Home of the Marist Poll | Polls, Analysis, Learning, and More

Scene from movie Dazed & confused of students standing, sitting, and laying on and inside an orange convertible car

April 19, 2023

We Should Hang Out More

Movies often serve as perfect time capsules, offering snapshots of what life was like in an earlier time. Take Dazed and Confused. The movie is set in late seventies Texas and focuses on groups of ... Read Now >

7/1: Cooking with Grandma Ann

July 1, 2009 | by Mary Griffith

Theirs was an average-sized kitchen in Queens, New York. But, the smells that wafted through my grandparents’ house were anything but ordinary! Growing up, my family lived on the second floor of a two family house owned by my Grandma Ann and Grandpa Anthony. The two floors, though, were connected by a door that rarely closed; family time was all the time.

Grandma Ann

My memories of my grandparents are countless — curling up with grandpa as he took a nap on the couch, watching The Today Show with grandma before I went off to school, and squeezing in between the two of them in the backseat of our car as we took summer road trips. Yet, out of all of the mental snapshots I have of my grandmother, the ones that stick out most in my mind are those of her in the kitchen.

Grandma didn’t cut any corners when she cooked. From her pasta sauce to her zeppoli, everything she touched tasted as though it had been kissed by the gods! Just about every member of my family lucky enough to have known grandma had a favorite. My cousin Joe still swears no one makes a meatball like “Auntie Ann,” and even though many have tried to replicate them, no one can. (We muse it must have been the oils in her hands.) For my cousin Terri, it was her Easter Bread. But, for me, there is one dish for which I lived — her homemade pizza!

If grandma were alive today, she would probably be among the 71% of Americans the Marist Poll discovered roll out their own dough and make their own pizza pies. Pizza day was a long day. Grandma started early in the morning, mixing the dough and letting it rise. When it wasn’t a school day, I loved being at her elbow. As my mother says — patience never was one of my virtues. So, I would pester Grandma, asking how long it would take for the dough to rise. When the time finally came to roll out the dough, I’d “help” her pound down the dough with my tiny, powerless fists. (At five or six years old, I thought I did a lot.) And, with wide eyes, I’d watch as Grandma rolled out the dough and cut it to fit a few cookie sheets. Then, came the fun part!

Grandma would ladle the sauce atop the dough, but it was often up to my brother and me to sprinkle the mozzarella cheese on top and dash it with a bit of oregano. I still remember how the crumpled cheese felt in between my little fingers and how happy I was to be like my grandma.

Grandma Ann and Mary

My mouth watered as the pizza went into the oven, and I counted the minutes until the pie would be done. Then, the moment of truth: Grandma removed the cookie sheets from the oven and placed it on the counter to cool. Again, my patience would quickly run out, and I would fidget in agony until it was time to slice up the pizza and enjoy grandma’s delectable creation.

Looking back on those all too brief times with my grandmother, I realize ours was a unique relationship — one that I dearly cherish and wouldn’t trade for anything in this world. Yes, my grandmother was an amazing cook, but I know, now, that our time together in the kitchen was about more than just food. It allowed us to strengthen our familial bond and create lifelong memories.

What amazes me most, though, is how the simplest, every day gestures we experience as children have the greatest impact on us as adults. If there is one thing I took with me from my time with, not only my grandmother but, both of my grandparents it’s to never underestimate the effect we have on children during some of life’s most mundane moments. It’s in those moments when we truly help shape the adults they will become. Some day, I hope to tackle Grandma’s pizza recipe with my own children. Perhaps, they will then be able to get to know a bit about their great grandmother in a very special way and to create memories they will take with them throughout their lifetimes.

Grandma Ann’s Pizza Recipe

7/1: Dining In

7/1: Pizza Pizzazz!

7/1: Featured Recipe: Megg McKMuffin

| by Marist Poll

A Recipe by Meghan McKeever

Breakfast is important. But, then again so is sleep. So, how do you ensure that you get a tasty balanced breakfast, while still allowing yourself those precious extra minutes under the covers? The Megg McKMuffin is my solution. A vegetarian delight, it is packed with protein to stave off hunger (about 13g), and prepared in about 3 minutes in the morning. I first heard of the concept at a Weight Watchers meeting, where they suggested using real eggs and adding turkey sausage or Canadian bacon. I modified it to accommodate my dislike of real eggs and my vegetarian diet. I’ve gotten the preparation down to a science and every few weeks I whip up two or three batches and keep them on hand. Crisis averted with a healthy breakfast and ten more minutes of sleep.

Prep Time: 15 minutes
Cook Time: 22 minutes
Makes 6 muffins

Ingredients:

12 oz. egg substitute (Egg Beaters, although the generics are just as good. I use plain, but you can use any of the varieties)
¼ cup of shredded 2% cheddar cheese
3.5 oz. (¼ of a package) “Gimme Lean” vegetarian ground sausage
2 Tbsp. dried onion
Diced jalapeños to taste
Salt and pepper to taste
Whole-grain light English muffin (Thomas’ or some grocery stores have their own brand)

Recommendations:

A silicone muffin pan. I experimented with metal pans, Pam, olive oil — anything to make release and cleanup easier — and trust me, unless you want to spend 30 minutes cleaning cooked egg off your metal pan, the silicone muffin pan is the only way to go.

Mixing ingredients in a 2-cup measuring cup.

You can add any other vegetables to this recipe, but I recommend using only dried vegetables, or cook and squeeze the moisture out of veggies like spinach, mushrooms, and peppers. Any excess moisture will make the tops of the muffins a little watery.

Cooking instructions:

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. I find the best way to mix these up and eventually pour them, without making too many dirty dishes, is to use a measuring cup as a mixing bowl. Combine Egg Beaters, cheese, onion, jalapeños, other veggies, salt and pepper, in the measuring cup. Using a fork, mash the vegetarian ground sausage on a plate and add to the mixture in forkfuls. Using the fork and a little elbow grease, stir the faux sausage into the egg mixture; it will break up into bits as you mix.

The silicone muffin pan is floppy. (If you try to move the thing full of liquid Megg McKMuffins, you will end up with a very eggy floor.) So before pouring, put the pan on a flat cookie sheet for transport.

Pour the mixture into the muffin pan in equal amounts. As they cook, they fluff up a bit, so fill to just below the rim of the cup.

Bake at 350 degrees for 22 minutes.

Allow a few minutes to cool, Then, run a rubber spatula around the edge of the McKMuffins to release them. Freeze in one layer in a zip-top bag and store flat until frozen.

In the morning:

Defrost one McKMuffin (my microwave does a good job at 50% power for 2:30)
Toast a whole-grain light English muffin.
Enjoy! (with ketchup, or hot sauce, yum!)

7/1: Dining In

7/1: Pizza Pizzazz!

7/1: Cooking with Grandma Ann

6/25: Parenting Advice from the Trenches

June 25, 2009 | by Marist Poll

By John Sparks

Kids…when it comes to parenting, even the littlest angels can be devils. In her new book, 13 is the New 18, author and Associated Press columnist and editor, Beth Harpaz, shares her experiences raising a trying teenager. When Harpaz spoke with The Marist Poll’s John Sparks, she offered her insights, advice, and reassurance to parents that there is a light at the end of the tunnel. The transcript to the interview is below.

John Sparks
Beth, the Marist Poll conducted a national survey and asked folks which stage they thought was the most difficult to raise a child. Not surprisingly, two-thirds responded that teens from 13 to 19 were the most challenging. Now, regardless of the region of the country, the income, the education, the race, age, gender, the respondents overwhelmingly agreed. Now does this surprise you?

Beth Harpaz
Not at all. It doesn’t surprise me at all. I mean, I think when they’re little, in some ways you’re more prepared emotionally for how hard it is physically. You’re up in the middle of the night. You’re changing diapers. You’re dealing with tantrums. They’re starting in school. But, I think there’s a lot more support for parents at the stage. If you’re a mom or even a dad, you’re going to the playground, and you’re commiserating with the other parents, and you’re trading advice on: oh, I have a colicky baby. Well, nobody blames you if you have a colicky baby. They might offer advice, but they’re not going to judge you for it. But, if you have a teenager who is yelling at you on the street or in a mall or failed a class and has to go to summer school or gets in trouble or talks back to grandma, people do judge you as the parent, and that’s very difficult. You don’t get that kind of support. People are very secretive about their problems they have with teenagers. They’re afraid to tell the other moms, “Oh gosh, I don’t know what to do with this kid. He’s driving me nuts.” So, I think part of it is the isolation that we have to deal with these problems by ourselves.

John Sparks
Well, an even greater percentage of the respondents said that it’s harder to raise a child now than in previous generations. Why do you think this is so?

Beth Harpaz
Well, you know it’s interesting. I mean people who have teenagers now, they’re probably, what, in their late 30s/40s/early 50s, majority of them I would guess, and so, a lot of these folks grew up in the ’60s and ’70s, and I think maybe a lot of us, myself included, I’m 48, born in ’61, so, I was little girl in the ’60s and a teenager and college student in the ’70s, I think we thought that we were the worst teenagers, you know that we were out there doing everything, that we know all about sex, drugs, and rock and roll, so there’s nothing a kid could throw at us that would freak us out. Well, guess what? You know, they always manage to find something. I mean now as parents we have a different kind of generation gap with our kids. They’re so into the technology, and they know so much more about it than we do. They can outsmart us every time, and they’re constantly coming up with something new — the texting; the IM’ing; the websites, the Facebook, the MySpace; the cells phones; the laptop. I mean you can’t even get a kid’s attention because they’re plugged into so many things. They’ve got things in their ears and their fingers are attached to something else, and they’re looking at the screen, and the phone is beeping and texting and all this stuff. You can’t even have a conversation with them they’re so plugged into stuff. So, I think at least for me, I have a 16-year-old and an 11-year-old, and I honestly thought it would be easier because I thought well, I know everything about being a teenager. There’s no generation gap now, and then all of sudden there was one. So, part of it was the surprise.

John Sparks
Beth, it’s really interesting. My kids are grown. They’re in the 30’s, and the thing that struck me in reading that book was the difference that technology has created. When my kids were in their teens, there were no cell phones. It’s almost like you want to have that connection with them so that you know that they’re okay, and yet the technology that enables you to keep them under surveillance, if you will, is the same technology that enables them to go off in different directions and disconnect with you as a parent.

Beth Harpaz
That’s right, and of course, there’s a lot of fear. Parents have a lot of fear of what’s out there on the Internet. I mean, I try not to be a fear monger. I try not to get hysterical about child predators on MySpace. Oh my God. But, it’s actually a symbol of an issue that’s been true of raising teenagers since time began, which is an issue of trust and separation, where you don’t know who they’re communicating with on their — in their text messages and on the Internet and by cell phone, and so, it’s a scary thing as a parent because it’s another thing that you don’t have control over. There are real dangers involved, and you don’t want to be hysterical about it. On the other hand, you want to be realistic and proactive. So, it’s a tricky thing. The other thing…The book that I wrote is called 13 Is The New 18 and people say to me, “What does that mean?” When I was 13-years-old, it was a very gradual transition between childhood and being a teenager. Adolescence was a long period of time where kids were funny looking, and they still played with toys. When I was 12-years-old, I had braids, and I played with Barbies, and let me tell you that 12-year-old girls do not play with Barbies anymore. 12-year-old girls look like movie stars now. They have beautiful teeth and beautiful hair and beautiful skin, and there’s no more pimples, and there’s no more dandruff, and there’s none of that stuff. Their braces…they start wearing braces when they’re 9-years-old. By the time they’re 14, they’re ready for their screen debut, so that transition that maybe in past generations gave parents a little bit of time to get used to this idea of a kid grown up, that transition is gone. Overnight now 13-years-old, they are the way we were when we were 16/17. The middle schoolers are behaving now like high schoolers used to, so that’s another issue for this generation I think.

John Sparks
Precisely. I was going to again attribute that to media. The media’s so pervasive. For instance, I love baseball. I watch baseball, but I’m watching the game on television and all of sudden in between innings is an ad on erectile dysfunction. So, are today’s children deprived of their childhood, and how can a parent combat this or deal with this? I mean you mentioned about the Barbie dolls and the girls and what girls are doing now at 12 is so different, and I get back to some of the things that they’re exposed to.

Beth Harpaz
Yeah, I couldn’t agree with you more, and I hate to sound like an old fogey, but we watch…We’re Yankee fans, and I got an 11-year-old who loves baseball, and it is hard to sit through those commercials with an 11-year-old, let me tell you. I agree with you, it’s — they are exposed to a lot more sort of sophisticated themes and older themes, and I think it’s especially hard for parents of girls. I have two boys, so I think it’s not quite as hard for us, not that obviously a parent of any teenager being a responsible parent is talking about sexuality and what your values are as a parent and what the rules are from your point of view, whatever those might be. But, especially the second time around, since I do have an 11-year-old, I am so committed to letting him be a little boy. I think with my older son, I wasn’t quite ready for that transition to go so fast, and I feel so strongly that as parents, we have to save childhood. We have to somehow find ways to preserve that sense of wonder. It’s really hard because they are bombarded with so many messages that tell them they have to grow up. They have to see R-rated movies. They have to play violent video games. It’s really, really hard, but there are ways. I’m lucky my little boy loves sports, and I think that sports is a terrific, terrific way to keep kids young because you know why? Because instead of it being all about me, I’m so fabulous, look at me, they are part of a team and they’re part of something that’s bigger than they are, and I think that’s part of how you help them preserve that sense of childhood wonders so that they don’t get all teenagery and I know everything and it’s all about me. I think there are other ways to do it, but I think that sports is a good way… If you’re of a mind to belong to a house of worship or any kind of a community organization, I think anything where we can de-emphasize the self and the selfishness and the I, that sort of self-obsession that teenagers have and connect kids to their family, to their neighborhood, to some organization, to something that’s bigger than they are, and that might even be as simple as you go outside on a starry night and try to find Orion’s Belt or the Big Dipper or something like that, just something so that they get out of that obsession, which I think is very much driven by the media and the celebrity culture that we’re in.

Another issue I think for a lot of kids now is this emphasis on brand names. I mean, you don’t get quite as much when you have boys; but even boys, they want those Jordan sneakers, and Jordan sneakers cost a hundred bucks. When they’re little, you can buy them sneakers at Payless for 10 bucks, and they’re happy. Then all of sudden, they’re 13-years-old, and that’s not going to do. They want $100 sneakers. So as parents, we have to again communicate our values. In my case, I said, “Okay, here’s my budget for sneakers. I’m willing to pay $50 a year for sneakers. If you need more than that, buddy, go get a job.” You know what, they got jobs. Teenagers are very resourceful. If you tell them that you’re only willing to pay so much for something, they will find ways. They will mow lawns, walk dogs, save up their allowance, babysit. So, that’s another thing that we can do as parents is just be clear about what our values are and just draw those lines and say, “If you need to do it another way, then here’s the situation from my point of view.”

John Sparks
Beth, one thing that hit me in the face when I read the book were cultural differences. You grew up in the Northeast. You raise kids in a Brooklyn apartment. Parents in other parts of the country, they live in houses with yards. They don’t depend on the subways or trains for transportation, and yet raising teens is a challenge despite those differences isn’t it?

Beth Harpaz
Well, I’m very struck by the results of your poll that this is a commonality among parents regardless of where they live, how much money they make, what their ethnicity is. I mean I just — I think that says something about just the basic nature of the relationship between parents and teenagers that it doesn’t matter whether your kids taken the subway or having their first driver’s license experience driving a car. As I said before, I think a lot of these issues revolve around separation. And, so in New York City, our kids don’t drive. They do take the train and the bus independently as teenagers, but I think that there’s probably something that I have in common putting my son on the subway by himself for the first time with the mom or dad who is giving the keys to the car to their kid for the first time. I mean obviously it’s a little more dangerous if you’re going to get in a car accident than if you get lost on the subway, but I think emotionally that it’s a similar moment of letting them go. One of the other big differences, which ultimately may not be all that different, is in an apartment, there’s not a lot of private spaces, so we don’t have the rec room, the basement, the place where kids can go and be alone doing their things with their friends. So, my son as a teenager is not home a lot because there’s no space there for him to hang out with his friends, and unfortunately they — a lot of times, they’ll go hang out in the park, which isn’t great because there’s no adult supervision whatsoever, or they’ll go to somebody’s house where parents aren’t home. I mean I’m not naïve. I know these things go on so. But, again, it’s one of those separation issues where they want their space. They want to be private. They’ll find it one way or the other. I guess in the suburbs or in the country, it’s a little bit different because maybe parents are able to provide a space and then maybe another layer of supervision. Sometimes, I do wish I had that suburban basement, believe me.

John Sparks
When I was a kid in Texas, this would’ve been the 1950s, I would be away from home all day. Now my parents would not know where I was. I was usually at the park playing baseball without parental supervision. I even took a city bus to downtown Fort Worth, Texas, when I was five-years-old all by myself.

Beth Harpaz
Wow.

John Sparks
And they knew, or at least I felt they knew, that I was safe. But it’s a different world today, isn’t it?

Beth Harpaz
Yeah. Well, it’s interesting, I think that we are starting to see the end of the helicopter parent. I don’t know if you’re familiar with that term or if your listeners are, but that is a term for the parent who is very anxious and always hovering over the child and not letting the child be independent. I’m not really sure what created that term. I myself was not so much like that. There’s actually another great new book out called Free-Range Kids, like if you heard the term free-range chicken for chickens that are allowed to run around the barnyard, Free-Range Kids. The author is Lenore Skenazy, and she sort of espouses that philosophy that our kids would be better off we backed off a little bit and let them make some of their own mistakes and gave them a little more freedom. I’m not sure that the world is any more dangerous now than it ever was. In fact, crime statistics would suggest, in fact, that it’s safer now than when we were growing up in the ’60s and ’70s. So, personally, as a parent, I think there’s a lot to be gained from independence, and I’ve tried to create situations where my kids could figure out the world on their own whether it was walking to school by themselves starting in the third grade or taking the train and subway when they’re 12-13, budgeting their own money, being responsible for some of their own expenses. I think that’s how you create independent adults, and I think if we don’t do that, we’re going to have a lot of 25-year-olds who are doing way too much dependence on their parents.

John Sparks
Beth, I want to talk a little bit more about the book, 13 Is The New 18. Now, you wrote primarily about your experiences with your son, Taz, at the age of 13.

Beth Harpaz
Uh-huh.

John Sparks
Now I’m just curious what do you think the book would’ve been like if Taz had written a book about you.

Beth Harpaz
Well, that’s a good question. I bet it would’ve been a different book if he’d written when he was 13 than when he was 16. I’m happy to say that although I had a very rocky period when he was 13, as a 16-year-old, he is a really nice young man, and we have a very good relationship now. When he was 13, it was very, very difficult. We were constantly battling. There just were constant tensions. It was a constant push and pull where he was very combative and very — the psychologist used the word oppositional. He was very oppositional. If I said red, he said blue. If I had a rule, he had to break it. He was just constantly getting in trouble at school. It was just everybody who was an adult didn’t know anything, and everyone who was a kid was — had a lot of wisdom and that was who he was going to listen to, not his parents. I already see that he’s already sort of a little bit nostalgic. He has a little brother, who’s 11, so he can act the big brother and say, “Well you know, it’s good that when we were little, mom did this.” Well, at the time when I said, “No, you can’t have ice cream for dinner or whatever it was, you didn’t like it. But, now that you’re 16, you think it was a good idea, well okay.” It’s funny because he’s a very resourceful kid. He has a lot of jobs. He works at an after-school center and as a camp counselor, and he babysits a lot, and he’s very, very good at that, and it’s interesting because he’s tough. He doesn’t let little kids push him around. When he says, “This is the rule,” that is the rule. It’s interesting because when he was on the receiving end of rules, he didn’t like them very much. He thought we were very mean. Of course, the other thing is even in the last five years, technology has changed a lot. So his little brother, for example, uses a laptop and has a cell phone because I want to be able to hear from him after school, make sure he’s okay, and of course my older son didn’t have those things when he was 11. So, he’s constantly saying, “It’s not fair. He’s only 11, and he gets to have a cell phone and be on a laptop, and you didn’t let me do that when I was 11.” Well, it was all so new when he was 11 that most 11-year-olds weren’t doing it. So, it’s interesting that even from his point of view, there’s been this sort of increase in technology. But, from his point of view, we were just really mean when he was younger, and we didn’t let him have those things, but they were very expensive when all this technology was new, and nobody really knew a lot about it. It wasn’t like every kid had a cell phone when he was in fourth grade. None of them did, but now most of them do, at least in New York City because they are kind of independent after school, so moms and dads want to hear from their kids, make sure they’re okay in the afternoon. Where are you? What are you doing, et cetera?

John Sparks
Beth, you also have a partner in parenting that — with Elon.

Beth Harpaz
That’s right, my husband Elon.

John Sparks
There are many kids today that don’t have the benefit of two parents,, and I’m just curious what the book would’ve been like if Elon had written it.

Beth Harpaz
Well, I guess a couple things. One is there are more single parents than ever. The statistics show us that. Obviously a single parent can do an incredibly brilliant job of raising kids. Just look at our President. I mean just because you are raising a kid on your own, it doesn’t mean that your kid is going to be handicapped in some way. I think it’s important to try to find other people both to help you and to give a kid various kinds of role models. I mean don’t forget, President Obama had a grandpa and a grandma, and other people in his life who cared about him. So, try to make sure if you’re a single parent that your child is involved in activities, sports, where there’s maybe a coach or maybe drama, a play at school or something like that where they can have a relationship with other adults, take a little bit of pressure off you, but also give them some alternate role models. I think that’s really important. But my husband is a wonderful guy. He’s absolutely brilliant. He went to Yale. He was number two in his law school class. He has a mind like a steel trap. He could beat anybody at Scrabble. He’s really good at things like that and so he’s just…And, he was a really nerdy kid, never kissed a girl, never smoked a joint, never went to a concert. He was really straight as an arrow Boy Scout kind of a kid. In fact, he was in the Boy Scouts. We have the medals to prove it. So, for him to have a kid who’s a teenager who’s a more typical teenager who breaks rules and sometimes gets in trouble and pushes all the buttons, he was completely freaked out by this kid, and I felt that I was often running interference between Elon’s ideal of a brilliant child who’s going to get straight A’s and be perfect and this and that and the other and Taz who was just kind of the teenager who drives you insane. So…Also, my husband’s father was an immigrant actually, so I think also in immigrant families, there’s a lot of pressure on kids to really be perfect, to be the perfect American child, and this is why we came to this country. I think there’s…And, I think often kids rise to that challenge. It’s a pressure for them, but often you find in immigrant families that children do try to be more helpful, and that there is that sense that they’re not entitled to something, this is a privilege to be here and you better do it right. So, that’s definitely been a challenge in our child rearing, but it’s also in some ways, it makes it easier because I can always say to the kids, “Please don’t let daddy down. You cannot get a ‘C’ in that class, because daddy will just be devastated.”

John Sparks
I’m curious, did Taz ever try to triangulate and play you off of Elon?

Beth Harpaz
There are some kids who will do that, not so much. I think as parents, we can probably put an end to that. I think with us, with my husband and I, we often will decide what is important to us and then let the other person make the decision if it doesn’t matter to — if it doesn’t matter. If something just doesn’t matter to me but I think it’s going to matter to Elon, then I’ll just often defer to him, and I’ll just say, “You know what. I just really don’t have an opinion on that. It’s up to daddy to make the decision.” I’m not being a coward about it, but I know that he might care more about something like, oh I don’t know, something having to do with school perhaps or… we’re in the college application process now, so there’s a lot of coordination in that regard. My husband also is very into sports, so my younger son’s a jock, and sometimes we have sports conflicts. Okay, he’s got a big test tomorrow, and he’s got a basketball tournament tonight. What are we going to do here? I sometimes let him make the call on that because in a marriage, you have to figure out what’s the way that will cause the least conflict among all the parties, that’s the way I see it.

John Sparks
In your book, you talk about how kids at the age of 13, Taz is embarrassed to be seen with his parents.

Beth Harpaz
Oh yeah.

John Sparks
Has Taz ever read your book?

Beth Harpaz
Taz has not read my book. Interesting question. I asked him… I’ve asked him about this a couple times. I checked with him all along in the process. When I had the idea for the book, I got his permission. At various moments, I gave him an opportunity to read the proposal, the manuscript, the finished product before I sent it in, and he said that he trusted me not to embarrass him too much, which is a good thing. I also used… The first thing I did when I got my check for the book was I went out and bought him and his brother a Wii, so that made me a cool mom. Yes, bribery, it works. You can buy a child’s love. I’m not saying it’s the right the thing to do. I’m just saying it works. I also…I gave him Taz as a nickname. It’s not his real name, so I created just one little bit of a layer of privacy for him. I figure, hey, if a college counselor happens to have that book on his desk, and Taz’s application is there in the pile, they might not necessarily make that connection right away because the name Taz is not going to be in the application material. So, he’s certainly been supportive. I had a big reading in our neighborhood at the local bookstore, and he came with a couple of friends, which I thought was really nice. So, he’s cool with it, and that’s what matters. Obviously, it’s not good to embarrass your child in public, so you want to… If you’re going to,do something like this, we’ve got a lot of mommy bloggers out there, and if you’re going to do something like this, you want to make sure your kids aren’t going to hold it against you.

John Sparks
So, Taz is a nickname that you call him by or is this one that you came up with for the book?

Beth Harpaz
I came up with it for the book.

John Sparks
Okay.

Beth Harpaz
But, it does have a little bit of resonance. The Tasmanian Devil is a very popular Looney Tunes’ character, and for kids nowadays, I guess maybe 10-years-ago, Taz was really a big sort of icon. Everybody had a Taz hat or a Taz shirt or a Taz sticker or something like that; and the character Taz, the cartoon character himself, he’s kind of like a teenager. He’s kind of this like sloppy lazy crazy kind of a guy, so it was a good fitting name. I also… I could sort of see that as a graffiti tag– Taz. I could see those letters spray painted on some building somewhere in my mind’s eyes. It seemed like kind of a cool combination of letters.

John Sparks
Now, why did you write the book? Was it to entertain? Was it to give parents’ tips on parenting based on your successes, your perceived failures?

Beth Harpaz
The main reason I wrote the book I think was because I was just so shocked at how secretive everybody was once my friends and the people that I had been raising my son with, our community of parents, once their kids got to be adolescents… Like I said before, when they’re little and they have colic or you’re toilet training them or we’ve got kindergarten anxiety or something like that, everybody’s happy to talk about it, honestly, and offer tips and support and oh, I went through the same thing, and here’s what worked for me, or that sort of thing. Nobody was embarrassed. But, all of sudden when they get to middle school, nobody wants to admit that their kid isn’t perfect. Nobody wants to have a conversation about well I’m worried. I think they might be smoking cigarettes after school. What do you think? Oh, my kid would never do that. That’s not really helpful, and I actually don’t really believe it’s true. I mean we know from surveys that the federal government does, the CDC does a biannual survey of teenage behavior that most teens do experiment with cigarettes. They experiment with alcohol. They experiment with marijuana. I mean, I’m not the only one who’s walked this path, but parents are afraid to talk about these things. And I thought well, if I wrote a book about it, and I was honest, and I tried to be as honest as I could, maybe somewhere some mother who’s up in the middle of the night tearing her hair out will read this book and say, “Okay, I’m not the only one. I’m not going crazy. It’s not my fault. This is part of the normal sequence of events in raising a teenager,” and that was honestly what I hoped to do. I’ve gotten… believe me, I’ve gotten lots and lots of e-mails and letters from people saying things like: have you been spying on my house because I’m going exact — I’m going through exactly what you went through with Taz, and it’s so good to know that I’m not the only one, and that they go through this and then they come out on the other end. Hopefully, fingers crossed, they come out and they’re human beings again.

John Sparks
Beth, you’re quite versatile with the subjects that you tackle. You’ve been a political writer. You wrote about covering Hillary during the Senate campaign. I believe you also wrote another book about your mother’s three sisters, the book on raising Taz, you’re a travel editor, you write a parenting column, anything else on the horizon that’s in the works?

Beth Harpaz
I think my next book is going to be called 25 Is The New 11. I’m just having some problems with people who should be grown up and they just are acting like they — like they’re not. So just hold your breath on that one. If you’ve got any thoughts, let me know.

John Sparks
I used to think that each stage has its trials and it has its treasures and that when I look back, I like to remember the treasures and hope I’ve grown from the trials.

Beth Harpaz
Very good advice.

John Sparks
At any rate, anything else you’d like to add? You told me of course that Taz is 16, you’re in a new stage there…that Sport, and I assume that’s another nickname, is, I believe, 11.

Beth Harpaz
Yep, that’s my little jock.

John Sparks
So…

Beth Harpaz
Yeah, I think ultimately my message is: Hang on, moms and dads. If you’re raising teenagers, hang on. Like I said before, figure out what your values are, communicate those values, draw your line, try not to get drawn into the screaming battles and hopefully you’ll come out on the other end. When they’re 15-16-17, hopefully you’ll come out with a kid who’s a human being who loves and respects you and whom you can be proud of.

John Sparks
Well, I know you’re proud of your kids and you should be proud of your book.

Beth Harpaz
Thank you.

John Sparks
I think you’ve done a service and in a humorous way, and good luck to you in all your future endeavors.

Beth Harpaz
Thank you so much. It was great talking to you.

** The views and opinions expressed in this and other interviews found on this site are expressly those of the speakers or authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Marist Poll.

6/18: Health Care in the United States: An In-Depth Look

June 18, 2009 | by Marist Poll

By John Sparks

Dr. Irwin Redlener, Co-Founder and President of the Children’s Health Fund, discusses the Marist Poll’s findings on health insurance in the United States and shares his thoughts on President Barack Obama’s health care plan and the future of health care in the country. Dr. Redlener, also the Director of the National Center for Disaster Preparedness, addresses, as well, how ready we are to handle the H1N1 virus, other pandemics, and acts of terrorism. The transcript of his interview with The Marist Poll’s John Sparks is below.

John Sparks
Dr. Redlener, The Marist Poll conducted a survey, and we learned that 21% of households in America have at least someone who is not covered by health insurance. Now that percentage increases when those households surveyed earned less than $50,000 a year or they’re not college educated or they’re young families or if they fit into a category of ethnic minorities. For instance, 37% of Latino households had someone who’s not covered by health insurance, 31% if it’s an African American household. Do these numbers surprise you?

Dr. Irwin Redlener
The numbers really reinforce what we’ve been increasingly concerned about over the last almost two and a half decades now. The fact of the matter is that an extraordinary number of Americans are not getting access to healthcare in part because of the fact that so many do not have health insurance, and the costs are now absolutely prohibitive. So, these numbers are striking, and in a certain sense, they’re what we might expect in these very difficult economic times where access to health insurance has always been problematic anyway.

John Sparks
Now, you worked with Hillary Clinton on that National Healthcare Program that never came to fruition.
A lot of folks, including some in the Obama administration, are working on a new national healthcare program. Will we see something put in place this time, and what do you suppose it will be like?

Dr. Irwin Redlener
I am very optimistic that with President Obama’s leadership that we will in fact see a successful effort this time to really re-create our healthcare system, to reform those parts that need fixing, and to reinforce those parts that we’re very good at. At the end of the day, I think we’ll see very much of an American style reform in place that won’t be perfect from anyone’s point of view but will bring with it many, many improvements that will benefit American families and really help the economy in terms of slowing down the runaway costs associated with healthcare.

John Sparks
You mentioned a program called Doctors for America, which has been active lately in calling for national healthcare. Can you tell me what efforts they’ve undertaken for this effort?

Dr. Irwin Redlener
There are a number of physician organizations who are really focused on trying to make sure that the American people understand what is involved with trying to fix the nation’s healthcare system, and this is something we did not see back in the early ’90s when the Clintons were attempting to reform healthcare more than 15 years ago. What we saw then was general resistance by medical groups in terms of trying to fix the system, but what we’re seeing now is that tens of thousands, maybe hundreds of thousands of physicians around the country are joining the call to reform the healthcare system because doctors know as well as anyone else, maybe even more acutely, that what we have now is simply not working. The role of these organizations, Doctors for America, and some of the other organizations like the National Physicians Alliance are out in public now speaking with the media and speaking directly to the public to try to allay some of the anxiety that people have about health reform. People are perhaps worried that they’re going to lose their ability to choose a physician if we had health reform, or that we’d have a government run system. These are part of the myths that are associated with people that are resisting or are opposing healthcare reform, and these myths have to be dispelled. People have to understand that we’re looking to develop systems that will keep everyone’s ability to choose their physician and their hospital and at the same time do something about the runaway costs.

John Sparks
And speaking of runaway costs, any idea what a program of national healthcare will end up costing, and how we’ll pay for it?

Dr. Irwin Redlener
Right now the healthcare system in the United States costs about $2.3 trillion a year. It’s around 14.5% of a gross domestic product. If we don’t do something to curtail these costs, we’re going to see healthcare, if it goes along its current trajectories, reach a level of maybe 20% of the nation’s gross domestic product which would be utterly unsustainable in terms of the economic forces that would ensue. The investment in the system right now to fix it so that the costs slow down and that we’re able to ring savings out of the, all elements of the system, will still entail putting somebody into the actual measures that will be part of the reform bill so that we have to invest in state-of-the-art electronic health record systems. We have to invest in developing programs to prevent disease, not just treat it and so forth. Those costs could be anywhere from 500 billion to a trillion dollars over a ten-year period, and the President and his economic team, congressional leaders, are coming up with ways to identify those costs which we’re going to have to then debate in Congress and in the public and see what will work.

John Sparks
Are you optimistic that this time we’ll end up with something?

Dr. Irwin Redlener
I am actually optimistic that we will end up with some very significant changes in the system that will significantly expand access to healthcare for people and will reduce costs. In fact, I believe we will get a package that the president will sign within this calendar year, so I would say I’m in the very optimistic category when it comes to prognosticating about where we’re going.

John Sparks
I’d like to change subjects on you for just a moment. You’re also involved with the National Center for Disaster Preparedness, and I want to ask you about Swine Flu. Can we realistically produce enough vaccine to combat H1N1?

Dr. Irwin Redlener
There’s been a great deal of talk obviously and concern about this what’s now being called the novel or new H1N1 virus or what people were originally calling the Swine Flu Virus that originated in Mexico a couple of months ago and is now been spreading rapidly around the world to a point where it spread so much that it’s called an actual pandemic by the World Health Organization, and there’s a lot of things that are being done and could be done to slow the spread, but right now it’s a very mild illness in terms of the potential fatalities that come from it. That said, we obviously will be needing a vaccine, and the vaccine is being developed as we speak. What our concern is on a large scale is that if we had to vaccinate many people in a hurry, if let’s say the virus comes back in a more severe form in the Fall and Winter of this year, we’ll really wanting to be vaccinating people. But at the maximum capacity, we could not even produce a billion doses of vaccine, which seems like a huge number, but there’s 6.8 billion people in the world. So, if we all get is 900 million doses, there’s going to be a substantial gap between those that will be able to get the vaccine and those that won’t, and that’s a big concern. Secondly, if we put all of our vaccine manufacturing plants on the task of producing a maximum of H1N1 vaccine, that will have the potential of impairing our ability to produce the usual annual influenza vaccine that we still need every year, and don’t forget that seasonal influenza which comes around every year kills about 36,000 Americans every year as well as 250,000 people worldwide. So, we might be caught between this public health rock and hard place where we need to both work on the seasonal flu but the new pandemic as well.

John Sparks
You mentioned that there’s no way we will be able to produce enough doses. How will we determine who will get the vaccine, and how many at risk, who will not get the vaccine? Is it the “haves” versus the
“have-not’s?”

Dr. Irwin Redlener
Well one of the most difficult ethical questions we’re going to have is how to distribute a limited amount of vaccine to a very large population around the world who needs it, and I don’t think we have the answers yet, frankly, to that question. What we… Our guess… What we are most concerned about is that the nations with limited economic resources, the developing nations, for example, will have far less opportunity to buy or produce the vaccine so that we’ll have a situation where the so called “haves” of the world, the developed nations, may have more than their fair share of the vaccine, and the “have-not” or the poor countries be really suffering because they simply can’t get their hands on enough material to vaccinate all of their citizens. That will have significant political and economic repercussions however.

John Sparks
You know when I think about disaster preparedness, certainly the H1N1 falls under that category. But I was in New York City for 9/11 and in that,of course, we came to the realization of the potential for other acts of terrorism that could certainly tax our American hospitals. Just how well equipped are our hospitals today to respond to a pandemic or an act of terrorism?

Dr. Irwin Redlener
This is a fascinating question that we have been wrestling. My center is the National Center for Disaster Preparedness at what’s called the Columbia University Mailman School of Public Health, so we actually have been focusing a lot of our energy on trying to analyze the state of readiness of the nation’s hospitals to respond to a pandemic or nuclear terrorism or even another Katrina-like Hurricane. And, what we and others have consistently found is that while we’re making advances on the public health side, in other words, the ability to track things like pandemics and to follow disease patterns to produce vaccine, we’re getting better at that. But, what’s now improved very much is the capacity of the nation’s hospitals and healthcare systems to respond or to surge up, to increase capacity if a major event happened. That problem has been something that we’ve been working on hard, but if we don’t fix it, we may come to regret the fact that we haven’t invested enough in improving hospital readiness prior to the next big event, which inevitably will happen.

John Sparks
Is it a matter of needing more hospitals and more people entering the healthcare profession, or is it simply a matter of trying to ramp up those facilities that we do have?

Dr. Irwin Redlener
The health professional workforce issue is a big challenge, and we do have to ramp that up, and we have to get more people into primary care and that sort of thing. Right now, we have lots of doctors, but poorly distributed, because some communities have lots of doctors, others have none, so there’s some other areas in the background. But, what we need is the capacity that if something big were to happen in Chicago or LA or the whole country next month, that the system can’t expand enough to take care for the numbers of victims and people needing medical care that we might imagine. Now, there’s not that many scenarios where large numbers of people would get sick or injured in a short period of time, but you could think of a big earthquake on the West Coast, another Katrina-type situation in the Southeast, nuclear terrorism, and I mean actually a nuclear bomb, not just a dirty weapon in New York or Washington, D.C. or Los Angeles, and when you start thinking about these large, what I call mega events is or mega disasters, we remain concerned that the system doesn’t have enough depth to really be able to respond in a large scale way when we need it.

John Sparks
You know if all this isn’t enough to be concerned about, there is a recession and its effect on healthcare in this country, you referenced it earlier. We read about losses in the stock market. We read about huge corporations like General Motors who are not good health, but what is the cost of human health as a fallout from the recession?

Dr. Irwin Redlener
This has been very interesting for us to observe — the reporting of the recession as it became more and more severe starting with late 2007 and of course, continuing on through this moment. Most of the descriptions about the economic downturn were written in financial terms, so we’re talking about a banking crisis, subprime mortgages, uncontrolled derivative markets, and so forth. What we heard very little about though, was the human cost and the human toll and in particular with children. So, the Children’s Health Fund a couple of months ago came up with a new initiative called Kids Can’t Wait, and the point of Kids Can’t Wait is to really underscore how badly affected low income families and children are and have been because of this economic downturn. We think on the one hand, this is bad for the banks, it’s bad for our pensions and so forth, but it’s desperately dangerous for people at the lower end where there’s not a lot of disposable income and what income there is needed to go to the doctor or buy groceries or pay the rent or whatever and those people and therefore those children, are being greatly affected, and we really need to put them back on center stage so we can make sure that they aren’t hurt anymore than they already are.

John Sparks
Any idea of a number how many children have lost healthcare?

Dr. Irwin Redlener
Since 2007, we think about a million children have lost healthcare, which parallels the loss that they’re — that families are taking and parallels the loss that is incurred by unemployment, loss of a job. So, as we track that over this period of time, I believe there’s at least a million kids who are, as a result of these larger economic forces and as a result of the breadwinners of the family losing their jobs or having their jobs greatly reduced, that we’re seeing a very serious downside for children as well.

John Sparks
In talking about some of these challenges with our healthcare, there are moral issues. We’ve talked about cost control issues, and yet, we need a robust healthcare system. Do you think we’ll be able to meet all those challenges, and what are the implications if we’re not able to?

Dr. Irwin Redlener
Well, we’re facing, as you allude to, a vast array of seemingly overwhelming problems from dealing with the recession, the healthcare crisis to the environment, energy, and a very long agenda on our international challenges as well. The point about all this is that we can’t do, even though as much as we might want to, we just simply cannot take things on sequentially, because the world doesn’t work like that, and we have to be in a sense as a nation multitasking because all of this is important to the nation’s future, in some cases the world’s future and the world’s future well being. So, taking care of our children’s needs, worrying about global warming and figure on how to become energy independent are all part of a complex set of agendas that have to be taken on almost — unfortunately, almost at the same time.

John Sparks
It’s not an easy world we live in. Dr. Redlener, I want to thank you for your time. But before you go is there anything that you’d like to comment on?

Dr. Irwin Redlener
I think it’s difficult for people in a day and age like this to understand how serious the problems are we’re facing and in many ways without overusing this term, a lot of these challenges are pretty — are unprecedented in a real way, the amount of debt that the country is building up, the degree to which the healthcare expenses and costs are getting more and more out-of-control, the intensity of our international challenges, it all is big time. But all that said, the reason I bring this up is to make a point that I think there’s also reason to be optimistic. I think we can get control in the healthcare system. I think we could do a better job than we’re doing on virtually all the areas that we’re talking about, and I think we’re fortunate that we have an administration that is smart, is well led, it’s organized, and while it’s tackling a lot, I personally am optimistic that we’re going to find some way out of this briar patch sometime in the next few years.

** The views and opinions expressed in this and other interviews found on this site are expressly those of the speakers or authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Marist Poll.

So, You Want to Start a Website

June 12, 2009 | by Mary Griffith

If you were to ask me a year ago if I ever thought I’d be overseeing a website like The Marist Poll’s, honestly, I would have laughed in your face. You see, my feet were firmly planted in traditional broadcast news (whatever that means anymore), and although I would often talk about changing careers, I knew where my heart was. I had no real plans to make a move. Perhaps, I should have listened to John Lennon’s prophetic words, “Life is what happens to you while you’re busy making other plans.”

Mary Azzoli

Please, don’t misunderstand me! I love Pebbles and Pundits. It allows me to flex my editorial muscle, and that was the challenge. My background is more editorial than technical. But, we, at The Marist Poll had a message to get out, and it was my job to figure out how to do so.

Now, if you’re one of the 82% of Americans who The Marist Poll discovered does not have a personal website, my guess is it’s not due to a lack of ideas or messages. My money is on a fear to broach the digital divide. But, fear not. If I could spearhead a project like Pebbles and Pundits, you certainly can launch a website of your very own!

Don’t believe me? Well, here’s some advice that I hope will help. First, don’t go it alone. You’re intimidated, and that’s ok. Admit your limitations and get past them. The best way to do that — research. We chose WordPress as our publishing platform. WordPress is free and user-friendly. It also has a ton of widgets to help you add to your site as well as a community of users! I’m also not too proud to admit that I turned to WordPress for Dummies for advice. Now, this isn’t a commercial for WordPress. There are many other platforms out there and tons of books on the market to assist you in building a website. In fact, I typed the search string, “Creating a website,” into BarnesandNoble.com and discovered 712 books on the topic. When I did the same search on Amazon.com, I found 2,163 books. If you don’t want to invest the money in buying a book, there are online resources you can check out. Your local public library is also a good place to start. And, while you are researching, don’t forget. You will need a hosting platform. Explore all of your options. There are inexpensive ones out there.

Plus, keep an eye on the latest tech news. There are websites that often review companies’ services (many of which are free). Those sites can be extremely useful in your project. I, personally, like TechCrunch. It offers an RSS feed that helps keep you up to date even if you forget to go to the website!

Friends and family can also prove to be valuable sources of untapped knowledge. Maybe, your best friend’s uncle is a computer guru. Ask if you can shoot him an email with your questions or pick his brain over a cup of coffee. It couldn’t hurt. Surrounding yourself with good, intelligent people is a great strategy. Not only can they help you get your website up and running, but they’ll also be there when you need to troubleshoot problems which will inevitably arise. And, ask, for comments and feedback on your site. It’s the most honest way to find out what needs fixing. Nothing is ever perfect, and there is a learning curve. Look at obstacles as learning experiences which will ultimately make your website even better!

Most importantly, though, have fun with the process especially if your website is a personal project and not one for your company or organization. In either case, remember to be realistic in your goals. Rome wasn’t built in a day, and my gut tells me that if you’re a novice, neither will your website. Maybe, you want to market your content to a certain audience but the comments your visitors are leaving show that’s not who you’re attracting. That’s ok. The greatest thing about having your own site is that you can change it whenever you want.

The internet, to a certain extent, has made formal publishers obsolete. It allows every person, young and old, to be his or her own publisher. The resources to assist you are available. So, don’t let your fear prevent you from communicating your message to the digital world.

Related Stories:

6/12: Running Wild with Websites

Twitter: Can’t Beat the Tweet

| by Marist Poll

Even if you don’t use Twitter, you’ve probably been inundated with news about the social networking site. That’s because the sharp minds behind Twitter managed to create a perfect media storm. Not only does their product have an insanely catchy name — isn’t it fun to say “Twitter” and “tweet”? — but it also provides mainstream media outlets with another way to reach an audience whose technology I.Q. is growing every day (Pebbles and Pundits also has a Twitter account). As a result, talking heads have been giving Twitter endless free publicity, promoting their own Twitter accounts and cracking each other up with Twitter-related banter (in a much-publicized gaffe on “The Today Show,” Stephen Colbert rendered Meredith Vieira speechless when he attempted to coin the past-tense variation of “tweet”).

Jared Goldman

Personally, I was skeptical when I first heard about Twitter. After the ascent of Facebook, MySpace, and many other social networking sites, why did the world need another one? What’s more, Twitter only allows messages of up to 140 characters in length. How much significance could be conveyed in a sentence or two? Twitter struck me as another nail in the coffin of the average American’s attention span.

A recent Marist poll suggests that, despite all the publicity, many people may share my skepticism — only 6% of Americans have personal Twitter accounts. Moreover, a study by Nielsen found that a majority of Twitter users stop tweeting a month after signing up. Is it possible that Twitter is a passing fad?

That’s doubtful. The aforementioned Nielsen study caused such a fervor among Twitter users that an addendum was posted acknowledging their complaints (though not retracting the original findings). Comscore, a company that measures consumers’ surfing habits, awarded Twitter the fastest-growing property title for the month of March; in April, Twitter surpassed The New York Times and the Wall Street Journal in unique visits. While Twitter may not be able to maintain its astronomical growth rate — a 1382% boost in unique visitors from February 2008 to February 2009, according to Nielsen — it seems to have become a staple in the lives of many people who use it to trade information and stay in touch.

You may be wondering, “What about money? Even though Twitter is popular, that doesn’t mean it’s generating any revenue — which means it may not be sustainable.” That’s a good point, but Twitter doesn’t appear to be stressing over finances. In November, its owners rebuffed Facebook after the social networking rival offered to take over Twitter for stock worth $500 million. And, on the web site, Twitter claims that it’s more interested in improving its service than boosting its bottom line. Meanwhile, speculation abounds over potential revenue streams with one possibility being the sale of commercial accounts to businesses. One can imagine the benefit a company might draw if it can find out, via Twitter, who’s tweeting about their product, who else is receiving those tweets, and what, specifically, those people need in terms of customer care or innovation. What’s more, some of that information can be found on a real-time basis, which could help inform business decisions that need to be made sooner rather than later. Recently, the ability of Twitter’s search engine to deliver data in real time earned praise from no less than an online eminence — the co-founder of Google.

In other words, thanks to shrewd marketing and cutting-edge technology, Twitter appears to have built a sturdy nest in the tree of online media. For Twitter die-hards, that’s great news. For the rest of us, it means enduring a lot more Twitter hype — or joining the growing ranks of tweeters.

6/12: Keeping In Touch Online

Paterson Could Be Casualty of Albany Political Coup

June 9, 2009 | by Marist Poll

By Dr. Lee M. Miringoff

Just as Governor Paterson was trying to dig out in Albany, is the GOP Senate takeover yet another shovel of dirt on his political grave? The most recent Marist Poll in New York State found that only 20% of voters statewide think Governor Paterson is changing the way things work in Albany for the better. Now, the page on Albany politics has turned from dysfunction to chaos bringing to a standstill the Governor’s attempts to score a few legislative points (he needs many) in the closing days of the session. Instead, the governor must now deal with a hostile turnover in Senate leadership, committee power, and changing staffs which accompany such an upheaval.

Lee Miringoff

The matter is made more complicated for the governor, because for better or worse, as chief executive officer, he is the face of good and bad coming out of Albany. Dean Skelos and Malcolm Smith aren’t exactly household names.

So, what’s an unpopular, unelected governor to do? In the short run, Governor Paterson can respond aggressively to the political coup. He can try to bank on the huge numbers advantage Democrats enjoy statewide and call it a partisan power grab if he likes. But, with the often used words of “reform” and “transparency” bouncing around the capitol corridors once again (didn’t Eliot Spitzer promise not too long ago to change things in Albany from day one?), the likely immediate result of the political coup is gridlock. It’s hard to imagine how the governor can really benefit.

Governor Paterson takes a 19% approval rating into this leadership crisis. To have any chance of restoring his political standing he needs to emphasize issues ahead of political gain in his public pitter-patter. This would involve developing and advancing any semblance of an economic development theme. Tie his fortunes to the president’s stimulus plan. To unearth an effective economic program while others are pursuing power politics as usual might stop his political slide and get him out from under this current crisis. Will this work? It’s certainly a long shot, but what is his choice at this point?

6/5: Makeup for Summer

June 5, 2009 | by Mary Griffith

What are the hottest makeup trends for summer, and how can you incorporate them into your every day look? Celebrity Makeup Artist Vincenza Carovillano offers her tips in an interview with The Marist Poll’s Mary Azzoli. Read the transcript below.

Mary
So, Vincenza, let’s just get right down to it. The Marist Poll recently asked Americans how often they wear make-up, and 56% of the entire population, both men and women, say they never wear make-up; but when we look at just women, only 19% say they never wear make-up. Does this surprise you?

Vincenza
Wait, only 19% never wear make-up?

Mary
19% of women say they never wear make-up. So, does that surprise you?

Vincenza
No.

Mary
Why not?

Vincenza
Because… So, that would mean… Because, I think most women feel good wearing make-up and even though people think… Even natural because even to look natural, you have to wear make-up, and it makes us feel good. You put your best face forward, so make-up is powerful and makes you feel positive and when you look good, you feel good.

Mary
Great. So, when it comes to beauty and fashion, we always talk about seasonal trends. So, what are some of the upcoming make-up trends for the summer?

Vincenza
Well, the hottest make-up trends now, I like to call it, “The Tropical Getaway,” because when I go to the stores and I research it, it’s like fantasy make-up. So, we want fantasy, honestly, with everything – – the stress of recession and everything that’s going on in life. It’s affecting everyone. So, in beauty, the colors are very much tropical, like bright aquas. It’s bolder, brighter colors, because they just make you feel better, a lot of glimmer, sparkle, dewy. So, if you add that into your make-up, it’s a good, easy way to just make yourself feel better by putting color into the make-up.

Mary
You know, you did bring up the recession, and you said that is reflected a little bit in terms of the color. So, how else are we seeing the make-up industry or make-up trends impacted, if in any way, by the current economic situation?

Vincenza
Well, definitely, I mean retail stores are definitely not doing as well as they were. I can see that. A lot of the drugstore brands like Maybelline, Revlon, Max Factor, have really upped their products with like the hottest new colors and trends. I mean you can get anything now [in the] drugstore. What I recommend doing honestly, even for us, like even our budget for make-up personally has gone down. So, we go see what the hottest new thing is and then we match it with a brand that’s less expensive. So, you can still get the look but you don’t have to buy the expensive YSL, Dior; you just match it, go see what’s new and happening and then go to the drugstore and match it with something that you can afford.

Mary
So, are you saying that professionals too are now kind of moving toward less expensive brands?

Vincenza
Yes, yes. I mean I, full-time; I’m at truTV, and our budget has gone down, and everyone’s affected by it because we don’t… One thing that I would never skimp on is foundation but color, lip gloss, it’s seasonal. You can have fun. I mean you don’t have to spend a lot of money on a cherry lip gloss. We could go to Maybelline, and they’ll have a cherry lip gloss. Then, you’re done with it in two months. So, definitely, it has affected everyone, all of us. If you can’t afford that, then go see… Research what’s happening, and the stores will always tell you. If you go into any of the great department stores, they always have the newest hottest things, and then go match it up with something you can afford to buy.

Mary
Okay. Many times we see trends in magazines, and they can be overpowering, maybe a little bit too much for the office. So, how can the average person incorporate some of these latest and greatest trends into their everyday look without going over that top?

Vincenza
I love it. When… I say it now honestly, Mary, that it’s like a Crayola box like when we did runway. I felt like it was a Crayola box: lime green on the eyes, pink on the lips, fuschia, red. I mean it was like great on the runway but not for life. So, the best thing to do is take one thing. So, if you like to pop the eyes… I love an aqua liner, so I do a nice bronzy natural make-up and then I put a turquoise eyeliner on instead of black; and it gives me that pop. I feel bold and fun, so it’s like… If you can picture that Crayola box, pick the one color and one area, either the lip or the eye, and just pop it there. You can’t do the whole runway. You’ve got to take one thing out of that, which feature you want to pop and you want to have fun with and focus on that, not everything. If you’re doing bold… Bold red lips are really in now, too. So, you’re not going to do dramatic eyes and bold red lips. Keep the eyes soft, maybe just clean black liner and then bold red lips, tone it down.

Mary
And, Vincenza, should age influence your use of these trends?

Vincenza
No. Make-up is fun. I’m so — love to break the rules. I think age influences more like in foundation and powders and dewiness. The skin should look fresh and dewy. I think that’s more affected by foundation. I mean, of course, I don’t know. I wouldn’t put lime green eye shadow on my 69-year-old mother. You know what I mean? So, I mean the younger you are, the more you could do real fun, trendy colors and that… But, it depends on the person. You know, we meet some very interesting people and who’s to tell them, and especially in fashion, that they can’t wear something bold. So, I don’t think so. I don’t think age has any soul about who you are and how you want to express yourself.

Mary
You also brought up the “rules”. Are there any hard and fast rules when it comes to applying make-up, when it comes to the types of colors you use? Talk to me a little bit about the “rules.”

Vincenza
The rules, I mean for me personally or maybe I don’t know if it’s rules, mistakes, or my pet peeves, are foundation, matching skin tone. Now we see… For me and my talent and my celebrities, the talent that I do, summer hopefully is coming, so foundation color changes. As the skin gets darker, the foundation has to change. You can’t wear the winter foundation. If you really look at women, most of them are always wearing the wrong color foundation. There’s that cut on the chin. It doesn’t match. Their neck and their body looks like it’s detached. I mean so if there’s any rule, I mean I’d rather see women not wear it, than like have different color skin or the wrong foundation color. With season, you have to change it just the way you would change your boots to flip-flops. It’s the same that you would change your foundation.

Mary
I know that a lot of times you can go to the store and you can be really overwhelmed by the selection of even foundation colors. So how can you, or the average person, make sure that she buys the correct foundation for her skin tone?

Vincenza
I would definitely… You have to test it to your body or look at your chest, look at your arm, not necessarily just the face because the face is a different color. Most women… I’m an advocate for sunscreen, so my face is always lighter than the rest of my body, but I love to tan. So, I match my face to my body, even though it may look like it’s wrong; but then when it’s on, it’s right. So, you have to really… I would recommend going to… That’s one thing I would recommend spending money or find out going to someone what tone you should be wearing. Are you warm? Are you pink? Are you cool? So you have a good match; and once you find it, you should stay with it. Foundations, that one staple product that you don’t go look for the new thing that’s happening. If you found the right color and the right texture, you should stay with it.

Mary
Are there any other mistakes that you see people make in terms of their make-up?

Vincenza
I would say make-up, applying blush. A lot of times towards the end of the ear where it’s not on the apple of the face, I like to see like where we would naturally blush; a lot of times women put it towards the back of their face towards… Like if you picture the ear versus on the apple where you’re smiling and you naturally would blush. If you had a glass of wine and you looked in the mirror and you got all flushed, that’s where blush should be. If you look at a natural little child and the way they’re happy and blushing, well most women… Or the colors too, Mary, people wear brown blush. Who blushes brown? I mean even bronzers should be golden, and blushes should always be rosy colored and should be… If anything, you could get really cheeky and do something that looks very blushed but no one blushes brown or those kind of tones. I mean that’s a contour color but that’s not something that women really need to do in life. So, on the apple, keep it rosy, keep it to the color that you would naturally. Then just look in the mirror, smile, and pop it on those apples.

Mary
I have one more question for you. Women aren’t necessarily the only ones who wear make-up. In our poll that we talked about earlier, 97% of men say they never wear make-up; yet a very slim proportion of men, 3%, say they do wear make-up at some point, whether it be going out for work or with their friends or for special occasions.

Vincenza
I love it!

Mary
As a celebrity make-up artist, I would imagine that you have to advise your male clients on how to wear make-up appropriately. So, if there are men out there who do wear make-up or who want to wear make-up, what advice do you have for them and what would you tell them?

Vincenza
I love it! I say that real men wear make-up, number one, I love it. Yes, we do make-up on all the men and the same with them. Most of the time, men should bronze the skin. If they’re putting on make-up, it should be either for a blemish and powder. A lot of times, they’re very shiny, like the most distracting… Even in life, I mean I love to do weddings and stuff, and I beg the grooms to let me powder them because that shine looks like sweat. It just looks terrible so I would say powder would be fabulous. It would give a smoother look to the skin and it takes down that shine. Then also with discoloration, so if there’s any one product, I would probably say concealer and powder for a man.

Mary
Are there products specifically made for men and men’s skin types?

Vincenza
Not really, honestly. I don’t recall right now, but there was… I want to say maybe it was Gaultier that had made a specific men’s line but no. It’s the same; skin is skin.

Mary
Okay, Vincenza, is there anything that you would like to add?

Vincenza
No, I’m so excited! Sunscreen, sunscreen, sunscreen, very important.

Mary
And what about sunscreen, I mean what kind of SPF should you be looking for?

Vincenza
Oh my God! I do like Helioplex SPF 70 with no… I would say no fragrance, lotion, and put it underneath. That should be the first thing that touches skin because the damage of the sun, you cannot turn back.

Mary
Okay, great, Vincenza.

Vincenza
I think everyone should start with a great sunscreen and then have fun with make-up.

Mary
Well, Vincenza, I thank you very much for your time today. It has been very informative.

Vincenza
Thank you, Mary.

** The views and opinions expressed in this and other interviews found on this site are expressly those of the speakers or authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Marist Poll.

Related Stories:

6/5: It’s All in the Makeup Bag?

Additional Resources:

Makeup Alley

Makeup 411

Makeup Tip

Reflections on the Great White Way

June 4, 2009 | by Mary Griffith

Flashing lights, a pop-rock score, and actors whizzing by on roller skates! I couldn’t have been more than 11 years old, and there I sat in the Gershwin Theater experiencing my very first Broadway musical, “Starlight Express!”

My parents weren’t wealthy by any stretch of the imagination, but we lived a comfortable middle class existence in the outer borough of Queens. My mother, an avid opera and theater fan, always looked for ways to expose my brother and me to the fine arts. And, while dad was more of a “beer and baseball” kind of guy, he, too, enjoyed the finer things in life. So, after a casual conversation at a family gathering with my Godmother (also a theater junkie), my parents thought it was time to introduce my brother and me to the glittering lights of the Great White Way.

The evening started off with a crash — quite literally. On the day of the performance, mom picked us up from school, scurried us into the house to get us changed (no jeans and sneakers to a Broadway show, thank you very much), and whisked us into our car where we proceeded to Bensonhurst to pick up my Godmother. From what I can recall, we were right on schedule to wait in line to purchase discount tickets at the TKTS booth in Duffy Square. It was first come, first serve at TKTS, and I held my breath, hoping upon hope the tickets for the evening performance weren’t sold out!

Success! Mom returned to the car with five tickets. First, though, we had to park the car. That’s when it happened.

The garage my father chose had one of those twisting entrance ramps that went on for what seemed like an eternity before you actually reached an attendant. Let me put it this way, we never reached “forever.” At the time, my parents drove a used Lincoln Continental the size of, oh, let’s say, the U.S.S. Intrepid, and as we were winding our way down the ramp, my dad sideswiped the wall.

Everyone was fine, but it was an unwelcomed and unexpected sideshow to the evening’s events. Miraculously, though, we made it for the performance’s curtain. The musical was a spectacle like nothing I had ever seen before! And, I thank you, Sir Andrew Lloyd Webber for giving me my first taste of the narcotic that is Broadway. Twenty years later, it is an addiction I choose not to break.

That night was more than an introduction. It was an initiation. I became a member of the legions who have had the privilege to witness some of the greatest performers in the world take to the boards — Ethel Merman, Angela Lansbury, Jerry Orbach, Mickey Rooney, Chita Rivera, Bernadette Peters, Patti Lupone, Michael Crawford, and the list goes on and on.

But, I ask, will future generations be able to say the same? To put it mildly, Broadway is not cheap. According to a 2007 New York Times article, the average paid admission for a show between 1946 and 1947 was $3.90. From 1986 to 1987, theater goers paid, on average, $29.42, and that jumped to $76.32 between 2006 and 2007. And, for the week ending May 17, 2009, the average ticket price for a show ranged from $48.00 to $109.88.

I concede. There are great deals out there to be found. (Keep an eye out in the Sunday papers. My family found a terrific 2 for 1 promotion that allowed us to introduce my little cousins to the wonder that is “Mary Poppins.”) But, with so many “deals” available, does that not mean there is an unstated agreement that ticket prices are just way out of line? Shouldn’t discounted prices, then, be more of the rule than the exception? And, with the new discovery that the Broadway League — the trade association of owners and producers — has been charging a $1 league fee on discounted tickets sold at TKTS booths even though they successfully fought and prevented a state tax on theater tickets recently, I ask, “Is nothing sacred?”

Perhaps, Broadway producers should take a cold hard look at the facts. New Yorkers — an obvious target audience for Broadway shows — think the price of admission is out of line. In fact, The Marist Poll found that 72% of New York City residents think Broadway shows are not affordable for the average person. That includes 81% of those who have seen a show in the last three years. Even worse, perhaps, is that 47% of New Yorkers think Broadway shows are not a good value for their money.

There is nothing in the world like Broadway! And, trust me when I say, I do not begrudge the struggling actors, singers, and dancers their rightful due. These men, women, and children bring the words and music to life night after night. But, there must be some way to strike a balance — to make Broadway affordable while compensating the talented professionals who act, sing, and/or dance their hearts out six days a week. If not, I fear that entire generations to come will miss out on the magic that is Broadway.

Sources/Related Stories:

6/4: Bad News for Broadway?

Theater: The Tonys; Broadway by the Numbers: Remember Those $4 Tickets

Opposing a Tax, Broadway Added a Fee

Theater; ‘Starlight Express’ Rolls to Market with a Rock Beat

6/2: Dugout Chatter — Baseball in NYC

June 2, 2009 | by Marist Poll

By John Sparks

Baseball season is in full swing! From Major League Baseball’s ticket prices to new stadiums’ impact on the game, there’s a lot of chatter surrounding the sport. In an interview with The Marist Poll’s John Sparks, sports journalist Len Berman weighs in. Check out their conversation below.

John Sparks
Len, we conducted a poll and we asked the public if they thought the cost of a ticket to a major league game was a good value for the money. 83% of those who considered themselves baseball fans said, “No, it is not a good value”. In fact, 84% of those who make $50,000 a year or more also said a big league ticket isn’t a good value. I was just wondering what you think and why you think folks responded as they did?

Len Berman
Well, I think in some new stadiums and some old stadiums, the price of tickets has gotten out of hand. I mean clearly all the publicity is focused on the new stadiums in New York City. I mean to spend hundreds of dollars for a baseball game is patently absurd. We all have long memories. I mean mine goes back… I bought a reserved seat at the Old Yankee Stadium for $2.50 because I couldn’t afford the $3.50 box seats, so I mean we all have those memories. I think it’s just gotten out of hand in some places.

John Sparks
Well, you know, at the beginning of the season, you mentioned the new Yankee Stadium. I think those premium seats went for $2,500 a game and then they slashed those in half, but those seats are still just too pricey; don’t you think?

Len Berman
Well, absolutely. In fact, I was just reminiscing about Jay Leno’s last show coming up, and I was fortunate enough to be a guest on his program on the Tonight Show back in 2005. Now this was four years ago, and one of the questions Jay asked me was, “What would I do if I were commissioner for a day?” and I just off the cuff said that, “Gee, I’d like to make a couple of tickets at every game be affordable. Maybe, you could buy them by lottery just so the average family could go to the ballpark.” And, the audience erupted into applause, so I knew I touched on something four years ago and now four years later, things have only gotten worse.

John Sparks
Absolutely. You may remember that George Steinbrenner was always pressing for more luxury boxes, the old Yankee Stadium built it and back in 1923, it wasn’t equipped with luxury boxes in those days. That was one of the motivators behind building a new stadium, but those suites are not being filled. Could it be that major league baseball has finally out-priced itself?

Len Berman
Well, I mean I don’t think anyone predicted the recession. For years, everything was just going up, up, up, up, up, from housing to luxury cars to everything. I mean there was never a downturn so this was just the perfect storm that killed the golden goose. I mean I just think – – listen, fortunately I make a nice living and a few friends of mine, we decided to go to baseball game in a couple weeks so we decided to buy a ticket for $190. Now, it’s per person and it’s just a couple of guys, so I’m going to spend $190 to go to a baseball game. Now I think that’s way out of line but thank God I’m not buying tickets for my family. I guess the flipside is there are plenty of tickets available online. I got a great email from somebody the other day saying they were able to buy some cheap seats in the upper deck at Citi Field, and they had a great time. So, I mean I guess there is a bright side to this somewhere.

John Sparks
Do you think it’s reached a point where the game’s in danger of survival?

Len Berman
I’m not sure survival is ever an issue. I mean that’s been spoken about for years. I mean it’s come up during the war. It came up in the 40’s. It came up when baseball took a year off for the strike in ’94. I think the game is strong. I think people will figure out a way, but I think those owners who envision just riches that would be on top of riches, I think there’s another thing coming. I mean listen, the Giants and Jets built a new stadium. There was nothing wrong with the old stadium. It’s a fine – – it’s a fine facility and the Giants always had this legendary waiting list with hundreds of thousands of names for tickets. Well, they’ve burned through the entire waiting list, and they’re still looking for people because fans are just balking at the idea of personal seat licenses.

John Sparks
In that regard, we also asked New York City residents if they follow professional baseball a great deal, somewhat…

Len Berman
I love that question. I absolutely love that. In fact, I’m writing about it on my website; but go ahead, I’ll let you finish the question.

John Sparks
Great. Well, almost 50% said they don’t follow the game at all; and when you add those that don’t follow it very much or somewhat, it’s a whopping 84%. Now, I grew up loving baseball and I’m concerned that we may have lost a whole generation of fans. Would you agree?

Len Berman
I think there’s two parts to that. Yes, I think some fans have been lost. You’re certainly going to lose kids who can’t stay up late at night to watch the World Series and whose parents can’t afford to take them to games. But, the other side of that is I’ve always felt that the number of sports fans were over-rated. I’ve always argued with people that the majority of people are just not sports fans, and people look at me like I’m crazy. I think the sports fan or the non-sports fan is intimidated into thinking that he’s in the minority because of ESPN, and All Talk radio, and the tabloids. The truth of the matter is the majority of the people aren’t big sports fans, so maybe that’s another eye-opener to some of the owners that their audience is dwindling. That’s one of the reasons I started my website: LenBermanSports.com, and I send out daily emails, the top five, to my subscribers is because I think there are people who aren’t big fans, who would like to know a little bit about what’s going on and that’s what I do. I provide some water cooler information.

John Sparks
One of the things that I noticed now is that it’s more of a complete entertainment venue. Besides the game, you’ve got dot races and certainly at the minor league level, a lot of these fan participation stunts between innings, but even at the Rangers and the Yankees… Between innings, you’ve got all kinds of activities. The fans are on the Jumbotron engaged in contests and things, so it sounds like that the owners have really expanded beyond the game itself.

Len Berman
Well, it’s the old idea of get them in the tent. You’ve got to provide entertainment. I mean I would naively think the ballgame would be enough, especially at the major league level. At the minor league level, I think it’s wonderful. I mean the tickets are reasonable. The players sign autographs. They’re accessible to the fans, and they have all these little fun contests. It really makes kids and people excited about the sport. There’s nothing wrong with that at the minor league level. It’s the major league level that needs a lot of help.

John Sparks
You know, at the major league level, because of the ticket prices, is it a different caliber of fans that go to big league games these days?

Len Berman
Well, that’s another interesting question. I mean the old idea that corporations are going to buy up the seats used to work, and then they distribute it to people. Sometimes they’d sit in it themselves, so you wouldn’t have the hardcore blue-collar fan rooting for the home team. I mean I noted the other day that at a Yankees’ game against Philadelphia, there were so many Philadelphia fans. Well, that’s another sign of the times of fans. If your home team can’t afford the tickets or don’t want to buy them or are easily reselling them, then it makes it much easier for the other team to get into your ballpark, and it really does diminish the home field advantage.

John Sparks
You know, I guess in this age of government bailouts, it doesn’t look too good for these corporations to be, whether they’re buying naming rights or even entertaining clients in luxury.

Len Berman
Well, it just doesn’t look good on your corporate report to say you’re spending hundreds of thousand dollars on premium seats. Listen, you mentioned a $2,500 seat for the first row at the Yankee Stadium, that’s if you bought it on a season ticket basis. Well, if you bought four seats, that’s $10,000 per game. That’s $800,000 for the season. Now how’s that going to look on your corporate report? If you’ve spent $800,000 for baseball seats for your clients, I don’t think it looks very good.

John Sparks
I agree with you. Listen, you mentioned the new Yankee Stadium and, of course, the Mets have a new home field as well. New York fans were pretty much evenly divided when we asked them if building these new stadiums was a good thing for baseball. What do you think? Was it a good thing that they built two (inaudible) ball parks?

Len Berman
I was surprised by your poll results. I would’ve thought because of all the flack that has transpired, I would’ve thought a bigger percentage would’ve been against the idea that this was good for baseball, so that did surprise me. I guess it’s good in a way that it draws more interest and more attention. I’ll tell you the fact in your poll that I found fascinating when it came to New York City was that the only demographic that considered themselves Met fans as opposed to Yankee fans were people over 45. So, I really got to thinking about that, and I obviously… It might have something to do with the more recent success of the Yankees. I mean they won World Series as recently as 2000 where the most recent Mets World Series won was ’86; but I’m also wondering if that has something to do with the fact that the older fans still have an allegiance to the old Dodgers and Giants, who used to play in New York and might have considered themselves national league fans. But, I thought that was – – There was the fascinating tidbit in your poll about the over 45-year-old people, who are Met fans.

John Sparks
Are you a Mets or a Yankees fan, Len?

Len Berman
Well, the thing is, is that when I became a journalist, I kind of became neutral because I worked in Dayton, Ohio, and that was Cincinnati Reds country, and, then, I worked five years in Boston, so I was a Red Sox reporter. I grew up a Yankee fan back in the 50’s because Mickey Mantle played for the Yankees, but he doesn’t play for them anymore. So right now, if anything, I’d probably lean toward the Mets out of compassion. I was actually hoping in 2000 that they could win the subway series. I mean the Yankees have won so many, so I’m an odd individual to ask. I don’t… I’m not really a fan from that sense because I am a journalist.

John Sparks
The Yankees certainly struggled last year. They didn’t make the post-season. Now, I saw the other day, I think I read that there were 17 games this year in which they’ve come from behind to win. It seems to me that the free agents aren’t necessarily making a team; and at the same time, the Yankees don’t seem to be good at growing their own on the farm like they did with those great teams of the late 90’s. Yet Tampa Bay, the Red Sox, the Minnesota Twins seem to be having more success with developing their players. Now is this a problem for the Yankees? Should they consider a different approach? Is it a question of their scouting department being inferior to other organizations these days?

Len Berman
I’ve long advocated that the Yankees change their ways. I mean they have gone about buying free agents every year since their last World Series win in 2000. None of it has worked. I mean I can make you the whole list from Mike Mussina, to Jason Giambi, to Randy Johnson, to Alex Rodriguez, to Johnny Damon, to Hideki Matsui, to every… Right down the line, it hasn’t worked, and I’ve long advocated it. I love the fact what the Red Sox and Tampa Bay and those teams have done, and that’s why I give them an edge. I mean they have those young people, young players who aren’t afraid to get their uniform dirty and until the Yankees can develop those kinds of players, I think just buying up players, who are older in nature by their age and their free agency, I think it’s a losing proposition.

John Sparks
Listen, I want to kind of divert for a moment. We asked fans in an earlier poll about the effect of steroids in the game. Now, we had all this A-Rod business this year and, again, this ties into the success of the Yankees or the lack of. Do you think there’s been some kind of clubhouse dissension that has accompanied A-Rod that not just this year that it really hasn’t reached the service that we haven’t been reading about but it has its affect on the Yankees team?

Len Berman
Well, I mean A-Rod has not been successful anywhere he’s been. Now, I don’t know if that’s cause or effect. It’s hard to say. He’s an enormously talented baseball player, but he does seem to cause friction or “look at me” and he comes bigger than the team. Is that a reason they don’t win? I mean I don’t know. I’m not in that clubhouse. I do know that he’s a unique individual; everything always revolves around him, even when he says it doesn’t. Maybe at some point, it does have an effect on the team. I mean I think there’s more factors at work. I mean obviously it’s all about pitching, and it’s about staying healthy, and it’s about playing some defense. It’s a lot of other things, but it may not be a coincidence that A-Rod’s never been to the World Series.

John Sparks
Let’s look in the crystal ball and look again to October and just say for the sake of a discussion that we’ve got a repeat of 2000, a subway series. How would you stack up the Mets versus the Yankees?

Len Berman
Wow! That would be a wonderful… That’s a great question. I thought you were going to ask me which teams would get there other than the Yankees and the Mets. Who would stack up better? In a short series, which is what a subway series is, you have to lean toward the pitching, and the Yankees get the slight edge of the starting pitching. The Mets get the big edge with the bullpen. I think, believe it or not, who wins the All-star game will determine home field edge. I would think if the Mets could play four of the games at Citi Field against the Yankees, Citi Field is a more pitcher-friendly ballpark. The Mets might have an edge. That’s weird that it might come down to some anonymous player from the Washington Nationals winning a game in the All- Star game and determining home field edge, and that gives the edge to the World Series; but I guess I would give the Mets the slightest of edges based on their bullpen.

John Sparks
You know, Len, there’s another factor in this home field advantage, and you know the World Series is two, three, and two, and the All-Star game determines the home field advantage now. But, they’re really two different ball games going on: the American League game and the National League game. Do you think it’s time that they got together and either both leagues do the DH or both leagues go back to the traditional game?

Len Berman
Well, no, that’s a broad question. I would think once you get to the World Series, you just play under one set of rules. Now, what that rule would be, I don’t know. I mean teams in the American League are constructed for the designated hitter and that’s how they run their payroll and their roster and play their games and the National League plays a different game, so I guess the only fair way is to have two different rules in the World Series; but I guess if push came to shove, I would favor one set of rules for a sport. I mean it’s odd to me that you have different rules. I mean it’s like…

John Sparks
It’s a different ballgame.

Len Berman
Yet half the basketball teams played with six players and half of them against each other, and then the Western conference played with only four players on the court. I mean that’s how odd it seems.

John Sparks
Finally, Len, tell me what you’re up to these days. Broadcasting has changed for all of us. You’re no longer at NBC. What are you doing these days?

Len Berman
Well, I’ve just recently left my NBC gig, so I’m spending a lot of time on my website, LenBermanSports.com. I’m sending out daily emails, my top five everyday. I’m talking to a lot of people. I’m talking to radio. I think there’s some things I want to do. I want to continue my “Spanning the World” feature. I think that’ll continue in some fashion. So, I definitely plan on continuing in broadcasting, but there’s nothing I’m ready to announce today.

John Sparks
Now, if I go on your website, I can register and get an email sent to me with your top five; is that right?

Len Berman
Yeah, they would just register on my website and they would get my top five; and it goes out Monday through Friday. Some of it’s… A lot of it’s offbeat. It’s not hardcore, super hardcore sports. A lot of it is the offbeat stuff that I like to dabble in.

** The views and opinions expressed in this and other interviews found on this site are expressly those of the speakers or authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Marist Poll.

6/2: Taking the Plunge at Yankee Stadium

6/2: You Call That a Record?!