To continue the thread. Carol King was born Carol Joan Klein. Such is the train of my thoughts: the squint of an eye to thread through another. To where does this lead, what awaits at eye’s other end? Another Klein has been on my mind.
Off the top of my head, I can’t quite remember when and where I first encountered stuff from the young Ezra Klein; but it was certainly pre-Obama, therefore before he migrated to The American Prospect at the end of 2008, and he was most certainly one of the most interesting (and youngest!) of the first generation of political bloggers. Always on my radar, through his tenure at the Washington Post to the founding (with others) of Vox, and last November brought news of his hiring by The New York Times.
And so it is that I have a new must read to add to my fluctuating (some have been known to fall out of favour!) list, and to date it has absolutely not disappointed. Already, some really excellent pieces focusing on the dangers ahead; from Covid-19 variants, for the Democrats should they rest on their laurels, should the failing political system and specifically the Senate not be reformed. Klein’s critical reflection on the problems (and liberal failings) crippling his home state of California is a highlight. Beyond the weekly opinion pieces, there is a twice weekly podcast (with full transcripts) that appear to be related and, after only a few weeks a wonderful mix of guests; including his Opinion desk colleague, Paul Krugman. Unafraid to go beyond his comfort zone, his talk with Yuval Levin about the future of the GOP is a master-class in intelligent, respectful conversation with those not of one’s own political persuasion. You may say they are peddling their wares (both have newly released, and big-time talked about books), but I could have listened all day to what Elizabeth Kolbert and Heather McGhee had to say. Only because it is the most recent, below is the conversation with the latter on Spotify, from whence the earlier episodes can be navigated to.
Returning to where I began, Ezra’s Typepad blog from the mid-noughties is still to be found out there on everyone’s favourite “forget nothing” machine (not to mention this foodie blog that he participated in – I even remember that!), and now I am fairly sure it was there that I began reading his earnest, geeky, political junkie commentary (and that of others – the Blogroll is like a blast from the past!), and which comes to an end in the year 2008 and Klein’s move to The American Prospect. What followed from then on seems to have been a career mostly in the ascendant. Half his luck, I say. The “good life” well earned. I’ve always found Ezra (everyone calls him Ezra!) to be an extraordinarily intelligent and thoughtful young man, and will enjoy accompanying him into his middle-age at NYT, just as I slink into the much older version. (Though I do note he doesn’t seem to stay in one place for too long!)