Letters to the Editor
SusanMc
Published Letters: 467 Editor's Choice: 1
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Tip
[Read the article: The Chicago Tribune vs. Time magazine]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]You know, the Tribune could have saved themselves a lot of trouble, and avoided some embarrassment, if someone there (an intern?) read through the political blogs each day. I was the best-informed person at the table on Thanksgiving only because I turn to Glenn (and digby and others) every morning before I read anything put out by the MSM.
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Rid-icule
[Read the article: The NYT's Michael Cooper demonstrates what real reporting is]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]UPDATE II: Washington Post cartoonist Tom Toles mocks his own newspaper's corrupt, stenographic coverage of the Obama smear campaign.
Funny! I think it would be a very good thing for all Bad Stenographers to be laughed off the pages, and from the salons, of serious discourse. The blogosphere is especially good at this-- but Toles could win another Pulizer.
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The Basics
[Read the article: The NYT's Michael Cooper demonstrates what real reporting is]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Via Glenn, Robert Niles:
It ought to mean that truth gets treated like truth and lies get treated like lies.
Incredible. It's as if he's been forced to explain simple street-crossing rules to tiny children. You'd think adults who can (presumably) dress themselves and make it into work could get this, wouldn't you? I also liked, from Niles:
Many folks in our industry like to think that the Founding Fathers wanted to protect objective news reporting with the First Amendment. But Larson's history illustrates the partisan newspapers of Jefferson's time looked a lot more like today's DailyKos than today's Washington Post. So maybe a more aggressive, even partisan, press isn't such a radical idea, after all.
(And before anyone accuses me of longing for more organizations like Fox News, let me be clear that I think people ought to let their discovery of the truth drive their partisanship -- and not, as Fox News does, let their partisanship drive their discovery for the truth.)
As the public re-evaluates who to trust for news and information, the real journalists are going to shine like diamonds. I'm glad there are instructors like Niles to guide the next wave.
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Good for Nothing
[Read the article: The NYT's Michael Cooper demonstrates what real reporting is]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]ondelette:
an injured enemy combatant is jailed and charged with the "war crime" of killing an enemy soldier on the battlefield?
Perhaps subversive forces within the Military are angling for a ruling that finally finds war to be a crime?
BTW, this near throwaway sentence from the story pains me no end: [The defendant] Mr. Khadr, who was 15 at the time, was badly injured.
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Embedded Truth
[Read the article: National Review reporter caught fabricating; where is the "liberal media"?]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]GG:
National Review is making Smith's fabrications their own.
That's always such a great move, when your aim is credibility. I checked my local "liberal media" outlet this morning, and so far nothing; I'm sure Jonah Goldberg will pipe up any moment now, though.
As for blaming this whole newfangled "blogging" medium for, oh, outright lies [Were clogged tubes involved? Opinions differ.], Lopez and Smith should both attend Blogging School at Camp Greenwald. They could learn about things like "evidence" and "embedded links." Your paragraph beginning:
Completely fabricated accusations designed to fuel their war agenda and other political interests are not new for the world of right-wing punditry. It is par for the course.
...was a stellar example. Thanks, Glenn! (Even if I did have to follow a link to LGF.)
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St. Paul
[Read the article: National Review reporter caught fabricating; where is the "liberal media"?]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]pete b:
If you have something that contradicts every single one of Glenn's other examples, shooter242, let's see it.
You have got to be kidding. Wingnutty trolls don't do homework! They just want to get you busy doing it. The folks who engage them here have the patience of saints, I think.
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Stones
[Read the article: National Review reporter caught fabricating; where is the "liberal media"?]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Jay L:
You [Glenn] spend too much time saying that the NRO scandal is worse than Beauchamp.
Where did Glenn say the NRO scandal is "worse" than Beauchamp, other than detailing that Greater Wingnuttia and Lopez' responses (and non-responses) are "worse" because they are completely hypocritical? I think you've missed his point.
You seem to find both Glenn's and Foer's explanations too long and difficult to wade through-- so maybe it's you? "Transparent" does not mean "short and sweet." And if all you've really meant to do is disagree with the use of one word, "impressive," I believe you've slaughtered the lede.
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@JayL
[Read the article: National Review reporter caught fabricating; where is the "liberal media"?]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]So, the few seconds Glenn (may or may not, I have no idea who writes the sidebars) spent writing a sub-head was "too much time"?
And if you've not spent 14 pages defending a fairly simple point ("He was not impressively transparent to me"), you've come close. Sometimes folks who are tying to explain themselves and maybe feel under attack do ramble on a bit, yes?
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Never Anonymous
[Read the article: National Review reporter caught fabricating; where is the "liberal media"?]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Re: the NIE, I suspect Pedinska's payback theory may be correct; I certainly (vindictively?) hope it is.
No payback needed from bebop's posse for Pamela, who seems quite reasonable after all. Skipping bebop's posts is only your own loss, though. Glenn (and bebop) are good arbiters of when it is too much, you'll see. He is our free-form poet and it's possible you'll learn to love him as we do (flirting, bebop). He knows his soup (and blueberries), that's for sure.
One of my favorite letters of his (from an earlier incarnation) was this one:
http://letters.salon.com/opinion/greenwald/2007/03/02/cpac/permalink/ca53015ca7a71ea40a37f1cb98b917bd.html
If you read Glenn's original post, you'll understand.
Or not! At any rate, welcome.
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Dereliction
[Read the article: Time magazine refused to publish responses to Klein's false smears]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]GG:
What kind of magazine smears its targets with patently false statements and then blocks them from responding?
A magazine with an apparent agenda and no credibility. They certainly don't seem to care much about keeping their readers informed, do they? I wonder how the rest of the staff there feels about that.
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Bizarro World
[Read the article: Our serious foreign policy geniuses strike again]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Yellow Dog:
The more you sin, the greater will be your reward when you return home.
I'm with you on the Prodigal Son parable, Mr. Dog. Along with the blatant misogyny, the incredible injustice in that story more than any other led me as a small child to ask myself about the Church, "If they're wrong about that, what else are they wrong about?" I became a recovered Catholic shortly thereafter.
I suspect the overwhelming dislike of Bush can partially be attributed to older folks asking themselves that same question-- not that the Serious pundits will ever realize it.