Elder Care, Japanese Style

Time magazine (full disclosure: my former employers) has a great story in their current issue.

I'll just give you the the first two paragraphs before commenting on it:

Besides his glowing complexion, Shigeo Tokuda looks like any other 74-year-old man in Japan. Despite suffering a heart attack three years ago, the lifelong salaryman now feels healthier, and lives happily with his wife and a daughter in downtown Tokyo. He is, of course, more physically active than most retirees, but that's because he's kept his part-time job — as a porn star.

Shigeo Tokuda is, in fact, his screen name. He prefers not to disclose his real name because, he insists, his wife and daughter have no idea that he has appeared in about 350 films over the past 14 years. And in his double life, Tokuda arguably embodies the contemporary state of Japan's sexuality: in surveys conducted by organizations ranging from the World Health Organization (WHO) to the condom-maker Durex, Japan is repeatedly found to be one of the most sexless societies in the industrialized world. A WHO report released in March found that 1 in 4 married couples in Japan had not made love in the previous year, while 38% of couples in their 50s no longer have sex at all. Those figures were attributed to the stresses of Japanese working life. Yet at the same time, the country has seen a surge in demand for pornography that has turned adult videos into a billion-dollar industry, with "elder porn" one of its fastest-growing genres.

I know. You love this as much as I do -- right?

You have to admit that, despite his age, Tokuda acts just like any other porn star, even to the point of being so fucking stupid he thinks he can be written up in Time magazine as a porn star without his wife and children finding out about it.

Nevertheless, the whole subject of "elder porn" is intriguing, to me at least, because it's a phenomenon that I've been predicting would happen for several years now -- in fact, I've suggested that it was pretty much inevitable.

I mean, think about it. The baby boomers have dominated virtually every aspect of life since the first of them was born. In the late 40s, American society was all about babies. Then in the 50s, it was all about little kids who came home from school to watch "Howdy Doody" and "The Mickey Mouse Club." Then the 60s were all about recalcitrant teenagers who wanted to smoke pot, have sex and avoid going to Vietnam. And in the early 80s, when the first of the boomers turned 35 and started seriously worrying about getting older, Jane Fonda was there with the first of her exercise tapes to help them keep in shape.

Now the oldest of the boomers is going to turn 65 soon. Now, given that this rather obnoxious demographic bulge has been the cynosure of American society from the instant they shot out of the womb, you don't expect them to get all shy when they enter their golden years, do you? As Spike Lee might say: Hell no!

I've thought for a long time that, given the endless self-aborption of the baby boomers, it would only be a matter of time before "elder porn" became a recognized genre of American adult film, but it stands to reason that the Japanese would beat us to it -- after all, they have an older population then we do. And when it happens, it might be a good thing.

Think about it. Can you think of a depiction of mature sexuality (defined, let's say, as sexual contact between persons 50 or older) in media that isn't somehow a joke or made an object of ridicule? It's almost impossible. You would have to go back thirty years and to Woody Allen's "Interiors" to find a positive depiction of mature sexuality.

But as some people have discovered that interracial sex is hot, some people are similarly discovering that intergenerational sex is hot as well -- one of the better selling series in the Girlfriends Films line of lesbian porn concerns itself with older women seducing young girls. And in the hetero market it's no big deal for men in their 40s or older to be banging girls young enough to be their daughters.

But what about older people having sex with each other? Is that, or can that be, erotic, not to mention profitable? Frankly, I think it's inevitable. The most narcissistic generation in history is going to want to see their sexuality reflected in the adult entertainment that they consume, and given how many of them there are, if it's made, they'll watch it.

Almost makes you want to consider a career change...

Obsequious Sorrow

With all due respect to Tim Russert, who by all accounts was a superb journalist and a stand-up guy, I found the coverage of his death to be nauseating.

It combined two of the most distasteful elements of our society: the incessant self-regard of the media when one of their own dies, and the obnoxious solipsism of the baby boomers when confronted by their own mortality.

Was Tim Russert's death a bad thing? Obviously. Anyone dying suddenly and before their time is a tragedy for their friends and family. But he was the host of a TV show, not the president. Breaking into regularly scheduled programming to announce his death with the same tones that used to be reserved for such earth-shattering events as the Kennedy assassination or the Moon landing was just ridiculous.

And it's only going to get worse later today, as the Sunday morning chat shows lay it on with a trowel -- which is why I'm not going to be watching them.

A good man died. You announce it, preferably at the end of the broadcast, and you let it go at that. To perserve with such an orgy of "obstinate condolement," as Claudius once said to Hamlet, bespeaks "an understanding simple and unschooled."

That's a pretty good capsule description of America at this point in time. Simple and unschooled.

Tom Moran

The End (We Hope) of Hillary

There's a story about JFK on the morning of his election as president saying of his opponent, Richard Nixon, who had churlishly semi-conceded, "He went out the way he came in -- no class."

Well, Dick Nixon was practically Fred Astaire compared to the way Hillary Clinton ended her campaign. Should we be surprised?

A number of columnists and pundits are writing Hillary Clinton's political obituary this week. If Barack Obama wins the White House and serves two terms, that would close off the presidency for a Democrat until 2016, which would almost certainly be too late for Hillary.

Gail Collins of the Times tries to be gracious about Hillary's defeat:

I get asked all the time whether I think Hillary lost because sexism is worse than racism in this country. The answer is no. She lost because Obama ran a smarter, better-organized campaign. It’s possible that she would have won if the Democratic Party had more rational primary rules. But Obama didn’t make up the rules, and Clinton had no problem with them until she began to lose.

Actually, this is not the whole story. Obama didn't just run a smarter campaign -- Hillary ran a dumber one. Obama didn't win this nomination so much as Hillary lost it -- lost it by her own hubris and her own arrogance. She thought this would be a coronation process that would be over in January, and by the time she figured out that it would be a fight it was too late. The Clintons held Obama in contempt as a lightweight, and before they knew what hit them he had run right over them.

Michael Crowley in the L.A. Times is pretty scathing:

A Washington mentality may even explain Hillary Clinton's astoundingly inept approach to the nominating process. The Clinton team seemed to treat the primaries more as a media narrative than a race for delegates. First, in their insider arrogance, Clinton's aides assumed that they could eliminate Obama early, in the Iowa caucuses and New Hampshire primary. When that didn't happen, they focused on the importance of wins in such "big states" as California, Ohio and Pennsylvania. Meanwhile, the Obama team grasped that it could lose such key high-profile contests and still take the nomination by methodically racking up delegates in smaller, unglamorous places the media had little interest in, such as Idaho, Colorado, Maine, Kansas and Utah.

When Obama started to overtake Clinton in the pledged delegate count, she fell back on the ultimate Washington insider's argument: that superdelegates, the creation of the inside-Washington party machine, would come to her rescue and override the will of the voters. Not only did this strategy fail, it enhanced Clinton's image as an insulated Beltway manipulator.

Even Clinton's supposed mastery of political media backfired on her. Her media team overplayed its hand early in the campaign, engendering resentment among reporters with a bare-knuckled, kill-or-be-killed philosophy cultivated during past Clinton scandals. Last September, for instance, Clinton aides forced GQ magazine to spike a critical story on her campaign by threatening to withhold access to Bill Clinton.

And other aides, notably Penn, became figures of ridicule with their constant over-spinning as they found ever-more creative ways to explain away Obama's wins and Clinton's losses (caucuses don't really count, Clinton won more "electoral votes," etc.).

Hillary's supporters didn't help either and are not helping now, as Collins points out:

They vowed to write in Hillary’s name on their ballots in November; to wear “NObama” T-shirts all summer; to “de-register” as Democrats. One much-circulated e-mail proposed turning June 3, the day Barack Obama claimed the nomination, as a permanent day of mournful remembrance “like the people in Ireland remember the Famine.”

With "friends" like these, do the Democrats really need enemies? Is this "If I can't win I'm going to take my ball and go home" attitude the way to win the White House?

Hillary was arrogant and stupid, blew the nomination and was too pig-headed to even admit it for close to a week. If she had won the general election and run the country the way she ran her campaign, her administration would have been a disaster. We should all be glad that she did not win the nomination, and let's hope that her followers grow up and vote the way they should in November, and not spend the Summer whining into their orange pekoe.

But I'm not hopeful about that last part.

Tom Moran

Leaving the Room With Dignity

Has Hillary Clinton finally admitted to herself that it's over?

A piece in today's New York Times by Adam Nagourney, Carl Hulse and Jeff Zeleny would seem to indicate that she knows that it's time for the lady in the pantsuit to pack it in:

... Mrs. Clinton’s associates said she seemed to have come to terms over the last week with the near certainty that she would not win the nomination ... Her associates said the most likely outcome was that she would end her bid with a speech, probably back home in New York, in which she would endorse Mr. Obama. Mrs. Clinton herself suggested on Friday that the contest would end sometime next week.

Has reality finally sunk in? One would think so, but then there are indications elsewhere in the same piece that Senator Clinton is still firmly in denial:

Gov. Phil Bredesen of Tennessee, a superdelegate who has been at the forefront of calling for uncommitted Democrats to make a choice soon after the last vote, said in an interview that Mrs. Clinton called him last week and urged him to “keep an open mind until the convention.”

So which is it? A graceful exit (if that's even possible at this late date) or whining all the way to the convention and beyond?

Democrats want a nominee. They want one now. They want this process to be over, so they can start working on the general election and the task of defeating John McCain. All Hillary Clinton can do at this point is make it more difficult for Barack Obama to win the general election.

So what is to be done? Hillary Clinton will not -- repeat, will not -- be the nominee. Barack Obama is not going to put her on the ticket (not unless he wants to be the first presidential candidate to be assassinated by his running mate). There's nowhere for her to go at this point.

There's a famous quote by a standup comedian named Lotus Weinstock: "I used to want to change the world, now I just want to leave the room with a little dignity."

Is Hillary Clinton capable of leaving the room with a little dignity? This week might give us the answer. But based on past performance, I wouldn't count on it.