It’s with a heavy heart that I approach this weekend’s blogging stint here at Political Animal, because it will be my last. I’m leaving for happy reasons: I’m getting more freelance work, and I have a lot less free time these days. I’ve recently begun writing three blog posts a week for The Baffler’s excellent, recently relaunched blog. (FYI, this past week for The Baffler, I smacked down Thomas Piketty’s right-wing critics; explained how my mayor, Rahm Emanuel, has earned his unofficial title of Mayor One Percent; and looked at the Apple-Samsung patent wars as a symptom of our dysfunctional, inequality-generating intellectual property regime).
In addition to my Baffler blogging I will be announcing a second freelance gig within the next couple of weeks. I also plan to write more one-off pieces, including more long-form work. If you’d like to keep track of my work, I strongly suggest that you follow me on Twitter and regularly check my blog, Inequality Matters (I will post links to my work for The Baffler and other outlets there). I’m also open to additional freelance work — or better yet, a job with benefits — and any interested editors can get in touch with me via Twitter or the blog as well.
Though I am giving up the weekend blogging, I hardly consider my relationship with The Washington Monthly to be over. As I’ve told Ed and Paul Glastris, I would be happy to write articles and book reviews for The Washington Monthly magazine. My review of the Piketty book in the Monthly’s March/April edition was the most exciting assignment I’ve landed in my writing career so far. How often does a person get to review a book that has a genuine claim to be considered ground-breaking?
But yes, I will be giving up the blogging, because I’m far busier these days. But I really did love blogging for the Political Animal. It is through my work here that I finally figured out what I enjoy doing most, which is writing. There’s no sense in trying to get away from it any more: this is what I am meant to do, and I’ll keep doing it so long as I can scratch out a living from it, however precarious that living may be. As a friend said to me the other day, “You’re like a car thief who can’t stop stealing cars!” Indeed.
There’s no way I can thank Ed and Paul enough for granting me this opportunity. But I owe my deepest gratitude to you, my readers. If it weren’t for your eyeballs on this webpage, there would be no point, and certainly no economically sustainable model, for doing what I do. I thank you all from the bottom of my heart. It’s been the greatest of pleasures.
Now let me go on to writing a post about something serious. But first, here’s the JoBoxers, a super-fun English new wave/pop/neo-soul band from the early 80s. I love this song, and I love this silly video, which, as you’ll see, is all about the dog.
