Newsweek Editor: Our Warming Story Contrived

 

Via NewsMax.

A contributing editor at Newsweek magazine, Robert J. Samuelson, has sharply criticized his own publication for what he calls a “highly contrived” cover story about the global warming threat and the “denial machine” that seeks to debunk it.

In this week’s issue of Newsweek, Samuelson writes: “As we debate it, journalists should resist the temptation to portray global warming as a morality tale – as Newsweek did – in which anyone who questions its gravity or proposed solutions may be ridiculed as a fool, a crank or an industry stooge.”

He also writes: “Unfortunately, self-righteous indignation can undermine good journalism. Last week’s Newsweek cover story on global warming is a sobering reminder. It’s an object lesson of how viewing the world as ‘good guys vs. bad guys’ can lead to a vast oversimplification of a messy story.”    more… 

As the article notes, Marc Morano, communications director for the U.S. Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works, said a Senate report is scheduled to be released in the fall that will feature hundreds of scientists “who have spoken out recently against [Al] Gore, the U.N., and the media-driven climate ‘consensus.’”

Sharon Begley’s article, “The Truth About Denial“, is here. 

 

Just for the record, anything that starts off with Barbara Boxer in the opening sentence can’t be good.

Robert J. Samuelson’s rebuttal can be found here. 

Oooops!  What a screw up, if your own editors feel compelled to run a rebuttal in the following issue.

Noel Sheppard at News Busters weighs in on the Begley article. 

Manmade global warming alarmism took a disgraceful turn for the worse this weekend when Newsweek published a lengthy cover-story repeatedly calling skeptics “deniers” that are funded by oil companies and other industries with a vested interest in obfuscating the truth.

In fact, the piece several times suggested that publishing articles skeptical of man’s role in climate change is akin to misleading Americans about the dangers of smoking.

Despicably titled “Global-Warming Deniers: A Well-Funded Machine,” the article painted a picture of an evil cabal whose goal is to thwart science at the detriment of the environment and the benefit of their wallets.   more…

Tailrank has a roundup from around the blogosphere on the Begley story. 

And, of course, Sharon Begley now has her own blog over at Newsweek.  So much for editorial critique there, huh?

Others posting on this topic:  JammieWearingFool / Liberal Values / Villainous Company / Amy Ridenour / Pat Dollard / American Conservative Daily /

John, just what all do you consider a “charity”?

John “Pretty Boy” Edwards is one of those gifts that just seems to keep on giving. 

Politico reports that Edwards might have been having a problem with the whole truth and nothing but the truth, when he told CNN’s Wolf Blitzer, “Every dime of the money they gave to me has gone to charity.”  Maybe he should have defined “charity” for Wolf and the viewing audience?

Democratic presidential candidate John Edwards recently defended taking a lucrative book contract from a publisher controlled by Rupert Murdoch — whose News Corp. empire Edwards has sharply criticized — by insisting that “every dime” of his $500,000 advance went to charity.

Left unmentioned by Edwards, however, was that Murdoch’s HarperCollins paid portions of a $300,000 expense budget for the book to Edwards’s daughter and to a senior political aide, Jonathan Prince.

The sums paid to Cate Edwards and Prince, who are listed as co-authors on the little-noticed 2006 coffee table book, “Home: The Blueprints of Our Lives,” have not been made public, but were confirmed by two sources with first-hand knowledge of the book deal.

These and other details of the deal that have spilled out in recent weeks demonstrate both the complexity of Edwards’ transformation into an anti-corporate crusader, and of Murdoch’s double role as a corporate titan and political player.    more…

Michelle Malkin weighs in on the “silly pony” and even offers up a cool PhotoShop of Edwards’ book giving it a more appropriate title.

Neocon News has a good title rewrite for Edwards, along with the cover change.

Others posting on this topic:  Rhymes with Right / JammieWearingFool /

Damned public education system impacting WWW and confusing NYT.

 

H/T to Michelle Malkin. 

It’s horrible, I tell you.  The product of the public education system working on the WWW is leading to the errant spelling habits of New York Times staff, as one might come to believe from NYT Editor Clark Hoyt.

The fact is, The New York Times misspells names at a ferocious rate — famous names, obscure names, names of the dead in their obituaries, names of the living in their wedding announcements, household names from Hollywood, names of Cabinet officers, sports figures, the shoe bomber, the film critic for The Daily News in New York and, astonishingly and repeatedly, Sulzberger, the name of the family that owns The New York Times.

The Times has given Gen. Douglas MacArthur the middle initial A at least 25 times since 1987, though he had no middle name and didn’t use A, B, C or S, all of which have been ascribed to him.

So, you ask, what’s the big deal? Doesn’t The Times have more important things to worry about, like getting it right on Iraq and Iran and the presidential campaign?

Yes, a great newspaper has to get the big things right, but it also has to pay fanatical attention to thousands of details every day to prevent the kinds of mistakes that start readers wondering, “If they can’t spell his name right, what else is wrong with the story?”

Or, as Joe Lelyveld said in 2000, when he was executive editor of The Times, “When it comes to accuracy issues, tolerance and the larger view can be dangerous to our health.”

At a retreat of senior editors of The Times, Lelyveld called on them to “sweat the small stuff.” He bemoaned “the malignancy of misspelled names,” pointing out, among other things, that The Times had misspelled the first name of Madeleine Albright, who was then secretary of state, 49 times, despite running three corrections.

Unfortunately, the cancer appears to be getting worse. When Lelyveld spoke in mid-September, there had been 198 corrections for misspelled names in The Times so far that year. Through yesterday, still in early August, there had been 269 this year. And the mistakes keep coming.   more…

PowerLine notes, “Shakespeare couldn’t spell either; but then, he was writing fiction.”  Now, there is no reason to start associating The Bard with the NYT, even like that. 

What are some of the excuses:

¶Reporters say they were operating from memory and didn’t bother to check. That’s what one writer said after misspelling the name of Julianna Margulies, the television actress.

Okay.  They’re lazy.  Check.

¶Reporters assume that a name is spelled the “normal” way and don’t check. That’s what happened with the obituary of Neal Shine, the former publisher of The Detroit Free Press, whose first name was not Neil, as it appeared in the paper. Shine hired me in 1968, when he was the city editor of The Free Press, and he would get infuriated by errors like this.

Okay.  They’re lazy and believe somone’s name should be spelled the way they like it.  Check.

¶Reporters checking names on the Internet are carelessly misled by other people’s misspellings.

Okay.  They’re lazy, believe they’re right and are easily duped.  Wait.  This is starting to sound like TNR.

Craig Whitney of the NYT offers up another “theory”.

“Their minds are on higher things,” he said. “They’re looking at the bigger story, and they think they can’t bother with details like that.” Besides, he added, they expect misspellings “will be caught on the copy desk.”

“Higher things”, like pushing an agenda, maybe?  “Can’t bother with details”?  What is the truth, without the details?  Mistakes “will be caught on the copy desk”?  Wouldn’t it be a good idea to catch as many of those as you can on the front, instead of waiting for someone to, hopefully, catch in on the back?

Look.  It’s simple. When my kids try to shift blame to another child for something they did wrong, I quickly point out, “Little Johnny did not make you do that.  You chose to do it yourself.” 

We are responsible for our own mistakes.  Don’t blame the WWW or anyone else, if you:

• Can’t spell
• Are too lazy to look up the correct spelling
• Believe it should be spelled the way you would have done it 

In other words, if you mess up, ‘fess up, period!

Really, Karl, a year ago would have been okay.

UPDATE:  Bill Plante with CBS had a parting question for the president regarding Rove’s tenure. 

Too bad we didn’t get to hear the response to that.  I suspect it was under his breath.

UPDATE:  Jim Treacher at The Daily Gut asks a question on many of our minds.  And, the answer is…and the answer is…

Oh, well.  I suppose we will find out soon enough.  Won’t we?

For now, say goodbye to M.C. Rove, as he rides off into the sunset.

UPDATE:   Is there any truth to the rumor that Rove may be jumping ship to the Thompson non-campaign campaign or an officially announced campaign?  Surely not, with the way Rove has been polling.  And, we all know how campaigns are about poll numbers.

********************************* 

 

Karl Rove, White House Deputy Chief of Staff and President Bush’s longtime political advisor, has decided to step down. 

Karl Rove, President Bush’s close friend and chief political strategist, plans to leave the White House at the end of August, joining a lengthening line of senior officials heading for the exits in the final 1 1/2 years of the administration.

A longtime member of Bush’s inner circle, Rove was nicknamed “the architect” by the president for designing the strategy that twice won him the White House.

Click here for the full interview.

A criminal investigation put Rove under scrutiny for months during the investigation into the leak of a CIA operative’s name but he was never charged with any crime.

Bush was expected to make a statement Monday with Rove.   more…

I’m with Rove, “I just think it’s time.”  Of course, a year ago, when he first started thinking about it, wouldn’t have been too bad either.

Michelle Malkin has more on it here, outlining some of Rove’s “legacy“.

*************************** 

Others posting on this topic (good, bad and indifferent):  John Little / Pajama’s Media / The Memeorandum / Blogs of War / JammieWearingFool / Shaun Mullen / Betsy Newmark / Chris Lawrence / Mustang Bobby / Clarissa Pinkola Estes / Psericks / Tammy Bruce /Wizbang / HotAir /

We would like Rep. Murtha’s response on Justin Sharratt…*CLICK*

Still no response from Rep. John Murtha on his rush to judgement of Justin Sharratt and the other Haditha Marines.  I knew we shouldn’t hold our breath waiting on him to step forward and admit the error of his ways acting as judge, jury and executioner. 

Bryan Preston with HotAir tried to get in touch with John Murtha to get his reaction to the dismissal of charges against Sharratt and his fellow Marines, only for Murtha’s office to hang up on him.  Listen to the call on HotAir.

Michelle Malkin is still looking for Murtha to show himself and offer an apology too.  My advice still stands: Don’t hold your breath.

*****************************

Others posting on this topic (good, bad or indifferent):  TMQ2 (here and here) / Bill’s Bites / Neocon News / Blue Start Chronicles / Bits Blog / Mover Mike / TIW Blog / Let Freedom Ring / California Conservative / Republican GOP News Source / Two Malcontents / Assaulting the Spire / Cop the Truth / Speaking the Truth / Cook Crumb Express / MY Vast Right Wing Conspiracy / The Rogue Jew / Keith Milby / Wonkette / The Buzz Blog / Robert Steely / Inoperable Terran / Hennessy’s View / American Traditionalist / Texas Hold ‘Em /