? I’m excited about it. I think it does a few good things for Obama. Powell is the most famous Republican moderate, by far; he could have an impact with just the kind of right-leaning independents who need one final small nudge to vote Obama. And it may help secure an Obama presidency (knock wood) on the firm bipartisan ground it needs to succeed.
But more directly, it might change the tone of a campaign that is now seeing its fair share of racial and ethnic innuendo. Powell criticized McCain’s unsteadiness on economic matters and his selection of Sarah Palin, but he saved his most powerful words for the subject of American inclusiveness:

I’m also troubled by, not what Senator McCain says, but what members of the party say. And it is permitted to be said such things as, “Well, you know that Mr. Obama is a Muslim.” Well, the correct answer is, he is not a Muslim, he’s a Christian. He’s always been a Christian. But the really right answer is, what if he is? Is there something wrong with being a Muslim in this country? The answer’s no, that’s not America. Is there something wrong with some seven-year-old Muslim-American kid believing that he or she could be president? Yet I have heard senior members of my own party drop the suggestion, he is a Muslim and he might be associated with the terrorists. This is not the way we should be doing it in America.

I feel strongly about this particular point because of a picture I saw in a magazine. It was a photo essay about troops who are serving in Iraq and Afghanistan. And one picture at the tail end of this photo essay was of a mother in Arlington Cemetery, and she had her head on the headstone of her son’s grave. And as the picture focused in, you could see the writing on the headstone. And it gave his awards—Purple Heart, Bronze Star—showed that he died in Iraq, gave his date of birth, date of death. He was 20 years old. And then, at the very top of the headstone, it didn’t have a Christian cross, it didn’t have the Star of David, it had crescent and a star of the Islamic faith. And his name was Kareem Rashad Sultan Khan, and he was an American. He was born in New Jersey. He was 14 years old at the time of 9/11, and he waited until he can go serve his country, and he gave his life.

That picture appeared in _The New Yorker,_ and the “picture”:http://www.newyorker.com/online/2008/09/29/slideshow_080929_platon?slide=16 was taken by Platon. Here it is:

_Elsheba Khan at the grave of her son, Specialist Kareem Rashad Sultan Khan. Photo by Platon._
Platon is a recent _New Yorker_ hire, and he could hardly have had a more auspicious start! The whole “portfolio”:http://www.newyorker.com/online/2008/09/29/slideshow_080929_platon is stunning; you can listen to the photographer “discuss”:http://www.newyorker.com/online/2008/09/29/080929on_audio_platon the series in a podcast on the magazine’s site.

_Martin Schneider writes:_
Emdashes extends a hearty congratulations to the new Nobel Laureate in Economics, Paul Krugman! I saw Krugman speak once at the Society for Ethical Culture, at the height of the conservative attempt to privatize/kill Social Security in spring of 2005. It was a debate between Krugman and Cato Institute analyst Michael Tanner, with “Talking Points Memo”:http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/ head honcho Joshua Micah Marshall supplying blogosphere context but in fact allying with Krugman. Krugman slayed Tanner easily, aided by Marshall’s input and Tanner’s incredibly disingenuous arguments.
Friend of Emdashes Jonathan Taylor caught a “reference”:http://economix.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/10/13/honoring-paul-krugman/ on the Edward L. Glaeser’s entry on today’s “Economix” blog on the _N.Y. Times_ website:

In his public role, Paul Krugman is often a polarizing figure, loved by millions but also intensely disliked by his political opponents. I still chuckle over an old New Yorker cartoon with one plutocrat saying to another that he gets some satisfaction from the fact that his vote will cancel out the vote of Paul Krugman.

Curiously, a search on “Krugman” in the Complete New Yorker archive does not find the hit; it’s a Charles Barsotti cartoon from the March 22, 2004, issue. You can view/purchase it “here”:http://www.cartoonbank.com/product_details.asp?sid=70283.
It’s about time he wrote something for _The New Yorker_!

Yep! Just got the news via the magazine’s Twitter. Here’s the link. It opens:

Never in living memory has an election been more critical than the one fast approaching–that’s the quadrennial cliché, as expected as the balloons and the bombast. And yet when has it ever felt so urgently true? When have so many Americans had so clear a sense that a Presidency has–at the levels of competence, vision, and integrity–undermined the country and its ideals? Read on.