I unfortunately did not take Dave Robert’s advice, and went ahead and read Jonah Goldberg’s vapid op-ed on global warming. I’ll leave it to others to say why Goldberg is wrong. I want to discuss why the L.A. Times is wrong.
A year or so ago, ESPN hired Rush Limbaugh to provide color commentary (the irony only became apparent later) during NFL football games. This little experiment ended, as any idiot could have predicted, when Limbaugh made on-air comments that — how to say this in a balanced way? — some listeners thought might be racist, and others knew for sure were racist.
Limbaugh’s shtick might play well on rightwing hate-radio (though is no less excusable), but no one, including ESPN, should have been surprised when it didn’t translate well to a broader audience. An audience with black people, for instance. ESPN endured a firestorm of criticism — the National Association of Black Journalists said “ESPN’s journalistic credibility is at stake” — and ended up issuing mea culpas and canning Limbaugh.
Ditto Goldberg. His vapid screed might play well over on National Review Online, but the L.A. Times insults the thinking members of its circulation when they publish this kind of horseshit on Earth Day. What’s next? Paul Bunyan’s ode to lumber on Arbor Day? Will they give Hugh Hefner free rein on National Chastity Day? (Trust me. It’s only a matter of time.)
Shame on you, L.A. Times. You insult your readers at your peril.
