P.J. O'Rourke, Phil Bronstein at The Commonwealth Club

When you've got a speaker as funny and interesting as political satirist P.J. O'Rourke, you want to team him up with someone who's also a strong figure. Smart, funny, controversial. So we're rather pleased that on September 30 at noon, The Commonwealth Club in San Francisco will be hosting O'Rourke, and moderating duties will be performed by our friend Phil Bronstein, executive vice president at the San Francisco Chronicle.

O'Rourke will be discussing his latest book: Don't Vote, It Just Encourages the Bastards. So come and get into the spirit of the November elections, and be prepared for a great event.

Former First Lady Rosalynn Carter Tells SF Chronicle about Advances in Mental Health

Former First Lady Rosalynn Carter, who will be speaking at The Commonwealth Club this Friday at noon, was interviewed by Julian Guthrie in today's San Francisco Chronicle. She tells the paper about her decades of involvement in mental health policy (which she discusses in her new book, Within Our Reach), and she also shares her first memories of being in San Francisco – and being told she and husband Jimmy looked too young to drink.

It's a charming interview. And don't forget to get your tickets to see her in-person this Friday.

Paul Saffo: Bay Area Should Flex Its Economic Muscles in the Political Arena

The Bay Area would benefit from thinking more like a city-state and less like a region within a dysfunctional state, futurist Paul Saffo writes in yesterday's San Francisco Chronicle.

Noting that the Bay Area's economy would be the 25th largest in the world if it were an independent country (which would put it ahead of Austria, Denmark, and even Taiwan), Saffo writes that local-based pragmatism would result in better economic management than the state currently provides. He argues that "a sudden outbreak of city-state pragmatism might shock Sacramento out of its ideological deadlock and into a serious exploration of how to effect essential but unpopular solutions – from service cuts and tax increases to a rewriting of our state Constitution."

You can read his entire essay here.

The ever-provocative Saffo will be on a high-powered panel at The Commonwealth Club tomorrow night (July 13) that includes Laura Tyson (an economic advisor to President Obama), DBL Investors Managing Partner Nancy Pfund, Robert Klein (governing board chair of the California Institute for Regenerative Medicine), former Assembly Speaker Robert Hertzberg – all moderated by KPIX-TV anchor Sydnie Kohara. The event is part of the Chevron California Innovation Series at The Commonwealth Club.

For details and to order tickets, visit The Commonwealth Club's web site.

San Francisco Chronicle Staff Cuts

The San Francisco Chronicle may have escaped the grave, but there's still a painful downsizing taking place at the city's major print news outlet. The online news site San Francisco Sentinel is publishing online a list of what it says are the first batch of Chronicle employees to accept a voluntary exit deal.

The list includes some names and news beats that are likely to interest long-time Chronicle readers.

For more background on the Chronicle's troubles, see here.

Chronicle Update: Tentative Deal Reached

San Francisco might not be left without a major daily paper after all, if a tentative deal between the paper's owner and its largest union holds. As reported in today's Chronicle, the deal involves wage and benefit cuts, increased work hours, and a reduction in the work force of about 150.

As noted on The Commonwealth Club's blog here, paper owner Hearst was threatening to close or sell the paper if it couldn't get major concessions within a matter of weeks. Hearst also owns the Seattle Post-Intelligencer, which is facing its own death spiral. Media observers had questioned whether San Francisco would earn the dubious distinction of becoming the first major city without a major daily newspaper. (San Francisco continues to have the free daily Examiner.)

The Chronicle notes that Hearst still has to negotiate with its other large union, the Teamsters.

In the meantime, you might want to check out the blog of Chronicle editor-at-large (and frequent Commonwealth Club event moderator) Phil Bronstein, who recently wrote about the messy newspaper industry. "The speed of technology has stunned a lot of people, along with quick-changing consumer habits. The economy sucks more than ever before in our lifetimes," Bronstein writes. "Even while slamming ourselves for being too complacent, we're also just shell-shocked by what's been happening."

San Francisco Chronicle: The First of the Last Papers?

Read a 3/10/09 update on this story: Tentative union agreement in Chronicle case


In 2007, UC Berkeley Professor of Journalism William Drummond challenged a Commonwealth Club panel on journalism with this: "It's always been a great puzzlement to me [that] in an area where people are intelligent, affluent, sophisticated -- how come even now, how the LA Times is still a major newspaper of considerable import, and San Francisco has never produced that kind of product?"

If that was a long-standing question of Bay Area media watchers for years, the answer is not likely to become any easier now. The San Francisco Chronicle could be sold or even closed if owner Hearst Corp. is unable to get significant cuts to operating costs in the next few weeks. Yes, weeks -- not months, not years. The cuts might be unachievable; some estimates are that the company would have to cut as much as 47 percent of staff.

But others are suggesting that San Francisco could soon become the first major U.S. city without a paid daily newspaper (we do have, of course, the free daily SF Examiner and a number of local news and opinion blogs, in addition to broadcast media). Even if the paper survives, if it loses so much of its staff, will it be able to cover the city and region the way it historically has? (Hearst's Seattle Post-Intelligencer is also facing a Chronicle-like end.)

With losses of $50 million a year, and more predicted for 2009, the Chronicle was in serious trouble even before the economy went off a cliff in 2008. (For a good overview of the challenges facing newspapers and other local traditional media, listen to audio of Professor Drummond's Sept. 27, 2009, Commonwealth Club panel discussion, "The State of Journalism," with industry pros Leslie Griffith, Robert Rosenthal, Kevin Keeshan, and Steve Wright.)

If we are about to enter a post-Chronicle era, that does not mean there is less news to report and be interpreted. The Commonwealth Club hosts a wide range of speeches and panel discussions by newsmakers, and this blog is just one effort we undertake to try to get this news out into the public consciousness, making connections between speakers here with timely issues in the news.

There are also, of course, many blogs, written by everyone from teenagers to laid-off newspaper reporters, and these blogs do everything from highlighting important news that is overlooked by the major media, to pushing partisan agendas. We will likely see a continued multiplication in blogs covering our local scene, and we will likely see some aggregation of blogs into super-blogs (hyperblogs? can we coin a term here?) like Huffington Post. Michael Kinsley, former editor of The New Republic and Slate.com, and the former editorial page editor of the LA Times, recently recanted somewhat on his earlier criticisms of news bloggers and offered a more optimistic assessment of their value, during a speech at The Commonwealth Club December 9, 2008 (listen to audio; see the video).

What will the future of Bay Area journalism be?

Where do you get your news? How good is it? Leave a comment and join the discussion.

India's Enron Threatens the Legitimacy of the Oscars

With the Super Bowl over, the attention of a weary nation turns to its next distraction, the annual Academy Awards event in late February. And it just might have more drama than is noticed by the casual observer.

India has its own Enron. An Indian film also received 10 Oscar nominations, including Best Picture. The accounting firm charged with overlooking nearly $1 billion while auditing the books of the Indian firm Satyam is PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC), the same company that tabulates voting for the Oscars.

This could easily be a mystery-suspense picture starring the guy from Heroes as the scheming CEO, Jude Law as the unscrupulous accountant and Neil Patrick Harris as the guy who figures it all out. I'll wait for my Oscar nod until next year.

In the meantime, should there be a bit of concern for the legitimacy of the Oscars? Could PwC suffer the same fate as Arthur Andersen, the accounting firm that went belly-up after the Enron scandal? The Oscars web site clearly states that a small amount of PwC employees are involved in the counting of votes. In fact, once a winner is declared, according to the Oscars, only two representatives from the firm know the results until showtime. PwC is trusted to faithfully deliver the correct winners, yet they are unable to account for $1 billion on the other side of the world?

The Indian film, Slumdog Millionaire, has received glowing reviews across the board and is unlikely to win Best Picture, so the specter of impropriety is low. On the other hand, Robert Downey, Jr., received a Best Supporting Actor nomination for playing an Australian actor who plays a black man in the comedy Tropic Thunder. Maybe there's something to this accounting scandal after all?

Welcome to Oscar Season, a time of rumors and speculation and hopes and inevitable embarrassing moments on stage by the award recipients.

The San Francisco Chronicle's renowned film critic Mick LaSalle will give his impressions and predictions for the 81st Oscars in a conversation with Sacramento Bee film critic Carla Meyer on Feb. 21 at the Napa Valley Opera House. For more information, visit The Commonwealth Club web site here.

–by Steven Tavares

Is History the Casualty of the Internet?

An older gentleman by a kiosk outside The Commonwealth Club offices on Market Street holds up the San Francisco Chronicle and cries repeatedly, "EXTRA!, EXTRA!, EXTRA!"

Who says the newspaper industry is faltering?

At least, it's not hurting today, with another round of colorful, graphically pleasing editions featured on newsstands across the country. The Newseum web site has an extensive gallery of today's historic page-ones featuring a very elegant and simple cover from The Fresno Bee.

According the Associated Press, many of the nation's largest newspapers, including The New York Times, USA Today and the Washington Post, printed extra papers in advance of high demand. Many learned a lessons from the day after the November election when demand for papers to commemorate Barack Obama's victory left publishers flat-footed. Not only are newspapers increasing production of their daily editions, but also publishing special editions and books ranging in price from $4.95 to $14.95.

The rush to grab a piece of history through buying and preserving newspapers has been an American tradition since the colonists' veracious habit of reading the news made the nascent country one of the most learned places in the world. With the end of newspapers as we know them possibly around the corner -- at least, Michael Hirschorn at The Atlantic says The Times could be kaput as early as this May -- how will people retain the memories of historic times such as President Obama's inauguration?

Without a paper and ink version of the news, will people download a screen shot of yesterday's home page of the Washington Post? Send the file to their printer and unassumingly tuck it between last month's overdue phone bill and their child's sterling report card? The Internet as a record of history has proven to be insufficient with its power based on constant change at the whim of breaking news. Lasting snapshots of a single day or event invariably fall through the cracks. Organizations like The Internet Archive strive to preserve the web's news history but fall short in their brevity.

What is the future? There seems to be a missing link between how a new generation of people consume the news through the net on a personal computer, laptop or even their smart phones. Portability and complete access to the web at any moment is also problematic. TechCrunch.com reported in December on rumors of a larger seven-by-nine inch iPod which would be capable of accessing the news and making it easier to navigate and read. Down the road, the news may be downloaded onto bendable computers, which conceivably could be rolled up and folded without harm.

Of course, none of these devices will solve the problem of capturing history in a tangible form. It may be the one aspect of communication we will have to adapt at a time when more information is flowing than at any time in human consciousness. The casualty ironically may be history.

--Steven Tavares