Justin Remus

Hail to the Queen

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This past January, Serena Williams won her sixth Australian Open. That wasn’t surprising. What was surprising was that Serena, now engaged to Reddit co-founder Alexis Ohanian, was eight weeks pregnant at the time. Having broken Steffi Graf’s record for most Grand Slam victories in the Open Era, she is only one shy of tying Margaret Court’s all-time record of 24 wins, most of which occurred when only amateurs were allowed to compete.

What will happen when she returns from her maternity leave? If history is any indicator, Serena has the mental and physical toughness to not only make a comeback but also to continue dominating her sport. Yes, she’s 35, but to say she’s playing her best tennis yet would be a huge understatement. Today, she’s ranked as the World Tennis Association’s number one women’s player while most of the opponents she faced at the beginning of her career are either retired or no longer top-ranked. Not only is she the greatest women’s tennis player ever, she may well be the most dominant American athlete alive today. When it comes to sheer physical talent and competitive willpower, Serena takes a backseat to no one. Mostly a baseline player, there are no weaknesses in Serena’s game.

Fight the Power

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Colin Kaepernick had a plan. The San Francisco 49ers’ quarterback had made up his mind: He wasn’t going to stand for the national anthem for the team’s first preseason game. He felt in his heart that it was necessary to make a statement against racial oppression and police brutality. Still recovering from shoulder, thumb, and knee surgeries, Kaepernick wasn’t suited up to play. So he sat through the anthem, and either no one noticed or no one cared. The same thing happened for the next preseason game. It was only when he sat for the 49ers’ next game—in uniform this time—that he stood out. He was now in the spotlight.

A small, simple, silent act of protest, but one that has had large repercussions. Although Kaepernick now kneels instead of sitting, in deference to those serving in the military, fans have booed him, burned his jersey, and made death threats against him. One NFL executive called him a “traitor,” while other NFL brass said they would never want him on their team, no matter how talented he is.

Nature of the Beast

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Super Bowl XLIX definitely lived up to the hype. The Seattle Seahawks had squandered a 10-point fourth-quarter lead, but they were driving downfield, down 28 –24. They were at New England’s 38-yard line. With just 1 minute and 14 seconds remaining, quarterback Russell Wilson lofted a pass deep down the right sideline. Backup cornerback Malcolm Butler was all over receiver Jermaine Kearse, both men falling backwards onto the grass at the five-yard line. Miraculously, the ball fell into Kearse’s soft hands, as good a catch as any in Super Bowl history.

On the next play, Marshawn Lynch, aka “Beast Mode,” was given the ball and almost dragged New England’s defenders into the end zone. He was stopped just short of the goal line at the one. With the clock running and one timeout left, the stage was set for Lynch, one of the game’s most punishing runners, to punch the ball in. Seattle would be the first team to repeat as champions since the Patriots did it 10 years earlier. Then Wilson went into the shotgun. One of the NFL’s elite quarterbacks took the snap and fired a rocket to Ricardo Lockette at the goal line. But this time Butler got there first and intercepted the pass. With three downs left, why had head coach Pete Carroll not called for Beast Mode to power his way in for the score? He had more rushing yards and touchdowns than anyone over the last four years.

The Rebuilding of the Yankees

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The Yankees have such a legacy of domination that it’s hard to remember that they weren’t always a playoff juggernaut. After gambling on multiple high-priced free agents during the 1980s with little to show for it, the bottom fell out in 1990, when they won only 67 games and lost 95, finishing last in the American League East. With George Steinbrenner banned for the year from the day-to-day business operations of the team by MLB, the Yankees temporarily kicked their addiction to marquee names and went back to basics, nurturing talent through their farm system. That produced Derek Jeter, Mariano Rivera, Andy Pettitte, and Jorge Posada: the Core Four.

The results paid off big in 1996, their first World Series championship since 1978. Three more titles followed in the next four years, the most recent one in 2009. They’ve missed the postseason only twice since 1994, including last year, which led to an orgy of spending in the off-season on expensive talent. Like every team, the Yankees always want more trophy hardware, but ticket sales and suite licenses have dropped almost $60 million since 2012. Since Steinbrenner’s demise in 2010, the team has been run more like a corporation by his sons Hank and Hal. The emphasis is on the bottom line. Playoffs appearances create a jump in concession and merchandise sales as well as ticket sales, but the Yanks also knew they had to shore up their base. Fans need an incentive to support the team.

Riverside Droves

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A new organization, Friends of the Seaport, which supports plans to redevelop the South Street Seaport, hosted a Town Hall meeting in the Financial District on December 1, drawing more than 100 people to the auditorium of the Pine Street School.

Both the group and the meeting appear to have arisen in response to Save Our Seaport (SOS), a preservation group vigorously opposed to plans formulated by the City’s Economic Development Corporation and its private-sector partner, the Howard Hughes Corporation (HHC), to remake the Seaport neighborhood. Among these is the renovation of Pier 17 into an upscale retail destination, which is currently under way.

But ground has not yet been broken on other aspects of the plan, such as the proposal to move and rehabilitate the landmarked Tin Building, while demolishing the nearby New Market Building (which local preservationists regard as having enormous historic value), and erecting a tall residential tower, which will contain 150 apartments, on the site of the latter. (This is the most controversial aspect of HHC’s proposal, and the one that critics appear to regard as a deal-breaker.) The plan also contains provisions to connect the East River Esplanade as far north as the Brooklyn Bridge, and link it with surrounding parks and waterfront public spaces.

Book Reviews

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How much can you really say in 140 characters? Apparently a lot, as evidenced by Twitter’s ability to smear reputations, foment political upheaval, and coordinate disaster relief. Hatching Twitter, an intriguing behind-the-scenes account of the founding of the social media behemoth, practically begs for a Hollywood movie like The Social Network as it delves into the internal backbiting and power plays between Twitter’s four founders.

The Choice Is Yours

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On the surface, Barack Obama and Mitt Romney couldn’t be more different. For a paranoid segment of the population who sees a person holding the nation’s highest office who doesn’t look like them, Obama constitutes a threat to their way of life.  To those on the other side of the ideological divide, Romney is an entitled plutocrat using his wealth and influence to bully his way into the White House so that he can further the diabolical machinations of his corporate cronies, who seek only to exploit the lower classes and add to their already overflowing coffers.

Michelle Obama: 21st Century Fox

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Michelle Obama is very much a product of black America. Unlike her biracial, multicultural husband, whose mother was white and whose father was from Kenya, she is, like many African-Americans, a descendant of slaves. Her father, Fraser Robinson, worked as a pump operator in a boiler room all his life for the city of Chicago, but both of his children received Ivy League educations. Now his daughter has become one of the most famous women in the world… It’s been an incredible journey, not just for Mrs. Obama, but for all African-American women. She will redefine what it means to be a strong black female and also reopen the feminist debate on what it means to be a professional woman— a very successful one, at that—while balancing the responsibilities of being a dedicated mother and wife. She will have a huge impact as a role model, activist, and trendsetter—mostly with fashion and perhaps also interior design. She has been on record as saying her top priority is to raise her daughters, but her new life in the White House will be infinitely more complicated than that.

Kenneth Chenault: Grace Under Fire

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On September 11th, Kenneth Chenault, Chairman and CEO of American Express, was fortunate to be in Salt Lake City, over 2,000 miles away from New York City. But other AMEX personnel weren’t quite so lucky—11 employees were either killed or reported missing due to the tragedy. Hardly surprising when you consider that AMEX’s corporate offices are only 50 feet or so from the Twin Towers site.

But let’s give Chenault credit. He responded quickly and decisively—and not just as a businessman, but as a humanitarian…

He personally ordered the evacuation of the AMEX building minutes after the first plane struck, and by afternoon, he’d called a meeting of his top execs to assure employee safety and customer service—in that order.

Barack’s Women

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Barack Obama is now the most powerful man in the world. But as the saying goes, “Behind every successful man, there’s a strong woman.” However, in Mr. Obama’s case, it would be women: Stanley Ann, his mother; Madelyn Dunham, his grandmother; and Michelle, his wife. All have been instrumental in molding his character and shaping his intrinsic beliefs. These three women not only inspired him, they also comforted him and sometimes even scolded him. They helped make him into who he is today: educator, author, activist, and politician. They’re the foundation of our first African-American president.