Diversity, Hiatt-Style
Washington Post editorial page editor Fred Hiatt, shining star of your liberal media, says:
Post Editorial Page Editor Fred Hiatt called Kristol “very smart and very plugged in,” saying Kristol would be an influential voice in the coming debate over redefining the Republican Party. “It seems to me there were a lot of Times readers who felt the Times shouldn’t hire someone who supported the Iraq war,” said Hiatt, adding that he wants “a diverse range of opinions” on his page.
Even absent Kristol, the Times will have among its op-ed columnists Iraq War supporter David Brooks. And it will also have Iraq War supporter Thomas Friedman as its dedicated foreign affairs columnist. So it’s hardly as if Iraq War supporters have been purged from the NYT. Meanwhile, what kind of diversity has Hiatt really brought to the Post’s opinion section? His masthead editorials backed the war, as did all of his conservative columnists and most of the “liberal” columnists. A believer in diversity would be trying to get some company for poor E.J. Dionne and Harold Meyerson among the liberals.
The fascinating thing about this, though, is that Hiatt combines contempt for newspaper readers with contempt for the craft of journalism. He clearly thinks it was bad of the Times to cater to the desires of its readers. And he doesn’t say Kristol’s column is good! Doesn’t call it insightful, doesn’t call it informative, doesn’t call it well-written. He just says that Kristol is “plugged-in” and influential. Which no doubt he is. But as a consumer of media, I prefer to take in well-written informative commentary that’s entertaining or enlightening. Being deliberately misled by influence-peddlers or wannabe influence-peddlers doesn’t rank high on my priority list. But to Hiatt it’s the very model of a modern major political pundit.
29 Responses to “Diversity, Hiatt-Style”
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January 27th, 2009 at 9:24 am
So why not Iraq war supporter Matthew Yglesias also?
January 27th, 2009 at 9:25 am
If WaPo is only interested in page views, why should I read ‘em? If I want to be entertained, I’ll read Wonkette.
January 27th, 2009 at 9:34 am
Don’t forget Eugene Robinson. Otherwise I completely agree.
January 27th, 2009 at 9:57 am
Re Matthew’s comment “Being deliberately misled by influence-peddlers or wannabe influence-peddlers doesn’t rank high on my priority list. But to Hiatt it’s the very model of a modern major political pundit.”
—————
Actually, you could argue that to Hiatt it’s the very model of newspaper publishing as well.
January 27th, 2009 at 10:23 am
Even absent Kristol, the Times will have among its op-ed columnists Iraq War supporter
Don’t forget Judy Miller and Michael Gordon (the latter, I believe, still there), who — far more consequentially than Brooks or The Mustache — published their pro-war opinion pieces on the front page, as “fact.”
To say nothing of the editors who permitted them to do so.
January 27th, 2009 at 10:33 am
Wasn’t Safire still publishing a regular column, and supporting the war, in ‘02-’03?
January 27th, 2009 at 10:44 am
The problem with BK had nothing to do with his support for any/all wars (though noxious) but that he was a complete party hack who broadcasted “advice” without actually offering creative thought on why the right, or republicans should prevail. He was a waste of column inches and precious, precious server space. See George Packer for the rest of this:
January 27th, 2009 at 10:45 am
hiatt thinks he offers a “diverse range of opinions?” my god, he’s even stupider than al.
January 27th, 2009 at 11:13 am
Doesn’t George Will still write for them?
How many arch-conservatives does it take to represent this particular viewpoint?
January 27th, 2009 at 11:17 am
Mr. Yglesias seems to have forgotten his favorite columnist, Charles Krauthammer.
January 27th, 2009 at 11:35 am
my god, he’s even stupider than al.
Neither Fred Hiatt nor Al are stupid. They’re just doing their job, which is to appear stupid.
You might not think people like that are hard to find, but they are. Not many human beings are willing to humiliate themselves so relentlessly.
January 27th, 2009 at 11:40 am
Fred Hiatt called Kristol “very smart and very plugged in,”
That’s not true until you attach the cap and flip the switch.
Still, I’m surprised that Hiatt could talk with his tongue up Kristol’s asshole. Perhaps he just said “omnggnmmgng”, but the staff can translate after many similar encounters.
January 27th, 2009 at 11:57 am
Don’t forget Judy Miller and Michael Gordon (the latter, I believe, still there), who — far more consequentially than Brooks or The Mustache — published their pro-war opinion pieces on the front page, as “fact.”
To say nothing of the editors who permitted them to do so.
What did Gordon write that was so bad? To the doves, reporting the fact that Saddam was a psychotic dictator is somehow pro-war.
January 27th, 2009 at 12:12 pm
The “doves’” beef goes far beyond Gordon saying Saddam was a “psychotic dictator.” From Glenn Greenwald in May of 2008:
Like clockwork, the administration’s most stalwart surge supporter/journalist — the New York Times’ Michael Gordon — has a lengthy article today bolstering the administration’s war-justifying accusations against Iran. It claims in the lead sentence that “militants from the Lebanese group Hezbollah have been training Iraqi militia fighters at a camp near Tehran,” and that “the training, the Americans say, is carried out at several camps near Tehran that are overseen by the Quds Force of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Command, and the instruction is carried out by militants from Hezbollah, which has long been supported by the Quds Force.”
As usual with Gordon’s articles, nothing is done here other than uncritically repeating Bush administration claims under the cover of anonymity. Virtually every paragraph in this article is nothing more a mindless recitation of uncorroborated assertions which he copies from Bush officials and then weaves into a news narrative, with the phrase “American officials say” tacked on at the end or the phrase “according to officials” unobtrusively interspersed in the middle, as in:
In a possible effort to be less obtrusive, it appears that Iran is now bringing small groups of Iraqi Shiite militants to camps in Iran, where they are taught how to do their own training, American officials say.
The militants then return to Iraq to teach comrades how to fire rockets and mortars, fight as snipers or assemble explosively formed penetrators, a particularly lethal type of roadside bomb made of Iranian components, according to American officials. The officials describe this approach as “training the trainers.”
As presented, the “news” here isn’t that Bush officials are making these accusations; the news, as Gordon reports it, is what the Iranians are allegedly doing, all based on anonymous, unchallenged Bush claims. It’s nothing more than yet another Bush administration press release masquerading as a New York Times article on Iranian involvement in Iraq.
January 27th, 2009 at 12:26 pm
Compare Al and Fred Hiatt to Peter K., who is a genuine idiot. What an embarrassment to Hitchens he is.
January 27th, 2009 at 12:55 pm
As presented, the “news” here isn’t that Bush officials are making these accusations; the news, as Gordon reports it, is what the Iranians are allegedly doing, all based on anonymous, unchallenged Bush claims. It’s nothing more than yet another Bush administration press release masquerading as a New York Times article on Iranian involvement in Iraq.
And how do you know these are all based on anonymous unchallenged Bush claims?
Anything negative written about Saddam or Iran is decried by the doves as war propaganda. They just cry wolf over and over so you don’t know what to believe.
Iran wants the US out of Iraq. Why wouldn’t they be doing that stuff. Even if they are – which I believe – it’s not a reason to go to war with Iran.
But funny how you can’t produce anything Gordon wrote about Iraq….
Compare Al and Fred Hiatt to Peter K., who is a genuine idiot. What an embarrassment to Hitchens he is.
Brave insult from an anonymous internet poster.
January 27th, 2009 at 1:16 pm
The thing is, Al, that MattY is capable of learning. By contrast, you and Kristol are not, placing the two of you much lower on the evolutionary scale.
January 27th, 2009 at 1:37 pm
I agree that Kristol was a terrible columnist, but it seems to me that he committed an unpardonable sin the day he mocked the newspaper’s credibility on the Daily Show. I’m surprised he was allowed to write another column in the paper after that.
If a normal reporter for any newspaper in the US went on television and said, in essense, “don’t believe the lies they print in my paper,” he would be fired before he got back to the office.
It would be like a McDonald’s executive saying in an interview, “our food will make you sick.” That guy wouldn’t last long.
January 27th, 2009 at 1:38 pm
But funny how you can’t produce anything Gordon wrote about Iraq….
you can put three words into google, right?
January 27th, 2009 at 1:48 pm
And the MSM wonder why they are going down the tubes.
People don’t buy newsprint because they don’t have an interest in reading the vacuous thoughts of Kristols, the Bobo’s, the Chucks and the George’s.
January 27th, 2009 at 1:59 pm
you know, wrw, i was a longtime defender of al’s, since we share many of the same viewpoints on sports, but i believe at this stage on matters political al has gotten trapped into playing stupid to the point where he may as well be stupid: there is no discernible difference.
this may be true of fred hiatt as well, but i don’t know enough of him: what i do know suggests that he’s natively stupid, but you never know for sure.
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