Editorial: What the New York Times won't tell you and how it's always been that way

As Common Ills members we've followed the criticism of the reporting on Ireland. We've spoken to professors who've noted that The New York Times is "ahistorical," "in over their heads," "fails to grasp conflict," and "missed the boat as usual."

We couldn't agree more. The New York Times more useless every day. (That's a steal from The Common Ills.)

When Gail Collins leads her cheerleaders on the editorial board for any cause why does it always appear there's a cost-benefit analysis? Are they an insurance agency or are they damn newspaper?

Yesterday, they trumpeted "The Bullies of Belfast." We went to a professor with that editorial right away, one we'd already talked to.

"They demean the entire struggle. They reduce it to allegations that have yet to be proven about a pub brawl and work from there to push an agenda that ignores the historical roots of a struggle in Ireland. As an editorial in a campus paper this wouldn't cut it. Their ahistorical approach is an insult to intellectual inquiry and any pursuit of knowledge."

So what do they not explain? Oh kids, where do we start?

Anytime you use "wise" to refer to the Bully Boy's administration, you're not just ass kissing, you're gouging your own eyes to be willfully blind. Little Missy Collins loves her history, provided it's women's history, provided it's far in the past, provided it's something that causes no controversy and can be dismissed by detractors as "niche history." (Missy Collins would be the last to raise a voice in objection to anyone dismissing it as "niche history." It's history for the ladies that lunch.)

Completely useless as any type of historian, Collins may be the least of the problems for the editorial board. Though we do enjoy her repeated claims that she's moving things forward op-ed wise in terms of representation for women. Collins, you've hired what regular op-ed female?
John Tierney? We thought he was a man. Collins, you give feminism a bad names and your bullshit about "in ten or twenty years" maybe change will come . . . Susan Estrich does more to help things right now then you rushing in singing "Let's Wait Awhile."

But as The Common Ills noted, it's very interesting how the issue of patents re: Ireland isn't a story The Times wants to cover. It's also interesting that a group with socialistic aims (IRA)
is yet again attacked by the neo-liberals (open the markets enough for us to dominate them!)
that pass for liberal on The New York Times editorial board.

The whiney ass cowards of The Times editorial board bemoan Gerry Adams:

But he hurt his cause by adding a defense of "those who break the law in pursuit of legitimate political objectives."

He hurt his cause? What is that quote about the tree of liberty and blood? (We know the quote, we think the ed-board chooses to ignore it.) If a law isn't valid, do you have to obey it?

That's at the heart of intellectual inquiry and has been forever. It's basic to philosophy, ethics and history. But The Times pretends they've never heard of the concept as they continue their Rush to Judgement.

Civil disobedience takes a slap down as a result of their badly written editorial.

Dissent as well.

They'd no doubt argue (in some weak assed fashion), "We were referring to the I.R.A.'s actions!"
Allleged.

You may have thought you were but as usual you were too quick to push the administration's spin to speak clearly.

But you never speak cleary. You toss your darts out with malice and true zeal.

Then you whine about how you were misunderstood.

"The Bullies of Belfast?" Why don't you speak of "The Bullies of The New York Times?"

You could start with Jeff Gerth. You could explain why you never informed the public that Kathleen Wiley was discredited by the independent counsel's office. You could explain your attacks on Richard Jewell. You could discuss why Nicholas Kristof felt it was okay to conduct a trial on the op-ed pages regarding who was responsible for the anthrax attacks. You could talk about your great history of lying. How about when you used your paper to BULLY Wilfred Burchett? How about the lies of William L. Lawrence that you printed as fact? Good God, how about allowing Daniel Okrent to attack a reader with the full weight of the paper behind him?

You want to talk about bullies? Look in the damn mirror.

We don't support the IRA. We don't condemn it. We're smart enough not to allow our brains to go all mushy over a propaganda campaign aided by the White House.

A man died. Sad. Tragic. A bar brawl. Not uncommon.

Slate's Scott MacMillan reported on Friday some things that the editorial board might have missed (it's hard work those maritini luncheons and anagram rounds):

Many now say the McCartney murder -- by all accounts a sordid pub brawl that had nothing to do with the IRA's elusive revolutionary aims -- will damage the reputations of the IRA and Sinn Fein far more than the heist. An anti-Sinn Fein campaign led by McCartney's sisters has compared the current IRA to the reviled Shankill Butchers, the Protestant gang that terrorized Catholic West Belfast in the 1970s. Born in the late 1960s from a genuine need to defend Catholic neighborhoods from Protestant loyalist pogroms, the Provisional IRA has never employed the noblest methods in its war, but even once-stalwart partisans now say the group has degenerated into a mafia-style criminal racket.

The Shankill Butchers don't make your editorial or the fact that the IRA responded to them, does it? Your ahistorical approach speaks of bias.

You also fail to grasp this bit of reality MacMillan reports:

Still, despite talk of excluding the party from politics altogether, Sinn Fein is unlikely to go away. Despite its faults and a dip in popularity, the party has a loyal republican support base. A recent poll shows the SDLP and Sinn Fein neck-and-neck even after all the bad press. And at this point, imagining a Sinn Fein without Gerry Adams -- who made the party what it is today -- would be a bit like Blondie re-forming without Debbie Harry.

But most of all you fail to grasp this (which C.I., Krista and Dominick of The Common Ills have repeatedly pointed out) from MacMillan's Friday piece:

The Irish and British governments openly fingered the IRA, sending Northern Ireland's already foundering peace process completely off the rails.

The great "liberal" paper that The New York Times is supposed to be (but isn't) is spinning this story with no concern over the peace process, with no concern that they are taking a match to kerosene. In their efforts to advance neo-liberal markets and the Bully Boy's stance, they are perfectly willing to set the stage for a blood bath in Ireland.

Who's the bully?

Having failed in your efforts to prompt outrage over allegations of a bank robbery, you now rush in with the poor McCartney sisters and try to put a face on your attacks against the IRA, Sinn Fein and Gerry Adams which you expand into an attack on honest intellectual exploration.

You have no shame. Here at The Third Estate we don't think you'll change. You've never changed. You've always run your little clamp downs.

We don't think you'll ever get better because you've never gotten better.

You are useless and we'd argue the sooner you move to a for-pay site, the better. At last the "reach" of the paper will cease and without that "reach" you'll fold quickly.

You were saved from economic problems in the past by investors who wanted to clamp down on a progressive spirit sweeping the country. You did that very well. You continue to do it.

You will lie about anything and anyone and you will never take accountability.

You will create lies about Congress woman Cynthia McKinney. When called on it, your reporter will claim that the remarks attributed to McKinney are in the Congressional Record. They weren't, they aren't. But you just go on lying.

Let's go to Greg Palast via AlterNet:

The New York Times' Lynette Clemetson revealed her comments went even further over the edge: "Ms. McKinney suggest[ed] that President Bush might have known about the September 11 attacks but did nothing so his supporters could make money in a war."
That’s loony, all right. As an editor of the highly respected Atlanta Journal Constitution told NPR, McKinney’s "practically accused the President of murder!"
Problem is, McKinney never said it.
That's right. The "quote" from McKinney is a complete fabrication. A whopper, a fabulous fib, a fake, a flim-flam. Just freakin' made up.
Hi, Lynette. My name is Greg Palast, and I wanted to follow up on a story of yours. It says, let's see, after the opening -- it's about Cynthia McKinney -- it's dated Washington byline August 21. "McKinney’s [opponent] capitalized on the furor caused by Miss McKinney's suggestion this year that President Bush might have known about the September 11 attacks but did nothing so his supporters could make money in a war." Now, I have been trying my darndest to find this phrase . . . I can't. . .
Lynette Clemetson, New York Times: Did you search the Atlanta Journal Constitution?
Yes, but I haven’t been able to find that statement.
I’ve heard that statement--it was all over the place.
I know it was all over the place, except no one can find it and that's why I'm concerned. Now did you see the statement in the Atlanta Journal Constitution?
Yeah....
[Note: No such direct quote from McKinney can be found in the Atlanta Journal Constitution.]
And did you confirm this with McKinney?
Well, I worked with her office. The statement is from the floor of the House [of Representatives].... Right?
So did you check the statement from the Floor of the House?
I mean I wouldn't have done the story. . . . Have you looked at House transcripts?
Yes. Did you check that?
Of course.
You did check it?
[Note: No such McKinney statement can be found in the transcripts or other records of the House of Representatives.]
I think you have to go back to the House transcripts.... I mean it was all over the place at the time.
Yes, this is one fact the Times reporter didn't fake: The McKinney "quote" was, indeed, all over the place: in the Washington Post, National Public Radio, and needless to say, all the other metropolitan dailies--everywhere but in Congresswoman McKinney's mouth.
Nor was it in the Congressional Record, nor in any recorded talk, nor on her Website, nor in any of her radio talks. Here's the Congresswoman’s statement from the record:
"George Bush had no prior knowledge of the plan to attack the World Trade Center on September 11."
Oh.

You want to talk about bullies?

Every now and then the paper will toss out the sop of "printer error" and "editorial error" and we're supposed to see that as the paper being responsive. It's not.

And why have they never corrected referring to Sinead O'Connor as "Mr. O'Connor?"

How did that even make it into print? The attacks on Irish Catholics seem more and more to be part of pattern dovetailing nicely with the lack of respect for working class men and women.

They are unresponsive and useless. C.I. mentioned The New York Post pre-Murdoch. We didn't know it was ever any different. So we went to the rolled film at the library and checked day by day for two weeks comparing you with The New York Post owned by Dorothy Schiff.

Know what we found? The Times didn't cover the working class issues then. So people who think that somehow the paper will suddenly start to move beyond its elitism or find some dedication to the truth are kidding themselves or just don't know the facts.

Saying the paper is the alternative to the Murdoch-owned-Post is like saying Joe Lieberman is the alternative to the Bully Boy.

In Post Cards From the Edge, Debbie Reynolds scolds daughter Merly Streep with the possibility that she might have been raised by Joan Crawford or Lana Turner to which
Streep cracks, "These are the alternatives!"

Exactly. These aren't alternatives. And The Times isn't a choice, not a real one.

The right has a paper in New York City, The New York Post. The left has no paper. When we hear people praise The Times for their coverage of social security currently, we can't help but remember that the house organ has historically taken part in the trashing of social security.
But no apologies for that either because they don't apologize and they don't take responsibility.

Bill Keller can whine about attacks and it's true that a lot of the rage shouldn't be aimed at him.
The problems predate Keller. The roots take hold long before Keller breathed his first breath.
But when he dismisses critics of the paper he fails to grasp that the paper of record has a long record that reads like a criminal's rap sheet.

The Times never got honest about that and never will because the committment isn't to telling the truth, it's to managing people. That's why it attracted the investments that bailed it out in the first place. When people argue that the paper can change, they are ignoring the realities of the reason the paper has continued to exist.

No, it can't all be laid at Keller's doorstep. He's an outside flunky running a family business and taking all the heat for things beyond his control. But the reality is The New York Times is beyond any editor's control.

They can (and did) attack the BBC for breaking the truth about the "rescue" of Jessica Lynch.
And they feel no one notices so they can get away with it. Like they got away with Whitewater,
like they got away with the attacks on Wen Ho Lee, like they get away with everything.

This isn't a paper that reports reality, this is a paper that attempts to manage opinion. The sooner it moves to a for-pay site and loses its readership the better. We agree with BuzzFlash's recent coverage of The New York Timid. We agree with Gore Vidal's longterm criticism as well.
Can we get one real paper in this country? The New York Timid sure ain't it.

If not Death to the Grey Lady, then certainly Retirement! And may she end up on one of the shoddy pension programs she advocated in the eighties and early nineties.