Month: August 2005
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Go read Wonkette
Ana Marie Cox is officially on fire this week – go read Wonkette ASAP. Here’s my favorite item so far: Fox News and others are reporting that the President just got “his own bird’s eye view” of Katrina’s damage as Air Force One flew over the devestated region. Shortly after, Bush gave prepared remarks to
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Slate and the future of intermediation
My debate with Jack Shafer made me realize something: the next casualty of blogs may be general-interest intermediary publications like Slate. Just a few years ago, the need for a meta- approach to the news seemed compelling. But with so many expert blogs now available for free, I don’t need a general interest intermediary anymore.
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The “Bush Boom,” Harper’s Index style
Number of articles touting the “Bush Boom” on nationalreview.com: 44. Change in median income 2001-2004: -$673. Change in the number of Americans in poverty: +4.1 million Change in the number of Americans without health insurance: +4.6 million (All statistics are from Census data via the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities.)
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Debating journalism at Slate with Jack Shafer
Last Friday, I linked to some criticism of Slate by Eric Alterman and wrote this: [T]he problem with Slate is that it’s virtually content-free. There’s almost never new reporting, so the articles have to present really smart takes on the news to be worth reading. But as Alterman points out, there’s only one Michael Kinsley,
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What is Eric Alterman talking about?
Today, Eric Alterman writes: Will Bush become the most unpopular president in the history of Gallup Polling? Here. (And will the mainstream media continue to refer to him as “well-liked” by the country?)” I agree — Bush’s approval ratings make the phrase “well-liked” totally inappropriate. So I took Alterman at his word and tried to
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Things you should read
My friend Chris Mooney’s book The Republican War on Science is out today — pick up a copy! I’ll have a full review by next week (haven’t quite finished reading it yet), but in the meantime, see his blog for links to excerpts and reviews. Also, Dateline Hollywood, the satirical entertainment website that my friend
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Jon Stewart’s beatdown of Christopher Hitchens
Via Marginal Revolution, here a partial transcript (and video link) to John Stewart’s destruction of Christopher Hitchens during a debate about the Iraq war on the Daily Show last week. Stewart only challenges his guests infrequently (apparently for fear of being too preachy), but when he does, it’s borderline revolutionary. Before Hitchens, the best example
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Light posting this week
I was out of town over the weekend, classes start today, and I’m leaving for the American Political Science Association’s annual meeting on Wednesday, so blogging will be light this week. But I will be posting occasionally, so stay tuned…
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Tony Blankley, polling mastermind
Via Atrios, Media Matters has
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Eric Alterman on Slate
A while back, Eric Alterman had a nice precis on what’s wrong with Slate and “counter-intuitive” journalism: It’s not easy trying to be as smart as Mike Kinsley; in fact, for mere mortals like you and me, it’s impossible. I’ve always thought the biggest problem over at Slate is that nobody there got the memo