More Ari Fleischer

The former Bush flack is still dishonest and wrong about taxes (via Ezra Klein). The Wall Street Journal editorial page is, of course, an important prominent media outlet. And it's not just an ideological wasteland, but a near-total fact-free zone -- an appaling miasma of lies and distortions. In a decent universe, decent conservatives would shun it like the plague -- to have your work published alongside the dreck that regularly appears there would be humiliating -- and it would wither away and die. We do not, suffice it to say, live in such a universe.

Comments

Ari may want to run for Congress in 2008, but I expect that after the election, John Hall will be still the one . . .

Posted by: rea on April 19, 2007 08:52 AM

In a decent universe, 100% of decent conservatives would shun the WSJ editorial page. This means that if you happened to see 100 decent conservatives in the street, all 100 of them would shun.

Posted by: AP on April 19, 2007 08:53 AM

Help me out here, but is there any such animal as a Left business journal? I would think that competent business, market and economic reporting are altogether incompatible with Left thought. But since I've never looked for such a beast as defies that rule, perhaps you could help me out.

Posted by: Cobb on April 19, 2007 09:38 AM

TNR is also an appalling miasma of lies and distortions on US Middle East politics, but many 'liberals' people seem desperate to be published there.

Cobb: The left leaning business newspaper you are looking for is called the Financial Times.

Posted by: otto on April 19, 2007 09:40 AM

TNR is also an appalling miasma of lies and distortions on US Middle East politics, but many 'liberals' people seem desperate to be published there.

True; but not me.

Posted by: Matthew Yglesias on April 19, 2007 10:21 AM

No-one who works for the american prospect is any position to demean the integrity or status of any publication.(my favourite piece in prospect history is when bob kuttner was so angry at being humiliated by milton friedman in an interview in his own publication that he supplimented the interview with an op-ed in which he claimed, with not the slightest proof, that one of the most widely respected academics of the twentieth century was a liar)

Especially someone for whom lying comes so naturally he even mischaracterizes articles with which he agrees. If he botheres to read the article it doesnt accuse fleischer of being "wrong" about a single point of fact. What it does do is make the assertion that fleisher, although factually correct in ihs arguments, was attempting to imply that tax rates have gone up. It doesnt bother to actually substantiate what is a fantastically bizarre allegation when you consider that for so long one of fleisher's main duties was to talk about the fact that bush had cut taxes.

Posted by: pimp hand strikes! on April 19, 2007 10:45 AM

oh yawn frickin' yawn, pimp hand strikes.

as for the wsj editorial page, i am truly curious: i know a number of people (i'm one of them) who read the rest of the wsj religiously and never touch the editorial page. The question is, are we the minority of wsj readers or are the wsj editorial-page readers the minority? i have trouble thinking that anyone except the mouth-foaming true believers read the crap they publish there, but how would we know?

Posted by: howard on April 19, 2007 11:32 AM

"Help me out here, but is there any such animal as a Left business journal? I would think that competent business, market and economic reporting are altogether incompatible with Left thought. But since I've never looked for such a beast as defies that rule, perhaps you could help me out.
Posted by: Cobb on April 19, 2007 09:38 AM"

What about the Left Business Review (I've never read it). Also, didn't Fortune or Business Week tend to before be the liberal image of the more conservative Forbes?

Posted by: Reality Man on April 19, 2007 11:54 AM

Reality Man, do you mean the Left Business Observer that Doug Henwood used to edit (i think it's closed down now). That was a very well-written and argued little newsletter; henwood now works with a barron's grad, john liscio, in producing the liscio report, oft-cited by alan abelson in barron's.

Posted by: howard on April 19, 2007 12:06 PM

Well there's the editorial page, and then there's the op-ed page. I'm not sure they deserve to be lumped together. The op-ed occasionally has a thoughtful, interesting piece, while the editorial is a complete joke from start to finish.

Presumably Ari appeared on the op-ed page. Although I didn't check.

Posted by: lewp on April 19, 2007 12:07 PM

I wonder what it would take to accomplish a hostile takeover of the Journal and turn its editorial page into something as credible as its front page. George Soros, where are you? Maybe a truly entrepreneurial spirit could start a corporation explicitly aimed at this and this alone.

Posted by: dcbob on April 19, 2007 03:30 PM

Re: "Left Business Journal"

Well, Business Week, as someone has said, has a more liberal image than Forbes, but for an equivalent to the WSJ the only thing close is the Financial Times. When it comes right down to it, yes the FT is a center-right paper (which likes it globalization liberal), but it does carry the likes of Larry Summers (who talked about inequality in his first regular piece). Generally speaking it does have a broader spectrum of debate on the op-ed page. Morever, it does not russle up Professors from the University of North-Eastern Texas at Podunkville to argue against global warming or cast doubt on rising inequality statistics--or former press secretaries to write agit-prop against taxes. In other words, it is "reality based," which is an improvement on the WSJ.

Posted by: Castorp on April 19, 2007 05:41 PM

Sorry Otto, I didn't see your response on the FT. Although, I would only say that it is the closest thing Cobb will find, not that it is actually a left-leaning business journal.

Posted by: castorp on April 19, 2007 05:44 PM

No problem. One could have a debate about it. It is a business journal that is not opposed to government spending on both welfare and infrastructure. Blairite if you like (or even Kinnockite, given that it supported Labour in 1992, before Blair). That makes it well to the left of anyone electable in US politics.

Posted by: otto on April 19, 2007 05:52 PM

In defense of the WSJ op/ed page, the paper publishes some compelling opinion pieces, including ones penned by Democrats such as Robert Reich and Bob Pozen. The ad hominem shots at Fleischer do nothing to invalidate the facts cited, or the argument based on them, in his essay. As someone who largely agreed with the essay, I would have preferred if it had been written by a more credentialed Journal regular who shared Fleischer's viewpoint (no shortage of those) -- just to avoid the ad hominem distraction the essay's writer invited.

A more legitimate criticism of the WSJ is that it's editorials have gotten considerably weaker in the last few years. Not especially worse than what you see in the NY Times, but weaker nonetheless. The WSJ desperately needs to add a smart liberal to its editorial board, just to help the rest of them sharpen their arguments. Back when the WSJ editorial board had its show on PBS, I remember a live debate between the late Robert Bartley and Robert Reich where Reich mopped the floor with Bartley. If I were in charge of the WSJ, I'd offer Reich gobs of money to perform that service for the current members of the editorial board, behind closed doors. Let those editorials go a few rounds with a sparring partner before taking off the headgear.

It's sad though that the sheer level of maturity and intelligence of a typical FT editorial makes NY Times and WSJ editorials look like the work of college newspapers.

Posted by: Dave on April 20, 2007 12:37 AM

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