Snapler

March 12, 2010

Ben Zimmer New ‘On Language’ Columnist: New York Times Magazine Names William Safire Successor

The New York Times Magazine has named Ben Zimmer its "On Language" columnist.

Zimmer, described in the Times' announcement as a linguist and lexicographer, succeeds William Safire, who launched the column in 1979 and wrote it through his death last fall.

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March 4, 2010

More on the New York Times and Israel: Does the World’s Greatest Newspaper Have Any Standards?

The New York Times' Week in Review recently contained a long oped column by Efraim Karsh, a British academic well-known for his rightwing opinions about the Middle East in general and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict in particular. Most of the column focuses on historical and contemporary divisions in the Muslim world, or on what Karsh calls "incessant infighting within the House of Islam, which has never ceased."

It is not hard to detect that Karsh's real purpose is to argue for an American military attack on Iran and an end to the Obama administration's "imperious approach to the Arab-Israeli conflict," his way of characterizing the administration's woefully weak efforts to bring about a two-state solution of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Apparently, however, the Times failed to notice both the obvious inconsistency and badly misleading nature of Karsh's argument. When Karsh is arguing for a hardline on Iran, his argument about Muslim internal divisions serves his purpose, since it supports his assertion that "they would be unlikely to rush to Iran's aid in the event of sanctions, or even a military strike." Indeed, he claims, "most other Muslim countries would be quietly relieved to see the extremist regime checked."

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February 26, 2010

Sally Quinn Has ‘No Regrets’ Over Column

Sally Quinn may have lost her print column in the Washington Post, but she says she has no regrets.

"I have absolutely no regrets at all," Quinn told Politico's Michael Calderone.

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Glenn Beck’s Message: It IS Happening Here

Let's pause and give thanks to Glenn Beck. No, seriously - as my newspaper column out today argues, that's what he's due.

We owe this talk-show-host-turned-political-leader gratitude for using his televised keynote address to the Conservative Political Action Conference to so frankly outline what the conservative movement has become - and why it repulses so many Americans.

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February 25, 2010

Think Again: Conservative? Bad? How About Both?

When I began thinking about doing a column about recent developments on The Washington Post editorial page, I was torn between focusing on its increasing conservatism and its overall badness. The problem, however, is that the two appear inextricably linked. Is the problem with George Will's constant global warming denialism ideological or intellectual? Is David Broder's misinformed love letter to Sarah Palin indicative of a desire to ingratiate himself to Republican Tea Partiers or continued evidence of the deterioration of his ability to apply common sense to political analysis? Was the Post's decision to add former Bush administration official and vocal pro-torture advocate Marc Thiessen to its bevy of pro-torture advocates and former Republican officials more important for its right-wing tilt or its implied contempt for traditional journalistic values? Hard to say, really.

Of course, the categories "conservative" and "bad" are hardly mutually exclusive when it comes to columnists, making the choice a false one. In fact, based on the representation of conservative views at the Post, they often appear to be purposely complementary. One can be a deeply conservative individual politically and still find oneself offended by the constant stream of intellectual insult.

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Good for the gander, too

Married now for a little over a year, my husband, Ken Gruberman, teases me that he married me for my money. (As if!) I tease back that I married him for his appliances. (He's got really big ones!) In any event, the truth is I married him for his gigantic heart; his unique and badly needed "brand" of individuality and masculinity. He has done something with me that few, regardless of gender, have ever really done, and that is listen -- deeply and profoundly. Then after listening, he's processed my views in his own ways, filtered them through his life experience, and made them his own. What a joy it is to share my life with him! And it is with great pride that I introduce you to this piece he just wrote about his experience of full force, full impact self-defense.

I'm Ken Gruberman, "The Tech Daddy." I've been writing about personal technology and tech-related issues for many years, and currently have a column at SouthPasadenaToday.com. This week's column, however, is a complete departure for me.

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February 23, 2010

Sally Quinn’s Overshare Column Becomes Fodder For Workplace-Issues Live Chat

Last week, in a puzzling editorial decision, the Washington Post gave in-house social gadfly Sally Quinn the column space to overshare at length about her extant personal problems, under the pretense that a worried nation of newspaper subscribers was in dire need of catharsis and closure at her side, to draw from her experience the life lessons needed to avoid being related to Sally Quinn by blood or by marriage.

Today, an eagle-eyed tipster pointed out that Quinn's column came up this morning in a live chat hosted by "Washington Post job expert" Lily Garcia. The chat, titled "How To Deal Live," was a place for Post readers to get answers to their "career- and workplace-related questions." The second question, from "Burke, Va.," appeared to come from a Washington Post employee, and it was delightful!

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February 22, 2010

Rachel Maddow Praised: ‘Some Of The Finest Commentary Available On Cable TV’

The New York Daily News' Stanley Crouch writes a column in praise of Rachel Maddow Monday, who he says offers "easily some of the finest commentary available on cable television."

Crouch writes that Maddow seems "terribly allergic to conservatives," and that this allergy is what inspires her to success.

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February 18, 2010

The Heisenberg Effect Of Televising Political Negotiations

Filed under: News, Original Content — Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , — Chris Weigant @ 2:29 am

I'm going to start off today's column with a chart. I'm doing this for several reasons, not least of which is the fact that it's a really good chart. It is simple, easy to read, and involves very little mathematics (meaning it is accessible to a very wide spectrum of the American public). And it is a very effective way of presenting the facts, free of media spin. The chart comes from the White House, and shows the monthly number of jobs lost for approximately the past two years. It also uses color very well, to separate George W. Bush's term in office from Barack Obama's. Without further introduction, here is the chart:



Job Loss Chart



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February 15, 2010

Let’s Not Help the Right Manufacture A Perception That Creates An Alternative Reality

Some readers of my blog posts readers of my column and listeners to my daily radio show have asked me why I spend a lot of my time pushing, critiquing, criticizing and generally talking about Democrats and the progressive movement and not Republicans and the conservative/Tea Party movement these days. My answer is fairly simple: Democrats and (thus theoretically) the progressive movement are in the policy driver's seat right now, and Republicans and the conservative/Tea Party movement are effectively locked out of power, at least at the national level.

Pretending this isn't true creates a reality that cannot exist without such manufactured illusion. Indeed, beyond the filibuster (which is circumventable in many cases), the only way Republicans and the conservative/Tea Party movement can wield power is through perception. The more the media - and especially the progressive media - pretends Republicans and the conservative/Tea Party movement is powerful, the more chance that wholly manufactured perception can become reality.

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