No, this isn’t about Dostoevsky. I’m just responding to a blog post about me (and you don’t have to thank me for boosting your traffic, NVB). I ran across it because I was looking for the URL to provide a link back on this post.
An excerpt:
I started wondering today what qualifications are needed to be an
editorial writer at the state’s largest newspaper. I don’t mean this in
any petty, mean-spirited, Brad-Warthen-is-an-idiot sort of way. But I
know what qualifications are needed to be a doctor or a lawyer or a
brick mason or a fast food worker. I don’t really know what they are
for an editorialist.It can’t just be that you have opinions. We all have those. It’s got
to be the quality of the opinion that determines, at least as an
initial matter, whether someone is good at that particular job. And
after that, the ability to persuade someone else of that quality.I’ve criticized Warthen and the gang over at the State with some
frequency not because I disagree with them on the issues, although I
often do, but because, well, either the judgment or the persuasiveness
is often so lacking in what they write. And on top of that, the
reaction from them when they are disagreed with is telling….
It goes on in that vein. And on account of the fact that it’s Friday evening, and I have hours and hours of work ahead of me doing the Saturday Opinion Extra thing that so many people hate, and I want to put THAT off as long as possible (a great deal of blogging is explained by this factor), I responded, as follows:
“Bingo?”
Tell you what, I’m gonna have to go ahead and do what the bingo caller does here, and ask to see your card, to make sure you have five squares lining up.
In other words, it would be nifty if you, or Doug, or “Silence” (and in a completely unrelated point here, I gotta say that I respect Doug WAY more since he uses his real name, and because he recently paid for my breakfast)…
… where was I? Oh yeah, it would be nifty if one of y’all would provide some examples of this failure on the editorial page just one, or two. Or five, if you think you can go all the way to “bingo.”
[I’m looking for examples on] the editorial page, mind you, since what you question is our abilities as editorial writers/editors. I can accept service on the “Brad Warthen the blogger is an idiot” implication, because, well, he’s a blogger.
Not so much on the “editorial page editor is an idiot “implication, though. For that, I seek evidence….
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Notverybright hit you right between the eyes, Mr. Warthen.
Shame you didn’t notice. But the trees do seem to have been blocking your view of the forest lately.
The one thing an editorial page editor should never do is tick off too many people without making a point significant enough to justify it.
The Hillary-Eight Belles cartoon made a point, but not one that hadn’t already been made a thousand times on television before The State was published — WITHOUT the horrifying reminder of a broken-legged Kentucky Derby contender.
You’d come out ahead here to say, “O.K., maybe y’ all do have a point” and change the subject.
Sticking to your guns when you’re out of ammunition is not a good battle strategy, unless you’re merely seeking to provoke hits on your site.
Even so, belittling your opponent when you’re beaten is just plain stupid.
Brad, I made extended comments to your comment over at the post on NVB, but I also re-assert here that I never called you an idiot nor insinuated it – and it appears neither did Not Very Bright, but NVB can speak to those issues in the first person.
I do however stand by my recent comments made here on the previous post about Mr. Arial, and don’t retract those in any regards.
If you want to make this about mine or some other bloggers anonymity, fine, that is a great subject, BUT completely divorced from the one I raised. Furthermore, since I didn’t call you an idiot, nor think that you are one, it will be very difficult for me to find examples of such.
Tell you what — let’s talk about Dostoevsky instead.
That should help with my campaign to get on Foreign Policy‘s list for next year.
Actually, I just finished reading The Idiot again. It seemed even more pertinent, given our current societal tendencies. … An asylum may be the only sane refuge.
Reminded me of the cult classic movie, King of Hearts, which you may remember, Brad. One of my favorite all-time comedies of the absurd — just as pertinent to our Iraq adventures as it was to Vietnam in its day.
http://www.allwatchers.com/topics/info_3816.asp
Wait, I thought this was Brad Warthen’s Blog. Suddenly it seems like I’m reading Buzz Bissinger…
To see the way some of these people go on about my insensitivity, you’d think I was some animal like Dmitri Karamazov. Obviously, I’m an Ivan…
Foreign Policy people, are you paying attention here? We’re talking allusions…
Oops, I didn’t mean “animal.” I meant, “brutish, insensitive person”…
right … that wuold be anthropomorphism, you beast.
Warthen’s hubris is exceeded only by his insecurity.
Warthen’s hubris is exceeded only by his insecurity.
I don’t want anybody to think from the first couple of sentences of this post that I called you an idiot. I did not.
As for your challenge for me to name specific editorials that are lacking, I did that over at my place. (Marriage amendment, Mohammed cartoon, Edwards is a phony.)
I’m sure you could find blog posts of mine that are lacking too, but the difference is that I don’t claim infallibility.
Moi, claim infallibility? WHEN? I go out of my way to tell y’all about stuff I screw up!
Here’s a new one, by the way (when I get caught up on video footage I’m going to try to dig this one out and post it) … when Cindi and I were interviewing Chris Hart the other day and he said something about Nikki Haley, I went off on this tangent saying something like, "What’s with Nikki; I see in the paper this morning that she’s against indexing the cigarette tax to inflation?" Cindi points out that I’m thinking of Nikki Setzler (MY senator, by the way), which should have been obvious, seeing as how the story I was thinking of was about SENATE action…
… but now that I think further about this, the "Pope of Shop Road" has a certain ring to it…
And I agree with The New Republic, which said of Lord Acton:
Folks, forgive me for posting this in several places, but I wanted to let you know…
I’m having serious TypePad problems today (Monday, May 12), and they’ve prevented me from putting up ANY new posts, although I’ve tried like fun.
When it’s fixed, I’ll be back…