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James Bennet on his departure from the NYT

Bennet's piece is long, but a mostly worthwhile read:

https://www.economist.com/1843/2023/12/14/when-the-new-york-times-lost-its-way

It doesn't exactly cover him in glory, which may or may not have been intentional, but that is probably good nonetheless. He clearly made a bunch of mistakes during the aftermath of the Cotton op-ed affair, mostly of the kind that I would characterize as "cowardice", but honestly the gold medal on that front goes to none other than AG Sulzberger, who could have and should have told the entire newsroom staff to choose between being journalists at the New York Times or activists on the sidewalk working the find-a-new-job beat.

One thing that jumped out at me that seems minor but really clearly illustrates a blind spot in approaching the journalistic enterprise with good faith is his reference to "a certain Murdoch-owned cable-news network". Instead of conjuring the image of a shadowy media empire, led by a deeply ideologically-motivated puppet master, and pushing distortions and untruths on useful idiots and the unwitting, could he just have said "Fox News"?

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Micheal Joseph said…
Thanks ffor posting this
11:20 PM
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