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I'd argue that it's worse news than it appears. Bari Weiss left for the same reason Krugman did (you can make more money for less hassle with a Substack) even though her politics were the opposite and she didn't have as good a gig as Krugman did. Since the NYT had a web site everybody there knows they live and die based on the usage stats, and the usage stats says that people would rather read Krugman, Klein, Brooks…
Paul Krugman was not the worst in that regard by any means. The champion was A. M. Rosenthal: Israel good, China bad, drug legalization bad, again and again and again. But I still became able to predict with confidence what position Krugman was going to take—and what positions he wouldn’t take—without reading his columns.
I'd argue that it's worse news than it appears. Bari Weiss left for the same reason Krugman did (you can make more money for less hassle with a Substack) even though her politics were the opposite and she didn't have as good a gig as Krugman did. Since the NYT had a web site everybody there knows they live and die based on the usage stats, and the usage stats says that people would rather read Krugman, Klein, Brooks…
Bari Weiss is center left by the way. Prior to her New York times stint, she was at wsj editorial pages where she was to the left of basically everyone. If you read her actual political beliefs, she's more of a classical liberal.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bari_Weiss
I'll agree with the criticism of "anti-fascism" and similar trends, but she has way too much enthusiasm Peter Thiel, Joe Rogan and such.
I think The Economist should be center right thanks to its consistent insistence on free trade (founded to oppose the Corn Laws in 1843) or rather it is what the center right should be. Between the current Tories and Labor it is politically homeless in the current UK. I'd argue that its rating here
https://www.allsides.com/news-source/economist
is a sign of the US political spectrum itself being hopelessly biased, but maybe any American taking an interest in a foreign publication is left leaning, but then I remembered
https://www.allsides.com/news-source/spectator-world-media-b...
Full disclosure: I read The Economist and The Guardian regularly and I'd say the latter really is lefty. I was introduced to The Economist by someone who was a conservative at the time but switched sides but has enough sense to not to talk about "anti-fascism" around me.
Having read Krugman's reasoning for leaving the Times, I find myself sinking even deeper into pessimism about the future of news media and, more broadly, the future democracy. My interpretation of Krugman's departure is that higher-ups edited and re-edited his columns to reduce the possibility of calling up a kerfuffle. They wanted him to soften his words and blunt his message because they were sensitive to calls of…
> My interpretation of Krugman's departure is that higher-ups edited and re-edited his columns to reduce the possibility of calling up a kerfuffle. They wanted him to soften his words and blunt his message because they were sensitive to calls of media bias. I think that's exactly the wrong response. This seems to be how Krugman is framing it, but is editorial oversight actually bad? In the past this kind of pundit cl…
However, that's what might be politely called "unsupported speculation" aka "just making things up." Without evidence to the contrary, I see no reason not to take Krugman at his word.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Bari Weiss is center left by the way. Prior to her New York times stint, she was at wsj editorial pages where she was to the left of basically everyone. If you read her actual political beliefs, she's more of a classical liberal.
The only person in this Wikipedia article to say she leans left is herself: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bari_Weiss I'll agree with the criticism of "anti-fascism" and similar trends, but she has way too much enthusiasm Peter Thiel, Joe Rogan and such. I think The Economist should be center right thanks to its consistent insistence on free trade (founded to oppose the Corn Laws in 1843) or rather it is what the cent…
The silliest detail to me (and one of my major gripes about many new sources) is that the Times seemed to resist use of charts in his articles? I've read so many articles on the housing crisis, inflation, immigrations, etc. that would be 10x better with a FRED chart.
> The silliest detail to me (and one of my major gripes about many new sources) is that the Times seemed to resist use of charts in his articles? Right! I think this could be an example of skeuomorphism at its worse. I imagine the thought process as being: "We are a newspaper, therefore space is limited and we can't devote precious inches to charts and graphs. Even though most people read us online, and space is actu…
And as long as they do, it's understandable that for most articles they don't want two versions -- one that requires charts and one that doesn't.
I'm not defending it, but it certainly does make sense.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
> The Times consolidated their opinion content and eliminated the blog From my reading of the article, you're conflating two seperate events, perhaps due to knowledge of additional facts it doesn't contain, or conjecture, or misreading - it isn't clear. The blog was shuttered, yes, but on his opinion column he just mentions an increase in editorial oversight and getting notes. You call this "consolidating their opini…
The Times shuttered dozens of blogs (all of them, I think?). It was kind of a big deal at the time.
Having read Krugman's reasoning for leaving the Times, I find myself sinking even deeper into pessimism about the future of news media and, more broadly, the future democracy. My interpretation of Krugman's departure is that higher-ups edited and re-edited his columns to reduce the possibility of calling up a kerfuffle. They wanted him to soften his words and blunt his message because they were sensitive to calls of…
FWIW, his articles have been just as good or better on his substack. At their best, newspapers could be very good, but we might be able to do better than a fixed set of opinion writers covering an infinite number of topics.
So, the piece here wants to frame this as an ideological issue, but the kernel of it seems to be: * the Times employed Krugman to generate content, originally on terms that included a Times-branded blog where he could write with minimal editorial oversight. * The Times consolidated their opinion content and eliminated the blog, leaving Krugman only venues with extensive editorial oversight, notably including how ofte…
What's wrong with economists? Not a huge Krugman fan, but I feel economists bring important insights from data that tend to escape regular journalists. If Krugman wore his economist hat more and stayed away from general political punditry, I would probably like him more. The writing of Emily Oster is a great example of what economists can bring to analysis of current events. I wish we could clone her.