Last night Barack Obama and John McCain participated in a panel discussion about getting more people involved in service.

But what if folks want to leave service — particularly government service?

You don’t often hear much about them.

Which is why we so enjoyed today’s Washington Post article about Dana Gioia, chairman of the National Endowment for the Arts since March 2003, who announced he will leave in January.

This Gioia quote is a gem:

“I really want to go back to writing. I haven’t had time for my own writing. I write all the time for the NEA, official writing. Since I have become chairman, I have not published a poem.”

What a great reason to depart the government.  Not to become a lobbyist or to be part of the permanent Washington Institution … but to write poetry.

That, Mr. Gioia, is poetry right there.  Congrats on getting published again.

Tough shot Fishbowl gives the Washington Post today for pointing out this editing error in a Paul Farhi story:

Of course, it’s Drudgereport.com.

That mistake earns this…

You know, to be honest, we really haven’t read Courtland Milloy since, well, the fall of the Berlin Wall.

Only by accident today did we stumble over his Washington Post column.  Metro section?  Style?  Tough to be sure.  Regardless, hoooo boy, are we glad we took a look.

Because lo and behold, whom does he take to task?  Whom does he get all woodshed on?
None other than fellow Washington Post thought leader Richard Cohen.

Here’s Milloy’s wind-up:

What is Obama to do?

Obviously, it’s not enough to battle your way to the Democratic nomination for president of the United States. You can vanquish a field of primary candidates. You can win campaigns in the far northwest, in places where there are no blacks to speak of. You can raise a war chest that exceeds the annual budget of a midsize town.

You can walk a fine line between being too black for whites and not black enough for blacks. But here you are, just weeks away from the presidential election, being called on to prove that you are man enough — without coming off as an angry black man.

And here’s Milloy’s pitch:

“Barack Obama, as an African American man, has a real challenge,” Estelle B. Freedman, professor of history at Stanford University, said Sunday on National Public Radio’s “All Things Considered.” “Some of the criticism of Obama as being too aloof or not going after red meat enough or not being aggressive enough are really questioning his masculinity in some ways.

“But given the historic stereotypes about fear of African American men’s masculinity and fears of their aggression, Obama has been successful because he embodies an earlier model of black male politicians for whom respectability and reason were tickets into full citizenship.”

But not successful enough, apparently.

On Tuesday, Richard Cohen wrote on the op-ed page of The Washington Post that Obama’s appearance on a TV talk show Sunday “had me wondering if, as a kid, Obama ever got a shot in the mouth on the playground, he’d glare at the bully — and convene a meeting.”

Yowzers!  Richard Cohen under friendly fire!

For his column today, Milloy has earned back this wary reader.  And for the record books, Milloy has earned himself a six on the Batman fight scale.

A new Web 2.0 venture for the Washington Post?

(hat tip Instapundit/Michael Silence)

Fishbowl headline:

“Milbank, a Banana, and a Condom”

Extreme Mortman senior historian Richard Andrews brings us up-to-date about David Broder and 1956:

In the one of his videos on Washingtonpost.com/postpoliticstv (partly transcribed on p.A27 of today’s Post), Broder says LBJ helped make Estes Kefauver the VP nominee in ‘56.  WRONG!  LBJ supported JFK to the bitter end; one of LBJ’s best known pre-Presidential utterances was his casting Texas’ votes for “the fighting sailor who wears the scars of battle”.  I have this here in Caro’s “Master of the Senate” book, and there are online references, too.

D’oh!

An awe-inspiring correction in today’s Washington Post:

“An Aug. 22 Business article about Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac incorrectly said Fannie Mae is withdrawing from the market for ‘all-day loans.’  Fannie Mae is withdrawing from the market for “Alt-A loans’” …

Can’t get enough JFK-references in Barack Obama coverage?

Then consider another route — today’s Washington Post story on Dulles Airport replacing its mobile lounge shuttles with Aerotrains.

The AeroTrain, similar to train systems in Atlanta, Dallas-Fort Worth, Tokyo and Hong Kong, will cost $1.4 billion, nearly half of the $3 billion D2 expansion at Dulles, which includes a fourth runway, parking garages, 15 new gates, concourse and terminal expansions, and a control tower.
But the airport’s 49 Kennedy-era mobile lounges are not being retired — at least not yet. They will be used to serve the D gates and for all international arrivals, because international passengers must be segregated until they pass through customs.

True JFK fans should consider this photo from the Dulles Airport kids page.

Caption:

President John F. Kennedy (on the left) and former President Dwight D. Eisenhower (in the center, holding his hat) walk up to a sculpture of John Foster Dulles (on the far right) at Dulles Airport!

Exactly six months ago today this was sent (h/t Fishbowl)…

Atlantic:

Letter of complaint from the Washington Post’s managing editor, Philip Bennett, February 11, 2008: The Clinton staff engaged in epic battles with the press. As the campaign’s fortunes worsened, resentment at the press turned into personal attacks against reporters. In this letter to Clinton’s campaign manager, the Washington Post’s managing editor complained that Phil Singer, a senior Clinton spokesman, was spreading malicious—and false—rumors about a Post reporter to one of her own colleagues.

Can Eugene Robinson write a Washington Post column without mentioning Paris Hilton?
So far in August, it seems like he can’t.

August 1:

The low point so far is McCain’s bizarre ad that flashes images of Paris Hilton and Britney Spears before showing Obama in Berlin addressing the multitudes.

August 7:

Bring on the Olympics. Please. When Paris Hilton dominates the presidential campaign for a whole week, even spelling out a plan for achieving energy independence, it is sooooo time for a break.

Likewise, it might be soooo time for a break from Robinson’s column.