Back in the spring of this year, The New York Times ran an obituary of a certain infamous individual that began with these words: "Osama bin Laden, who was killed in Pakistan on Sunday, was a son of the Saudi elite whose radical violent campaign to re-create a seventh-century Muslim empire redefined the threat of terrorism for the 21st century."
click
Now, they probably didn't mean to say that it is the Saudi elite in general whose radical violent campaign to recreate etc. has redefined the threat of terrorism for the 21st century.
This was, after all, an obit for Osama in particular, and they were saying that he is deserving of historic attention because of his own radical violent campaign, etc.
Or at least that's what they seem likely to have been trying to say! This is a classic instance (perhaps!) of the grammatical mistake known as a misplaced modifier. The phrase "son of the Saudi elite" is intended as a modifier for Osama bin Laden, but is misplaced so it looks like the "Saudi elite" is the subject on which the rest of the sentence is predicated.
They could have avoided the double-takes if they had written, say, "A son of the Saudi elite, Osama bin Laden, was killed in Pakistan on Sunday, ending his radical, violent campaign....which redefined...."
But my Machiavellian streak suggests that maybe this isn't carelessness, maybe they did mean to indict the whole Saudi elite, under the guise of an obit for an individual.
Showing posts with label The New York Times. Show all posts
Showing posts with label The New York Times. Show all posts
25 August 2011
05 June 2011
Jill Abramson
Congratulations to Jill Abramson for her new gig. This week, she was named the next executive editor of The New York Times, effective in September.
She's replacing Bill Keller who is himself staying on as a columnist. Keller became executive editor after the Jayson Blair scandal drove out his precursor, Howell Raines, in 2003.
For those with short memories, in late April of that year the San Antonio Express-News discovered a blatant instance of plagiarism, and The New York Times responded with an internal investigation which led to a voluminous record of the plagiarisms and sheer inventions of one of its reporters, Jayson Blair, fraud which tainted at least 36 articles. There was some back-and-forth at the time about who would take the fall. In early June, though, Raines left, and that July, Keller replaced him.
Felix Salmon has congratulated the publisher Arthur Sulzberger for "orchestrating this necessary handover in a very smooth and professional manner." In Salmon's view, and those of others it was necessary because of Keller's aversion to any technology that doesn't involve killing trees.
Let's get back to Abramson! She has the distinction of having testified, in response to a subpoena, as part of the defense of Scooter Libby. She was The Times' DC bureau chief at the time of the whole sideshow over Valerie Plame. Defense counsel asked her whether she spoke with Judy Miller at that time about reporting on piece on "whether Joe Wilson's wife works for the CIA?"
The defense was apparently hoping she would say "absolutely not," thus discrediting Miller's version of events.
She responded, "I have no recollection of such a conversation," which was less than they wanted. And, of course, Libby was convicted.
She's replacing Bill Keller who is himself staying on as a columnist. Keller became executive editor after the Jayson Blair scandal drove out his precursor, Howell Raines, in 2003.
For those with short memories, in late April of that year the San Antonio Express-News discovered a blatant instance of plagiarism, and The New York Times responded with an internal investigation which led to a voluminous record of the plagiarisms and sheer inventions of one of its reporters, Jayson Blair, fraud which tainted at least 36 articles. There was some back-and-forth at the time about who would take the fall. In early June, though, Raines left, and that July, Keller replaced him.
Felix Salmon has congratulated the publisher Arthur Sulzberger for "orchestrating this necessary handover in a very smooth and professional manner." In Salmon's view, and those of others it was necessary because of Keller's aversion to any technology that doesn't involve killing trees.
Let's get back to Abramson! She has the distinction of having testified, in response to a subpoena, as part of the defense of Scooter Libby. She was The Times' DC bureau chief at the time of the whole sideshow over Valerie Plame. Defense counsel asked her whether she spoke with Judy Miller at that time about reporting on piece on "whether Joe Wilson's wife works for the CIA?"
The defense was apparently hoping she would say "absolutely not," thus discrediting Miller's version of events.
She responded, "I have no recollection of such a conversation," which was less than they wanted. And, of course, Libby was convicted.
26 May 2011
Novastar Financial
Anybody remember Novastar? It was big news in 2004, and then again in 2007.
It was a subprime lender that used a controversial accounting system called gain-on- sale, a system that was a red flag for short seller attention.
Novastar Financial was an enthusiastic participant in the housing/mortgage bubble of a time that already seems long ago. Gretchen Morgenson and Joshua Rosner have rescued Novastar from oblivion in their new book, RECKLESS ENDANGERMENT.
Here is a link to an excerpt from that book.
In 2004, at a time when the company's stock was worth $70, the Wall Street Journal printed a very well-written analytical story questioning the basis for its whole business model, which was offering high-risk loans to people with a poor credit record. Put so baldly as that, it seems obviously wrong. But somehow, at the time, that had to be said -- and the WSJ was sharply criticized for saying it.
The company took a stock price hit after the WSJ story came out, but for the most part continued along nicely (the "rising tide" of that era lifting all boats, including the least seaworthy) until February 2007, when it announced in its fourth quarter 2006 results a loss of $14.4 million, which was $0.39 a share. The general expectation had been a gain for the quarter of $0.73 a share. I'll do the arithmetic for you -- that's a difference of $1.12 a share, a heck of a failure to 'meet the number.'
Failing to meet the number by itself is not necessarily fatal. But in this case the attendent circumstances so perfectly confirmed what the shorts had been saying for three years -- that it had been meeting its numbers until then only by trickery which could not be sustained indefinitely -- that the end came very quickly.
During the period 2004-07, Novastar had a persistent message-board cheerleader who called himself sometimes Bob O'Brien, sometimes Easter Bunny. On a couple of occasions Bob the Bunny posted a list of the "most common basher myths," for example the "myth" that NovaStar was paying out in dividends more than it was earning, which was not sustainable. That "myth," like several of the others, happened to be true, but the Easter Bunny (who really is a myth -- oh nomenclatural irony, where is thy sting!) explained how to "debunk" it with various evasions about GAPP versus the IRS etc.
In February 2007, when Novastar made that disastrous fourth quarter disclosure, O'Brien finally saw the light. "I've been duped!" he cried! Not so much as a matter of expressing regret for the role he had played in duping others ... more a matter of ... what would you call it? ... whining.
He wrote this: "I have been body-slammed by this. Many of my friends are devastated by this. Some of my relatives, too. Personally, you bet. Very expensive lesson: Don't bet more than you can afford to lose. And don't bluff. I will not be buying anymore stocks in the U.S. markets, that's for sure. I'm quite done now. This casino has lost its allure."
Thus the grave has its victory. A story worth remembering.
It was a subprime lender that used a controversial accounting system called gain-on- sale, a system that was a red flag for short seller attention.
Novastar Financial was an enthusiastic participant in the housing/mortgage bubble of a time that already seems long ago. Gretchen Morgenson and Joshua Rosner have rescued Novastar from oblivion in their new book, RECKLESS ENDANGERMENT.
Here is a link to an excerpt from that book.
In 2004, at a time when the company's stock was worth $70, the Wall Street Journal printed a very well-written analytical story questioning the basis for its whole business model, which was offering high-risk loans to people with a poor credit record. Put so baldly as that, it seems obviously wrong. But somehow, at the time, that had to be said -- and the WSJ was sharply criticized for saying it.
The company took a stock price hit after the WSJ story came out, but for the most part continued along nicely (the "rising tide" of that era lifting all boats, including the least seaworthy) until February 2007, when it announced in its fourth quarter 2006 results a loss of $14.4 million, which was $0.39 a share. The general expectation had been a gain for the quarter of $0.73 a share. I'll do the arithmetic for you -- that's a difference of $1.12 a share, a heck of a failure to 'meet the number.'
Failing to meet the number by itself is not necessarily fatal. But in this case the attendent circumstances so perfectly confirmed what the shorts had been saying for three years -- that it had been meeting its numbers until then only by trickery which could not be sustained indefinitely -- that the end came very quickly.
During the period 2004-07, Novastar had a persistent message-board cheerleader who called himself sometimes Bob O'Brien, sometimes Easter Bunny. On a couple of occasions Bob the Bunny posted a list of the "most common basher myths," for example the "myth" that NovaStar was paying out in dividends more than it was earning, which was not sustainable. That "myth," like several of the others, happened to be true, but the Easter Bunny (who really is a myth -- oh nomenclatural irony, where is thy sting!) explained how to "debunk" it with various evasions about GAPP versus the IRS etc.
In February 2007, when Novastar made that disastrous fourth quarter disclosure, O'Brien finally saw the light. "I've been duped!" he cried! Not so much as a matter of expressing regret for the role he had played in duping others ... more a matter of ... what would you call it? ... whining.
He wrote this: "I have been body-slammed by this. Many of my friends are devastated by this. Some of my relatives, too. Personally, you bet. Very expensive lesson: Don't bet more than you can afford to lose. And don't bluff. I will not be buying anymore stocks in the U.S. markets, that's for sure. I'm quite done now. This casino has lost its allure."
Thus the grave has its victory. A story worth remembering.
15 October 2010
Conflict of Interest? Gibberish
The New York Times worries about ethics. Okay, stop laughing. They worry about what they consider to be ethical principles, anyway.
This leads to such absurdities as you'll see here.
"In the Talking Business column in Business Day on Saturday, Joe Nocera wrote about a lawsuit by Oracle against a division of SAP, claiming theft of intellectual property. Mr. Nocera learned after the column was published that Oracle was represented by the law firm of Boies, Schiller & Flexner, where his fiancée works as director of communications. To avoid the appearance of a conflict of interest, Mr. Nocera would not have written about the case if he had known of the law firm’s involvement."
It sounds like they're trying to be nice to Joe, while giving him some sort of slap on the wrist. Would someone explain to me why the slap?
Suppose that Nocera had been aware of the rather indirect connection between himself and Oracle discussed here. It sounds like the game of "six degrees of Kevin Bacon" or however many degrees its supposed to be. But never mind that.
Suppose Nocera had known and had written exactly the same column anyway.
Here is the offending column.
Now: what would Nocera have done wrong?
Talking Business is an opinion column. It has always been an opinion column. If you want a just-the-facts type of story -- don't read it. Nocera isn't twisting your arm into reading his opinion. If you read Nocera (and you should, he understands business and he writes well) -- it is because you expect and desire his particular slant on business news.
So; who friggin' cares where his fiancee works? He hasn't even tied the knot yet. Besides, the law firm she works for, Boies, Schiller & Flexner, is huge. It represents lots of companies that someone like Nocera will write about. So let him write about them.
The way people get twisted around pretending that any significant piece of writing is not advocacy is just astounding.
This leads to such absurdities as you'll see here.
"In the Talking Business column in Business Day on Saturday, Joe Nocera wrote about a lawsuit by Oracle against a division of SAP, claiming theft of intellectual property. Mr. Nocera learned after the column was published that Oracle was represented by the law firm of Boies, Schiller & Flexner, where his fiancée works as director of communications. To avoid the appearance of a conflict of interest, Mr. Nocera would not have written about the case if he had known of the law firm’s involvement."
It sounds like they're trying to be nice to Joe, while giving him some sort of slap on the wrist. Would someone explain to me why the slap?
Suppose that Nocera had been aware of the rather indirect connection between himself and Oracle discussed here. It sounds like the game of "six degrees of Kevin Bacon" or however many degrees its supposed to be. But never mind that.
Suppose Nocera had known and had written exactly the same column anyway.
Here is the offending column.
Now: what would Nocera have done wrong?
Talking Business is an opinion column. It has always been an opinion column. If you want a just-the-facts type of story -- don't read it. Nocera isn't twisting your arm into reading his opinion. If you read Nocera (and you should, he understands business and he writes well) -- it is because you expect and desire his particular slant on business news.
So; who friggin' cares where his fiancee works? He hasn't even tied the knot yet. Besides, the law firm she works for, Boies, Schiller & Flexner, is huge. It represents lots of companies that someone like Nocera will write about. So let him write about them.
The way people get twisted around pretending that any significant piece of writing is not advocacy is just astounding.
14 October 2010
Today's Random Quotes
This is from RIGHT STAR RISING: A NEW POLITICS, 1974-1980, by Laura Kalman.
Richard Viguerie and his "new right" first displayed their political clout, she tells us, in a surprising way, in 1975.
They "forced [President] Ford to renege on his pledge to support legislation that would have enlarged the right of unions to picket construction sites. The President had not known what hit him when nearly three-quarters of a million letters and postcards deluged the White House demanding a veto of the common situs picketing bill. At first, only the construction industry lobbied against the bill, but then Ford's staff noticed that a broad spectrum of opponents had mobilized. Antiunion businessmen had been brought aboard by the appeals of the National Right to Work Committee, a client of Viguerie's. Reagan opposed the bill, too, and the New York Times reported that Ford had developed the 'fear that if he lost any more of his conservatrive Republican support, he might not get his party's Presidential nominatioin.' Trapped, Ford caved at the end of 1975 and vetoed legislation that the AFL-CIO had sought for more than twenty years, that he had pledged to support, and that his own secretary of labor, Harvard economist John Dunlop, had drafted. Dunlop resigned in protest, and George Meaney called Ford a weakling who 'ran out' on his promises."
Question: why does she write about the New York Times?
Shouldn't it be The New York Times?
Anyway, here is another quotation from later in the same book. What happened once the Democrats took office? With no Republican around to veto anymore, surely common situs picketing became law, right?
"The Democratic Congress also narrowly defeated the common situs picketing legislation enlarging the right of unions to picket construction sites that candidate Carter had pledged to sign. (That President Carter did not press for it spoke volumes.) Eleven Democrats who had voted for the common situs legislation in 1975, when Ford vetoed it, now opposed it."
Richard Viguerie and his "new right" first displayed their political clout, she tells us, in a surprising way, in 1975.
They "forced [President] Ford to renege on his pledge to support legislation that would have enlarged the right of unions to picket construction sites. The President had not known what hit him when nearly three-quarters of a million letters and postcards deluged the White House demanding a veto of the common situs picketing bill. At first, only the construction industry lobbied against the bill, but then Ford's staff noticed that a broad spectrum of opponents had mobilized. Antiunion businessmen had been brought aboard by the appeals of the National Right to Work Committee, a client of Viguerie's. Reagan opposed the bill, too, and the New York Times reported that Ford had developed the 'fear that if he lost any more of his conservatrive Republican support, he might not get his party's Presidential nominatioin.' Trapped, Ford caved at the end of 1975 and vetoed legislation that the AFL-CIO had sought for more than twenty years, that he had pledged to support, and that his own secretary of labor, Harvard economist John Dunlop, had drafted. Dunlop resigned in protest, and George Meaney called Ford a weakling who 'ran out' on his promises."
Question: why does she write about the New York Times?
Shouldn't it be The New York Times?
Anyway, here is another quotation from later in the same book. What happened once the Democrats took office? With no Republican around to veto anymore, surely common situs picketing became law, right?
"The Democratic Congress also narrowly defeated the common situs picketing legislation enlarging the right of unions to picket construction sites that candidate Carter had pledged to sign. (That President Carter did not press for it spoke volumes.) Eleven Democrats who had voted for the common situs legislation in 1975, when Ford vetoed it, now opposed it."
20 February 2010
Zachery Kouwe
The latest case of looking over the shoulders of the guy in the desk in front of you involves Zachery Kouwe, a New York Times business reporter who has plagiarized shamelessly.
The paper in an editors' note on Valentines Day didn't use the p word, but it did say the editors had found "cases of extensive overlap between passages in Mr. Kouwe’s articles and other news organizations’. (The search did not turn up any indications that the articles were inaccurate.)"
Personally, I am always more saddened by reporters who copy the work of their colleagues than I am by reporters who make stuff up, Stephen-Glass style. I am more put off, you might say, by the inadequacy of imagination than by its excess. Staying true to the facts, while finding a fresh way to express them, that is always the double challenge of the non-fiction writer in general.
Not long ago it was fashionable to talk about the "death of the author." That was a literary-critical theory born on the left bank of the Seine, yet later nurtured under the shade of the elms lining the streets of New Haven, Conn. It taught that when properly deconstructred by clever critics, all texts refer to other texts -- indeed, all texts merge into one big text. Authors just disappear from the account.
Fortunately, the author seems to have been resurrected, even in academia. Now it is even more important than before that Paschal-event that authors, of all sorts, respect their own calling and that of their colleagues.
Kouwe was immediately suspended and then, on Tuesday (Mardi Gras -- two days after the Valentines Day announcement -- should we be drawing some sort of symbolic conclusions from these intruding holidays?) met with editors and union reps to discuss possible disciplinary action. Apparently, Kouwe decided to save them the trouble of further proceedings and resigned.
You can find particulars here.
The paper in an editors' note on Valentines Day didn't use the p word, but it did say the editors had found "cases of extensive overlap between passages in Mr. Kouwe’s articles and other news organizations’. (The search did not turn up any indications that the articles were inaccurate.)"
Personally, I am always more saddened by reporters who copy the work of their colleagues than I am by reporters who make stuff up, Stephen-Glass style. I am more put off, you might say, by the inadequacy of imagination than by its excess. Staying true to the facts, while finding a fresh way to express them, that is always the double challenge of the non-fiction writer in general.
Not long ago it was fashionable to talk about the "death of the author." That was a literary-critical theory born on the left bank of the Seine, yet later nurtured under the shade of the elms lining the streets of New Haven, Conn. It taught that when properly deconstructred by clever critics, all texts refer to other texts -- indeed, all texts merge into one big text. Authors just disappear from the account.
Fortunately, the author seems to have been resurrected, even in academia. Now it is even more important than before that Paschal-event that authors, of all sorts, respect their own calling and that of their colleagues.
Kouwe was immediately suspended and then, on Tuesday (Mardi Gras -- two days after the Valentines Day announcement -- should we be drawing some sort of symbolic conclusions from these intruding holidays?) met with editors and union reps to discuss possible disciplinary action. Apparently, Kouwe decided to save them the trouble of further proceedings and resigned.
You can find particulars here.
08 October 2009
The Last Tycoons
I was skimming, recently, through a book off one of my shelves, called The Last Tycoons (2007) by William D. Cohan. The book takes us in an unexpectedly compelling way through the history of Lazard Freres & Co., the investment banking partnership founded back in the late 1840s, just in time to benefit from the flow of gold out of California -- and that continued as a partnership until 2005, when it succumbed to the logic of the corporate form and an IPO.
Anyway, I found a tidbit in this book that rather diverted the flow of my own stream of consciousness. Lazard was deeply involved in the ITT/Dita Beard scandal of the Nixon years, a matter discussed here in some detail.
When the SEC's investigation of that was finally resolved in a settlement, in October 1976, The New York Times took note of the fact in a brief inside story (p. 78) by Judith Miller.
Judith Miller? This appears to be the same Judith Miller whose more recent career is associated with "weapons of mass destruction" and imprisonment to protect Scooter Libby.
At any rate, back in '76 she wrote a 408 page story about a twenty-six page settlement agreement. Her story said that the document sheds "new light on one of the most complex and controversial mergers in corporate history," but her story doesn't say anything about what if anything that light revealed.
What that light revealed was a series of confusing machinations that apparently allowed Lazard to pull well over $4 million in fees out of this one transaction, by structuring it as several transactions and charging separately, so that the deal became as Cohan calls it "the gift that keeps on giving."
It is all under the bridge now, but Miller's involvement, and her much recent headline-worthiness in her own right, makes it intriguing.
Anyway, I found a tidbit in this book that rather diverted the flow of my own stream of consciousness. Lazard was deeply involved in the ITT/Dita Beard scandal of the Nixon years, a matter discussed here in some detail.
When the SEC's investigation of that was finally resolved in a settlement, in October 1976, The New York Times took note of the fact in a brief inside story (p. 78) by Judith Miller.
Judith Miller? This appears to be the same Judith Miller whose more recent career is associated with "weapons of mass destruction" and imprisonment to protect Scooter Libby.
At any rate, back in '76 she wrote a 408 page story about a twenty-six page settlement agreement. Her story said that the document sheds "new light on one of the most complex and controversial mergers in corporate history," but her story doesn't say anything about what if anything that light revealed.
What that light revealed was a series of confusing machinations that apparently allowed Lazard to pull well over $4 million in fees out of this one transaction, by structuring it as several transactions and charging separately, so that the deal became as Cohan calls it "the gift that keeps on giving."
It is all under the bridge now, but Miller's involvement, and her much recent headline-worthiness in her own right, makes it intriguing.
27 August 2009
Ben Stein: Yahoo
Now that he's gone from The New York Times, we are of course going to have to keep track of Stein's other platforms more vigorously in order to sustain the viability of our humble Ben Stein Watch.
Fortunately for this feature, though perhaps unfortunately for other purposes, he has plenty. I'm looking just now at his Yahoo column.
On August 7, 2009, he wrote there a column titled, "Congrats, Bankers, You're Rich Again." Actually, they were never not rich, although the marginal people and institutions among their investor base became much less rich, as did their rank-and-file employees. But if "bankers" refers to the bigwigs, they weren't unrich even through the worst of the recent crisis.
Still, one knows what he means by the sentiment of that title, which is carried throughin the column. He means that the subsidization of banks in the final months of the old administration and the early months of this one was a bad, idea, qa classic case of lemon socialism, of government taking up the costs of the losers of an economy at taxpayer expense, thereby rewarding what Ben calls their "obscenely selfish behavior."
These sentiments seem unobjectionable. Indeed, I heartily share them. But they ought to come with some element of mea culpa. Because Ben was one of the great cheerleaders for the very subsidization against which he now rails.
Watch his screamathon with Neil Cavuto, for example. They are talking over each other through most of this clip, so you may have a tough time. But skip foward to about 1:50 in the clip. Stein is saying: "We go in for as much federal stimulus as it takes to keep us out of a Great Depression ... We've got to commit even more," and so forth.
That was the argument of the subsidization. That is always the argument. So he is now shouting "boo" to a bandwagon on which he was a rider back in the day.
He is entitled to "boo" that bandwagon. If he has changed his mind, I am happy to see it. But a "mea culpa" or two would be welcome.
Fortunately for this feature, though perhaps unfortunately for other purposes, he has plenty. I'm looking just now at his Yahoo column.
On August 7, 2009, he wrote there a column titled, "Congrats, Bankers, You're Rich Again." Actually, they were never not rich, although the marginal people and institutions among their investor base became much less rich, as did their rank-and-file employees. But if "bankers" refers to the bigwigs, they weren't unrich even through the worst of the recent crisis.
Still, one knows what he means by the sentiment of that title, which is carried throughin the column. He means that the subsidization of banks in the final months of the old administration and the early months of this one was a bad, idea, qa classic case of lemon socialism, of government taking up the costs of the losers of an economy at taxpayer expense, thereby rewarding what Ben calls their "obscenely selfish behavior."
These sentiments seem unobjectionable. Indeed, I heartily share them. But they ought to come with some element of mea culpa. Because Ben was one of the great cheerleaders for the very subsidization against which he now rails.
Watch his screamathon with Neil Cavuto, for example. They are talking over each other through most of this clip, so you may have a tough time. But skip foward to about 1:50 in the clip. Stein is saying: "We go in for as much federal stimulus as it takes to keep us out of a Great Depression ... We've got to commit even more," and so forth.
That was the argument of the subsidization. That is always the argument. So he is now shouting "boo" to a bandwagon on which he was a rider back in the day.
He is entitled to "boo" that bandwagon. If he has changed his mind, I am happy to see it. But a "mea culpa" or two would be welcome.
13 August 2009
Ben Stein Watch: now The Times is Free (of him)
Ben Stein has been fired from The New York Times. Perhaps "fired" is not exactly the right word, since Stein was never on the payroll in the first place. His formal relationship was that of a regularly featured free-lancer. That relationship, at any rate, has come to a close.
On Thursday, August 6, the Times released a statement that said: "Ben Stein's fine work for us as a columnist for Sunday Business had to end, we told him, after we learned that he had become a commercial spokesman for FreeScore, a financial services company. Ben didn't understand when he signed on with FreeScore that this might pose a potential conflict for him as a contributing columnist for the Times, because he hadn't written about credit scores or this company. But, we decided that being a commercial spokesman for FreeScore while writing his column wouldn't be appropriate.
"We are sorry to lose him as a columnist, and appreciate his work for the Times over the years."
He was never doing "fine work" for them as a columnist, and they're probably clever enough to be happy he's gone, not "sorry to lose him." So let's get the FreeScore stuff out of the way.
FreeScore tells people that it will get them their credit SCORE for free. And that is true. But the credit score is just a number, and for most people is not very useful. If you have a low credit number and you suspect it is based on faulty information in your credit reports, you want the credit report, not the number. And FreeScore is in the business of selling you the report (which you could get elsewhere for free). It is in short a bait-and-switch operation to get money from suckers.
Ben Stein is entitled to shill for a bait-and-switch operation if he wants. Likewise, the Times is entitled to stop running his columns for that reason or other reason. "Good reason, bad reason, or no reason at all" will suffice to terminate a free-lance column. The subject doesn't especially interest me.
The relationship ought rightly to have been terminated long before, and on weightier grounds. For The New York Times found itself with a business columnist who doesn't appear to have known diddly about business. Perhaps (to interpret the matter charitably) they realized this and thought the situation awkward. Perhaps they used the "credit report" thing as an elegant way out of the awkward situation. It is good to think so. At least, he has lost that platform.
Why was he so bad? Well, let's go back to January 2008, when Ben Stein invented the label "trader realism" in an effort to make himself seem profound. Wow, a new theory of finance. Trader realism! There just was no there there. Even in the 21st century, when dead-tree newspapers increasingly seem anachronistic anyway, trees should not die for this little!
The gist of that silly column (which began with discussion of the meatloaf that Stein used to eat at the kitchen table with his economist father Herb), is that professional traders, (like judges in the "legal realism" model) start from their desired conclusion, and work backward to rig up the necessary premises.
"Traders can see masses of data any minute of any day. They can find data to support hitting the 'buy' button or the 'sell' button. They don’t act on the basis of what seems to them the real economic situation, but on what’s in it for them."
Of course, classical economists would say, traders act on what's in it for them! So does everybody in the system, at least according to the classical model Stein may think he's refuting here. The difference may be this: Stein thinks the decision whether a "sell" or a "buy" has more "in it for them" has a non-rational, even an irrational, element based on, say, the corporate politics of the broker-dealer, quirks of bonus policies, idiosyncratic personalities.
A classicist who doesn't wish to conform to stereotype too tightly can of course acknowledge that traders sometimes act in ways hard to model. Still, those who consistently act on irrational factors will lose money. They won't stay in business for long. And if there are a lot of traders, and a lot of trading going on, then the irrational aspects are factored out within the whole system, the noise is filtered out and the market conveys information efficiently.
Stein's reason for believing this model is wrong and his "trader realism" has pierced a veil? An uncheckable anecdote. A "close friend of mine, now deceased," who used to be a trader in London for a major financial house, told him a story about shorting IBM on a dare from the boss, and then geting on the phone to spread rumors, talking down the price of IBM so his short position would pay off.
That's it. After the household meatloaf, the law school memories, the trader/judge analogy, we get around to a theory based on a single recollected story from one unnamed person who has shuffled off the mortal coil. Wow! On such evidence, many people seem to believe that Elvis continues to walk about and order Slurpees at various Quickie Marts.
He should have been fired after that. His performance as a "business columnist" got worse, not better, thereafter. He went from a zero into the deep negative numbers.
Sorry, Ben. Glad you're gone.
On Thursday, August 6, the Times released a statement that said: "Ben Stein's fine work for us as a columnist for Sunday Business had to end, we told him, after we learned that he had become a commercial spokesman for FreeScore, a financial services company. Ben didn't understand when he signed on with FreeScore that this might pose a potential conflict for him as a contributing columnist for the Times, because he hadn't written about credit scores or this company. But, we decided that being a commercial spokesman for FreeScore while writing his column wouldn't be appropriate.
"We are sorry to lose him as a columnist, and appreciate his work for the Times over the years."
He was never doing "fine work" for them as a columnist, and they're probably clever enough to be happy he's gone, not "sorry to lose him." So let's get the FreeScore stuff out of the way.
FreeScore tells people that it will get them their credit SCORE for free. And that is true. But the credit score is just a number, and for most people is not very useful. If you have a low credit number and you suspect it is based on faulty information in your credit reports, you want the credit report, not the number. And FreeScore is in the business of selling you the report (which you could get elsewhere for free). It is in short a bait-and-switch operation to get money from suckers.
Ben Stein is entitled to shill for a bait-and-switch operation if he wants. Likewise, the Times is entitled to stop running his columns for that reason or other reason. "Good reason, bad reason, or no reason at all" will suffice to terminate a free-lance column. The subject doesn't especially interest me.
The relationship ought rightly to have been terminated long before, and on weightier grounds. For The New York Times found itself with a business columnist who doesn't appear to have known diddly about business. Perhaps (to interpret the matter charitably) they realized this and thought the situation awkward. Perhaps they used the "credit report" thing as an elegant way out of the awkward situation. It is good to think so. At least, he has lost that platform.
Why was he so bad? Well, let's go back to January 2008, when Ben Stein invented the label "trader realism" in an effort to make himself seem profound. Wow, a new theory of finance. Trader realism! There just was no there there. Even in the 21st century, when dead-tree newspapers increasingly seem anachronistic anyway, trees should not die for this little!
The gist of that silly column (which began with discussion of the meatloaf that Stein used to eat at the kitchen table with his economist father Herb), is that professional traders, (like judges in the "legal realism" model) start from their desired conclusion, and work backward to rig up the necessary premises.
"Traders can see masses of data any minute of any day. They can find data to support hitting the 'buy' button or the 'sell' button. They don’t act on the basis of what seems to them the real economic situation, but on what’s in it for them."
Of course, classical economists would say, traders act on what's in it for them! So does everybody in the system, at least according to the classical model Stein may think he's refuting here. The difference may be this: Stein thinks the decision whether a "sell" or a "buy" has more "in it for them" has a non-rational, even an irrational, element based on, say, the corporate politics of the broker-dealer, quirks of bonus policies, idiosyncratic personalities.
A classicist who doesn't wish to conform to stereotype too tightly can of course acknowledge that traders sometimes act in ways hard to model. Still, those who consistently act on irrational factors will lose money. They won't stay in business for long. And if there are a lot of traders, and a lot of trading going on, then the irrational aspects are factored out within the whole system, the noise is filtered out and the market conveys information efficiently.
Stein's reason for believing this model is wrong and his "trader realism" has pierced a veil? An uncheckable anecdote. A "close friend of mine, now deceased," who used to be a trader in London for a major financial house, told him a story about shorting IBM on a dare from the boss, and then geting on the phone to spread rumors, talking down the price of IBM so his short position would pay off.
That's it. After the household meatloaf, the law school memories, the trader/judge analogy, we get around to a theory based on a single recollected story from one unnamed person who has shuffled off the mortal coil. Wow! On such evidence, many people seem to believe that Elvis continues to walk about and order Slurpees at various Quickie Marts.
He should have been fired after that. His performance as a "business columnist" got worse, not better, thereafter. He went from a zero into the deep negative numbers.
Sorry, Ben. Glad you're gone.
22 May 2009
Serial bankruptcies, six figures
Edmund Andrews, who has been an economics reporter with The New York Times for several years, has written a book entitled BUSTED: Life Inside the Great Mortgage Meltdown.
Here is the amazon entry for the book.
From what I understand -- and I admit upfront I haven't read the book, so of course I stand open to correction -- Andrews treats his and his wife's experiences as a homeowning couple as a microcosm of the broader meltdown, and although he acknowledges that they were imprudent in some financial decisions, the general premise of the book is that this is anyone's story -- it could have been you, etc.
Commendable research by Megan McArdle at The Atlantic indicates that they aren't a very good microcosm for everyone. She could have done a routine review, but chose instead to do some digging. Nothing dramatic -- no meetings in a dark garage -- just some study of publicly available records of bankruptcy filings and the like. But very revealing.
The serial bankruptcies of an individual making six-figure incomes -- with the second bankruptcy coming almost as soon as lawfully possible -- is hardly an "everyman" type of situation. And treating it as a microcosm of our broader economic difficulties is not the path to clarity on the subject of the latter.
Here is the amazon entry for the book.
From what I understand -- and I admit upfront I haven't read the book, so of course I stand open to correction -- Andrews treats his and his wife's experiences as a homeowning couple as a microcosm of the broader meltdown, and although he acknowledges that they were imprudent in some financial decisions, the general premise of the book is that this is anyone's story -- it could have been you, etc.
Commendable research by Megan McArdle at The Atlantic indicates that they aren't a very good microcosm for everyone. She could have done a routine review, but chose instead to do some digging. Nothing dramatic -- no meetings in a dark garage -- just some study of publicly available records of bankruptcy filings and the like. But very revealing.
The serial bankruptcies of an individual making six-figure incomes -- with the second bankruptcy coming almost as soon as lawfully possible -- is hardly an "everyman" type of situation. And treating it as a microcosm of our broader economic difficulties is not the path to clarity on the subject of the latter.
16 April 2009
The New Ben Stein Watch
Felix Salmon has for a year and a half in his Portfolio blog performed the great public service of keeping track of the spiral of nonsense emanating from the word processor of Ben Stein, the guy who has carved out a niche in life as something between a pundit and a Hollywood extra.
I've followed and learned from Salmon's BSW, and my own readers have, I think received some benefit.
Here's an example of something I wrote on Stein in my other blog, Proxy Partisans, back in November.
The Economics Junkie has also done good work in keeping track of Steinian absurdities.
And here is an example of one of my contributions to this particular genre of literaure within the four corners of Pragmatism Refreshed.
Anyway, the reason for the whole revival is that Salmon has decided to abandon the BSW. Stein's column's are no longer amusingly bad or infuriating to Salmon -- they are "somewhere between boring and incomprehensible."
That's his call to make of course, but the disappearance of BSW strikes me as sad. So I hereby volunteer to "take over the franchise," as Salmon's April 12th entry suggested that some one might. I think of it more as grasping the baton.
For future BSW fixes, come to Pragmatism Refreshed.
This decision leaves us with the question of timing. Stein has his "Everybody's Business" column in he New York Times of course, and Salmon's BSW was conceived mostly as a same-day response to that. He also has an advice column with yahoo, in which he says unhelpful things like this (from his latest): "The economic future has become extremely cloudy, albeit with hints of sun. The government is doing what it can -- this is sometimes helpful, sometimes not. Your primary reliance, however, must be on yourself."
And of course no one can schedule when he'll come out with another pseudo-documentary or eyewash commercial.
My own schedule won't be tied to his in any event. I anticipate this blog's BSW as an every Thursday event. Or most Thursdays (I don't promise fanaticism.) So if that suits you ... we'll meet here next week.
I've followed and learned from Salmon's BSW, and my own readers have, I think received some benefit.
Here's an example of something I wrote on Stein in my other blog, Proxy Partisans, back in November.
The Economics Junkie has also done good work in keeping track of Steinian absurdities.
And here is an example of one of my contributions to this particular genre of literaure within the four corners of Pragmatism Refreshed.
Anyway, the reason for the whole revival is that Salmon has decided to abandon the BSW. Stein's column's are no longer amusingly bad or infuriating to Salmon -- they are "somewhere between boring and incomprehensible."
That's his call to make of course, but the disappearance of BSW strikes me as sad. So I hereby volunteer to "take over the franchise," as Salmon's April 12th entry suggested that some one might. I think of it more as grasping the baton.
For future BSW fixes, come to Pragmatism Refreshed.
This decision leaves us with the question of timing. Stein has his "Everybody's Business" column in he New York Times of course, and Salmon's BSW was conceived mostly as a same-day response to that. He also has an advice column with yahoo, in which he says unhelpful things like this (from his latest): "The economic future has become extremely cloudy, albeit with hints of sun. The government is doing what it can -- this is sometimes helpful, sometimes not. Your primary reliance, however, must be on yourself."
And of course no one can schedule when he'll come out with another pseudo-documentary or eyewash commercial.
My own schedule won't be tied to his in any event. I anticipate this blog's BSW as an every Thursday event. Or most Thursdays (I don't promise fanaticism.) So if that suits you ... we'll meet here next week.
02 January 2009
Libel Lawsuit
A telecommunications industry lobbyist, Vicki Iseman, filed a lawsuit against The New York Times on Tuesday, Dec. 30, in the federal district court in Richmond, Virginia, in response to a story TNYT ran on February 21, concerning her relationship with then primary candidate (later of course Republican Party presidential nominee) John McCain.
I commented on that story when it first appeared. I didn't think much of it as campaign reporting, but I didn't comment at that time about the legal issue.
The second graf of that story is presumably what most inspired this lawsuit: "A female lobbyist had been turning up with him at fund-raisers, visiting his offices and accompanying him on a client’s corporate jet. Convinced the relationship had become romantic, some of his top advisers intervened to protect the candidate from himself — instructing staff members to block the woman’s access, privately warning her away and repeatedly confronting him, several people involved in the campaign said on the condition of anonymity."
The story doesn't say, there or anywhere else, that the "relationship had become romantic." It says that some of his top advisers became convinced that it had, and took actions as a result.
The lawsuit raises some great law-school-exam type questions. First, is a telecommunications lobbyist, as such, a "public figure" in a sense that would make any libel suit very difficult to maintain?
Difficult, but not impossible. So however that definitional quandry is resolved, one has to move to the issue of whether there was a statement of fact that could be libellous.
A plaintiff is generally expected to contest something the defendant actually SAID, explicitly. Mere "suggestions" don't cut it.
In one well-known case, "60 Minutes" incurred the wrath of apple growers for a program about a widely-used apple crop pesticide, Alar, that was a suspected carcinogen. The apple-growing plaintiffs lost at the trial court level, and the appellate court upheld the summary judgment in CBS' favor. (How ya like THEM apples?)
The 9th Circuit said that the growers had demonstrated an "inability to prove that statements made during the broadcast were false." The growers argued "that summary judgment for CBS was improper because a jury could find that the broadcast contained a provably false message, viewing the broadcast segment in its entirety," in the court's words. But the appellate court would have none of this.
It ought to be fairly easy to establish that she was in fact "turning up at fund raisers," etc. Is she contending that she wasn't turning up at fund raisers? or denying that McCain advisers tried to block her access to McCain? Or (this could be the tricky part) contending that their REASON for trying to deny her access was something other than what the paper said it was?
Is she contending that the story somewhere says that the relationship DID IN FACT "become romantic"? Or that it implies that between the lines? What it says ON the lines is just that some of his top advisers became convinced that it had, and took actions as a result.
I commented on that story when it first appeared. I didn't think much of it as campaign reporting, but I didn't comment at that time about the legal issue.
The second graf of that story is presumably what most inspired this lawsuit: "A female lobbyist had been turning up with him at fund-raisers, visiting his offices and accompanying him on a client’s corporate jet. Convinced the relationship had become romantic, some of his top advisers intervened to protect the candidate from himself — instructing staff members to block the woman’s access, privately warning her away and repeatedly confronting him, several people involved in the campaign said on the condition of anonymity."
The story doesn't say, there or anywhere else, that the "relationship had become romantic." It says that some of his top advisers became convinced that it had, and took actions as a result.
The lawsuit raises some great law-school-exam type questions. First, is a telecommunications lobbyist, as such, a "public figure" in a sense that would make any libel suit very difficult to maintain?
Difficult, but not impossible. So however that definitional quandry is resolved, one has to move to the issue of whether there was a statement of fact that could be libellous.
A plaintiff is generally expected to contest something the defendant actually SAID, explicitly. Mere "suggestions" don't cut it.
In one well-known case, "60 Minutes" incurred the wrath of apple growers for a program about a widely-used apple crop pesticide, Alar, that was a suspected carcinogen. The apple-growing plaintiffs lost at the trial court level, and the appellate court upheld the summary judgment in CBS' favor. (How ya like THEM apples?)
The 9th Circuit said that the growers had demonstrated an "inability to prove that statements made during the broadcast were false." The growers argued "that summary judgment for CBS was improper because a jury could find that the broadcast contained a provably false message, viewing the broadcast segment in its entirety," in the court's words. But the appellate court would have none of this.
It ought to be fairly easy to establish that she was in fact "turning up at fund raisers," etc. Is she contending that she wasn't turning up at fund raisers? or denying that McCain advisers tried to block her access to McCain? Or (this could be the tricky part) contending that their REASON for trying to deny her access was something other than what the paper said it was?
Is she contending that the story somewhere says that the relationship DID IN FACT "become romantic"? Or that it implies that between the lines? What it says ON the lines is just that some of his top advisers became convinced that it had, and took actions as a result.
21 November 2008
Transparency
The cause of transparency in government won a victory this week.
As I observed in my November 14 entry, a federal district court last week held a hearing over a request by two newspapers for the unsealing of the materials on which the search warrants were based in the matter of Stephen Hatfill and the anthrax scare of 2001.
The newspapers won. This Tuesday, Nov. 18, Judge Royce Lamberth ruled that "a qualified first amendment right of access exists and the government has no compelling interest in keeping the materials secret."
Here's a link to the opinion.
The court laid a good deal of stress on the fact that the underlyig investigation is at an end, i.e. that government has declared that Buce Ivinsis the only culprit, Bruce Ivins is dead, QED there is no continuing investigation that can be compromised.
So: now that the materials are available, is there anything explosive in there?
We'll know soon enough. If nobody is shouting "eureka" in a year or so ... probably not.
As I observed in my November 14 entry, a federal district court last week held a hearing over a request by two newspapers for the unsealing of the materials on which the search warrants were based in the matter of Stephen Hatfill and the anthrax scare of 2001.
The newspapers won. This Tuesday, Nov. 18, Judge Royce Lamberth ruled that "a qualified first amendment right of access exists and the government has no compelling interest in keeping the materials secret."
Here's a link to the opinion.
The court laid a good deal of stress on the fact that the underlyig investigation is at an end, i.e. that government has declared that Buce Ivinsis the only culprit, Bruce Ivins is dead, QED there is no continuing investigation that can be compromised.
So: now that the materials are available, is there anything explosive in there?
We'll know soon enough. If nobody is shouting "eureka" in a year or so ... probably not.
14 November 2008
Hatfill/anthrax documents
The federal district court held a hearing Wednesday over a request by two newspapers to see documents presently sealed in the matter of Stephen Hatfill and the anthrax scare of 2001.
You'll remember, if you were sentient and living on this planet at all at the time, that Hatfill was named a "person of interest" by those investigating anthrax scares - soon after envelopes containing the stuff were sent to news outlets and Congressional offices.
Hatfill (who has worked at the army's infectious disease laboratory 1997-99) was eventually cleared. Suspicion fell more recently on Bruce Ivins, who committed suicide this summer.
But let's stick with the Hatfill side of the case. The government searched Hatfill's home pursuant to a warrant, and authorities must have obtained that warrant by making a "probable cause" showing to a judge -- that is, a showing that there was probable cause to believe that they would find specified evidence of a crime or crimes if they looked in the specified place.
The New York Times and The L.A. Times have asked the court to see the documents on the basis of which that warrant was obtained.
As a general common-law matter, the court would weigh the government's interest (and Mr. Hatfill's privacy interest) in keeping these matters sealed against the value to public understanding and debate in having them made available. The government's interest in secrecy is considerably reduced by virtue of the fact that there is no ongoing investigation -- after Ivins' death, the US has said that the matter is closed.
I'm hoping these documents are unsealed. The reason? I think of an exchange at the press conference that the district attorney for DC held after Ivins' death:
Question: So there was at least a two-year delay between the forensic evidence
leading to Fort Detrick, and really focusing on Dr. Ivins. How big a factor
was Dr. Hatfill in that, and how did the FBI get so off-track in focusing on
him, apparently as the sole and primary suspect?
Mr. Taylor: Let me refer back to what I said: It was an extensive investigation.
In an investigation of this scope and complexity, the task is to follow the evidence
where it leads . . . .
Question: Was Dr. Hatfill under investigation at this time?
Mr. Taylor: Again, the evidence – they followed where it led. That’s all I’m
prepared to say at this point.
---
Somebody at some point should be able to say a good deal more. An investigation as important and high-priority as this hit a dead end for several years? focusing on the wrong guy? And the public, for whom the whole federal law enforcement apparatus works, isn't supposed to learn anything more about it? we're just supposed to be happy with anodyne remarks like "they followed the evidence where it led!"???
Bah. Humbug.
You'll remember, if you were sentient and living on this planet at all at the time, that Hatfill was named a "person of interest" by those investigating anthrax scares - soon after envelopes containing the stuff were sent to news outlets and Congressional offices.
Hatfill (who has worked at the army's infectious disease laboratory 1997-99) was eventually cleared. Suspicion fell more recently on Bruce Ivins, who committed suicide this summer.
But let's stick with the Hatfill side of the case. The government searched Hatfill's home pursuant to a warrant, and authorities must have obtained that warrant by making a "probable cause" showing to a judge -- that is, a showing that there was probable cause to believe that they would find specified evidence of a crime or crimes if they looked in the specified place.
The New York Times and The L.A. Times have asked the court to see the documents on the basis of which that warrant was obtained.
As a general common-law matter, the court would weigh the government's interest (and Mr. Hatfill's privacy interest) in keeping these matters sealed against the value to public understanding and debate in having them made available. The government's interest in secrecy is considerably reduced by virtue of the fact that there is no ongoing investigation -- after Ivins' death, the US has said that the matter is closed.
I'm hoping these documents are unsealed. The reason? I think of an exchange at the press conference that the district attorney for DC held after Ivins' death:
Question: So there was at least a two-year delay between the forensic evidence
leading to Fort Detrick, and really focusing on Dr. Ivins. How big a factor
was Dr. Hatfill in that, and how did the FBI get so off-track in focusing on
him, apparently as the sole and primary suspect?
Mr. Taylor: Let me refer back to what I said: It was an extensive investigation.
In an investigation of this scope and complexity, the task is to follow the evidence
where it leads . . . .
Question: Was Dr. Hatfill under investigation at this time?
Mr. Taylor: Again, the evidence – they followed where it led. That’s all I’m
prepared to say at this point.
---
Somebody at some point should be able to say a good deal more. An investigation as important and high-priority as this hit a dead end for several years? focusing on the wrong guy? And the public, for whom the whole federal law enforcement apparatus works, isn't supposed to learn anything more about it? we're just supposed to be happy with anodyne remarks like "they followed the evidence where it led!"???
Bah. Humbug.
24 October 2008
Today's Press: Ups, Downs, and Overs
Are newspapers, old-fashioned pen-and-ink type newspapers of the sort that a young person might plop onto your porch in the morning, dinosaurs? Are the present remnants of a once-proud industry just the decaying carcasses left after the mass extinction?
Some points to ponder:
1. Good news. Newspaper readers are better educated and more affluent than TV news viewers. According to one recent survey, 70% of the readership of the average newspaper consists of households with incomes of more than $60,000 annually. This compares to about 40% for CNN and Fox News. Presumably this makes the tree killers of continued value to advertisers.
2. Bad news. The stock of the parent corporation of the US "paper of record," The New York Times Co., is now down in the sub-$10.50 per share neighborhood. It hasn't been this low for at least a decade. The Times Co. stock spent most of the period between the presidential elections of 2000 and 2004 above $40 a share. It was briefly above $50 in mid 2002.
On a related front, the NYT has announced its profits for the third quarter of 2008. They're down 51% from the 3d quarter of last year.
3. Moving on and starting over?
I don't know what to make of this, as to whether it is good news or bad for the NYT or for newspapers as such ... but ... famous/notorious former New York Times reporter Judith Miller is going over to television. Fox News announced Monday that she will "provide commentary and analysis on national security issues, counterterrorism, and international affairs, including the Middle East...."
Here's her blog.
Just putting this stuff out there. Make up your own WMD punchline.
Some points to ponder:
1. Good news. Newspaper readers are better educated and more affluent than TV news viewers. According to one recent survey, 70% of the readership of the average newspaper consists of households with incomes of more than $60,000 annually. This compares to about 40% for CNN and Fox News. Presumably this makes the tree killers of continued value to advertisers.
2. Bad news. The stock of the parent corporation of the US "paper of record," The New York Times Co., is now down in the sub-$10.50 per share neighborhood. It hasn't been this low for at least a decade. The Times Co. stock spent most of the period between the presidential elections of 2000 and 2004 above $40 a share. It was briefly above $50 in mid 2002.
On a related front, the NYT has announced its profits for the third quarter of 2008. They're down 51% from the 3d quarter of last year.
3. Moving on and starting over?
I don't know what to make of this, as to whether it is good news or bad for the NYT or for newspapers as such ... but ... famous/notorious former New York Times reporter Judith Miller is going over to television. Fox News announced Monday that she will "provide commentary and analysis on national security issues, counterterrorism, and international affairs, including the Middle East...."
Here's her blog.
Just putting this stuff out there. Make up your own WMD punchline.
26 September 2008
The Scandalously Wimpy New York Times
All the news that might not give offense.
Here's a correction The New York Times ran yesterday:
A front-page headline on Wednesday with an article about Warren E. Buffett's plan to invest $5 billion in the Wall Street investment banking firm Goldman Sachs described that company as "ailing." While its stock has been battered and it has agreed to tighter government regulation and wants to raise more capital from investors, "embattled" would have been a more accurate headline description of Goldman's state than "ailing."
What kind of letter did a Goldman lawyer have to write to get that "correction"?
Anyone who thinks that "ailing" is an unfair term to apply to Goldman Sachs just isn't paying any friggin' attention!
It seems clear to me that TNYT wants to occupy the niche of utter gutlessness.
They should, as my older brother likes to say, "man up," at least to the minimal extent of calling an ailing bank ... an ailing bank! without apologizing for it. This is so classically "wimpy" one expects the editors to head out to a cheeseburger joint, offering to pay Tuesday for a cheeseburger today.
Pedantic note. "Embattled" is an odd word. Nowadays it is often used as the author of that wimpy correction seems to mean to use it, to mean "battered by battles."
But there was a time when it meant -- and it sometimes still means -- "prepared for battle".
Remember the poem Ralph Waldo Emerson wrote about the minutemen at Concord in April 1775?
By the rude bridge that arched the flood,
Their flag to April's breeze unfurled,
Here once the embattled farmers stood
And fired the shot heard round the world.
He is describing the farmer/soldiers just as the battle was to start. So "embattled" doesn't mean battered. It means "ready to take what battering may come in the impending battle."
The shot heard round the world refers to the FIRST shot of that battle, logically. And they were already "embattled." So the term has the meaning of "in readiness."
As always, when I make these semantic points, I do so to serve a substantive point. The Times is complciit in hiding the fact that the bankers of Wall Street today aren't "embattled" in the right sense, the Emersonian sense. They aren't ready to do battle like proper entrepreneurs with a risky world.
A wimpy press of this sort is proper for a monarchy, not for the descendants of the farmer who fired that shot at Concord in defiance of a monarch.
That's a scandal.
Here's a correction The New York Times ran yesterday:
A front-page headline on Wednesday with an article about Warren E. Buffett's plan to invest $5 billion in the Wall Street investment banking firm Goldman Sachs described that company as "ailing." While its stock has been battered and it has agreed to tighter government regulation and wants to raise more capital from investors, "embattled" would have been a more accurate headline description of Goldman's state than "ailing."
What kind of letter did a Goldman lawyer have to write to get that "correction"?
Anyone who thinks that "ailing" is an unfair term to apply to Goldman Sachs just isn't paying any friggin' attention!
It seems clear to me that TNYT wants to occupy the niche of utter gutlessness.
They should, as my older brother likes to say, "man up," at least to the minimal extent of calling an ailing bank ... an ailing bank! without apologizing for it. This is so classically "wimpy" one expects the editors to head out to a cheeseburger joint, offering to pay Tuesday for a cheeseburger today.
Pedantic note. "Embattled" is an odd word. Nowadays it is often used as the author of that wimpy correction seems to mean to use it, to mean "battered by battles."
But there was a time when it meant -- and it sometimes still means -- "prepared for battle".
Remember the poem Ralph Waldo Emerson wrote about the minutemen at Concord in April 1775?
By the rude bridge that arched the flood,
Their flag to April's breeze unfurled,
Here once the embattled farmers stood
And fired the shot heard round the world.
He is describing the farmer/soldiers just as the battle was to start. So "embattled" doesn't mean battered. It means "ready to take what battering may come in the impending battle."
The shot heard round the world refers to the FIRST shot of that battle, logically. And they were already "embattled." So the term has the meaning of "in readiness."
As always, when I make these semantic points, I do so to serve a substantive point. The Times is complciit in hiding the fact that the bankers of Wall Street today aren't "embattled" in the right sense, the Emersonian sense. They aren't ready to do battle like proper entrepreneurs with a risky world.
A wimpy press of this sort is proper for a monarchy, not for the descendants of the farmer who fired that shot at Concord in defiance of a monarch.
That's a scandal.
17 August 2008
Torture and a photograph
Lest we forget, in the fall of 2003, prisoners were systematically tortured at Abu Ghraib. In the summer of 2004, a certain photo acquired worldwide infamy as the symbol of those ugly goings-on.
The photo I have in mind showed a man standing on a cardboard box, wearing a hood. Wires were attached to his outstretched arms.
In the late winter days of 2006, a dispute broke out in certain circles over the question: who was that man? That dispute is in some respects an evasion: torture is torture, whatever the name of its victim.
Still, there is a natural impulse to want to give a specific name and history to the victims of such an event. And a fellow named Ali Shalal Qaissi stepped into the breach, going on speaking tours on the basis of his claim to be that man. The New York Times did a profile on him that ran March 11, 2006, taking that claim at face value.
The politics/commentary site Salon did an expose three days later here indicating that the real man in that photo was Abdou Hussain Saad Faleh, known to the American GIs at the prison by the rather jocular nickname "Gilligan."
So: what happened to Mr. Faleh? He was released from custody in January 2004. He seems to have remained silent about his experiences (surely an understandable choice!), and that silence created the vacuum into which Mr. Qaissi stepped.
All of this is too old to be journalism now, and too new to be history yet. I bring it up here simply to add a brick to the bridge between the former and the latter,in hopes that the incident of the wrong-man-on-box shall make the passage safely.
It has its own philosophical lessons, about perception, the need for ocular evidence, etc.
The photo I have in mind showed a man standing on a cardboard box, wearing a hood. Wires were attached to his outstretched arms.
In the late winter days of 2006, a dispute broke out in certain circles over the question: who was that man? That dispute is in some respects an evasion: torture is torture, whatever the name of its victim.
Still, there is a natural impulse to want to give a specific name and history to the victims of such an event. And a fellow named Ali Shalal Qaissi stepped into the breach, going on speaking tours on the basis of his claim to be that man. The New York Times did a profile on him that ran March 11, 2006, taking that claim at face value.
The politics/commentary site Salon did an expose three days later here indicating that the real man in that photo was Abdou Hussain Saad Faleh, known to the American GIs at the prison by the rather jocular nickname "Gilligan."
So: what happened to Mr. Faleh? He was released from custody in January 2004. He seems to have remained silent about his experiences (surely an understandable choice!), and that silence created the vacuum into which Mr. Qaissi stepped.
All of this is too old to be journalism now, and too new to be history yet. I bring it up here simply to add a brick to the bridge between the former and the latter,in hopes that the incident of the wrong-man-on-box shall make the passage safely.
It has its own philosophical lessons, about perception, the need for ocular evidence, etc.
16 August 2008
"May you live in interesting times"
The title of this entry is a line often described in popcult contexts as an "ancient Chinese curse."
The actual history of the expression is tangled -- it MAY have Chinese antecedents, although nobody has been able to trace it authoritatively earlier than the 1930s, when officials in the UK, some of them indeed with Chinese connections, began to use the phrase as a way of expressing their anxiety about the darkening of the diplomatic climate in Europe.
Reporters want interesting times, of course. The curse is a "slow news day," whatever the ancient Chinese or Chamberlain-era Brits might have thought.
I thought of the expression when I read this morning a story in The New York Times by David Kocieniewski lamenting the fact that the summer of 2008 seems especially unremarkable -- uninteresting: one might even say -- uncursed.
Mr. Kocieniewski longs for days when every summer in that city had its signature story. The son of Sam, the West Nile virus, black outs, or even a rash of pit bull attacks.
Chill out, Mr. Kocieniewski.
Or, in the words of another purportedly Chinese curse, you may get what you wish for.
The actual history of the expression is tangled -- it MAY have Chinese antecedents, although nobody has been able to trace it authoritatively earlier than the 1930s, when officials in the UK, some of them indeed with Chinese connections, began to use the phrase as a way of expressing their anxiety about the darkening of the diplomatic climate in Europe.
Reporters want interesting times, of course. The curse is a "slow news day," whatever the ancient Chinese or Chamberlain-era Brits might have thought.
I thought of the expression when I read this morning a story in The New York Times by David Kocieniewski lamenting the fact that the summer of 2008 seems especially unremarkable -- uninteresting: one might even say -- uncursed.
Mr. Kocieniewski longs for days when every summer in that city had its signature story. The son of Sam, the West Nile virus, black outs, or even a rash of pit bull attacks.
Chill out, Mr. Kocieniewski.
Or, in the words of another purportedly Chinese curse, you may get what you wish for.
26 July 2008
Troubles at The New York Times Co.
An article in BusinessWeek observes that a share of stock in The New York Times Co. is now worth only half what it was worth a year ago.
Why? Well, it's true that the equities of US based corporations have fallen across the board, but not so dramatically as all THAT! The S&P index has fallen about 20% in the past year. The NASDAQ 100 has fallen only 10%. So why has NYT fallen nearly 50% (or to be precise, 46.3%)?
In a July 23d release about disappointing second quarter earnings, the CEO (Janet Robinson) blamed the economic slowdown as well as "secular forces playing out across the media industry."
No. First, if this were simply a manifestation of the general economic slowdown, it should mirror the results of the broader indexes. Second, if the problem were "secular forces" etc., you'd see similar results at other companies in the media industry.
You don't. The Washington Post Co. has lost about 25% of its value over the last year. That IS in line with the general economy, or only slightly worse. And that would tend to show, by the way, that the stereotypical conservative answer ("it's because the NYT is so dam liberal!") isn't empirical. The WPO is as much on their enemies' list as the NYT. But it has done better, or only half as bad, over these last difficult months because ... because its a better run enterprise.
That is where responsibility lies. With Ms Robinson and her board.
God bless you please. [Okay I couldn't help myself there.]
Why? Well, it's true that the equities of US based corporations have fallen across the board, but not so dramatically as all THAT! The S&P index has fallen about 20% in the past year. The NASDAQ 100 has fallen only 10%. So why has NYT fallen nearly 50% (or to be precise, 46.3%)?
In a July 23d release about disappointing second quarter earnings, the CEO (Janet Robinson) blamed the economic slowdown as well as "secular forces playing out across the media industry."
No. First, if this were simply a manifestation of the general economic slowdown, it should mirror the results of the broader indexes. Second, if the problem were "secular forces" etc., you'd see similar results at other companies in the media industry.
You don't. The Washington Post Co. has lost about 25% of its value over the last year. That IS in line with the general economy, or only slightly worse. And that would tend to show, by the way, that the stereotypical conservative answer ("it's because the NYT is so dam liberal!") isn't empirical. The WPO is as much on their enemies' list as the NYT. But it has done better, or only half as bad, over these last difficult months because ... because its a better run enterprise.
That is where responsibility lies. With Ms Robinson and her board.
God bless you please. [Okay I couldn't help myself there.]
13 April 2008
Weaver not the McCain Campaign Leaker
The New York Times, in February, published a very sloppy front page story on John McCain, and his relationship with a female telecommunications-industry lobbyist, Vicki Iseman.
It seemed for a time as if the story was going to be about adultery, but then (insofar as it developed any substance at all) the story turned out to be more about campaign fund raising and the conflicts-of-interest it may create for a candidate's discharge of his public responsibilities. The apparent adulter angle was only, excuse the expression, a tease.
I said as much here soon after the story's appearance. Why am I bringing it up again? Because The New Republic addresses a loose string left hanging back then.
TNR has run its own story about the internal dynamics of the McCain campaign, by Jason Zengerle, and he appears to have done a much better job than the Times' team did. Zengerle's point is that there are bitter enmities within the McCain campaign, personal rivalries that McCain does nothing to seek to control, and that accordingly spin wildly, dysfunctionally. That someone in this climate leaked quasi-salacious tidbits about Ms Iseman to The Times becomes quite believable.
But that someone wasn't, it appears, John Weaver. Weaver had been the chief strategist of the campaign until shortly before the story appeared, when he had lost a power struggle with Rick Davis. So he became a plausible suspect.
Zengerle convincingly clears him.
So what? In the big scheme of things, so ... nothing. Yet both God and the devil are in the details, and it seems to be that whoever did start the Times down the road of its adultery-maybe-now-campaign-finance story sits at some sort of intersection of microhistorical fault lines.
It seemed for a time as if the story was going to be about adultery, but then (insofar as it developed any substance at all) the story turned out to be more about campaign fund raising and the conflicts-of-interest it may create for a candidate's discharge of his public responsibilities. The apparent adulter angle was only, excuse the expression, a tease.
I said as much here soon after the story's appearance. Why am I bringing it up again? Because The New Republic addresses a loose string left hanging back then.
TNR has run its own story about the internal dynamics of the McCain campaign, by Jason Zengerle, and he appears to have done a much better job than the Times' team did. Zengerle's point is that there are bitter enmities within the McCain campaign, personal rivalries that McCain does nothing to seek to control, and that accordingly spin wildly, dysfunctionally. That someone in this climate leaked quasi-salacious tidbits about Ms Iseman to The Times becomes quite believable.
But that someone wasn't, it appears, John Weaver. Weaver had been the chief strategist of the campaign until shortly before the story appeared, when he had lost a power struggle with Rick Davis. So he became a plausible suspect.
Zengerle convincingly clears him.
So what? In the big scheme of things, so ... nothing. Yet both God and the devil are in the details, and it seems to be that whoever did start the Times down the road of its adultery-maybe-now-campaign-finance story sits at some sort of intersection of microhistorical fault lines.
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