Failing Upward

It's a D.C. tradition.

Huffington Post is reporting that your next regular columnist for the New York Times will be…William Kristol.

A pretty uninspiring choice. It means the Times op-ed page will be well-represented by big government liberals (Krugman, Herbert), big government moderates (Friedman, Kristof), and big government conservatives (Brooks, Kristol). I do believe that just about covers the full range of acceptable political opinion, doesn't it?

Also makes you wonder just how many times one man can be wrong before people will not merely stop taking him seriously, but stop giving him bigger and broader platforms from which to trumpet his perpetual wrongness.

Comments

[Douglas Gray]

Mr. Balko,

Haven't you heard, The Surge is working?

Actually, they cut the govt. hand-out food rations in half in Iraq; more and more people are too hungry and sick to get involved in the violence. Also, many U.S. units have silently mutinied and are no longer going out on patrol, hence the fewer bombings.

[thoreau]

Heckuva job, Kristol!

[Fluffy]

If Bill Kristol and Norman Podhoretz are in a boat and the boat sinks, who survives?

Brown people everywhere.

[Fluffy]

Wait, I told that joke wrong. I think it actually goes:

If Bill Kristol and Norman Podhoretz are in a boat and the boat sinks, who survives?

Thousands of American soldiers and marines.

[Paul]

Also makes you wonder just how many times one man can be wrong

Define "wrong"...

But seriously. The Times, when "balancing" out its editorial pages has to stick with a conservative they understand. Think of it like a jigsaw puzzle. Getting a small government libertarian on their editorial board would be like trying to fit a piece that doesn't fit into the puzzle that is the New York Times.

[tarran]

You know, this isn't the New York times of ten years ago.

Most of my family members have canceled their subscriptions, citing crummy reporting as the cause, saying things like "the stories are incoherent" and "there are huge gaps in the reporting, they routinely leave out important facts"

Frankly, I think the NY Times and Bill Kristol kind of deserve each other.

[Gilbert Martin]

"Actually, they cut the govt. hand-out food rations in half in Iraq; more and more people are too hungry and sick to get involved in the violence. Also, many U.S. units have silently mutinied and are no longer going out on patrol, hence the fewer bombings."

Got anything resembling actual proof of that?

[MCW]

Krugman is a real American hero for standing up to the international corporate neo-con cabal bent on ruling the world through disaster capitalism.

Bill Kristol is a war-mongering wingnut.

[thoreau]

Friedman, in regards to the hazing customary for new columnists during their probationary period, said that "The next six months will be crucial" for Kristol.

[Daniel Reeves]

Is it just me, or does Krugman constantly envoke a certain indescribable rage in his columns?

[Juan]

Are there various dudes called Paul Krugman? I just can't accept that the economist and the columnist are the same guy.

[Daniel Reeves]

Wait--I didn't read the comments when I made that post. After reading MCW's post, I think I have been ridden of all doubt.

[M]

It means the Times op-ed page will be well-represented by big government liberals (Krugman, Herbert), big government moderates (Friedman, Kristof), and big government conservatives (Brooks, Kristol). I do believe that just about covers the full range of acceptable political opinion, doesn't it?

Mr. Balko, often, like now, your phrasing is untoppable. Nothing beats putting some English on Received Opinion. I tip my hat. Thank you.

[Ugh]

Most of my family members have canceled their subscriptions, citing crummy reporting as the cause, saying things like "the stories are incoherent" and "there are huge gaps in the reporting, they routinely leave out important facts"

Whenever I read stories on the same topic in both the Times and the Wall Street Journal, I'm amazed at how bad the Times's reporting is. Vague, superficial, and sloppy.

[sam harvey]

"Actually, they cut the govt. hand-out food rations in half in Iraq; more and more people are too hungry and sick to get involved in the violence. Also, many U.S. units have silently mutinied and are no longer going out on patrol, hence the fewer bombings."

Is that a joke or a lie? I am a OIF vet and have had buddies over there constantly since '03. I hear that moral is up and things really are going better. Of course some squad level units skip patrols, but when you operating out of established posts like they are now, it's hard to fake.

[Johncjackson the 3rd]

How much do these columnists get paid? So you write around 3 articles a year for Time ( that's a weekly, right?). Get fired. Then you get paid a gazillion bucks to write a newspaper column. What is "regular" btw? Once a week? a month?

Just curious, really. Wondering how these print publications stay in business overpaying all these losers though.

[Warmongering Lunatic]

Wow, Mr. Grey!

I mean, usually, when a government cuts rations to the point it causes hunger and illness, the result is an increase in unrest and a need for more security forces to suppress bread riots. If the security forces then refuse to patrol, the result is increased violence from a radicalized population.

Yet you're saying that in Iraq, this tried-and-true formula for inciting revolutionary violence is magically causing a decrease? That's amazing!

[Brandybuck]

Haven't you heard, The Surge is working?

Of course it's working! If you say "just wait a little bit longer" long enough, eventually chance will hand you a lull in the violence and you can trumpet it as resounding success!

[KoWT]

Iraq's food ration program's budget was cut in half for next year:

http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/F80EB18B-84C5-4939-9250-004F6697D8F2.htm

and at least one US military unit refused to take the field when ordered to:

http://www.armytimes.com/news/2007/12/army_bloodbrothers_071126/

[jkii]

standing up to the international corporate neo-con cabal bent on ruling the world through disaster capitalism.

There is relevant point to that, I'm just practicing to become a junior cadet in the HTML tagging cabal.

[Warmongering Lunatic]

KoWT --

Iraq's food ration program's budget was cut in half for next year

That only makes it all the more amazing. Cutting the budget for next year is causing so much hunger and illness right now that it's rendering people unable to get involved in the violence? I mean, I've heard of "voodoo economics", but I thought the term was an insult, not an explanation of a real-world phenomenon.

[Scott Lahti]

Upward failure?

As in Bob McNamara, flush from his success with "input-output" systems analysis at the Johnson-era Pentagon, promoted instanter to helm the World Bank during the fiscally sober Nixon/Ford/Carter era?

As in Paul "Wolfie" Wolfowitz, flush from his success in democratising the Middle East at the Johns-, I mean Bush-era Pentagon, promoted instanter to helm the World Bank during the fiscally sober, er, Bush era?

Perish such thoughts! Now go back to watching Squeal Kabluto, Yawn Gypson, Prick Yoom, Shrill O'Biley, and Spawn Can a' Tea, and remember to boo on command.

God bless the American meritocracy, and our professional patriots who, with no thought whatever for their own personal safety or that of the Fox makeup assistants, or of lost speaking engagegments, continue to man the burning decks of big-government "conservatism" whence all but they had fled...

[Graphite]

I would become a markedly happier person if David Brooks were stricken with a fatal case of flesh-eating bacteria.

[El Grande De Rondo De Palooka]

Aw, shucks, gee, what could be the common denominator that reduces so drastically the pool from which these people draw? No one mentions it...........it festers

[A Fake MCW (aka prolefeed)]

Krugman is a real American hero wingnut for standing up to the who, despite claiming to be both sane and an economist, actually believes there is an international corporate neo-con cabal bent on ruling the world through disaster capitalism.

Bill Kristol is a war-mongering wingnut.

Fixed 'er for you, Marxist Class Warrior. Hey, at least you got the second paragraph right correct.

[SugarFree]

Hit & Run Math

((Alice Bowie + spellcheck) + (MNG - animal rights)) X (Dan T. + bold tags) = MCW

[Bronwyn]

An A+ brilliant deduction from SugarFree.

Bravo, sir.

Once again, I find myself disappointed that I have no NYT subscription to cancel.

[Episiarch]

So wait a second. You're saying that somebody in "the club" of established, stultifying, idiot big-government pundits who all know each other got hired at the NYT? NO FUCKING WAY.

[Ken Shultz]

"Also makes you wonder just how many times one man can be wrong before people will not merely stop taking him seriously, but stop giving him bigger and broader platforms from which to trumpet his perpetual wrongness."

It's like they're hiring a real live straw man.

[joe]

Of course it's working! If you say "just wait a little bit longer" long enough, eventually chance will hand you a lull in the violence and you can trumpet it as resounding success!

So it's sort of like supply-side tax cuts, then.

[Jim Bob]

I think Edward, (the blessedly absent) Dan T., and MCW are all one person.

[M]

I don't know how to cast it into symbolic logic, but the stimuli that gave rise to Sugar's response makes the average poster here feel by comparison endowed with the head of Tim C., the heart of Radley B., the will of Ron P., and the imagination of VM.

[Jennifer]

Yet you're saying that in Iraq, this tried-and-true formula for inciting revolutionary violence is magically causing a decrease? That's amazing!

That's because the Iraqis (unlike some ungrateful Hit and Run posters I could mention but won't) have the sense to appreciate a government that's kind and caring enough to Do Something about the obesity epidemic.

[Edward]

Yeah, the Times has no Trotskyist or radical Green representation either. What about the Nazis or Christian Identity movement? Talk about staying within the bounds of acceptable political commentary.

[Jim Bob]

What about someone who's in favor shrinking government, Edtard?

[Jim Bob]

Quick, Edtard, switch to your alter-ego and bold some words for us! The less rhythmic the bolding makes the text the better!

[Edward]

Jim Bob

Shrinking the government to extent that you want to, Jim Bob, is as much on the fringe as wanting to nationalize everything. Wingnuts on the fringe tend to have their own rags, like this one. Sorry for the long reply. Are your lips sore?

[Jim Bob]

Edtard, I can't understand you unless there are bold words!

I'm glad you know with such certainty exactly how much I want to shrink the federal government!

And, Edtard, it really is a mystery to me why you preside over such a fucking troll attack. I mean, it's like you come here for the idiot purpose of making yourself look like a complete boor.

[Guy Montag]

Dang Radley, if Kristol disagrees with you much more he will be shopping for homes in Great Falls.

[Jerry]

To complete the Times mosaic might I suggest adding Naomi Klein to the list of columnists?

[Franklin D. Lomax]

editorialstaff net notes: -Zhomb NYT Jan 17 2009 $10 Put, the prophetically, even poetically accurate, name for my favorite options bet, ever, states the free market price of the betting, that the ten year slide of NYT times stock, from a high near $52, in Jun 2002, to $17 this week, will continue. Choosing Mr Kristol, voted in his conservative high school year book, as most likely to be chosen as the -Zhomb NYT's whipping boy conservative, is a desperate act, in the same vein of editorial genius that ushers the gray lady, zombie NYT to the knackery. It obeys the first law of the ultra left MSM, that no conservative writer, not a candidate for instant dismissal, gets ink within the final arbiter of acceptable wing-nut liberal political thought. Sensible conservative commentary is an insult, to the convinced liberal readers of the Quean of America's Main Stream Media. The reason that my beloved -Zhomb NYT $10 Put options are up 29% in the past few days is that the MSM and the NYT were never the main stream, and are no longer, rightly, the media, as American stockholders and readers are proving with their canceled subscriptions, and their preference for non-U.S. English speaking newspapers, http://www.artsandletters.com, where old fashioned journalism still allows printing both sides of an issue, without exclusionary bias. Further proof is clear, in American's selling NYT stock, and shorting it, and their purchases of LEAP options betting the NYT continues it's decade long decline to less than $10, a level where Rupert Murdoch will consider picking it up, as another trophy, to go with his WSJ. Richly deserved justice, albeit long delayed, is justice, nonetheless.

[joe]

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Because here at Weird Eddie's, if you mess with The Bull, you will get the horns.

*Offer not valid in Taintsville.

[R. Totale]

Wasn't John Tierney a regular libertarian NYT columnist until he quit? Or was he just the science guy?

[GILMORE]

tarran | December 28, 2007, 10:34pm | #
You know, this isn't the New York times of ten years ago.

Yet, it's still the most oft-linked source of primary news on this blog.

Dont know what that means necessarily, just pointing out that Times bashing comes with the question, "ok. then who's the standard then?" I dont desagree with comments here, just wondering how much of it is player hating and how much is legitimate.

FWIW, I personally think Kristol is a cock and doesnt deserve the post

[washy]

Well, no one's got the balls to say it. But everyone's thinking it.

[Pug]

Whenever I read stories on the same topic in both the Times and the Wall Street Journal, I'm amazed at how bad the Times's reporting is. Vague, superficial, and sloppy.

That's because all Rupert Murdoch publications, especially Fox News, are known for their well researched, meticulous attention to reporting the facts in a straight forward manner. Fair and balanced, you know.

[Pug]

A quick sampling of the brilliance and insight of William Kristol could be found last week on Rupert Murdoch's Fox News Sunday.

He predicted the McCain/Lieberman ticket would win the White House and the Republicans would reclaim the House in 2008.

The crowning moments of his career came, of course, in his sniffing, scornful pronouncements that predictions of trouble between Sunnis and Shi'ites in Iraq were just "pop psychology" and completely without merit.

No wonder the Times wants a guy like this on board.

[thoreau]

It's like they're hiring a real live straw man.

Ken wins the thread.

[jp]

just pointing out that Times bashing comes with the question, "ok. then who's the standard then?"

IMO, the best US paper is the Wall Street Journal, but since all it's stuff is gated, bloggers don't link to it.

[jp]

it's = its

A pox upon me for a scurvy lout.

[joe]

The best paper in the country is the Boston Globe - which the NYT has left pretty much along since purchasing a majority stake - but they don't have much of an overseas department.

[thoreau]

I think it's obvious that the LA Times is the best paper in the country, given that they have Tim Cavanaugh and until recently had Matt Welch.

[Edward]

Yeah, having one someone whose ideas you endlessly parrot on staff is what really makes a newspaper great.

[Edward]

If Ron Paul doesn't make it to the presidency, maybe he could become science editor at the NY Times. You know, to provide some balance to the Darwinist crowd.

[Brandybuck]

So it's sort of like supply-side tax cuts, then.

Supply-side tax cuts DO work... if you don't combine them with massive deficit spending and inflationary monetary policies.

[Brian Courts]

The best paper in the country is the Boston Globe

Hmmm... aren't you from around there? Sounds like a homer, if I ever heard one... I suppose you think the Patriots are the best team in the NFL too... er, well... But, I bet you think the Red Sox are the best team in baseb... uh... whatever. Anyway, I'll bet you think the Celtics* are the best team in the NBA... ok, ok, never mind, you know what I'm trying to say. Wait, I bet you think the Bruins are the best team in the NHL! Ha. Gottcha!

* Unless of course you judge by current performance where I would be remiss if I didn't note that the longest winning streak in the NBA, both currently and this season, (12 games and counting) belongs to the "Boom-Chaka-Laka!" Portland Trail Blazers. Rip City, baby! 🙂

[thoreau]

We've started a list of Bill Kristol facts:

http://highclearing.com/index.php/archives/2007/12/29/7636

It's sort of like the Chuck Norris facts, except they're all true.

[sage]

Those are pretty good, DrT.

[Jake Boone]

Special Offer From Weird Eddie's House of Beef

joe,

I doff my hat to you, sir! That was "teh awesome," as the younger set, I'm given to understand, are wont to say nowadays.

[M]

The image offered by Edward at 3:40pm exhibits the irrelevance to RP's campaign of his extra-crepidam opinions. Thank you.

[Guy Montag]

Was I the only person who thought Bill Kristol was funny on Soap?

[Scott Lahti]

What up, Pinchdog - N-Pod Tha Bombsquad and Zort Muckerman had other engorgements? As lateral moves among the Likudniks go, this was as anticlimactic as it gets.

With the money the Times now saves in calling off its search for an "unwitty"-humor columnist, it can pay me to replace the chair I broke in falling from when I read the news today, oh boy.

[MCW]

You wingnuts just can't admit Krugman is the real deal. He makes you Randroid distaster capitalists into a joke.

[Neu Mejican]

MCW,

I agree, and the people who benefit most from capitalism are cosmopalitan Jews.

[Guy Montag]

So, will Ron Paul call for the resignation of the entire Bush administration after the release of the latest bin Laden tape?

In other news, the New England Patriots become the third unique team in American Pro-Football history to have an undefeated regular season, prompting many in the DC beltway to call for the Cowboys to "step down" before today's game.

[Distase me, Bro!]

Randroid distaster capitalists

[Scott Lahti]

MCW: "He makes you Randroid distaster capitalists into a joke."

CAUTION: Do not administer MCW to children under 3 years of age: may present a joking (not to mention bolding) hazard.

So, these three distaster capitalists walk into a coffee bar, and pay for their Distaster's Choice with KrugmanRands...

Have you had your dog to the vet's this year for its annual distaster booster?

Hold on...wha'...Must go now/Am getting recalled to Randroid Central/Abort all functions/Do not panic...

[VM]

Joe for the win!

he shoots! he scores!

11/10 well challenged!

partial list of Krugman's econ papers (a coupla are, although woefully dated, interesting)

[[e-mail]]

Yeah, the Times has no Trotskyist or radical Green representation either. Edward

Edward- William Kristol is a Trotskyist.

Neocons are Trotskyists. His father, Irving Kristol, was the head of the US Trotkysists.

For more information on how the necons emerged from left Trotskyists to become the right Trotkysists they are, check out this history of the American left, by an American Socialist Party...

http://www.dsausa.org/GIF/History.GIF

You could also try reading some Justin Raimondo Columns on Antiwar.com. But then again, he is a libertarian, and so may not believe in the Separation of Church and State, or even evolution.

[MCW]

If you all think disaster capitalism isn't real, you should pick up a Naomi Klein book.

[Edward]

Edward- William Kristol is a Trotskyist.

Libertree- either English isn't your native language or you're so fucking stupid you don't know the past from the present. As for reading Jason Raimondo, go fuck yourself.

[SugarFree]

Edward is a suppurating cuntsore.

I welcome any and all evidence to the contrary.

[BakedPenguin]

MCW has obviously been reading the Trolling Manual of Style.

[MCW]

"MCW has obviously been reading the Trolling Manual of Style."

Is urkobold some kind of Wingnut Randroid?

[VM]

MCW:

fail. URKOBOLD is a militantly-peaceful, agnostic Unitarian.

But you already know that from your other incarnations.

[VM]

In fact, MCW, the chapter you submitted to my newest book, "The History of Navy Bean Soup: No Navy. No Beans. Just Paper Clips." was excellent.

As we discussed, the royalties shall be distributed via the usual channels.

[M]

Great link, Baked.

May I suggest that inherent to trolling is a conflation of knowledge and opinion (Plato pointed this out), such that prefacing a proposition by "I believe that" would be most untrollike.

[M]

And for extra enrichment, bear in mind the polyphemous origin of conflate.

[BakedPenguin]

Thank you, M. And I have to agree - qualifiers and trolls don't mix.

[prolefeed]

Baked: Laughed so hard I cried at your link to your Trolling Manual of Style. Any more chapters forthcoming?

[BakedPenguin]

prolefeed - thx - the chapter on "inflammatory statements" will probably be next. That one should be fun to write...

[Self controll]

Yo mama.

[Graphite]

"Randroid" is a term employed almost entirely by libertarians (and even, sometimes, objectivists) to mock the more orthodox of Randians. Yet more evidence MCW is a clown rather than a troll.

[Rhywun]

I stopped reading the NYT regularly several years ago when I noticed that every story had to have a racial angle*. Dunno if it was they who changed or I. Probably me.

*And the constant bemoaning of the sad state of the downtrodden whilst blackmailing the government (i.e. you and me) into eminent-domaining them a nice chunk of ultra-valuable Manhattan real estate is just tacky.

[Guy Montag]

Axually, the folk speaking of the Neocons as having been ex-Leftists are generally correct. That is how that name came about. They are newly Conservative and came over from the Left.

[the real Neu Mejican]

I see in my absence, someone has started using my handle to post odd things...at 1:38am...

I have not posted for a week, until today.

Wonder what other things people think I have said.

[Dave W.]

Is urkobold some kind of Wingnut Randroid?

Actually, Urkie's politics aren't so extreme, on balance. But they do get really, really annoyed by lack of orthodoxy here below the fold.

I mean, HnR is a funny place in that the issue selection of issues that they choose to post about is outstanding. HnR knows what is important. Unfortunately, the opinions expressed here by the writers on those issues are kind of one-sided and predictable. Respectable opinions, to be sure. But not outstanding. Fortunately, we have those ppl Urkie so h8s to keep the substantive discussion as interesting as the topic selection here. Look at it this way, I am somewhat well-informed, but I would not know what disaster capitalism was if it were not for HnR.

[libertreee]

Ah, Edward, methinks you flame too brightly. Like the shining star, you don't know who you are...

And Guy--the Neocons are STILL communists. Polite folks call their ideology "Wilsonian", but in truth they are the "communists who call themselves conservatives."

Instead of class war, they export war for Democracy. Same wolf, different clothing.

[Timothy]

I am somewhat well- completely misinformed, but I would not know what disaster capitalism was if it were not for HnR.

Fixed.

[Guy Montag]

And Guy--the Neocons are STILL communists. Polite folks call their ideology "Wilsonian", but in truth they are the "communists who call themselves conservatives."

They are not still Communists, silly. They might be Conservative leaning National Socialists maybe, but not Communists. I know of none of them who wants to nationalize corporations and their lust for regulation, for the most part, falls quite a bit short of their Democrat peers.

[Nostromo]

I have always suspected some unstated reason that John Tierney stopped writing his op-ed for the Times; he was far and away the best columnist they have had. Despite the official story that Tierney just preferred science writing, I suspect that the Times culture couldn't stand the idea of a libertarian voice that made sense and would only tolerate pet conservatives like Brooks.

[Scott Lahti]

With the Times's Kristol hire, the nation's only metro daily not to run an astrologer has pulled it off by other means - only without the need for "for entertainment purposes only" CYA boilerplate.

Being a partisan pundit means never having to acknowledge you when you were wrong. And as one who has pulled off his own share of cons over the years, I tip my cap to him in guild solidarity, while reading beneath the surface of his every word - including "a", "and" and the.

The biggest mistake made by observers of these matters make? Assuming Kristol and the Times are enemies, rather than mutual enablers playing the same game at the expense of the "unwitty". More's the pity, in New York City.

[Scott Lahti]

And not proofreading my last post makes my writing look shitty; I swear I haven't had a drop of anything stronger than Maxwell House in weeks.

[TrickyVic]

Use a William Shatner accent when reading the posts with some words in bold. The bolded words get the Shatner emphasis. It's kinda funny.

I wonder how many right wingers are up in arms about Kristol going to that so called liberal rag that's always spewing lies?

[TrickyVic]

""" I know of none of them who wants to nationalize corporations and their lust for regulation, for the most part, falls quite a bit short of their Democrat peers."""

Dems wanting to nationalize corporations? That would be news to me. What corporations are they talking about nationalizing?