Chris Hedges on the collapse of the NYT
The once newspaper of record, and a global lighthouse of how to do journalism, has slid to the level of a cheap sheet focusing on propaganda and inuendo
Chris Hedges is one of my all-time favorites when it comes to the ways of this disarticulated, dangerous, often homicidal world. His writings are real page turners, his perception of politics, society, and the vagaries of conflict, and his journalistic honesty constitute examples for those who aspire to join the difficult, but honorable, road of telling it the way it is. Hedges’ assessments and observations rarely display tendencies of propaganda and obfuscation. Reading his books is often a hard slog not because his writings are slop, but, rather, because every other sentence is an invitation for introspection and attempting to grasp the often pessimistic nature of facts. Hedges is not your usual desk writer seeking to entertain, even if in a “sophisticated” manner, but, rather, the carrier of information that is food for serious thought and honest introspection.
Requiem for The New York Times
NEW YORK: I am sitting in the auditorium at The New York Times. It is the first time I have been back in nearly two decades. It will be the last. The newspaper is a pale reflection of what it was when I worked there, beset by numerous journalistic fiascos, rudderless leadership and myopic cheerleading of the military debacles in the Middle East, Ukraine and the genocide in Gaza, where one of the Times contributions to the mass slaughter of Palestinians was an editorial refusing to back an unconditional ceasefire. Many seated in the auditorium are culpable.
I am here, however, not for them but for the former executive editor they are honoring, Joe Lelyveld, who died earlier this year. He hired me. His departure from the Times marked the paper’s steep descent. On the front page of the program of the memorial, the year of his death is incorrect — emblematic of the sloppiness of a newspaper that is riddled with typos and errors. Reporters I admire, including Gretchen Morgenson and David Cay Johnston, who are in the auditorium, were pushed out once Lelyveld left, replaced by mediocrities.
Lelyveld’s successor Howell Raines – who had no business running a newspaper – singled out the serial fabulist and plagiarizer, Jayson Blair, for swift advancement and alienated the newsroom through a series of tone deaf editorial decisions. Reporters and editors rose up in revolt. He was forced out along with his equally incompetent managing editor.