On my last day of a great New York vacation I am even able to laugh at the fusty local paper the NYT which is still, incredibly after the election, living in 1972. (If you’re going to be nostalgic, at least give us Paris in the Twenties.) This morning they are sporting an orange “Apocalypse Now”-style photo of what could be the Mekong River (wink, wink - we know it’s the Euphrates) with the same writer, John F. Burns, flogging the same story he has for two years now, to wit Iraq could be the next Vietnam. (I know - you’re shocked). And it’s not even a Sunday. This kind of none-news usually fits better with bagel and cream cheese. Burns, once justifiably regarded as one of our better war correspondents, seems to be suffering from “Burns out,” feeding his audience what they want to hear.
Meanwhile, the NYT’s own hometown news, the UN Oil-for-Food Scandal, is dealt with only by William Safire, the opinion writer on the edge of retirement. Why doesn’t the NYT do a little more digging on that? Not enough reporters in Manhattan? Or perhaps the story doesn’t fit their narrative?
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11 Comments
1. Kevin P:Roger:
Vietnam, Watergate, McCarthy, and racism. Almost every major news event of the last 40 years that the LA and New York Times covers is based on those 4 touchstones for the “great” broadsheets of this country. They are like a oldies radio station , they can’t stop going to those issues like the oldies station plays the the Beatles. For the radio station it makes sense, they are there to relive the past. For a newspaper it is embarrassing.
Nov 29, 2004 - 7:12 am 2. Mike Walsh, MM:1972? I always think of them as “les soixante-huitards” or “68-ers” en anglais. That’s the part of French history they identify with. But “oldies station”, Kevin? Man, that’s cruel . . .
Nov 29, 2004 - 7:33 am 3. ms anne:perhaps, roger, we should fisk relevant nyt bank accounts. this former flagship of journalism has sprung too many holes to maintain its invincible aura–and it drilled the holes by itself with partisan stories and reporters and editors who are biased at best and incompetant at worst. they gave away the news beat.
Nov 29, 2004 - 8:53 am 4. MeTooThen:Roger,
I too, saw the NYT cover photo while out getting coffee this morning and had to laugh!
That the UN is in NYC and the Times can’t (read: won’t) find its way to investigate the most important story of fraud and corruption in three generations (or as you put it Roger, a thousand years) borders on the absurd.
The NY Times is becomming as irrelevant as the UN. That the two are linked in their loss of credibility is no surprise. But what is surprising is that each organization seems knowingly determined to continue on its ruinous path. For what?
Go figure.
Nov 29, 2004 - 9:01 am 5. Mark Poling:ms. anne is probably correct; the U.N. is free enough with it’s accounting that some funds may well have found their way to some editor’s pockets.
Roger, you’ll know you’ve become a major Force for Good when a friend of Kofi takes you to lunch and offers to bankroll your next film, even if you never get around to producing a film. Just let us know when it happens.
Nov 29, 2004 - 10:33 am 6. Dan-O:For the Times and their readers, EVERYTHING is viewed through the prism of Vietnam. It’s the Gold Standard by which they measure everything Iraq-related.
Remember the Six Degrees of Separation? With the Times, EVERYTHING is roughly one degree of separation from Vietnam.
(Sorry for the hyperbole, but you get the point)
Nov 29, 2004 - 2:00 pm 7. Catherine:It is an oldies station!
Lord help us.
I looked at that picture first thing this morning, and while I didn’t laugh OUT LOUD, I came close.
The weird thing about it, though, was that the image is incredibly beautiful. Minus the caption, it could pass for a front-page shot in the Travel section.
Nov 29, 2004 - 2:15 pm 8. Catherine:My husband has taken to telling me that we are at a “strange” juncture in American history, because liberals are called upon to block “reckless” reforms by conservatives.
Does everyone know the famous Buckley definition of conservatism back in 1954?
Over dinner in Paris we were all chuckling over this; heads were nodding as everyone agreed that trying to stop history is, was, and will always be the essential cause of conservatism.
So I guess that takes George Bush out of the conservative column.
Who’s standing athwart these days, guys?
http://www.nationalreview.com/comment/comment050200a.html
Nov 29, 2004 - 2:26 pm 9. Michael B:This MEQ report on al-Sadr provides an informative angle to evaluate Iraq from.
Nov 30, 2004 - 9:18 am 10. Salt Lick:I have a hard time lumping John Burns in with many other agenda-driven, anti-Bush reporters. I will never forget hearing him report from Baghdad as the 3rd ID approached the city from Kuwait. Gwen Ifill had him on by a satellite link to the Lehrer program, and Burns told her that many of the Iraqs he was with were anxiously awaiting liberation by the Americans. Ifill seemed a bit stunned at Burn’s candid, pro-invasion reporting. So Burns is someone who gets my ear, even when I don’t like what I’m hearing.
Dec 1, 2004 - 9:22 am 11. Hipocrite:I love how you really stick it to that Burns guy, saying that he’s been flogging that same old Iraq=Vietnam story for two whole years. What a hack. I especially hated him in mid September, 2003, regarding Saddam’s attrocities.
Can you do something about that guy who said that Burns “makes you believe in the possibilities of journalism again?” I think you can find him saying it here. You and him should compare notes and decide if you two think Burns was good or bad.
Dec 1, 2004 - 9:45 am