A sub-headline on the lead, front-page article in today's New York Times reads, "The War's Biggest Clash." If it's the war's biggest clash, how come it rates only a one-column headline instead of the banner treatment that the war's less-than-biggest clashes got? And wouldn't the enemy attack on September 11, 2001, qualify as the war's biggest clash?
Valentine To Barghouti: A dispatch from Ramallah in the international section of today's New York Times profiles a Palestinian Arab terrorist leader named Marwan Barghouti. The Times reports, "Mr. Barghouti favors attacking Israeli soldiers and settlers in the West Bank and Gaza Strip, the lands Israel occupied in the 1967 war. He opposes suicide bombings and other attacks within pre-1967 Israel, and he recognizes Israel's right to exist." The Times here displays an astonishing ability to read Mr. Barghouti's mind. It would be less naive, more skeptical and more newspaper-like to report: "Mr. Barghouti says he favors attacking Israeli soldiers and settlers in the West Bank and Gaza Strip, the lands Israel occupied in the 1967 war. He says he opposes suicide bombings and other attacks within pre-1967 Israel, and he says he recognizes Israel's right to exist." The Times news department, unless it has developed mind-reading ability, has no way of knowing whether Mr. Barghouti genuinely opposes suicide bombings within pre-1967 Israel or genuinely recognizes Israel's right to exist. There are plenty of Palestinian Arab leaders, such as Yasser Arafat, who claim to Western audiences in English that they recognize Israel's right to exist but who pursue policies -- such as advocating that Israel retreat to indefensible borders and accept waves of Palestinian Arab "refugees" -- that would have the practical effect of destroying Israel's existence.
Paid to Dig Dirt: A "news analysis" (the other stories are certified analysis-free) in the national section of today's New York Times identifies David Brock as "a journalist who was paid to dig up anti-Clinton stories in the mid-1990's." Journalists are, by definition, people who are paid to dig up stories, so the sentence is a bit silly. The Washington bureau of the New York Times itself contained, in the mid-1990s, journalists who were paid to dig up anti-Clinton stories. Today it contains journalists who are paid to dig up anti-Bush stories and anti-Enron stories. There aren't many good journalists who are willing to dig up stories without being paid. Smartertimes.com isn't suggesting that is the assignment in the Times Washington bureau -- "go out and dig up some anti-Bush stories and anti-Enron stories," the editor growled -- but a journalist who is paid to dig up stories about President Bush or about Enron is bound to come up with at least one or two that could be described as anti-Bush or anti-Enron.