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Job Well Done

By Big Tent Democrat, Section Media
Posted on Thu Oct 12, 2006 at 03:47:27 PM EST
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From Big Tent Democrat

Gail Collins steps down as Editorial Page Editor of the New York Times. From my perspective, Collins was the best Editorial Page Editor the Times ever had. She fully grasped the extremism, incompetence and danger the Bush Administration has presented and spoke to the issues in terms appropriate to the times (no pun intended.)

I have enjoyed Collins' work since she was a columnist at the New York Daily News. Always a gifted witty writer, Collins stepped up to the role she undertook, and with little fanfare, proved that the first woman Editorial Page Editor of the New York Times was not only up to the role, but was up to the unique challenge of being perhaps the foremost liberal voice in the Media in a time where liberalism and the country were challenged by the worst administration in memory.

[more on the flip]

Collins found the words and the tone to express the dire conditions, the unrelenting Bush Administration incompetence, the dangers the country faced, from within and without.

A job well done Gail Collins. We look forward to reading you again upon your return as a New York Times columnist.

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    Job Well Done | 10 comments (10 topical)
    Re: Job Well Done (none / 0) (#1)
    by cpinva on Thu Oct 12, 2006 at 05:45:09 PM EST
    you are joking, right? clearly, you have pretty damn low standards. if she was the
    best Editorial Page Editor the Times ever had.
    , i just can't imagine who might have been the worst: attila the hun, maybe? it was under her "leadership" that the nyt campaigned relentlessly for g. bush, with such luminaries as m. dowd and f. rich contributing (and continuing to contribute) their inane commentary on al gore and john kerry. thanks, in part, to these people, mr. bush was elected not once, but twice. well, actually only once, in 2004. i say good riddance to bag baggage. BT, you might want to stop, and take a hard look down memory lane, with respect to the nyt's editorial page, before praising ms. collins work. in brief, she sucked.

    Re: Job Well Done (none / 0) (#2)
    by Talkleft Visitor on Thu Oct 12, 2006 at 05:55:41 PM EST
    And what are your hopes for the new Times Editorial Page editor?

    Re: Job Well Done (none / 0) (#3)
    by glanton on Thu Oct 12, 2006 at 06:34:40 PM EST
    That the NYT Editorial Pageis Uhmerrikah's version of "liberal" rhetoric says much. All corporate, all the time.

    Re: Job Well Done (none / 0) (#4)
    by Big Tent Democrat on Thu Oct 12, 2006 at 06:34:40 PM EST
    cpinva: The Editorial Page Editor runs the Editorial page, not the news pages. Your critique is about Bill Keller and Howell Raines. And I agree with it. It has nothing to do with Gail Collins. Please inform yourself before attacking great journalists like Gail Collins.

    Re: Job Well Done (none / 0) (#5)
    by orionATL on Thu Oct 12, 2006 at 09:02:19 PM EST
    personally, i think gail collins presided in one of the most embarrassing time periods in NY(twi)Times editorial page history. she lacked the leadership and courage to call a spade a spade - a critical requirement for a competent editorialist. collins presided over a series of genuinely dumb and intellectually dishonest "judy miller" editorials. her editorial page failed to challenge bush when it counted - early on in the iraq misadventure. but most importantly, to me, in her reign the editorials were written in a mincing, prissy, sententious style that suggested a mix of ignorant sunday school teacher and moralistic grade school teacher. partly of course this was the consequence of the current preference for "collegial" editorial writing, in which "the gang" sits down and discusses a question of importance and then assigns one group member to write up the discussion. it is impossible to conceive of a more foolish and failure-guaranteeing way of editorializing. collins also supervised the endless trivial droning of maureen dowd and the hiring of john tierney. she hung on to tom friedman long after he had become an embarrassment to the times. and she never has, to my knowledge, acknowledged the accomplishments of the two stellar editorialist writing for the times -- bob herbert and paul krugman. the best is a relative term but in my opinion collins did a piss poor job at best. if you insist, give her the award of less incompetent than most (howell raines comes to mind), but no more. the key question for every organization is - how do you choose your key people? how do you insure they are the best available? or do you bother to take that trouble? collins was not chosen with those questions in mind. orionATL

    Re: Job Well Done (none / 0) (#6)
    by cpinva on Thu Oct 12, 2006 at 10:01:06 PM EST
    Please inform yourself before attacking great journalists like Gail Collins.
    consider me informed, and you studiedly ignorant. what cave have you been hiding in since 1999, when the nyt's editorial page, under ms. collins leadership, went on the warpath against al gore, and never looked back. i strongly suggest you actually do some real research son, before you go shooting your mouth off to your betters.

    Re: Job Well Done (none / 0) (#7)
    by Talkleft Visitor on Fri Oct 13, 2006 at 04:53:26 AM EST
    LOL: CPinVA: BIg tent does do this to people. Gail Collins in her would be an opinion writer, not a journalist.

    Re: Job Well Done (none / 0) (#8)
    by Big Tent Democrat on Fri Oct 13, 2006 at 08:07:19 AM EST
    cpinva: You wrote that "their inane commentary on al gore and john kerry . . ." fyi, Ms. Collins was appointed editor of the page in 2001. Campaign against Al Gore? Honestly, stubborn ignorance is not a good trait. Consider George Bush. Frankly, to argue that the NYTimes editorial page camapigned for g. bush is just well, ignorant.

    Re: Job Well Done (none / 0) (#9)
    by Big Tent Democrat on Fri Oct 13, 2006 at 08:09:23 AM EST
    Wile: A journalist can be an opinion writer. Indeed, they should be, if they are any good. Not all columnists are like David Brooks. The good one are not. Facts matter.

    Re: Job Well Done (none / 0) (#10)
    by Talkleft Visitor on Fri Oct 13, 2006 at 02:39:01 PM EST
    I too am a big Gail Collins fan. I started reading her considerably before her Daily News column days, when she was writing NYC related columns for New York Newsday. They were always both witty and informative.

    Job Well Done | 10 comments (10 topical)