More than a little hatred of the Internet lingers among certain elite journalists, and not just over copyright issues or job losses. The Net—with so much of a focus on pure information, as opposed to the social standing of the people delivering it—tends to reduce class differences. Despite the clues that the attentive can pick […]
Read MoreA WASHINGTON novel
The Solomon Scandals blog comes out of Alexandria, Virginia, just across the Potomac from D.C., and the novel itself is very much a Washington creature, as well as a Northern Virginia one. But oh how the local details can travel, so to speak. During the Watergate party in Scandals, a PR man offers boozy insights […]
Read MoreThe Georgetown name game: Roffman, Rothman, Solomon and The Georgetowner
Two kinds of parties show up in The Solomon Scandals, my D.C. media novel: the private variety (“party-parties”) and “name-in-the-paper parties” (where the givers and the guests want publicity). For both, the location is still the Georgetown section of Washington, famous over the years as home to the liberal elite. I’ve never applied for “elite” […]
Read MoreD.C.’s power lunchrooms: Then and now
The Solomon Scandals mentions the Sans Souci, where so many members of the D.C. elite plotted and dined. In real life JFK almost surely ate there on occasion, and aides such as his press secretary, Pierre Salinger, most definitely came. So did dealmakers and celebrities like the late Art Buchwald, seen in the right photo. A […]
Read MoreSubway etiquette and the social order: Are you a Left-Stepper, Right-Stepper or Parker?
Washington, D.C., the main setting of The Solomon Scandals, is like Hollywood or an Army base. It’s a city of hierarchies, both official and social. Read on and find out where you stand in the social order. You don’t have to live in D.C. to take the related poll in this post—one visitor has even […]
Read MoreHarry Edward Rothman’s Eulogy (Archived Item from 1997)
Dad was born in Manhattan on September 28, 1910, to Max and Dora Rothman. Max was a house painter and decorator, a craftsman; and from him my father may very well have inherited his own love of the brush. Dad grew up in Brooklyn and bus-boyed his way through New York University, from which he […]
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