Saturday, June 07, 2003 :::
You probably thought the Volokh Conspiracy couldn't get any cooler. But they just added Randy Barnett. Don't you feel silly for being so wrong? Or am I projecting again?
Unfortunately, his first entry is misguided:
Is anyone besides me disappointed at Howell Raines' resignation from the Times? Now the paper can go back to posing as an objective arbiter of the truth rather than the spirited ideological publication it's always been. By taking the white gloves off the Grey Lady, Raines did truth in advertising a great service. Now he's gone and the Times gets to go back to pretending. 'Tis a pity.
Even under Raines, the Times has been "posing as an objective arbiter of the truth". It hasn't done this posing quite as well, in large part because it hasn't done the truth quite as well. But in spite of what Barnett, Andrew Sullivan, or I think of the Times, there are still a lot of people who buy the paper. I'd venture to say that most of these people don't see it as an alternative to Mother Jones; they see it as an alternative to the Washington Post, the Wall Street Journal, or the Cambridge Chronicle. Raines may have hurt the Times' credibility, but that credibility which remains is all the more dangerous in his hands, and I think the latter effect more than compensates for the former.
Tangentially related, some Republicans (for example -- this happens in both directions) will vote in the Democratic primary for the more leftist of the two leading candidates, thinking the Republican candidate will have an easier time. I tend to think this is a bad idea, in that the danger a more leftist Democrat will pose if elected outweighs the extra difficulty he or she will have in actually getting elected. After Pat Buchanan won the New Hampshire primary in 1996, Al Gore was asked whether he thought Buchanan would be easier to beat than Dole or Alexander. Gore responded that after Reagan won the Republican nomination in 1980, he had celebrated, assuming that Carter would win easily, and hadn't worried about the Republican primary since. Since this is Al Gore, he probably made up the anecdote, but I think the point is valid.
The Conspiracy's other new JD, Sasha, has implied that, of their Jewish group of 13, he's the Christ figure. Perhaps that new degree is going to his head.
::: posted by Steven at 12:21 PM
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