Not enough women. There aren't enough women opinion writers -- or at least not enough of them make it onto the pages of America's newspapers.

That's the issue, not what Susan Estrich thinks about Michael Kinsley or how he has responded to her, entertaining as all that might be.

That dustup between a couple of high-profile Harvard grads has used up some ink lately, if for no other reason that its escalating nastiness. Here's the essence of it as recounted in a Los Angeles Times article by James Rainey this week. Estrich is a law professor at Southern California, the campaign manager for Michael Dukakis' 1988 presidential campaign, and a syndicated columnist. Kinsley is the former editor of Slate.com, a former host of CNN's Crossfire, and currently the editorial page editor of the Los Angelese Times.

And both are adults. More (Posted March 12, 2005)

Political cartooning -- a chance for survival? The number of political cartoonists, by one estimate, has dwindled to about 85 fulltime people. Newspapers, as usual, seem bent on cutting costs rather than delivering quality, so the local cartoonist is let go, encouraged to leave or not replaced when he or she does leave. Instead of encouraging this kind of journalism by growing their own local cartoonists, newspapers have generally viewed it as just another expense that can be eliminated. It is yet another example of newspaper short-sightedness. Still, the cartooning goes on among a determined few -- even those who don't have fulltime jobs. Mark Glaser, in a recent article posted on the Online Journalism Review, says the web may be cartoonists some hope:

These are the worst of times and the best of times for editorial cartoonists. Newspapers have been cutting full-time editorial cartoonist jobs down to the bone, and prices paid in syndication seem to drop by the minute. But the Web has brought new business opportunities for popular cartoonists, with global distribution and the chance for self-syndication.

Let's hope Glaser is right. Better yet, let's hope that news organizations will come to their senses and let readers enjoy a good laugh or get provoked by a good jab at their favorite politician. (Posted March 2, 2005)

Is television killing sports columns -- and sports columnists? Stephen Rodrick, writing for Slate magazine, seems to think it is. In a devastating critique of many of the yelling heads that appear on ESPN's several talk shows, Rodrick makes a simple point: the time a sports columnist spends on television takes away from the time he or she has to write a good column -- to talk with sources, to visit lockerooms, to research information, etc. He has particularly harsh word for people such as Stephen Smith (Philadelphia Inquirer), Dan Le Batard (Miami Herald), Tony Kornheiser (Washington Post), and Woody Paige (Denver Post).

Some columnists still give their first priority to writing the column -- people such as Tom Boswell of the Washington Post.

At the New York Times, where sports columnists are only rarely on television, the reported column lives on. In the first four days of 2005, columnist Selena Roberts wrote back-to-back columns that artfully skewered the seamier side of Auburn's football program using—get this—actual public documents that probably involved a trip to a courthouse or two. Rhoden also penned a thoughtful piece on USC offensive coordinator Norm Chow and racism in college football.

Rodrick's article is titled, "Unpardonable Interruptions: How Television Killed the Newspaper Sports Column." It's well worth reading. (Posted Jan. 26, 2005)

Conflict of interest. One of the basic tenets of journalistic practice is that a journalist should be independent. That is, a journalist should not work for any person or organization except the news organization that he or she represents. That tenet holds for editorialists as well as reporters. An editorial writer or columnist may express opinionated or partisan points of view, but there should always be a distance between the journalist and those who are being covered or commented upon. Armstrong Williams apparently did not understand this tenet of journalist (or he did understand it and chose to ignore it), and that has landed him in hot water with his professional colleagues and one of his employers, Tribune Media Services. Williams accepted $240,000 from the Bush administration to espouse favorable opinions about Bush's No Child Left Behind educational plan. (USA Today: Education Dept. paid commentator to promote law) He did not disclose that fact and is now facing blistering criticism from other journalists, such as the National Association of Black Journalists. Williams has been dropped as a columnist by the Tribune Media Services, which distributes his newspaper column to many newspapers around the nation. (TMS statement terminating its contract with Williams.)(Posted January 8, 2005)
Update: Williams appeared on the Washington Post’s Live Online discussion on Monday, Jan. 10, and took responsibility for his ethical failure: “I'm a principled columnist and commentator but yet I'm ashamed that my bad judgment has cast a black shadow on my name. Where I go in the future depends on my credibility and never violating journalistic ethical standards again. I've learned from this, the most important thing being it is far more important to maintain my integrity and ethics as a media pundit than to concern myself with generating dollars as a entrepreneur (sic).” Williams said he did not think he had done anything illegal: “Simply bad judgment that crossed a gray area of ethics. My bad judgment was an omission but I never intended to deceive or mislead anyone.” It's hard to believe that Williams did not know what he was doing when he took the money to conduct the interviews with the Secretary of Education about No Child Left Behind, but that's what he says. (Posted Jan. 10, 2005)

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