Observer

A new newsletter designed to trigger your DELETE button

Hello!

Yes, yes, yes – it’s another newsletter in your inbox. And worse, it’s from me, Terry Golway, who hasn’t had anything interesting to say since 1986. And by “interesting,” I mean in the same way that some people consider Donald Trump, the House of Windsor and the New York Jets to be “interesting.”

I’m here today utterly uninvited, which is a bit ironic since I usually don’t show up when I am invited. But never mind that. This isn’t personal. It’s business. Well, of a sort anyway.

I’m getting into the Substack newsletter business, and as usual, I’m several years behind the curve. I have no idea who owns Substack but this much is certain: If I have joined the ranks of Substackers, you can be fairly sure that the platform will cease to exist in a matter of months, having been overtaken by some new technology of which I will remain willfully ignorant until it, too, is about to become an anachronism.

But on the off chance that this enterprise does, in fact, keep going, I’m asking you to consider subscribing. Wait – this is free, ok? I don’t want your money. I just want a few minutes of your attention (which is a lot more valuable) once a week or so. But if the very thought repulses you, well, I won’t be offended if you do whatever one does to ensure that no email from me shall ever again soil your inbox. Most of you are aware that I will never know if you choose to unsubscribe, cancel, block, or perform a high-tech exorcism to expel this newsletter from your computer, as I have no idea how such things are done.

You might well ask what benefits will accrue from subscribing.

(I took a break after writing the above sentence to consider those potential benefits. After careful reflection and several consultations with my good friends, John Powers and John Jameson, I can think of none.)

That said, it’s not beyond the realm of possibility that you’ll find something worthwhile in the musings to come. I’m calling this newsletter “Observer” for a few reasons: It’s a tip of the hat to my favorite newspaper columnist, the late Russell Baker, it’s a homage to the old New York Observer, the Camelot of weekly newspapers in the 1990s and early 2000s, and it’s an acknowledgment that what I’m offering is observation, not any kind of inside information. I was never very good at the whole “inside the room” school of reporting, much to the chagrin of more than a few editors.

I was lucky enough to write a column for about a decade in the old New York Observer, and while it was originally supposed to be about local politics, I learned very early on that I didn’t have what it takes to be a purely political columnist. So the column became a platform for various and sundry observations about sports, culture, the media, and history.

I’m hoping to reprise some of that in this newsletter. Which means that you’ll never know what you might be reading in any given week. Maybe it will be an essay about a few good books (remember those?) that speak to where we are today. Or maybe a lament for lost youth (there might be a few of those). Perhaps a meditation on the brittle peace of a mid-winter’s dawn (you get to experience a lot of them when you have a dog with an overactive bladder).

In other words, Observer will not be singularly devoted to the latest political outrage. I don’t have the sources required to offer any meaningful insight into how we choose to govern, or mis-govern, ourselves. But don’t take that to mean I’m downplaying the crisis in which we find ourselves. Never in the history of our republic has so much damage been done to so many by so few. By one, in fact. But let’s not talk about Rupert Murdoch.

So there you have it. I’d be delighted and honored if you choose to subscribe. Thank you.

Terry