This morning on PJ we are publishing a roughly 2000 word excerpt from the book I am writing for Encounter Books, which as yet has no title. The title of the chapter from which the excerpt is drawn is “The New Blacklist,” so that should give you a hint of the subject.

It’s ironic and a little sobering to be publishing something on this topic on the eve of what may be another Writers’ Strike in Hollywood. The last was in 1988. This one could be more serious because the issues are. We are at an historical point in media where the system is no longer holding. No one knows what to do.

With film and television increasingly Internet phenomena, the WGA wants a foothold there. This may be the nub of the disagreement between the producers (MPAA) and the writers. In the early nineties I could say more positively because I was the on the negotiating committee for the WGA. I’m far from that now, sitting on the other side of the fence as employer of writers at PJM. The manner is quite different from the entertainment industry as I knew. But still I could be accused of having dual loyalties now.

Of course, that’s a common problem for the Writers Guild where, particularly in television, writers have been employing writers for decades. Everyone says they are a “writer first,” but perhaps that’s only sentimental. In any case the lines between executive and staff are blurry to say the least.

Well, of course it’s really the war, but the election itself may superficially be more about immigration than we think. While driving to Pajamas HQ this morning, I was listening to the usual rehash of last night’s Democratic debate, which I didn’t watch. (For some reason, the Lakers opener was more interesting.) Anyway, the big deal from last night, which I did read in transcript, was evidently Hillary’s continued evasiveness on the issues. Why not? She’s ahead. I’d do the same thing in her shoes, particularly on the immigration issue.

Barack (the Big Snore) Obama apparently advocates driver’s licenses for illegal aliens and was trying to get Hillary to take a stand on that. She didn’t, for obvious reasons. She’d have to be an idiot to know that’s not a BIg Loser in the general election. Even 72% of New Yorkers oppose it, according to a poll read on the radio that didn’t sound outlandish. Common sense dictates this is a non-starter, but not to Obama, who is courting the “liberal” wing of the Democratic Party, or rather hanging onto it for dear life.

If the Republicans get lucky, Obama and Edwards will really come after Hillary hard in a way that hurts her candidacy, but I think it’s already too late. On the other hand, something more interesting, at least more salacious, may be brewing on the campaign horizon…. And just in the nick of time. Many of us were about to fall asleep. More ! More!… say the Romans.

Dennis Kucinich is from Venus.

[But where is Ron Paul from?-ed. I'm not saying.]

Many of you may already know that Ron Silver is blogging at PJM at the “Silver Bullet.” Also blogging starting today is Roger Kimball at “Roger’s Rules.” Not surprisingly, Kimball’s first post – on a recent trip to Londonistan with a side journey to Oxford – makes most blog posts look Instant Messaging.

What happens to old pols when time has passed them by? They sue each other:

Consumer advocate and 2004 independent presidential candidate Ralph Nader sued the Democratic Party on Tuesday, contending officials conspired to keep him from taking votes away from nominee John Kerry.

The lawsuit also alleges that the Democratic National Committee conspired to force Nader off the ballot in several states.

Maybe they did. What do I know? But this should be entertaining to watch. I don’t think the DNC will be able to settle this one out of court. And, as we all know, even if Nader can’t get a lawyer to take his case on contingency, the “idealistic” consumer advocate can well afford a good attorney.

He’s not in a position to walk the walk yet, but Rudy Giuliani is talking the talk on the War on Terror better than anyone running for President at the moment:

“Suppose Hillary Clinton and John Edwards’ new position was their position back then, that it was a mistake to take him out,” Giuliani said, referring to former Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein. “Wouldn’t we be dealing with Saddam Hussein becoming nuclear right now? If Iran was becoming nuclear what would he be doing? Sitting there letting his arch enemy gain nuclear power over him? Or would we now be dealing with two countries seeking to become nuclear powers.”

Makes sense to me.

Ron Silver – a man with whom I worked many years ago in one of the proudest moments of my professional life, he says in his too – is now writing for Pajamas Media and will be soon blogging on PJM (tomorrow, actually, if all goes well). What can I say about Ron? (Everyone knows what a great actor he is.) Three great things: integrity, humor and guts.

What has four legs in the morning of its life, two legs in the noon of its life and three legs in the evening of its life?

The Sphinx after nuclear testing.

Oh, never mind.

But the latest news out of Cairo – that Egypt too is now going nuclear – does seem like a bad joke.

Our government is, of course, “welcoming” this decision on the part of Mubarak & Co., whose intention, again of course, is not military but “to diversify Egypt’s energy resources and preserve its oil and gas reserves for future generations.”

Meanwhile, back in our country, the left and right continue to do nothing much at all about our power situation – the left mired in knee-jerk fears of nuclear energy out of outdated Hollywood movies and the right mired in equally knee-jerk opposition to government subsidy of scientific projects (hey, it got us to the moon, didn’t it?).

Listen, ladies and gentlemen, drop your bourgeois ideologies, left and right, and start moving. The fight against Islamofascism is a waste of energy without new ways of obtaining energy. Don’t believe me, check out this list.

Or possibly he’s just an admirer of murdering dictators like Bashar Assad. You decide. Nevertheless the corrupt weasel at the helm of IAEA told CNN today:

Israel had “no business” bombing Syria and lacks “any evidence at all” that its target was a nuclear facility, the head of the United Nations International Atomic Energy Agency said.

Huh?

Guess Mohamed missed all the satellite photos. Of course, he claims the UN is purchasing some of their own now. We’ll wait for “his analysis.” Meanwhile, what’s interesting is that ElBaradei is defending something that even Assad himself isn’t. But then Bashar appears to have problems of his own. [It's Debka! -ed. I know, but this time the details fascinate.]

The NYT today trumpets that Obama is trying to jump start his campaign by talking tough to Hillary (or something):

“I don’t think people know what her agenda exactly is,” Mr. Obama continued, citing Social Security, Iraq and Iran as issues on which she had not been fully forthcoming.

“Now it’s been very deft politically,” he said. “But one of the things that I firmly believe is that we’ve got to be clear with the American people right now about the important choices that we’re going to need to make in order to get a mandate for change, not to try to obfuscate and avoid being a target in the general election.”

Oh, blather. One of the things Obama ought to know is that any time anyone uses the words “…one of the things that I firmly believe is that we’ve got be clear with the American people right now about the important choices that we’re going to need to make…” is that anyone who had been previously awake has just gone to sleep. We’re not listening. And we shouldn’t be. The words “firmly believe” by themselves should be “firmly” banned from the English language. They constitute such a tiresome cliché you can’t even parody them. It’s too boring. If that’s Barack’s idea of a jump start, he better try Ambien.

Now giving Obama his due, which isn’t a lot, the way the American presidential campaign is currently structured even Jackie Mason himself might put us all to sleep. No one has that much interesting to say for so long – and certainly not politicians, not any living ones anyway.

I have an idea. Why not after six months of campaigning we have an option of voting all candidates out on both sides and bringing in fresh ones? At least it would help us stay awake. The way things are going now, whoever assumes the Presidency in ‘09, it’s going to seem as if they’re already well into their second term by the time they’re sworn in. In Hillary’s case, make that a fourth term.