Tom Robbins

Ecco, an imprint of HarperCollins, will publish a new novel this fall by Tom Robbins called B is For Beer.

 

According to HarperCollins executive editor David Hirshey, who is editing the book, it is about 100 pages long, and takes the form of a "hallucinogenic hymn to beer, children, and the cosmic mysteries that sustain us all."

Mr. Robbins, author of Even Cowgirls Get the Blues, has not written a novel since 2003's Villa Incognito, and B is for Beer will be his first since leaving Bantam Books, his publisher of almost 30 years.  read more »

Here’s veteran reporter Tom Robbins of the Village Voice, expanding on an unusual argument he presented Friday night on New York 1 News: that the Times is underplaying the Barack Obama story.

“The New York Times managed to think that 30,000 people in a stadium in Columbia, South Carolina was worth a total of a squib on page 39. I was just stunned. Could any one of these candidates, could Hillary Clinton put 30,000 people in a stadium? I don’t think so.”

He also said, "It tells me that this paper, I think, is consciously not trying to promote this guy’s candidacy.”

Mark your calendars: the state Independence Party is getting together, apart.

A week from Monday, the New York County chapter of the party, which is closely associated with Lenora Fulani, will have its annual fund-raiser at the Woolworth Kitchen Tower.

Tomorrow, a rival, Staten Island-based faction will hold an event to present awards to Councilman Vinny Ignizio, Assemblywoman Janele Hyer-Spencer and Village Voice writer Tom Robbins.

It’s safe to say whoever shows up to one probably won’t show up to the other. But it's nice to know that party infighting isn't putting a damper on the social schedule.

I was kind of waiting for the Voice's Tom Robbins to weigh in with a definitive explanation what Central Labor Council chief Brian McLaughlin is actually accused of. He does that and throws in a mafia-ties bonus in this must-read online dispatch.

Here's his explanation of why McLaughlin would have been part of the alleged scheme:

Several of the contractors were involved in the city's streetlight program, where McLaughlin had enormous clout as a result of his role as a top official of Local 3 of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers. While most of his official union business centered on his Central Labor Council role, McLaughlin maintained control over a unit of the electrical workers' union whose members worked for the streetlighting contractors, sources said. By agreeing to reduce labor costs for favored contractors, McLaughlin was able to help steer awards to his pals, the sources said.

Robbins, whose judgement on this kind of thing is hard to match, writes as though the case against McLaughlin is pretty well nailed down.

Want to make your weekend a wonkend? I'll leave you with this Blog Stroll... Over at Power Plays, Tom Robbins notes that a certain new Dem chieftain can't bring himself to say Freddy's name. I'll give you a hint: he's a Brooklyner, and his first name rhymes with "neat-o."

Team Kos takes a look at third-quarter recruitment and fundraising. Casts it as Chuck vs. Libby Dole, cheers wildly.

"Sometimes the gods of Washington gossip-mongering smile, DeLay-like, upon us all," gushes Wonkette, on the announcement of an upcoming tell-all book by former DNC chair Terry McAuliffe. The Politicker - at least partially responsible for a collision involving wine, a busboy, and Mr. McAuliffe, back at a CGI cocktail party - now feels less guilty for not begging to pay Mr. McAuliffe's dry cleaning bill. Apparently, there was a bidding war (for the book, not his suit).

We're getting a Homeland Security representative... now let's send him back home! Gothamist is amused by the Police Commissioner's warm welcome to New York's Newest.

GOP and the City sends up the Daily News' latest take on TerrorEmailgate, proposing a complex network of alliances all the way from U.S. Coast Guard information officer Nathaniel Heiner (an original member of Sha-Na-Na) to the ubiquitous Kevin Bacon. The Daily Gotham runs an article taking Bloomberg's education record to task. And, as one reader notes, the fame of Freddy's botched appearance with Bill Clinton yesterday has spread so far, so wide, that... the Drudge Report has taken notice.  read more »

The Politicker, however, urges fans of Freddy to look on the bright side. It must be noted that, even though the speech he'd planned for this morning was cancelled when no one showed up, the sound guy was there.

'Til Monday.

Merchants at the Bronx Terminal Market—who are being pushed out to make way for a shopping mall—plan to stage a rent strike tomorrow, according to the Neighborhood Retail Alliance. Not paying rent is, we have found, a very good way to get evicted. On the other hand, if you are going to be evicted anyway, why not raise a fuss? The market is one of several Bloomberg no-bid deals that have raised suspicions—read Tom Robbins to figure this one out --and which could prove to be a huge liability for him this fall. But so far, Ferrer hasn’t taken the bait.  read more »

There were always two parts to the behavior of Bloomberg's aides toward Tom Ognibene -- the first fairly standard, the second a little thuggish.

First, on January 12, Bloomberg campaign chief Kevin Sheekey and City Hall aide Rich Wager meet the former Councilman in Starbucks and offer him a job on the campaign. Ognibene turns them down later that week, as he told us this morning. There's been some suggestion that the offer might have broken a law. But it's also politics as usual, and Ognibene told us he ends that day on good terms with the mayor's men, and without any plans to talk to the press -- much less his longtime tormentor at the Voice! -- about his meeting.

Then, on Saturday, there's another offer, and a threat. Ognibene wouldn't go into detail about this, but we've learned elsewhere that, on Saturday, Wager spoke to Ognibene's friend Dennis Gallagher, a Councilman from Queens. Wager told him that the title of Counsel to the Mayor was on offer. He also warned him with, Ognibene told us, "words to the effect that, 'Are you sure that case in Manhattan is closed?'" in reference to a bribery scandal in which Ognibene was never charged.

Ognibene wouldn't confirm that Wager was the one delivering what sounded to him, and to us, like an implicit threat. He only said that the conversation took place between his ally and "a very decent young man, who either made a gross mistake or was used" and who, Ognibene speculated, "is deeply pained." We learned from another source that this was Wager.

Now Wager, who works near us in the basement of City Hall, certainly doesn't have the authority to offer top city jobs. We also doubt that he would be in a position to threaten that an investigation be reopened. He hasn't responded to our voicemail as to who asked him to deliver those messages to Gallagher.

In any case, a few days later, Ognibene gets a call from the Voice's Tom Robbins, who had covered the bribery scandal. (Ognibene adamantly maintains his innocence.) Ognibene guesses that this is the consummation of Wager's threat, and that Robbins has been tipped by City Hall. So he tells Robbins the whole story.

We'd just note that the real political miscalculation here wasn't the one that has turned up in the papers and on certain sanctimonious blogs: the job offer. The miscalculation was the threat, which provoked Ognibene to go public with the whole thing. We'd love to know whose idea that was, but Wager doesn't seem inclined to tell us.

Ognibene, in any case, told us that the threat had the opposite of its intended effect. Once he'd been threatened, he felt that he couldn't let himself be intimidated. "You never threaten someone," he said. "Then they're locked in."  read more »

He also noted with a chuckle that the mayor is spending today on the Staten Island Ferry, doing what he considers make-up work with Republican voters.

"I already consider myself an effective candidate," he said.

A friend, reading about how public servant Russell Harding charged taxpayers for his morning bagel a  read more »

Tucker Carlson's problems at the Ho Chi Minh City airport on April 28 raise an interesting question  read more »