Once in a Blue Moon

As some readers of this column know I once sat on the Board of Governors for the Academy of Television Arts and Sciences in Los Angeles. During the time I was involved with the Academy I worked on many new media initiatives, including helping produce the Emmy Awards on the web for several years.

During that time I came into contact with Don Mischer, who has produced the Emmy Awards many a time. He was frequently in the room to talk about the Award show and I was in a couple of small meetings with him discussing web issues.

He has been always gracious, gentlemanly and courteous. He has produced a number of good shows but he may well be remembered most for an unfortunate incident at this year?s Democratic Convention, which he produced.

Yes, he was the voice that dropped the f--- word on national television, his mike open for the entire world to hear, in the great Democratic Convention Finale Balloon Snafu.

It was, depending on your point of view and sensibility, a high point or a low point in the week. It certainly gave comedians great fodder. VH-1's THE BEST WEEK THAT EVER WAS gave it play; the trades played it up. Multi-Channel News had an article about it: "DNC is Red, White and Very Blue."

So when the story of this year?s campaign is written and the obituary is written for Don Mischer, both will include this now [in]famous incident.

Note to producers: do not let yourself be miked when producing. When things go wrong, and they almost always do, we have a propensity for use of the f--- word and we don't want to be remembered in our obituary for it. Do we?

While comedians were dissecting Don Mischer's moment of infamy Al-Qaeda seems to have been planning more mayhem and destruction upon us. And we were experiencing a "blue moon," that rare occasion when the moon is full twice in one month.

You realize that on nights when the moon is full Emergency Rooms tend to put on more staff because people go a little crazy. Which, in my opinion, they did with this blue moon. And which might have been part of Mr. Mischer's trouble. The moon was against him.

I had to go out to Long Island and, as you often do at suburban train stations, I ended up sharing a taxi with a full load on the way to my appointment. The young woman next to me was on her way home from a job interview further out on the island.

Her regular job is in downtown Manhattan, not far from the World Trade Center site. She was interviewing for other jobs because she was frightened; she wanted to be out of Manhattan.

She wasn't going to take the job; it was too big a cut in pay and benefits but if had been comparable to her Manhattan job she would have been gone in a New York minute. There is a rumor that headhunters are circling the city looking for candidates that have the same sensibilities as my cab companion.

But would moving away from the city keep us safe? Up in Albany, suspected terrorists have been arrested and some farmer in Illinois has apparently been attempting to sell fertilizer to terrorists and he wasn't someone with a Middle Eastern name. He attempted to sell his fertilizer to "terrorists" who were government agents.

New York is not locked down - yet. The overtime is running in the millions and if we keep this up the city will go back to being stony broke without the need for Al Qaeda to even set off a firecracker.

We haven't even gotten to the Republican Convention yet!

That's a prospect that is daunting to the city and offices all around Madison Square Garden are being closed for the week and employees told to work from home. The city seems to be looking forward to the Republican Party with all the enthusiasm felt when faced with a root canal. It has to be endured but must it?

Once in a blue moon?