He'll be just as predictable as Herbert, but way more funny
On Radar today, Charles Kaiser quotes Jon Schwartz explaining what's wrong wtih the New York Times' response to all those exploding heads over the appointment of Bill Kristol to the op-ed page.
"It's as though an NFL coach decided to start a four-foot, 65-pound Korean eight-year-old at middle linebacker, and when he got criticized, responded: 'People are mad we're using a player of such tremendous size and experience, just because he's Korean. How intolerant!'"
I don't even know what an "NFL" is, and I understand that.
Skip the rest of Kaiser's piece and jump right to the page of Kristol's greatest hits on Iraq, from "the war itself will clarify who was right and who was wrong about weapons of mass destruction" to "a broad Iraqi consensus favoring the idea of pluralism."
Meanwhile, to understand what a joke it is that the Times claims to be pursuing a diversity of opinions by hiring another inside-the-Beltway hack who happens to be a neocon, consider a point my former Week colleague Brad Cope made back when the paper hired David Brooks: foreign policy conservatives are OK, but you will never, ever see the paper hire a staunchly pro-life, anti-gay-rights, morals-obsessed social conservative -- especially not a Christian one. Now, unlike Brad, I'm not saying the paper should do this. But his point is well-taken that if the paper really wanted to diversify the page to include opinions that are cherished by many Americans but shut out of the Times, that would be the way to do it.
Comments
Daniel, I think you meant that first link to go here.
Posted by: Jim/The Velvet Blog | January 3, 2008 11:56 AM
Fixed. Thanks.
Posted by: radosh | January 3, 2008 11:59 AM
Hint: The "f" stands for football.
Posted by: Anonymous | January 3, 2008 2:31 PM
Oh, like that helps.
Posted by: radosh | January 3, 2008 2:52 PM
Wake me when Sun Myung Moon buys the Times. Until then, I think this is the perfect place for Kristol to go all Eichenwald on us and lose all hopes of respectibility with the right.
P.S. If you don't agree with me then I'm going to flame your huffpo board and send hate e-mail.
Posted by: Owen | January 3, 2008 4:39 PM
This is one of those things you'd have to be from New York to care about, right?
Posted by: Maxwell Hammer | January 3, 2008 9:12 PM
Didn't you get the memo? We're all from New York now.
Posted by: Vance | January 4, 2008 10:37 AM
Spiritually, I'm from LA.
Posted by: Maxwell Hammer | January 4, 2008 7:03 PM