Dear Professor Krugman,
You are the LeBron James of NY Times columnists. No one has more prestige, more views, more email shares, etc. You have leverage because the paper needs you more than you need the paper.
The hiring of Bret Stephens is just the latest in the paper’s dismaying record in the last year. I am sure you are aware of:
- The Times’ collaboration with a Breitbart writer, Peter Schweizer to pump up the non-scandal, sham Clinton Foundation story.
- The Times’ now infamous and false story just a week before the election: Investigating Donald Trump, F.B.I. Sees No Clear Link to Russia
- The Times’ equally infamous three column headline days before: Emails in Anthony Weiner Inquiry Jolt Hillary Clinton’s Campaign
Your now familiar refrain “Thanks, Comey!” shows you recognize the damage the Times did by harping on emails and the Foundation while minimizing Russia. (Yes, not just the Times, but I’m sure you know the power of acceptance or endorsement of stories by the “paper of record.”)
The Stephens hiring brings to the paper a climate denier. Not only are his views anathema to you, they are not acceptable positions in the public discourse
Two prominent scientists, Michael Mann and Stefan Rahmstorf did not cancel their subscriptions to the Times when Stephens was hired, but did cancel them because of the Times’s attempts to rationalize the hiring. Rahmstorf wrote in canceling:
The Times argued that “millions agree with Stephens”. It made me wonder what’s next — when are you hiring a columnist claiming that the sun and the stars revolve around the earth, because millions agree with that?
On April 23, 2017, Times Public Editor, Liz Spayd, also defended the Stephens hiring:
After reading many of his past columns I, too, am wary about some of his more inflammatory language on climate change, Muslims, even campus rape. Are we to consider his more intemperate phrases “rhetorical flourishes,” or does he really mean them? . . .
What I do support — fully — is Bennet’s aim of hiring people who don’t conform to a liberal orthodoxy of thought. And I hope he is right in his unflinching belief that readers will want to hear what Stephens has to say. “The crux of the question is whether his work belongs inside our boundaries for intelligent debate, and I have no doubt that it does,” Bennet told me. “I have no doubt he crosses our bar for intellectual honesty and fairness.”
The Stephens episode touches the third rail of a debate surfacing as The Times looks to include a wider range of views, not just on the Opinion pages but in its news columns. It raises the question of whether readers want rules around who should be heard and how. And it raises the even larger issue of whether The Times should be a paper for all of America or whether it’s already been claimed by one side.
Mann tweeted: “The @NYTimes hiring of climate denier didn’t lead me to cancel subscription. Public editor’s offensive response did.”
Spayd’s “defense” is terrible on many levels:
- She asks “does he really mean” his “rhetorical flourishes” about climate change? Is there any hint Stephens was kidding in his writing? Hey, here’s an idea. Before hiring him, ask him that if he meant what he wrote.
- Believing in climate change is not “conforming to a liberal orthodoxy of thought,” but conforming to the truth and avoiding aiding and abetting lies.
- Bennet’s statement “[Stephens’ “work belongs inside our boundaries for intelligent debate” means those boundaries include dangerous lies.
- The Times wants to be a paper “for all of America” by caving to Americans who don’t mind being lied to.
The last point gives away the game. By doing things like hiring Stephens, the Times is trying to attract conservative readers by pandering to them, even to the extent of hiring liars. The Times is willing to sacrifice its standards to get more subscriptions and views.
The Times needs to learn there are consequences to its conduct and you have the clout to do that. You have to make them balance their craven appeals to right wing readers with losing their Nobel prize winning, most widely read and influential columnist.
And if they don’t agree, call their bluff and go elsewhere. I am sure you will have no trouble finding some other venues where you can reach the same audiences with the same views. Even one in particular that was much better at 2016 election coverage than the Times.