Jesus, everytime I head over to Slate to check the the news or seethe with rage at Christophen Hitchen's
mind-bogglingly tenuous gasp on reality, I see another one of the "kausfiles" warning of the evil afoot at the Times website. Though I agree with him that Times Select is a magnificently bone-headed move on the part of the paper, just let it play out. It's going to crash and burn, with the potential for new voices to come out of the ashes, but it's not the enormous phase-shift he's making it out to be. Nor do I agree with his
assertion that should Times Select succeed, the nation's most influential commentators will shift to the right, as most people will no longer have access to the NYT's commentators. Influential commentators are a result of excellent writing, wit, and intelligence. While most right-leaning commentators have the advantage of copious amounts of hot air as well as controversial/confrontational stances/comments, there are only a few (see Hitchen, above) who are eloquent and intelligent enough to bother responding or engaging them. That fact, along with a predisposition among the online population toward higher levels of education, leaves me with little doubt that those individuals who take up the torch from the NYT's commentators probably won't have Rush Limbaugh as an idol or think that Roberts is a particularly swell guy.
Once again, I am proud to be out of Pennsylvania, where the Dover school board has succeeded in embarassing the entire state once more- Good job, guys! Let's just hope they get the smack-down they so richly deserve now that they have left Pennsyltuckey and entered onto the national stage.
Also, in a hat tip to my friend Mikey Utah, it's good to see that his State is still as
fascist as he left it. Way to go, SLC and suburbs!
Why do I ignore reality? Because acknowledging it makes me cry.
