Last to the Party
On one hand, I want to associate myself with all those who’ve noted what an inspired pick Ross Douthat is for a New York Times columnist slot. As someone who is often perplexed by conservative hires within non-ideologically aligned media organizations, it’s great to see a deserving writer get this gig — sort of like watching The Wire in horror as all the wrong people wield power in the Baltimore police department, and therefore feeling that much more satisfied when Cedric Daniels gets promoted.
On the other hand, despite the widespread praise of Ross, I suspect that he isn’t quite getting his due, because the Times columnists are hired into ideological slots, so the compliments being offered often end up saying something like, “So young, and still the best conservative for the job.” Here at The American Scene, we know that Mr. Douthat is exceptionally talented when measured against all writers, full stop, as I suspect a whole lot of Times readers are about to figure out. Should anyone doubt my assessment, I’d point out that were someone assembling a stable of columnists from scratch, they’d do far better to pick Ross than quite a few of his new colleagues — Ms. Dowd, Mr. Friedman, and Mr. Herbert being the clearest examples. Were I a liberal scoring the op-ed page for quality of argument and persuasiveness, I’d be getting a bit nervous for my team about now.
Yeah, but Cedric Daniels had to step aside almost as soon as he assumed power. What are you saying?
— Gabriel · Mar 13, 11:39 PM · #
I am a liberal who reads NYT and I am celebrating the new arrival.
I love reading Brooks because he always has a fresh take on things. Ross is a bit more predictable but more rigorous in his thinking and I love reading him too.
I am most happy to finally have a credible conservative opinion on the NYT OpEd. Kristol and Safire seemed like cartoon characters. I’m not sure I was supposed to take them seriously.
I think Krugman, Rich, Cohen and Kristof can (each in their own way) more than hold their own against Ross.
I gave up reading Dowd and Herbert a long, long time ago. I only read Friedman so I can shout aloud at his arrogance.
— Kevin · Mar 14, 12:03 AM · #
The idea that liberals consider the theoretically liberal contingent of the Times editorial page ‘my team’ is almost entirely a conservative fantasy. I suspect if you took a poll the non-Krugman portion would get an approval rating somewhere south of the 2% I put in my coffee this morning.
The ‘team’ of nearly the entire Times editorial staff is Versailles a.k.a. the Beltway. Liberals qua liberals have been alienated from those clowns for decades.
Which is one reason that the liberal blogosphere has been almost unanimously enthusiastic about Ross’ hire. Not because they expect him to be a conservative conducive to liberal ends, but because a bright, young blog-born conservative is more ‘us’ than an out-of-touch ideologically vacuous insider like Dowd.
— sidereal · Mar 14, 12:12 AM · #
Brad DeLong in his essay on Friedman:
“Lord, enlighten thou our enemies,” prayed nineteenth-century British economist and moral philosopher John Stuart Mill in his Essay on Coleridge “Sharpen their wits, give acuteness to their perceptions, and consecutiveness and clearness to their reasoning powers: we are in danger from their folly, not from their wisdom; their weakness is what fills us with apprehension, not their strength.”
Amen. We’ve suffered enormously under conservative fools like Bush and his moronic apologists like Kristol, Dowd and Limbaugh. I think Obama is likely to do an excellent job, but he can hardly be expected to keep his game sharp against clowns like that.
Congratulations, Ross.
— peter · Mar 14, 12:15 AM · #
Friedman is not a liberal. Herbert is underrated.
— Freddie · Mar 14, 12:53 PM · #