It's true. The brother of WW's arts and culture editor
is a Republican. And not just any ol' every-four-years rah-rah
Republican. He's a professional Republican who lobbies
for conservative Jewish causes on behalf of the Republican
Jewish Coalition. Matthew H. Brooks has been on Hardball,
quoted in The New York Times and profiled on Salon.com.
But Caryn Brooks' big brother didn't wait until he was
raking in the big bucks to turn to "the cause." Caryn assures
us he was leading the conservative charge in high school,
as a regular spitting image of Alex P. Keaton of Family
Ties fame. While Caryn was hunting out keg parties in
the woods, he was decked out in cuffed, wide-wale corduroys
planning yet another small business. He was into Frank Sinatra
way before it was cool and took Caryn to see Sammy Davis
Jr. in Atlantic City not long before he croaked (Sammy,
that is).
This will be Matt's fourth Republican convention, and WW
had his little sister check in with him Monday to get the
inside scoop.
Willamette Week: So tell me about the convention
parties. Is it pretty much open invitation if you're registered
for the convention?
Matthew H. Brooks: No, no, no, no. It's not open invitation,
but for a lot of the parties people send a pretty broad
invitation list out. For the more exclusive ones, like the
one I'm coming from right now, it was a select group of
people. That party, which I attended as someone's guest,
is for people who've contributed $250,000 and up to the
Republican party.
But you're not one of those?
Obviously not.
So you got to eat lobster for free.
I don't think they had lobster. Actually, the food at this
was pretty sparse compared to some of the others.
What is the swag scene like?
There's a lot of swag. I'm carrying a bag from this Tiffany's
reception with a silver bowl that they gave us--and Tiffany's
perfume for [my wife] Deborah.
So if you go to a Philip Morris party they'd be giving
away cigarettes?
Not cigarettes. But Philip Morris had 60,000 specially
designed boxes of Kraft Macaroni and Cheese that had the
Republican elephant shapes and star macaroni to give away
to people here in Philadelphia.
Did you take some?
Yeah.
Might you feed that to your young children?
Probably, as my daughter is a big fan of the Kraft Macaroni
and Cheese product line.
Is there a convention theme song that you're aware of?
Not that I know of.
Think they might overuse the Rocky theme song
a bit?
I haven't heard the Rocky theme song, nor have I
heard "Philadelphia Freedom."
Tell me about the celebrities.
Celebrities are here in profusion. Depends on what your
definition of celebrity is. Obviously there are all the
performing celebrities: Martina McBride, Blues Traveler,
Brooks and Dunn. Lynyrd Skynyrd's doing a party. Bruce Willis
is speaking at the convention, as is Schwarzenegger.
Is the party feeling the loss of Sonny Bono?
I haven't heard that.
But do you personally feel the loss? The sense of someone
of that caliber representing....Hold on. Someone just put
something in front of my face: Governor Bush has declared
"Jesus Day" in Texas.
That was a couple weeks ago and he was one of nine governors,
including three Democrats, so I think it's a non-issue.
This doesn't have anything to do with law; it's just acknowledgement.
George W. has also signed things in support of Israel. He's
done things for Muslims. It's a non-issue. Propaganda.
You took W to Israel, right?
Correct.
Did he have a yarmulke on at any time?
Yes he did. In fact there are pictures. When he was at
the Wall.
Did he wail?
No, but it was a solemn moment.
Why are all the rich Jews in Hollywood Democrats? Is
that an area you might want to focus on?
I don't know. It's just a reflection of them being misguided
and wanting more and more opportunities to meet Barbra Streisand.
As a lobbyist you certainly focus on your cause, but
what about the other issues? You're in Philadelphia to support
the platform. As long as I've known you, you've been pretty
pro-choice, but the platform is adamantly anti-abortion.
How do you reconcile that?
In my decision matrix of what's important to me...
Decision matrix?!
...that doesn't really rank really high on what it takes
for me to vote for a candidate. To certain people it is,
and they'll vote accordingly. But to me it's fairly far
down on my list of issues that are relevant to who I'm going
to vote for.
Did you come up with that term "decision matrix"?
I don't know if I've trademarked it, but I use it a lot.
Tell me about convention signage. Have you seen any
that stood out to you as rather witty?
Yeah. There was one today: "Nixon in 2000. He's tanned,
rested and still less stiff than Al Gore."
Will you carry any signs?
I don't think so.
That's not part of what you do?
That was 10 years ago, that sign-carrying stage.
I recall you made a great sign once that said, "Save
the whales because they are nice."
I would carry that again.
Because the whales still are nice?
They still are nice.
The Republican Convention costs more than $50 million;
the Democratic, $35 million. Each gets more than $13 million
in federal funding. Don't you think that's a lot of money
for what amounts to a big pep rally?
Well, there's a multiplier effect. It's not a static cost.
The money that's invested is leveraged and multiplied many
times over in terms of revenue and growth...
What the hell are you talking about?
The people come and spend a lot more money on the food,
the catering, the hotels. Plus it's a phenomenal public-relations
opportunity. Other people are going to come and visit the
city.
But the city of Philadelphia is not America at large.
Bill Gates just gave that much to wipe out malaria in Africa.
It's a small price to pay for democracy.
Complete this phrase: "If I had a hammer..."
I would build a compassionate conservative bridge to the
21st century.
Oh, God.
How's that for staying on message?
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