Closing Out the Bartlet Administration

Posted by Bob Greenberger on May 14, 2006

Tonight NBC will air the final episode of The West Wing, ending seven seasons of one of the most brilliant television series of all time.

Since NBC and the actors couldn’t work out fees that would have allowed them to produce a clip-laden/fresh interview tribute special, they’re rerunning the pilot at 7. So, allow me to pay my own tribute.

WAIT! There is more to read… read on »

Quiet Week

Posted by Bob Greenberger on May 11, 2006

Been a quiet week but it could also be the quiet before the storm. There are several projects in the hopper that will either keep me very busy or not. I’m very positive about a few of these options while others are slow to develop so with luck, as they come through I can space them out.

On the other hand, if several get green-lit at once, my time gets filled very quickly.

And old projects also bubble back up. Just this morning I received the galleys to “The Landing Party” my story in Star Trek: Constellations so that requires a final read through. Fortunately, I’ve been given a week on this.

This is not to say the week has been non-productive. I’ve written my usual two pieces for Weekly World News plus started working through one of the Rosen Publishing updates (trimming 47,000 words down to 8000 plus revising statistical information). Spoke to one editor about some articles and spoke to another about essays for a book, plus did revisions to an essay that looks like it’ll be accepted (details to follow). I even spent a good chunk of Tuesday on my original fantasy, something I haven’t touched in a long, long time.

I have a meeting in Manhattan this afternoon which pertains to one of the projects and the one I am most optimistic about even though, if approved, will require a lot of catch-up because, in theory, the project should have started about a year ago.

So, it’s been busy and steady but not a lot of new activity to report. Stay tuned.

Thoughts on Barry Bonds

Posted by Bob Greenberger on May 8, 2006

I’ve allowed myself plenty of time to get past the emotional, knee-jerk reaction to the whole Barry Bonds situation. However, since he’s likely to hit #714 this week, I thought I’d finally weigh in.

On a purely technical level, Barry Bonds’ record should be allowed to remain intact because the rules of Major League Baseball have virtually ignored steroid abuse when it clearly stared them in the face. Therefore, Bonds took advantage, juiced up, and smacked all those homers.

On a moral level, Bonds’ record of 73 homers in a single season, and his homers over the last five to seven years, should probably be expunged from the record for his blatant disregard for the game and his body.

Barry Bonds is not a stupid man. He knew full well what he has done ever since he grew up at Bobby Bonds’ side, watching the game from an insider’s point of view. He saw players dope up and use whatever substances they could get away with to put a little extra zip on the ball or stay awake for a day game after a night game. Bonds knew enough to hire a good agent and get the best deal possible when his time with the Pirates was up. Bonds knew enough to get a trainer to help develop his body.

To sit there, in a grand jury room, and say he didn’t know what he was putting on and in his body (the “clean and the clear”) is disingenuous. More than enough evidence has come out that Bonds made a determined point to pump up and regain a spotlight he had ceded to Sammy Sosa and more importantly, Mark McGwire. (And yes, on the same grounds Bonds’ numbers should be expunged, so should McGwire’s since his use of Andro was also getting away with doping on a technical matter.)

What amazes me is that guys like Bonds and McGwire resorted to chemical enhancements when clearly neither needed it. Bonds was one half of the dreaded Killer Bs, along with Bobby Bonilla, that made the Pirates a threatening team. McGwire smacked a terrific number of homers with his leaner physique while playing alongside doping king Jose Canseco.

Still, all of the blame for this mess has to be laid at the feet of the owners. They allowed an independent Commissioner’s Office be turned into a stooge’s room that ignored this problem and allowed it to get out of control. As Congress had to step in back during the 1980s drug scandals, Congress had to haul players before them a year ago. The owners, instead, should have been in front of this years ago and dealt with it. They watched the Commissioners of football and basketball take a get tough policy and make it work. Instead, they let Bud Selig run things and run them badly.

As a result, Bonds will get away with eclipsing Babe Ruth, but only on paper. In the hearts and minds of baseball fans — a unique subset of humanity that can equate sports with poetry – Babe Ruth will remain the greatest hoe run hitter of all time. They will tip their hats to Hank Aaron for surpassing him (also without juicing up) and establishing the American record for career homers.

Bonds did himself in with a surly attitude, refusing to put himself out there to the community, doing the good deeds that match the on field career, and antagonizing the press. He brought this all down on his bald head. I’ve seen some columnists ruminate over the racial factor and I don’t see it. Not at all. Bonds could be black, white, Latino or Asian and still be reviled for his antics.

In my head, I’ve already consigned Bonds’ record to a parallel universe and will not be acknowledging the feat this week because, after all, most of those homers weren’t earned.

The Scribe Awards

Posted by Bob Greenberger on May 5, 2006

As previously discussed, I am a charter member of the International Association of Media Tie-In Writers. One of the many things debated during the founding of the organization, nearly a year ago already, was the creation of Awards to acknowledge the best in our business since media tie-ins may get nominations elsewhere, but never win.

This week, the following was announced and thought I’d share for those interested for any reason.

The Scribe Awards and How You Can Enter

The IAMTW will present six awards in three categories for books (including comic books and graphic novels) published in 2006. We will also honor one “Grandmaster” for career achievement in the field.

SPECULATIVE FICTION (Science Fiction, Fantasy, Horror)

BEST NOVEL (adapted) – A licensed novelization based on an existing screenplay, whether its a feature film, episodic teleplay, computer game, script, or play.

BEST NOVEL (original) – A licensed, original novel using pre-existing characters or worlds from a movie, television series, computer game, play, or an existing series of novels (ie new novels extending a literary franchise, ie DUNE, James Bond, etc.)

GENERAL FICTION (Mysteries, Thrillers, Westerns, Suspense, Historicals, Romances)

BEST NOVEL (adapted)

BEST NOVEL (original)

YOUNG ADULT (All Genres)

BEST NOVEL (adapted)

BEST NOVEL (original)

GRANDMASTER (For Career Achievement)

The judging committees are made up of three of your peers from within the organization, writers who know the unique obstacles and restrictions that tie-in writers face, because they are tie-in writers themselves. The judges will read all the submissions in their category and select both the nominees and the winners (a system patterned after the Mystery Writers of America and the Private Eye Writers of America among others).

Rules for Submission

Authors can submit multiple titles, but only ONE BOOK PER CATEGORY/ONE CATEGORY PER BOOK (i.e. you can’t submit the same book in two different categories or multiple titles in one category. Authors who’ve done several books in any one category need to pick the one title that seems strongest and submit only that).

Only authors can submit their books for consideration but we encourage you to have your editors/publishers send the actual books on your behalf so you don’t have to raid your author’s copies or pay the postage.

Judges can submit their work, but obviously not in the categories they are judging.

The book must be a licensed work published for the first time between Jan 1, 2006 and Dec. 31, 2006. Only books with a copyright date of 2006 will be eligible for consideration. Though novels published through December 31, 2006, are eligible, entrants are required to get copies of eligible work into the hands of the category judges no later than December 1st, to allow adequate time to review the titles. Galleys are acceptable.

All entrants MUST include a cover letter with each book. The cover letter must include the following information: the Category you are entering, Title of the Book, Name of the Author, Publication Date, Editor & Publisher, and email & “snailmail” addresses and phone numbers for the author and editor.

A copy of all submissions—the book and cover letter—should be sent to each judge in the category you are entering and to the IAMTW. Please send an email to tieinwriters@yahoo.com for the list of judges and their mailing addresses. IAMTW members can find the list in the MEMBERS ONLY section of this site.

Submission is free for any IAMTW member. Non-members must pay a $10 fee for each submission to cover our costs (payable via Paypal or by check to IAMTW, PO Box 8212, Calabasas, CA 91372).

A list of all the books submitted will be posted here and updated regularly. The nominees will be announced, to entrants and the media, in February 2007. The location and date of the awards ceremony is TBD.

Eternals Part Two

Posted by Bob Greenberger on

Woke up this morning to discover that Newsarama has posted the second article I originall wrote for Marvel.com. I also note that despite my request, no one in Editorial (like the ener-knowledgable Tom Brevoort) doublechecked it so at least one footnote is incomplete. Oh well, at least it does set the stage for the forthcoming miniseries, which is looking pretty cool.

What’s Going On

Posted by Bob Greenberger on May 3, 2006

It’s been a while since I’ve talked about the various projects I’m working on so let’s do a quick review:

Weekly World News: Every week I continue to chronicle the adventures of Matt Daemon SOS (Seeker of Obscure Supernaturals). I also have written several long and short “news” stories for the paper and continue to have fun. Sometimes I find a single sentence idea waiting in my In Box and get to run wild with it.

Cutting Edge Careers: Artificial Intelligence: Manuscript delivered to Editor.

In the News: Suicide Bombers: Manuscript delivered to Editor.

Star Trek: Corps of Engineers – “Troubleshooting”: Manuscript deliver to Editor.

Star Trek: Constellations – “The Landing Party”: Copy edited manuscript returned to Editor.

The Phantom Prose Anthology – “Ghost Hunting”: Manuscript delivered to editor.

Rosen Publishing’s Database Project: Three older works updated, several more to go.

Scifipedia: Not sure how much I’ve discussed this but I have written about four dozen entries for this new feature over at sci-fi.com. John Douglas, the project editor, was extremely generous in assigning me a broad variety of topics. As of today, only one is on line, the rest will no doubt roll out over the next few weeks. Happily, I got to write about comic strips, comic books, artists, novels, movies and television.

The Eternals: As mentioned on Friday, one of two pieces I wrote for Marvel about this series, is now available at Newsarama. No clue what’s happening with the second piece.

Actionopolis: Just got the outline for this project finalized and will probably start writing shortly. I’ll be talking more about this one shortly. However, the line overall looks very promising. Their first two offerings are available in this month’s Diamond Previews catalogue and worth a look in the Komikwerks sections.

Media Tie-In Novel: Proposal with Licensee.

Media Tie-In Project: Rough outline ready for the editor when he says it’s time to turn it in.

Original Urban Fantasy: This novel outline sits there, waiting its turn.

There remain a few other things in the works but all too tentative to talk about until later.

The Budget, Night the Second

Posted by Bob Greenberger on May 2, 2006

The lack of brownies should have been a clue it was going to be a long night.

Last night, the RTM held back-to-back meetings to finalize the budget for 2006-2007. Our first meeting was a special hearing to consider the appeal from the Board of Ed, asking to restore $641,000 to the proposed budget.

The Democrats caucused at 6:30 only to discover our counterparts from the other side of the aisle not only met at 6, but also during the week since our last meeting. Later it showed as several came with prepared remarks filled with statistics to show they’d done their homework.

The room was packed in a sea of white with parents and PTA leaders wearing t-shirts begging the RTM to Restore The Money. There were also principals, administrators and the Board. We also had the full Board of Finance along with the Board of Selectmen in attendance so it was jammed, fuller than last year.

The meeting began with a 15 presentation by the Board and Superintendent. We heard the beginning of a mind-numbing set of numbers and statistics that would mark the meeting. What stuck in my mind was that enrollment for next year was already known to exceed last year’s estimates and it’s something like the fifth year in a row that has happened. Immediately, I flashed on the notion that they should have budgeted for many more teachers plus the staff reserve they were begging to retain. Kindergarten enrollment is up for next year before the usual summer bump and 50 high school-eligible students expected to go to one of the private schools, have opted to stay, skewing the numbers. It sounded like they knew already they’d need 5-8 teachers before the reserve so any comments about returning the reserve funds if unspent was just so much rhetoric. We and they knew they’d hire those five teachers, and maybe more.

The Board of Finance had a 15 minute rebuttal and their chairman ran through a well-prepared set of numbers. As a result, they defended their decision for the budget under discussion and veering into the political realm, he made a set of personal comments that looked and sounded like a campaign speech. Whether he wants to run for the Republican nomination for First Selectman next year or not remains unknown but boy, it had the hallmark of a stump speech.

Then the Moderator opened things up for RTM comment. And we commented at length, with close to 20 members speaking. I even got up to point out that last week’s rejection of bonding to buy technology meant the school faced an additional $150,000 cut meaning the total cut was closer to $800,000 and that seemed too steep to me.

The vote was 28-21-2, lacking the two-thirds majority required to pass the appeal. Then the political games began. Anticipating this, one of our members had passed allowing him, under Robert’s Rules, to appeal the vote. It was seconded and then our majority leader called for a caucus. As we huddled, it was clear we’d try and vote as a block to revote and approve the total amount with the promise that at the next meeting we’d vote to lower the total amount of the Board of Ed budget by some $273,000, leaving the appeal with just enough funds for the five reserve teachers and supplies to outfit five classrooms. The minority leader seemed to think he could sell that.

Once more we filed in. After checking the appropriateness of the actions with the Assistant Town Attorney, we debated the appeal and voted in favor. With the appeal on the table, once more we heard from the various Boards and several RTM members. Our Majority Leader made the promise.

We voted and this time it passed 32-15-2. The cheer from the audience was loud and sustained.

Our 7 p.m. meeting ended at 10:15. Our 8 p.m. meeting began at 10:30.

And once we got through the pledge of allegiance, the Republicans called a caucus. All along, we wondered if they had some diabolical plan that had required all the extra meeting time. In theory, any proposed cuts to the budget were to be proposed last week so department heads affected could be present last night to defend the budget.

As the meeting resumed, we heard the proposed final budget numbers. I then took the microphone to propose a three-part-amendment to adjust the numbers as printed on the Call to reflect the $641,880 that had just been approved, an adjustment from the Chief Fiscal Officer to correct a miscalculation, and a reduction of $3000 as requested by the Registrar’s office. During the caucus, a fellow RTMer and I did all the math long-hand because our calculators and cell phone calculators couldn’t handle nine digits. Thankfully, our numbers matched the Chief Fiscal Officer’s own long-hand annotations.

Of course, that passed.

Then, one of the young Republicans got up to suggest we cut $40,000 from the budget, denying a traffic light be replaced at the intersection near the rec center and train station. He argued that with commercial development underway in the area, that might affect the needs for a light. After it was seconded, I then argued that with the rec center and high school traffic already an issue, the area was also going to receive a teen center in the next year or two so we better get the light added now to handle the increased traffic. Our First Selectman then said the police department requested this item based on safety concerns. Many of the other young Republicans got up to speak against the light. Sure enough, the reduction was approved.

With that, the budget was approved. Another agenda item got approved as almost an after-thought and then we were adjourned. Tonight, the Board of Finance will set the mill rate, the cost per $1000 of home valuation that will be the new tax rate. Once people see their bills in July, it will come as a shock once you couple the revaluation with the new taxes even thought the combined town budget was about a 6% increase.

Some final thoughts: the political rhetoric got pretty plain last night. The Board of Finance kept pinning the Board of Ed cuts on the Selectman, everyone else pinned it on the Board of Finance who approved the budget before coming to the RTM. It can be argued that the Republicans made the symbolic traffic light cut to show they were being fiscally responsible on both sides of the budget. The Democrats could argue that the Republicans were against education and public safety. And the citizenry should be shamed for not coming out for the most important meeting of the year. While the parents packed the room to speak for their children, not a single soul came to speak about any other aspect of the budget – either pro or con.

Interestingly, a bi-partisan group gathered at the local watering hole for the traditional “socialable soda”. The Young Republican I wound up disagreeing with twice and I managed a cordial conversation. Spoke with others from across the aisle and away from the heat of the moment, we all sounded far more rational and reasonable than you’d imagine from the public comments.

The second meeting ended about 11:40 and I got home just after 1. A very long evening with much accomplished and much still to do in an effort to make next year’s budget a less onerous process.