or Powell's or me• • •
"Mike and Jon, Jon and Mike—I've known them both for years, and, clearly, one of them is very funny. As for the other: truly one of the great hangers-on of our time."—Steve Bodow, head writer, The Daily Show
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"Who can really judge what's funny? If humor is a subjective medium, then can there be something that is really and truly hilarious? Me. This book."—Daniel Handler, author, Adverbs, and personal representative of Lemony Snicket
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"The good news: I thought Our Kampf was consistently hilarious. The bad news: I’m the guy who wrote Monkeybone."—Sam Hamm, screenwriter, Batman, Batman Returns, and Homecoming
January 23, 2008
More From The Our Lady Of Imperial Profit Newsletter
If you're the New York Times and you need a new columnist who'll cover foreign policy, you obviously want William Kristol. After all, he's the guy who said just before the war began, "we'll be vindicated when we find the weapons of mass destruction and liberate the people of Iraq."
Likewise, if you're the Washington Post and need a long piece for last Sunday's paper about the onrushing economic crunch, you obviously want Kevin Hassett. After all, he wrote Dow 36,000: The New Strategy for Profiting From the Coming Rise in the Stock Market.
I find the NY Times and Washington Post much more comprehensible if I just think of them as the church newsletters for a particularly unpleasant religion. OF COURSE the people who write the newsletter believe in transubstantiation.
—Jonathan Schwarz
Posted at January 23, 2008 12:18 PMThe comments at Dean Baker's blog show the problem goes much deeper than the editorial boards of the Times and Post. Lots of intense discussion about the National Bureau of Economic Research definition of a recession, much citing of our "official" unemployment rate of "only 5%", no acknowlegement (as yet) that the working class has been in a permanent recession since the 1970's, or that the whole economy is built on a house of cards.
I suppose it all helps pass the time, sort of like trying to recall the exact screeching noise the iceberg made when it hit us under the waterline.
Posted by: SteveB at January 23, 2008 01:14 PMWell, it's really a question of balance. It would be unfair to exclusively report the truth, or only to feature columnists who have some idea of what they're talking about. It would be particularly detrimental to the people who own newspapers and their chums at the country club. You just want them to be biased in favor of reality, which is manifestly a violation of journalistic ethics.
Posted by: cervantes at January 23, 2008 01:57 PMI find the NY Times and Washington Post much more comprehensible if I just think of them as the church newsletters for a particularly unpleasant religion.
Nice!
Posted by: Ashley at January 23, 2008 02:43 PMYOU would be much happier to just wrap the fish or wipe your ass instead of reading the trash.
Posted by: Mike Meyer at January 23, 2008 08:25 PM
