LAT- How Far You Have Fallen....

When we first moved to California in '98 I was pretty impressed with the LA Times. Soon after the paper was sold to the Tribune Co., however the quality remained good and we were subscribers. Over time however we saw the quality of the paper- especially the op-ed page go downhill quickly and we stopped our subscription. It was not even a question of left/right, the "liberal" Michael Kinsley was the editor while we received the paper and his lack of imagination or insight was astonishing.

Since that time things have gone from bad to worse. The great columnist Robert Scheer was let go, and soon afterward Jonah "Doughy Pantload*" Goldberg was hired. Now I don't have any problem with conservatives writing columns in newspapers, but why the hell the LA Times thought Goldberg would bring anything to the paper is beyond imagination. Sure enough his columns would make the editor of a high-school newspaper cringe. His latest whinny piece of genius is called, "Give Bush a Break" (I am not kidding) He writes:

LORD KNOWS I have my problems with President Bush. He taps the federal coffers like a monkey smacking the bar for another cocaine pellet in an addiction study. Some of his sentences give me the same sensation as falling backward in one of those "trust" exercises, in which you just have to hope things work out. Yes, the Iraq invasion has gone badly, and to deny this is to suggest that Bush meant for things to turn out this way, which is even crueler than saying he failed to get it right.

But you know what? It's time to cut the guy some slack. ...

...And then there's Hurricane Katrina. Yes, the federal government could have responded better. And of course there were real tragedies involved in that disaster. But you know what? Bad stuff happens during disasters, which is why we don't call them tickle-parties....

He finishes it with this real zinger:

Look, things could obviously be a lot better. But they could be a lot worse too. John Kerry could be president.

*I thought T-Bogg deserved credit for "doughy pantload", but when I looked at an old post of his he credited Norbizness.