May 15, 2014

How the NYT called Jill Abramson — its axed executive editor — a bitch.

This "all the news that's fit to print" business is tricky... especially when you're firing your first-ever! female executive editor and replacing her with your first-ever! black executive editor. The fit-to-print article — "Times Ousts Its Executive Editor, Elevating Second in Command" — is some of the best raw material for interpreters of crafty text that I have ever seen.

How did the NYT call Jill Abramson a bitch? Well, it all started with the unfit-to-print image of the new executive editor, Dean Baquet, as the angry black man. I'm going to do a little editing and cut this text down to highlight the "angry black man" story buried within the plentiful neutral verbiage:
Ms. Abramson... had clashes with Mr. Baquet.... Mr. Baquet had become angered over a decision by Ms. Abramson to make a job offer to a senior editor from The Guardian, Janine Gibson, and install her alongside him in a co-managing editor position without consulting him. 
Note that the cause for anger is strong and blatant. That sentence is written to put Abramson clearly in the wrong and to give Baquet reason for his outrage. Someone is installed — great verb! — next to you, in a co-position with you and there has been no discussion with you about why this new work structure is needed? Anyone should read that as a message that you can't do your job right, and we don't even want to tell you; we're just going to work around you. When that is done to a black man, he can and should at least speculate that the disrespect has a racial component. (Remember when constitutional law professors at Stanford set up — on the slyan extra constitutional law study program for students assigned to Derrick Bell's constitutional law class?)

The NYT article says about this incident — the installation of a white female right next to Baquet — "It escalated the conflict between them and rose to the attention of Mr. Sulzberger." Again, great verbs. No person is assigned the action, but things elevate — they escalate and rise. Human agency evanesces. Do not be so racist as to perceive an angry black man, or if you do, know that he is righteously angry at the indignity, embarrassment, and insult visited upon him. But no, no, no, please do not dare to perceive the NYT as discriminating against the black man. Or... if you must... that lady did it. That lady who is gone.

Maybe this is how the world works these days (or how America works anyway). If there's any racism, it's lodged in one person, and that person is lopped off. (You know, the Donald Sterling routine.)

Now, we never heard a public peep out of Baquet, but I suspect that the way "It... rose to the attention of Mr. Sulzberger" is that Baquet laid it out for Sulzberger. The Times is going to look awful for what it did to the black man, unless that woman is out before the story breaks, and the black man — who was humiliated when his white female superior diminished him with the installation of another white female — suddenly trumps both of those ladies. Put the lid on this embarrassing story. Out with the woman — and lock in her silence.
Ms. Abramson did not return messages seeking comment. As part of a settlement agreement between her and the paper, neither side would go into detail about her firing.
Problem solved! No sexism or racism at the NYT. It's so intra-Times: Everyone has agreed with each other that no one is going to talk about it. What about us, the reading public? The leaks with undisclosed sources are already springing. I'm merely speculating based on the clues that are apparent in this wonderful NYT article.

Let's continue:
Mr. Baquet thanked Ms. Abramson, who was not present at the announcement, for teaching him “the value of great ambition” and then added that John Carroll, whom he worked for at The Los Angeles Times, “told me that great editors can also be humane editors.”
Let me paraphrase that: Jill was too ambitious. It sparked my ambition, and I played my hand and I won. And you know you'll be better off, because unlike Jill, I'm humane.

Meaner paraphrase: Jill was outrageously pushy, and it pushed me — humane me — to push back, and now you've got an executive editor who is not a bitch.
With Mr. Sulzberger more closely monitoring her stewardship, tensions between Ms. Abramson and Mr. Baquet escalated. In one publicized incident, he angrily slammed his hand against a wall in the newsroom. He had been under consideration for the lead job when Ms. Abramson was selected and, according to people familiar with his thinking, he was growing frustrated working with her.
So there was a big blowup. What happened? It was "publicized," and we're given a link. Clicking, we see it takes us out of the pleasant environs of the New York Times, over to the rougher place that is Politico. Here is an article by Dylan Byers from a year ago, and it's by linking to Byers that the NYT has found its way to call Abramson a bitch. Here's where we find the NYT sources dropping the unfit-to-print bits:
More than a dozen current and former members of the editorial staff, all of whom spoke to POLITICO on the condition of anonymity, described her as stubborn and condescending, saying they found her difficult to work with. If Baquet had burst out of the office in a huff, many said, it was likely because Abramson had been unreasonable.
There was a scene between Abramson and Baquet, but everyone who knows them and is talking is saying it must be Abramson's deficiencies. What they saw was Baquet enraged enough to slam his hand on the wall, but everyone's saying he's not that kind of guy. If he acted out, the woman made him do it. (By the way, that's an excuse that demands the deployment of the cliché "as old as Adam.")

More from Politco's Byers:
“Every editor has a story about how she’s blown up in a meeting,” one reporter said. “Jill can be impossible,” said another staffer....

At times, ["staffers"] say, her attitude toward editors and reporters leaves everyone feeling demoralized; on other occasions, she can seem disengaged or uncaring....

“I think there’s a really easy caricature that some people have bought into, of the bitchy woman character and the guy who is sort of calmer,” [Baquet] said. “That, I think, is a little bit of an unfair caricature.”
A bit! But there it is. The "bitchy woman." It's what the "staffers" believe. It's out of the mouth of Baquet and yet HE didn't say it. It's what those other people think, those unnamed people, those people who also think that he is "sort of calmer." He's not the angry black man, says the man apparently nobody thinks is angry, even though he burst out of a meeting and slammed his hand on the wall. He's the one everyone sees as calm, he says so himself. And he's even nice enough — what a nice man! — to say that the beliefs of the unnamed staffers whose caricatures he's characterizing are a bit unfair.

And that's how the NYT called Jill Abramson a bitch — by linking out to Politico, where the new executive editor — the calm and humane Dean Baquet — is quoted paraphrasing the opinions of some people.

CORRECTION:  The Politico article was a year and 3 weeks ago, not, as originally stated, 3 weeks ago. Also, in the 7th paragraph, I say "we never heard a public peep out of Baquet," but the quote discussed at the end of the post could be considered a peep. I'm just acknowledging, not correcting, that, because the "peep" that I say was not heard was an accusation of race discrimination, which I speculated may have been leveled in Baquet's private meetings with Sulzberger, after which (apparently) Sulzberger took to "monitoring" Abramson "more closely." The quotes Baquet gave to Politico do not play the race card.

184 comments:

sykes.1 said...

To make this story perfect, Mr. Baquet needs to be gay and HIV positive.

rhhardin said...

Carter-appointee to the Civil Aeronautics Board Betsy Bailey, in the 70s, got in an argument with an Eastern Airlines stewardess taxiing at Newark, concerning seating and the smoking section.

The stewardess later defended herself, claiming she'd only called Bailey a witch.

Brando said...

This new leftist world of oppressor-hating, victim-fetishizing, protected racial/gender group favoring had to come to a head sooner or later. How difficult to decide between racial minorities and oppressed genders!

Which is why it's much easier to do the quaint thing and judge people as individuals.

Wince said...

Where's the 'ho' with a tape recorder when you need one?

Bill R said...

Good work Althouse. This is one of the best interpretations of crafty text that I have ever seen.

MayBee said...

When that is done to a black man, he can and should at least speculate that the disrespect has a racial component.

Really?

If so, that is black privilege.

A white man would have to assume he is actually doing a bad job, or at least assume his boss doesn't think he's competent to handle the job himself.
If you are a black man, you get to -- should! according to Althouse- assume you are in fact good, it's the boss who sucks.

traditionalguy said...

Circular firing squad practice at NYT reveals that women can't shoot straight.

Michael said...

Professor

Without a doubt, your very best post ever. Excellent.

We now learn that not only do black men trump women )we knew that, of course) but black men trump two women!

MayBee said...

I also read she had assigned a reporter to find out if her new boss had been tainted by the pedophilia scandal at the BBC.

Which she should have. A huge aspect of the scandal there was how much the BBC executives knew and covered for Jimmy Savile. She wasn't going to let something like that happen at her newspaper, but it made the new boss mad and counted as a mark against her. Which is ironic and funny.

garage mahal said...

I love this idea that the NYT controls the media narrative when they can't even control the narrative in their own newsroom.

Bob Ellison said...

What Brando said.

Christy said...

I look forward to the extortionist demonstrating his competence.

Insufficiently Sensitive said...

Amusing, when the world's leading PC paper cans its PC Executive Editor who's brung pee on her PC Managing Editor by installing a PC 'co-Managing editor' on no notice. Through its PC credentials, every one of these PC entities considers itself trumps in wrangles with ordinary mortals, but now we have the battle of the Untouchables where trumps don't count, and mere facts must decide.

After enough of these PC vs PC catfights are tabulated, we ordinary white males might be able to assign rankings to the PC-itude of any person to map the hierarchy, peering upward from our bottom position. But meanwhile, thanks to Ms. Althouse for describing Abramson's ouster in clear descriptive terms, in which even a low-level manager might nod and agree.

The installation without notice of a 'co-whatever' beside a worker just reeks of Lenin's insertion of political Commissars alongside professionals like engineers and military officers, with veto power over their educated profession decisions.

RecChief said...

Now, we never heard a public peep out of Baquet, but I suspect that the way "It... rose to the attention of Mr. Sulzberger" is that Baquet laid it out for Sulzberger. The Times is going to look awful for what it did to the black man, unless that woman is out before the story breaks, and the black man — who was humiliated when his white female superior diminished him with the installation of another white female — suddenly trumps both of those ladies.

Perhaps it wasn't as machiavellian as you describe. Perhaps Baquet went to Sulzberger and said, "If you don't like the way I do my job, tell me, but this is insulting to say the least."

The fact that he didn't go public shows a degree of professionalism that is becoming increasingly rare in our society. Why confront a boss directly when you can post some passive/aggressive bullshit on Facebook or Twitter.

Finally, it's interesting you jump to the sexist/ racist arguments. Maybe it's as simple as Abramson was indeed a poor manager (as evidenced by the installation of a co-editor to Baquet). Maybe in this age it's hard to see but there are poor managers of all races, genders and political persuasions. That wouldn't get so many site views though I guess.

Big Mike said...

... he can and should at least speculate that the disrespect has a racial component.

No he shouldn't. That's perhaps the real "privilege" that white males still enjoy, if that's the word. If something goes wrong at work we don't waste time speculating that it's based on our gender or skin color. If there's something that needs fixing, then we fix it and move on. No idle speculation, thank you.

Bob Boyd said...


"The different branches of Arithmetic -- Ambition, Distraction, Uglification, and Derision."
Alice in Wonderland

Jeffrey said...

Ann -

Here is an article by Dylan Byers from 3 weeks ago

Check the datestamp on that POLITICO article again -- it's not from 4/23/14, as you seem to think, it's from 4/23/13. In other words, it's more than a year old. Perhaps that alters the trajectory of the narrative at least somewhat.

Otherwise, I'm hugely entertained by your cruelly neutral application of the same standards the NY Times uses on others to the Times itself.

LYNNDH said...

And this is one editor that they can't fire. Ok to fire the White Woman, never the Black Man. They certainly dug themselves a deep hole, and will keep digging.

damikesc said...

I find it amusing when Progressives fail to live up to their lofty standards.

gerry said...

And he's even nice enough — what a nice man! — to say that the beliefs of the unnamed staffers whose caricatures he's characterizing are a bit unfair.

Anonymous under-bus throwing. Smooth.

Birches said...

Ha Ha. The ban bossy people are all about "Do as I say, not as I do."

Instapundit also linked to someone who suggests Abramson was angry because she found out her male predecessors made far more than she did.

What will the "Equal Pay for Equal Work" people at the Times say about that, I wonder?

traditionalguy said...

You're likable enough, Jill. Just don't act like the boss!

Birches said...

Oh, I missed your added Drudge Headline from earlier.

This is a time to sit back, have some popcorn and watch these people destroy themselves.

Anonymous said...

Belligerent Drunk Stand-up Comic says:

I once worked for a female boss, no big deal. The boss is the boss, that's all it is (sips drink). Sure, she wasn't competent, but that's not that unusual, boss-wise, incompetence comes in all sexes and colors. Now, it wouldn't have hurt her to be a little bit more to look at, but that's what strip clubs are for...

(sips drink)

Bosses boss, that is what they do. It comes down to body language, people, and -- unfortunately -- her body language said I am insecure in my position, have low-confidence issues and also haven't been laid in way too long (sips drink). Also: small breasts. C'mon, people, stop groaning. Everyone knows that the day after the boss gets laid is a good day at work, the boss is smiling, you can slip out the door a little early, it's cool...

(sips drink)

Now, here is where having a female boss gets a bit uncomfortable: the performance review. Don't get me wrong, the boss is the boss but -- as a male -- you need to neuter your body language. Neuter, neuter. Don't want to come across as overly masculine or intimidating, you have to pretend that testosterone has nothing to do with your superior performance...

(sips drink)

My last performance review, there was a bit of a problem, a problem I never had with a male boss before. My boss had just come back from medical leave, and by medical leave I mean she breast implants done. Big ones. Yep: two big grapefruits smack-dab on her chest, looked like the heads of bald midgets struggling beneath a sweater. Now, what is the proper etiquette here? Pretend not to notice, in which case she's upset that she just had this considerable work done to boost her self-esteem and no one is noticing? Compliment her new rack? A no-win situation, I tell you: neuter, neuter...

(sips drink)

The good thing about her surgery was -- lo and behold -- she finally got laid. Finally. And just like with a male boss the day after she got laid was a good day at work, good day (sips drink). See: male and female bosses, not much difference at all....

Thank you, you've been a peach...

Brian Brown said...

Remember all the congratulations by the Democrats when they passed Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act?

Lilly Ledbetter, meet Jill Abramson

By the way, Bill Keller was apparently making $650,000 a year in 2005.

I'd be outraged too!

Michael Fitzgerald said...

"When that is done to a black man, he can and should speculate that the disrespect has a racial component"- Why is that? What has skin color got to do with it? And I guess calling a woman ambitious is the same as calling her a bitch. Here's the liberal victimization mindset in a nutshell. Hearing dog whistles, reaching for the race card, reading condemnation into words of praise. Someone got up on the progressive side of the bed this morning...

Mark said...

Wouldn't it be nice if editors were judged on the quality reporting produced by their reporters?

Fred Drinkwater said...

Either the NYT was careful or careless in putting this story together. Its expressions are either nuanced or clumsy.
Either way, the whole thing is irrelevant to the NYT's publicly stated purpose: All the news that's fit to print.
Nobody took my previous bet (that Hillary will not be nominated) but here's another one: This change at the exec editor level of the NYT will have no discernable effect on the publication itself.

President-Mom-Jeans said...

Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar.

Sometimes a bitch is just a bitch.

Either way, the left's competing victimhood groups will eventually devour one another.

Mark said...

I love this idea that the NYT controls the media narrative when they can't even control the narrative in their own newsroom.

I know you're trying to be ironic, but the sad thing is that these bozos (and their bozo buddies with whom they wine and dine on the Upper West Side) do control most of the channels of communication.

The true tragedy of humanity is most of the people who are drawn to power are exactly the ones who shouldn't have it.

Michael K said...

It's in interesting how thew leftist institutions, Stanford and the NY Times, have to work around the angry black men to get the work done. Now we would never say anything about the competence of these affirmative action hires, but where was Obama on the night of Benghazi?

Just wondering.

The Cracker Emcee Refulgent said...

Dang, Althouse. Reminded me of one of Orwell's essays. Good job.

Scott M said...

Human agency evanesces.

That's got to be one of the best sentences I've read on this blog in six years.

Ann Althouse said...

"Check the datestamp on that POLITICO article again -- it's not from 4/23/14, as you seem to think, it's from 4/23/13. In other words, it's more than a year old. Perhaps that alters the trajectory of the narrative at least somewhat."

Thanks. Sorry. Corrected. It makes more sense on the longer time line, I would say.

Fred Drinkwater said...

What happened to Baquet, happened to me once. (Except for the racial thing, I suppose). I simply verified that the "secret, parallel" thing was actually real, then wrote a one sentence letter to the (relatively new) CEO. I then had a successful career elsewhere. None of this made the NYT, sadly.

Roughcoat said...

This is all very entertaining! Virtually Shakespearean!

Do you think she really is a bitch?

john said...

Didn't we see this played out in "The Office", season 4, I think? It was about Stanley.

Scott M said...

“I think there’s a really easy caricature that some people have bought into, of the bitchy woman character and the guy who is sort of calmer,” [Baquet] said. “That, I think, is a little bit of an unfair caricature.”

Maybe unfair in this instance, but can we really say there's no kernel of truth in that stereotype at all? Really?

David said...

This is good fun and all, but it's deck chairs on the Titanic. I wonder if Sulzberger has noticed that while people are bitching about their pay, or their title, or their bitchy boss, the business model is completely unworkable and no one knows how to fix it.

I mean, they print the news on paper, people!

MadisonMan said...

Wherever people with egos work -- and why would the NYTimes not have people with egos? -- egos will clash. It's not news that Abramson was fired, and I think the NYTimes spent way too much time explaining things.

Sorun said...

The Times is going to look awful for what it did to the black man

Also why you don't get honest reporting on the Obama Administration.

MayBee said...

I'm happy enough to see NYT get a dose of it's own identity politics medicine.

But I'd be happier still if more effort were spent on pointing out that there are good and valid reasons to see people as good at their jobs or not, their gender and race notwithstanding.

Sure, the NYT might believe they have a good reason to do what they did where Racist Republicans do not, when they act. That's how progressives who so love making rules think- they want to make rules that don't apply to them because *they* have good reason to do the things they do. Be it flying in a private jet (or air force one), firing women, or not having a union office.

It would be so awesome to use this moment to say, you progressives don't have a corner on the market when it comes to good reasons to do things. Maybe you don't need to make so many rules, because people are pretty good at knowing their own motivations. Even if onlookers can put a bad spin on what you do.

The Cracker Emcee Refulgent said...

"We now learn that not only do black men trump women )we knew that, of course) but black men trump two women!"

That might be true in some high-profile cases, but overall, black men have been ground to dust for the interests of white (and black) women.

Scott M said...

I look forward to the extortionist demonstrating his competence.

This.

With all the moral jujitsu they've just gone through, one wonders what they're going to do if their favored victim can't cut the proverbial mustard.

Scott M said...

No he shouldn't. That's perhaps the real "privilege" that white males still enjoy, if that's the word. If something goes wrong at work we don't waste time speculating that it's based on our gender or skin color. If there's something that needs fixing, then we fix it and move on. No idle speculation, thank you.

But the flip-side of that is an onerous sense that we have no shield to hide behind. If there's something wrong with our personal performance on the job, we can't assume that the boss coming down on us has a racial or gender aspect. We're forced to confront our own strengths/weaknesses and responsibilities.

BrianE said...

She may have not been a good executive editor.
I don't think it's possible to sort out the office politics and posturing from the facts.
Don't expect the NYT to do that job!
The few times I saw her on the talking heads shows, I would say her style might work against her in a charged office environment, which, no doubt, the newsroom was and is.
We'll know after some time as Baquet as executive editor.
Maybe it's a fault of Sulzberger-- to elevate people to their level of incompetence. Time will tell.

the wolf said...

Abramson should have checked the Hierarchy Of Identity Groups before clashing with Baquet. Her only recourse now is to either out herself or convert to Islam.

Unknown said...

We need some sort of sliding scale that clearly establishes the pecking order of victim to privileged. I want to be sure I'm rooting for and against the right people lest I get confused. Like what if Ms. Abramsan were also gay? Who would be the bad person then?

I'm Full of Soup said...

So you are saying Abramson lost in the game of Gay, Black, Woman which is the librul version of Rock, Paper, Scissors?

Anonymous said...

As B points out above, and Althouse does in her post, I'm guessing one of the reasons the Times is so ashamedly in the tank for Obama is because they're living the drama of the ideas as well. They're in deep.

Does all America work this way?

You can make a case for many important institutions having a lot of this going on.

Ann Althouse said...

Birches said..."Instapundit also linked to someone who suggests Abramson was angry because she found out her male predecessors made far more than she did. What will the "Equal Pay for Equal Work" people at the Times say about that, I wonder?"

I wrote about that yesterday. Click on the Jill Abramson tag to read that.

The "someone" was Ken Auletta at The New Yorker, probably the most-linked item that went up about the Abramson ousting.

This post of mine is about that the NYT saw fit to print. (No material about the pay differential.)

grackle said...

More than a dozen current and former members of the editorial staff, all of whom spoke to POLITICO on the condition of anonymity …

Mr. and Mrs. Anonymous,
just when needed
are easily heeded
and never autonomous.

When that is done to a black man, he can and should at least speculate that the disrespect has a racial component. Really? If so, that is black privilege.

Never, ever say
turnabout is fair play.
Don't you know
It's all for show?

I love this idea that the NYT controls the media narrative when they can't even control the narrative in their own newsroom. This is a time to sit back, have some popcorn and watch these people destroy themselves.

I once saw a sad movie
I thought was groovy
but it was too predictable
and the end was biblical.

Sydney said...

Ha! Too funny. But, truly, it sounds like she deserved to be fired. Hiring the co-editor like that is poor management. She must have bought in to that PR about the triumph of the woman and thought hers was a position of power to bring about the feminist conquest of the NYT. Her bad!

Ann Althouse said...

""When that is done to a black man, he can and should speculate that the disrespect has a racial component"- Why is that? What has skin color got to do with it?"

Amusingly, you stated the question that constitutes speculating, so... why did you do that?

You know, it is white privilege to be able to feel free not to need to analyze things all the time in terms of "Is it because I'm black/white?"

I wonder if you think Baquet has risen as high as he has because of affirmative action. I wonder if you think he has to think about whether people think that? If you think maybe he has and maybe he at least has to worry that he has, what do you think he thought when he saw that his superior has, without consulting him, installed a co-manager, a white woman, to share his work somehow?

SGT Ted said...

We now learn that not only do black men trump women )we knew that, of course) but black men trump two women!

Women have always been lower on the Victimology Pecking Order scale than blacks. This has been known for years.

Tim said...

Nice when the Left eats its own.

Anonymous said...

these bozos (and their bozo buddies with whom they wine and dine on the Upper West Side) do control most of the channels of communication

Your hat needs more tinfoil.

SGT Ted said...

You know, it is white privilege to be able to feel free not to need to analyze things all the time in terms of "Is it because I'm black/white?"

Not it isn't. Analysing things in terms of "Is it because I am black/white" is racist excuse making and guilt tripping that presupposes that everyone divides and treat people differently solely because of their skin color.

SGT Ted said...

And, yes, please pass the popcorn.

Scott M said...

You know, it is white privilege to be able to feel free not to need to analyze things all the time in terms of "Is it because I'm black/white?"

Does the white male burden of not having a gender or race to hide behind for screwing up negate that privilege?

mccullough said...

Well played Baquet.

glenn said...

All this PC stool is getting harder and harder to follow isn't it?

garage mahal said...

There is no sexism.

The left are the real sexists.

The Crack Emcee said...

Michael Fitzgerald,

"When that is done to a black man, he can and should speculate that the disrespect has a racial component"- Why is that?"

400 years of unwarranted, unadulterated, unfair and brutal, white-on-black racism.

Falacrine,

"Overall, black men have been ground to dust for the interests of white (and black) women."

And many whites still don't get it.

Scott M,

"If there's something wrong with our personal performance on the job, we can't assume that the boss coming down on us has a racial or gender aspect. We're forced to confront our own strengths/weaknesses and responsibilities."

Because that's NEW for white guys - checking themselves. They're cultured to lean on others, don't you know? That's "normal" to them - whether they're any good or not. I'm glad theory *might* be noticing.

It'll probably take 400 more years for them to get a clue, though,...

n.n said...

Their principles, either one or two sets, are not internally, externally, and mutually reconcilable. In the race to marginalize and eviscerate their competing interests, they created moral hazards, which should come back to haunt them.

glenn said...

Ahhh Karma. It's a ...... Never mind.

Skeptical Voter said...

Office politics; an ambitious subordinate slips the shiv into his boss's back.

Add a little group and gender issues to the mix, and it's delicious.

n.n said...

Tim:

No, it's not nice. Their internal conflicts inevitably cause mass collateral damage. Their strong ability to overcome irreconcilable differences, both naturally arising and manufactured, is the only thing preventing the bubble from bursting.

On the other hand, they also enable blowing the bubble ever larger, and it's probably best that it bursts sooner than later.

RecChief said...

With all the moral jujitsu they've just gone through, one wonders what they're going to do if their favored victim can't cut the proverbial mustard

Michael Sam comes to mind

Except we've already seen what they do. Think President Obama.

The Crack Emcee said...

Tim,

"Nice when the Left eats its own."

And when the Right does, it's all a lie.

What a load of malarky - propped up by this scrum of the world's leaders as America's historically racist lovers of chaos.

Enjoy….

RecChief said...

""When that is done to a black man, he can and should speculate that the disrespect has a racial component"- Why is that? What has skin color got to do with it?"

Amusingly, you stated the question that constitutes speculating, so... why did you do that?

You know, it is white privilege to be able to feel free not to need to analyze things all the time in terms of "Is it because I'm black/white?"

I wonder if you think Baquet has risen as high as he has because of affirmative action. I wonder if you think he has to think about whether people think that? If you think maybe he has and maybe he at least has to worry that he has, what do you think he thought when he saw that his superior has, without consulting him, installed a co-manager, a white woman, to share his work somehow?


I wonder why you strain so hard to inject a racial component into this? Any person, regardless of skin color, would be offended if a co-anything was installed to mirror your work. And the common sense thing to do would be to confront your immediate supervisor first, then bring it to the attention of management.

See Hanlon's razor.

This whole post looks like bait for Crack emcee. Why don't you just email him and ask him to comment

Seeing Red said...

Well, Professor, if what I read a few times about college kids today, yes he did or does think it. Didn't you post about that group of college kids from one of the elite colleges on the East Coast pointing out the racism on campus? Yes they do belong there even if they're a person of color?

Welcome to the effects of affirmative action. When generations are raised with the low expectation of being marks on a paper.....

Which is why AA has to go.

grackle said...

Nice when the Left eats its own.

I once ate a meal
I thought was veal.
After I could see –
Dammit, it was me!

tim in vermont said...

"You know, it is white privilege to be able to feel free not to need to analyze things all the time in terms of "Is it because I'm black/white?""

Affirmative Action has a price.

Surely you can't expect people not to wonder such a thing when the people doing the hiring are so strongly for AA at the NYT?

The fundamental flaw in AA is not that it is racist against whites, Asians, and Jews. It is that it comes from the racist assumption that blacks are inherently inferior and reinforces this stereotype not only in those harmed by it, but those helped by it.

The Crack Emcee said...

"The quotes Baquet gave to Politico do not play the race card."

How does someone "play the race card" in a country saturated in racism?

By acknowledging it?

That's quite a clever ploy to keep things quiet, by conservatives, I'll give them that.

It's still a load of bullshit,...

Roughcoat said...



If she really is a bossy bitch, doesn't she deserve to get called out for it? And didn't she get what she deserved?

Anonymous said...

"you're firing your first-ever! female executive editor and replacing her with your first-ever! black executive editor"

Democratic Party c.2008:
they're firing their first-ever! female presidential nominee and replacing her with their first-ever! black presidential nominee.

Prediction: NYT will soon discover their liberal readers are all racist.

Roughcoat said...

I wonder if you think Baquet has risen as high as he has because of affirmative action.

Certainly a possibility. One must consider it.

Big Mike said...

But the flip-side of that is an onerous sense that we have no shield to hide behind. If there's something wrong with our personal performance on the job, we can't assume that the boss coming down on us has a racial or gender aspect. We're forced to confront our own strengths/weaknesses and responsibilities.

@Scott, what's wrong with being forced to confront our own strengths and weaknesses? It might not be fun at the time, but there's nothing wrong with it.

You know, it is white privilege to be able to feel free not to need to analyze things all the time in terms of "Is it because I'm black/white?"

@Althouse, that's what Maybee and I independently pointed out upthread.

I wonder if you think Baquet has risen as high as he has because of affirmative action. I wonder if you think he has to think about whether people think that?

We'll know soon enough whether he's an affirmative action hire or an individual with rare talent. With as many out of work journalists who'd eagerly take their jobs if offered, the Times staffers would say precisely what they said no matter which was the case with Baquet so the Politico and Times articles should be discounted. But the first step towards easing Baquet's mind about whether or not he's viewed as an affirmative action hire is to end affirmative action, as Clarence Thomas has repeatedly pointed out.

paul a'barge said...

Is Dean Baquet gay?

rhhardin said...

Maybe this is how the world works these days (or how America works anyway). If there's any racism, it's lodged in one person, and that person is lopped off. (You know, the Donald Sterling routine.)

It's not modern. The scapegoat is ancient Greece and earlier.

It's a purification ritual.

Kenneth Burke goes on about it, with bad feelings for the future.

Megaera said...

Cannot take credit for this, seen last night either at Gatewaypundit or AceofSpades:

Out: #Ban "Bossy"
In: #Can "Bossy"

I almost did a spit-take on my laptop screen.

rhhardin said...

There's no speculation about the causality of moronic newspaper editing in this matter.

Maybe the black guy was anti-moron.

Jill, we know at least, was pro-moron.

Somebody defined certainty as wrong at the top of your voice. Maybe there's a lot of certainty in editorial meetings.

MD Greene said...

I know nothing about Dean Baquet, but it appears he knows how to play politics, which is useful in a great big bureaucracy like the NYT. No shame in that.

What surprises me is the lack of interest in "Pinch" Sulzberger's competence. This is the second executive editor he's chosen and then sacked -- remember nut job Howell Raines and the plagiarism scandal and Sulzberger's subsequent elevation of the previously passed-over Bill Keller?

If he weren't his daddy's son, Sulzberger would have a hard time getting a job managing the Times call center, let alone the whole operation.

drunkdebunker said...

The bitch made her bones with her hit piece on Clarence Thomas. Tough titty for her.

Pookie Number 2 said...

You know, it is white privilege to be able to feel free not to need to analyze things all the time in terms of "Is it because I'm black/white?"

No, it's immaturity to assume as a default that other people are flawed bigots.

There's no "need" to analyze things from the perspective of perpetual victimhood, there's only a destructive tendency amongst the unproductive to do so.

Anonymous said...

If this were a story out of the weekly standard, we'd be hearing how the Republican's have both a Woman problem and a Race problem.

Since it's a story out of the unbiased, no political affiliation whatsoever New York Times, we won't hear such nonsense from Althouse.

No suggestions for Democrats to clean up their house. That's only for Republicans, who might listen.

Scott M said...

Because that's NEW for white guys - checking themselves. They're cultured to lean on others, don't you know? That's "normal" to them - whether they're any good or not. I'm glad theory *might* be noticing.

100% wrong. It's always been this way. I was raised to look at my own strengths and weaknesses, to take responsibility for my own failings and to never blame others, that blaming others for my own issues was a weakness and to be avoided as dishonorable.

If you think that's somehow new, could be we've finally gotten to the heart of your discontent.

Scott M said...

@ Big Mike

@Scott, what's wrong with being forced to confront our own strengths and weaknesses? It might not be fun at the time, but there's nothing wrong with it.

ABSOLUTELY NOTHING. This is the way it should be. However, we've gotten to the point where personal responsibility is dog-whistle racism. When something goes sideways at work, the people responsible for actually screwing up should either admit it and fix whatever it is, vowing to try and avoid it in the future, or be fired...and expect to be fired.

Identity politics gum up the works when it comes to this, particularly with all of this hogwash about "privilege".

Drago said...

The ever increasingly incoherent crack: "That's quite a clever ploy to keep things quiet, by conservatives, I'll give them that."

So, let's see here.

Lefty female editor at lefty news organization (which prides itself on adherence to lefty PC notions) fires lefty female editor and replaces lefty female editor with lefty black editor.

Cracks response?

Darn those conservatives!!

BTW crack, have you been able to muster up even a minute amount of outrage yet at the kidnapping, rape and selling into slavery black african girls by black african islamists?

I'm guessing.....not.

"saturated with racism".

Michael K said...

It's interesting that Stanford, which hired a second professor to cover for the incompetent black man, is now about to bankrupt their own endowment i to indulge another leftist fantasy. The end of fossil fuels.

The students waged a textbook campaign, assembling impressive numbers, soliciting key testimonials, maintaining a respectful tone towards authority while at the same time keeping up the pressure.

The question is really: to what end? The answer is, sadly, self-delusion. No one doubts that Stanford students are smart, but their intelligence is not much of a defense against irrational enthusiasms that can sweep through a community. What the divestment movement has sold to Stanford students is a bit of flummery. When Stanford announced on May 6 that it would divest "direct investments in coal mining companies," President John Hennessy issued a statement that begins, "Stanford has a responsibility as a global citizen to promote sustainability for the planet..."


Maybe they can implode in time to avoid taking the rest of us down. I wish I was optimistic.

Drago said...

eric: "No suggestions for Democrats to clean up their house."

To even suggest the dems clean up their house is "ugly" and likely to drive Ann into the arms of the only party (the dems) that apparently is never "ugly".

Doug said...

Scott M said...
I look forward to the extortionist demonstrating his competence.

This.

With all the moral jujitsu they've just gone through, one wonders what they're going to do if their favored victim can't cut the proverbial mustard.


He won't have failed the NYT ... the NYT will have failed him.

The Crack Emcee said...

tim in vermont,

"The fundamental flaw in AA is,..that it comes from the racist assumption that blacks are inherently inferior and reinforces this stereotype not only in those harmed by it, but those helped by it."

Look over all the sentences in AA's conception and tell me, where that particular reading/definition is, in them.

Otherwise admit it's just more historically racist bullshit, conservative whites have made up, to sully black achievement.

Same as it ever was,...

The Crack Emcee said...

Scott M,

"Identity politics gum up the works when it comes to this, particularly with all of this hogwash about "privilege"."

White men - complaining about people noticing their privilege - are,…precious.

White men barely noticed they were advantaged when slavery was in full effect.And when they were getting all the free goodies the government handed out - a practice which they totally want to stop for anyone else. "Big Government" being bad - when it works for anyone else.

Fucking hypocritical hilarity,...

lemondog said...

Too convoluted.

Need a matrix to clarify necessary pc outcomes, e.g., white male v white male, white male v white female, white male v black male, etc. including all ethnic, gender, sexual orientation, cultural, religious,and political variations as to what should trump what.

rhhardin said...

Thurber loved his bitchy women.

The cartoon series "The War between Men and Women" is nice.

Reprinted in the easily found Thurber Carnival collection.

a page.

President-Mom-Jeans said...

Check your victimhood.

Fred Drinkwater said...

Scott M: I was indoctrinated that, as a manager facing a problem person at work, you have three possible choices to decode among:
Move 'em
Fix 'em
Shoot 'em
The only thing you cannot do is hope things will get better on their own.

Ann Althouse said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Ann Althouse said...

What's with these commenters who are so wedded to the notion that the NYT is a meritocracy? Can't even entertain the notion that it's anything but! Even when the first-ever female exec editor is ousted by the first-ever black exec editor.

Who knew you guys had so much respect for the NYT?!

Hmmm. Let's think about how that could possibly happen.

You're saying maybe she just wasn't good at her job. Well, why was she there in the first place?! Where do you get your foundational premise that the NYT is a meritocracy and she was ousted because she wasn't good?

MayBee said...

Check your victimhood.

Love that

Michael said...

Crack:
Scott M,

"If there's something wrong with our personal performance on the job, we can't assume that the boss coming down on us has a racial or gender aspect. We're forced to confront our own strengths/weaknesses and responsibilities."

Because that's NEW for white guys - checking themselves. They're cultured to lean on others, don't you know? That's "normal" to them - whether they're any good or not. I'm glad theory *might* be noticing."

Actually, people in the work force, white and black and other, have to deal with the consequences of their job performance. To suggest that this is new for "white guys" is both wrong and lazy thinking.

Illuninati said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Michael said...

I have no idea what constitutes a good editor and so am not qualified to guess at what would represent under performance or stunning success for an editor. But no decent manager brings in a senior position to serve alongside another senior position without consulting with the current holder of the post. To do so would be indicative of profoundly poor management skills.

tim in vermont said...

"Look over all the sentences in AA's conception and tell me, where that particular reading/definition is, in them"

Ha ha ha! So you think that is impossible for them to not recognize or acknowledge an underlying assumption in their thinking?

If it were a serious effort to help poor blacks, the effort would be applied at elementary school on, to bring up the level of education, and to punish cases of discrimination where whites were chosen over equally or better qualified blacks.

That would be an actual effort to remedy the problem.

Pookie Number 2 said...

What's with these commenters who are so wedded to the notion that the NYT is a meritocracy? Can't even entertain the notion that it's anything but! Even when the first-ever female exec editor is ousted by the first-ever black exec editor.

No-one's wedded to that idea. We're just disputing your broad but incorrect assertions if how people respond to men or women.

Illuninati said...

Iluminati said:


Althouse said:
"Maybe this is how the world works these days (or how America works anyway). If there's any racism, it's lodged in one person, and that person is lopped off. (You know, the Donald Sterling routine.)"

Excellent observation. This is a concise description of the process which the philosopher Rene Girard calls "the scapegoat mechanism" which he believes "is the origin of sacrifice and the foundation of human culture". Racism is just one example of the many different tensions which can be resolved through the scape goat mechanism. Another example is how the Nazis used the Jews as scapegoats to diffuse anguish in the German culture.

A major effect of the gospel of Jesus Christ is to short circuit the scapegoat mechanism. As our culture descends back into paganism the scapegoat mechanism will become increasingly prominent since it is the most effective way to diffuse societal tensions and to atone for the ills of society.

tim in vermont said...

"Who knew you guys had so much respect for the NYT?!"

No, this is fundamentally hysterically funny.

"How does someone "play the race card" in a country saturated in racism?"

What does "saturated" mean?

One definition among many that are all similar: " charged thoroughly or completely;"

There is not room for one extra speck of racism in our society? It is chock full?

So the Civil War, the Civil Rights Act of 1964, the Civil Rights Movement, the end of the use of lynching and Jim Crow, they didn't leave any space? It is all just the same as it ever was?



tim in vermont said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
southcentralpa said...

The most peculiar part is that the whole pay thing might just be a red herring. She was giving the imcumbent administration unshirted heck over all the criminal leak probes ....

MayBee said...

All organizations are, in the America we've created, a mix of meritocracy and diversity promotion.

They have to promote somewhat based on merit, or they wouldn't thrive and people would not choose to work for them.
But they can't promote entirely on merit because there are too many laws and pressures to have a blend of colors and genders throughout the organization.

As for the NYTs, we'll never know. NPR reported last night that Baquet was also considered for the job Abramson ultimately got. It could be that Pinch had always favored him for the job, even though at the time he had a more complicated history. Baquet possibly knew how to push the right buttons with Pinch, which didn't have to be racist or sexist. But might have been.

Clyde said...

Evidently Mr. Baquet's actions were viewed as more affirmative than Ms. Abramson's by the NYT. And that's the name of that tune.

The Crack Emcee said...

Scott M,

"I was raised to look at my own strengths and weaknesses, to take responsibility for my own failings and to never blame others, that blaming others for my own issues was a weakness and to be avoided as dishonorable."

I know you were, Scott. And it's a good thing slavery, Jim Crow, white racism, white supremacy, white privilege, and white entitlement, were never "my own failings" or else my parents would've had to tell me that as well.

Instead, they told me the opposite - it's not my fault America's a white man's lie - that it's the white guys, who make a show of being strong, and speak of honor, as they act weak and shamefully. Telling people, who they knocked down and took their shoes, to "pull yourself up by your bootstraps" being just one glaring example.

THAT's truly "dishonorable" behavior.

Reconstruction lasted 12 years, Scott. I had nothing to do with it. There were racist people, and a racist country, to blame. Blacks do ourselves no dishonor by stating that as fact. It is evil - evil - for the oppressors to try and paint the racist results as moral deficiency.

"If you think that's somehow new, could be we've finally gotten to the heart of your discontent."

Oh, I don't - America's always been this way. I have gotten to the heart of it, my friend. We, you and I, most certainly have.

I mean, only in America - or maybe South Africa - can a white guy lecture us some more on what's missing from our lives, and then explain even the historical forces behind the loss as well - as our fault - all the while claiming anything about this arrangement is somehow a colorblind break from the past.

Donald Sterling's "not a racist". Cliven Bundy's "not a racist". Which must be true because, even you have told me, all the racists are dead, right? Except for powerful Republican billionaires.

It's insanity putting Monty Python to shame.

Where do I come from, Scott? If I want to see "The Old Country" (as my white friends do) where do I go? But, then again, why?

My black foster sister just had a black grand baby with blonde hair and blue eyes - it's affecting the father's mental health. Should I send you over to consult, since you're so ready, and well-equpped, to tell blacks how to cope with that old, long ago, doesn't matter issues of rape and slavery? Our fault and all that.

The idea, in their ever-changing cesspool of situational ethics, that it's American whites - not blacks - who are accurately framing what "others" are responsible for, is so racist it practically deserves another thread of it's own.

Funny. You didn't mention what your parents said, or would've said, about being 100% in the right but outnumbered by bandits,...

Anonymous said...

"BTW crack, have you been able to muster up even a minute amount of outrage yet at the kidnapping, rape and selling into slavery black african girls by black african islamists?"

Let me predict Crack's response.

Because 400 years of slavery, white men just don't get it. You'll never get it.

richard mcenroe said...

Keep in mind it was the NYT that fired a black editor when the white reporter the black editor's two white bosses hired was caught making up stories.

Mountain Maven said...

That's the way it is now. Everything is about gender race and sexual orientation. Makes me sick.

I am waiting for MLK to be denounced like an old Soviet Premier for saying that character trumped race.

richard mcenroe said...

To make this story perfect, Mr. Baquet needs to be gay and HIV positive.

That's soooo 2oth Century. He needs to be HIV ASSERTIVE!

The Crack Emcee said...

Ann Althouse,

"How does someone "play the race card" in a country saturated in racism?"

You openly point to it. Baquet -- as far as we know from the quotes Byers put in the article -- did float the idea that the NYT was treating him differently because of his race.

But is that playing a card or stating a fact? We KNOW blacks get treated differently - from pre-school onwards, apparently - so where's the "card"?

"What's with these commenters who are so wedded to the notion that the NYT is a meritocracy? Can't even entertain the notion that it's anything but! Even when the first-ever female exec editor is ousted by the first-ever black exec editor."

I, most certainly, do not share that view.

"You're saying maybe she just wasn't good at her job. Well, why was she there in the first place?!"

Black people ask this question all-the-time. White supremacy is usually what it boils down to. What real "talent" do we see on TV? Why are they there?

Whites are in a flowing river, ignoring where we come from,...

"Where do you get your foundational premise that the NYT is a meritocracy and she was ousted because she wasn't good?"

Why can't it be both horrors? The NYT is fucked up and she's part of it or even more so?

Michael,

"People in the work force, white and black and other, have to deal with the consequences of their job performance. To suggest that this is new for "white guys" is both wrong and lazy thinking."

Sure - like in the booming illegal alien construction business AKA modern day sharecropping. You get big bonuses for screwing them over. Those are the "consequences".

tim in vermont,

"Ha ha ha! So you think that is impossible for them to not recognize or acknowledge an underlying assumption in their thinking?"

I've seen no reason to - to say America screwed us over doesn't imply we're inferior, but that whites and America are corrupt. To now try and take it away just compounds the implication.

"If it were a serious effort to help poor blacks, the effort would be applied at elementary school on, to bring up the level of education, and to punish cases of discrimination where whites were chosen over equally or better qualified blacks.

That would be an actual effort to remedy the problem."

Well, I like your enthusiasm anyway,...

paul a'barge said...

Dean Baquet, a black man married a WHITE WOMAN

President-Mom-Jeans said...

Why was the "father" (I notice you didn't say "husband", big surprise) of your foster sister's grandchild upset about the hair and eye color of "his" child?

Maybe some DNA testing is in order, wouldn't want to see another black male oppressed by having to support the child of a white man cuckolding him.

As to where you come from Crack, you are being disingenuous. You already told us that you came from your 7-children-by-god-knows-how-many-men prize of a mother.

Cheer up, sport. Pinch just gave exactly the spoils of reparations that you have been demanding from that pushy honky devil to the deserving oppressed African American.

Ann Althouse said...

"How does someone "play the race card" in a country saturated in racism?"

You openly point to it. Baquet -- as far as we know from the quotes Byers put in the article -- did NOT float the idea that the NYT was treating him differently because of his race. One could look at the facts and infer it, and Baquet may have presented the facts in a way that would cause and inference to be made (which is in a gray area that we might call trying to make the other players believe you are holding a race card). But I don't think he gave that to Byers. I think he may have used it as leverage with Sulzberger. Sulzberger was probably sensitive about the appearance of ousting the first-ever female executive editor. The NYT had a big stake in her success. So how could Baquet outplay that. How did he take the ambition he said he learned from Abramson and get her job? Race trumps gender in that card game I'm thinking could have happened between Sulzberger and Baquet.

[THIS COMMENT IS REPOSTED WITH THE PREVIOUSLY MISSING WORD "NOT" IN IT.]

The Crack Emcee said...

tim in vermont,

"So the Civil War, the Civil Rights Act of 1964, the Civil Rights Movement, the end of the use of lynching and Jim Crow, they didn't leave any space? It is all just the same as it ever was?"

If whites need wars, laws, mass movements, and demands not to kill or discriminate, then yes, they can be the same danger they ever were - affecting real lives in real-world ways. Especially as they keep trying to find wiggle room to deny anything is, or has been, occurring. Their plots are almost Shakespearian.

I arrived on this blog colorblind - few wanted any part of it. They wanted to talk about Trayvon.

Then I came back "black" - now I was a heretic. There are no racists, or racism - it was all in my mind.

The Supreme Court agreed.

And now we've got Cliven Bundy, Donald Sterling, Tal Fortgang - ♬ and many more ♬ - and, still, they act like nothing's changed, or been revealed, regarding the hollowness of anything they've said or done before.

All that's changed is their renewed enthusiasm for battling opposite me - is that progress?

The answer to your question is "Yes". White people are still "white people".

And it is all just the same as it ever was.

Contemporary Stylee,...

Doug said...

Hey! She went over that "glass cliff" we've been hearing so much about.

Elevated to the top position, the woman then gets canned when there is no improvement.

SEXISM! WAAAAAAAAA!

RecChief said...

You're saying maybe she just wasn't good at her job. Well, why was she there in the first place?! Where do you get your foundational premise that the NYT is a meritocracy and she was ousted because she wasn't good?

I'll admit, I don't have much respect for the NYT. I also don't think it is a meritocracy in the way you describe. However, my gut reaction is that she got the job by repeating lefty talking points, seeming reasonable in interviews with the boss, and her past writings where she went after conservatives. Not necessarily because she's a she who takes those positions. In other words, she got the job by being a good liberal/leftist.

That type of person would be welcomed in that position, that she was a woman is a bonus. But having the 'correct' ideological bent might get you the job, but being a terrible manager will get you fired.

I don't see why that simple proposition is so hard to understand. Instead, there is an immediate reaction that someone must have played the race card, or the gender card. I don't know why she was fired, nor do I care.

I think that says something about both of us (or maybe society in general)when one immediately jumps to the identity group explanation right off the bat, instead of "maybe she sucked at her job."

There has been a campaign in the military against 'toxic leadership' for a while now. It has nothing to do with race, gender, or any other identity group dynamic. It does have everything to do with 'leaders' who suck at being leaders.

Ann Althouse said...

NOTE: Crack at 2:11 PM quotes my comment that left out the word "not," which I've reposted.

Sorry that now appears after Crack's comment.

Ann Althouse said...

"But is that playing a card or stating a fact? We KNOW blacks get treated differently - from pre-school onwards, apparently - so where's the "card"?"

Sorry about the absence of "not" confusion, but here's my point. You can play the race card by pointing to something that happened and saying you think it was racial. But you can also just point to what happened and let the reader put 2 and 2 together. You can be a black person saying these things happen to me and allow the listener to infer that race was a factor. I wouldn't call that playing the race card. But that doesn't mean I'm saying the speaker didn't mean to cause the listener to make that inference. And even where the speaker didn't intend anything racial to be inferred, listeners may on their own plug in their background understanding of the word and make the inference. In that case, the speaker didn't "play the race card." The racial context existed outside of the speaker's presentation and was part of the interpretation of the facts.

Ann Althouse said...

""What's with these commenters who are so wedded to the notion that the NYT is a meritocracy? Can't even entertain the notion that it's anything but! Even when the first-ever female exec editor is ousted by the first-ever black exec editor." I, most certainly, do not share that view."

That's quite clear.

I didn't mean to refer to you in the category of commenters wedded to the notion that there's a meritocracy out there.

MayBee said...

This is why I don't think Baquet had to point to racism to push out Abramson:

(David Folkenflik of NPR Twitter feed from last night)

David Folkenflik ‏@davidfolkenflik 22h

1. Sulzberger had initially been conflicted about picking Abramson - for top slot - AS had long seen Baquet as a future exec editor

1a Baquet left NYT in 2000 to become LAT managing editor & then top editor; he rejoined in 07 after defying Tribune execs over further cuts
Expand

1b. Baquet's ultimate willingness to defy corp chiefs on cuts in LA gave business-side execs some agita.

2. Abramson had a relatively high profile as Times exec editor, in significant part because of path-breaking nature of her appointment

2a. Sulzberger didn't love that profile
---------

According to this, Sulzberger was never fully on board with Abramson, but had pushback from the board about promoting (his favorite) Baquet due to his somewhat wild run at the LAT.

Baquet had an ally and a fan in Pinch, Abramson did not. No race nudging necessary.


RecChief said...

And even where the speaker didn't intend anything racial to be inferred, listeners may on their own plug in their background understanding of the word and make the inference.

If you're the type of person whose first thought, on learning that one person was fired and another promoted, is "Is this racially motivated?" then give up, you're already dead inside.

The Crack Emcee said...

eric,

"BTW crack, have you been able to muster up even a minute amount of outrage yet at the kidnapping, rape and selling into slavery black african girls by black african islamists?"

Let me predict Crack's response.

Because 400 years of slavery, white men just don't get it. You'll never get it.


I have no idea why the history of slavery escapes you guys. I know why you're always screaming you won't feel guilty (!) but why you think I suffer some confusion on the issue - when it's you who deliberately (and repeatedly) ignore my beef with Thomas "All Men Are Created Equal" Jefferson to prattle on about a nation I don't even know the name of beyond what continent it's on - that part, I can't figure out. I assume it'll bring you comfort until you realize I'm focussed on America.

I have no idea why you guys keep thinking I'm fascinated with what happens, or happened, in Africa at all. I am a black AMERICAN. I have never been to Africa. I have no African relatives I know. I am not consumed with Africa in any way, shape, or form, beyond how racism has affected it's progress. Y'all never talk of that - an exception that also points up your racism. Africa, to you, is just a place to make a point. A point to defend your racism. Nasty business.

My interest in Boko Haram is the same as it's always been - it's the same thing that drives my racial coverage - Boko Haram is a manifestation of cultism. Just as American racism is. Just as your outlook is.

That you guys miss so much about me - willingly - is practically a sign of delusion itself,...

RecChief said...

"Where do you get your foundational premise that the NYT is a meritocracy and she was ousted because she wasn't good?"

Why can't it be both horrors?


You think achievement through your skills, and being fired for lacking in skills (without any other consideration) are both horrors?

The Crack Emcee said...

President-Mom-Jeans,

Why was the "father" (I notice you didn't say "husband", big surprise) of your foster sister's grandchild upset about the hair and eye color of "his" child?

The parents are married - big surprise you're a racist. The father is upset your pathology may exist in his bloodline.

"Maybe some DNA testing is in order, wouldn't want to see another black male oppressed by having to support the child of a white man cuckolding him."

I told my sister to do a DNA test to find whitey on the moon. My niece wouldn't touch a white man so - your racist fantasies aside - not much chance of that betrayal. Seeing their blood, running through white people's skin, freaks some blacks out. Others, too, apparently.

"As to where you come from Crack, you are being disingenuous. You already told us that you came from your 7-children-by-god-knows-how-many-men prize of a mother."

I figure, one of these days, you're going to need brain surgery and, once they crown you and open it up, all they'll find inside is a bowl of maggots. It'd be fitting. I just lost my God Mother, too - celebrate to your heart's content.

"Cheer up, sport. Pinch just gave exactly the spoils of reparations that you have been demanding from that pushy honky devil to the deserving oppressed African American."

I never said I had a problem with anything about the story except how race gets played,...

Illuninati said...

Crack Emcee said:
" And it's a good thing slavery, Jim Crow, white racism, white supremacy, white privilege, and white entitlement, were never "my own failings" or else my parents would've had to tell me that as well.

Instead, they told me the opposite - it's not my fault America's a white man's lie - that it's the white guys, who make a show of being strong, and speak of honor, as they act weak and shamefully. Telling people, who they knocked down and took their shoes, to "pull yourself up by your bootstraps" being just one glaring example.

THAT's truly "dishonorable" behavior."

Anyone who thinks that the Civil Rights movement can ever succeed in making a society in which white and black people can live together as brothers will be disillusioned by reading Crack Emcee's posts. If Crack is representative, there is just too much residual hatred among American Blacks to make reconciliation possible.

I'll be honest. When I lived in Rwanda at he beginning of the genocide, I never encountered any Africans who expressed that level of contempt for the other tribe. Yet, the Hutus hated the Tutsis with such a passion that they hacked them to death with machetes - including women with babies on their backs hacking Tutsis to death- with a clear conscience. How did this happen? The Hutus had gone through the same thought process dehumanizing the Tutsis that Crack has gone through in his mind concerning white people.

wildswan said...

Great analysis.

Baguet has been handed The Decline of the NYT and must fix it, leave, or take the blame for The Decline and Fall of the NYT. Now we wait to see how the paper changes. I'm betting that there will be no noticeable change and that the paper will continue its downward spiral. The stories about the change are about infighting, and about who's nice, and about who's faking nice - not about a man and his strategy to save a failing paper.

Brando said...

"You know, it is white privilege to be able to feel free not to need to analyze things all the time in terms of "Is it because I'm black/white?""

By that argument, the wealthy and connected are un-privileged because they have to ask themselves if what they've achieved are because they're wealthy and connected.

But there's a simple, lazy solution to the many problems the Left has given itself over race and oppression politics--judge people as individuals. You'd be surprised how many issues disappear when we stop assigning value to people's races, genders, ethnicities and sexual orientations.

Lydia said...

In line with what MayBee said at 2:47 PM -- According to this piece in NY Magazine, Sulzberger was never all that thrilled with Abramson, and it also seems that the tension between her and Baquet was pretty much built in from the very beginning:

"When former executive editor Bill Keller informed Sulzberger he planned to step down, Sulzberger hesitated to appoint Abramson, who had seniority at the paper, where it’s important, to replace him. He toyed with choosing Baquet, whom many in the newsroom knew. 'When Arthur picked Jill, it was by the slimmest margin,' a person close to the talks said. 'He really wrestled with that decision'.”

Anonymous said...

Jill did not take to heart Harrison Ford's admonition to "play nice with the other children".

President-Mom-Jeans said...

Settle down Crackie, you were the one who said "father" instead of "husband." I know that the only tune you know is to cry racism, but could you go back and read what you just wrote?

You are the one whose family has a problem with inter racial relationships, considering it "a betrayal" and "a pathology."

I feel bad for that child, growing up around unabashed racists like you, your niece, and the insecure husband. Perhaps DCF should be notified.

Haiku Guy said...

In the context of the 2008 Democratic Primary, this all sounds a bit familiar...

Haiku Guy said...

In the context of the 2009 Democratic Presidential Primary, this all seems a bit familiar.

Cedarford said...

Behind the black man - white women discussion is the matter of Jill Abramson being Jewish.

However....

She can't imply anti-Semitism because the guy who canned her is Jewish (Chip Sulzberger). And the "Victimized" black man who replaced her is married to an acclaimed jewish journalist and novelist - Dylan Landis.

Anonymous said...

There hasn't been a lot of talk on the thread about the state of newspapers.

The NY Times, like most papers, had unions, old grizzled veterans stuck in their ways, pay packages and financial obligations to worry about.

Unlike the state subsidized BBC, or CBC in Canada, or the minimally subsidized NPR in America, they are a for profit enterprise realizing their worth in the marketplace, primarily in print.

I'm guessing Abramson was behind on a lot of those changes and didn't really have a vision that was holding up, aside from the drama of pay gap. She wasn't up to the job.

Media, broadly defined, is using technology, the latest technology, to broadcast information to the broadest audience possible.

Aside from the pleasure I take in seeing many at the Times held to their own standards, called on their hypocrisy, and caught in the contradictions of their own ideological commitments, I don't see the hive changing that much.

Buzz, buzz. That's the nature of the business.

They still have to produce good journalism and find a way to make money at it, while maintaining some standards.

Perhaps one day soon, we'll see a good many opinion-shapers' egos back in a more stable feedback loop.

Lydia said...

Maybe this incident is a godsend for Hillary -- it does fit nicely with her recent talking point about the "double standard" being "alive and well".

tim in vermont said...

Crack, I am truly sorry you think it is the same as it ever was.

That progress is impossible.

Now answer me this, what incentive do you leave white people to try to change?

And that 400 years thing... 1609 to 2009? So there was not any point in ending slavery then, things are no better than they were in 1840s Mississippi?

The logical place where that leads is black separatism.

rhhardin said...

What's with these commenters who are so wedded to the notion that the NYT is a meritocracy? Can't even entertain the notion that it's anything but! Even when the first-ever female exec editor is ousted by the first-ever black exec editor.

The NYT is a temeritocracy.

Drago said...

Crack: "Instead, they told me the opposite - it's not my fault America's a white man's lie - that it's the white guys, who make a show of being strong, and speak of honor, as they act weak and shamefully."

There's nothing more honorable and brave than the hacking to death of small children with machetes.

There's nothing more honorable and brave than islamist african black adult males capturing school girls at gunpoint and raping them and selling them into sex slavery.

We all have much to learn from our "black-splaining" friend Crack.

Michael Fitzgerald said...

Sorry to be returning to the comments so late, but I see that AA has responded to me, so I will reply. First, I don't understand your statement that my question constitutes speculation. I simply asked you to support a contention that a black man should assume a racist world view. Your reply was flippant and sophomoric, why did you do that? And no, not analyzing everything through the prism of skin color is not"white privilege", because anyone can do it. Next, I have never heard of this guy Baquet, no nothing of his background, but I would assume that becoming a top executive, even at the ridiculously PC NYT, requires a lot more than a certain skin color, sexual orientation, or gender. Anyone who can't hack it gets dumped, such as the first female editor who has presided over several years of diminishing revenue, influence, and reputation. As for all the wondering about what I think he thinks, save it. I don't assume to know what he thinks, don't care, and I don't advocate that he thinks a certain way based on his pigment. That's what liberals do, and why people like Condoleezza Rice, Clarence Thomas, and Tim Scott, for example, drive progressives to such extraordinary levels of racist anger. Lastly, the fact that his boss brought in a surrogate to oversee his performance should be upsetting in itself. Should he be more upset because it was a white woman? So, in other words, had it been a black man, then he should be okay with it, but because it was a white woman he should assume racism. Why not assume sexism instead? Is it because of your female privelege that you assume racism and not sexism in this case? Gee, all this thinking like a Democrat party member is giving me a headache. So mixed up, so confusing, so illogical, so much bigotry.

HoodlumDoodlum said...

Ann Althouse said...
And even where the speaker didn't intend anything racial to be inferred, listeners may on their own plug in their background understanding of the word and make the inference. In that case, the speaker didn't "play the race card." The racial context existed outside of the speaker's presentation and was part of the interpretation of the facts.

But wouldn't that be ugly, Professor? Or is that only in certain cases?

William said...

I don't see how it's possible for the NYT to turn this story to their advantage. But in a way that just demonstrates Abramson's incompetence. She should have negotiated a nice severance package to occlude all this sturm und drang. "I'm retiring early to work on my book about Hillary, and I'm delighted to hand the reins over to Baquet who has been such a help to me through the years." With proper negotiating skills, a statement like that would be worth more than whatever sour memoir she produces......Check your privilege means a check for your victim hood.

Bleach Drinkers Curing Coronavirus Together said...

Behind the black man - white women discussion is the matter of Jill Abramson being Jewish.

LOL. This is "a matter?"

Someone's never been to New York.

Try traveling beyond the farm every now and then, son.

Richard Fagin said...

The only thing that will ever interest me about The New York Times is their inevitable bankruptcy court petition. Chapter 7 liquidation or Chapter 11 reorganization? Can't happen soon enough and I'm hoping for the liquidation. Get your security interests perfected now, boys and girls.

Richard Fagin said...

The only thing that will ever interest me about The New York Times is their inevitable bankruptcy court petition. Chapter 7 liquidation or Chapter 11 reorganization? Can't happen soon enough and I'm hoping for the liquidation. Get your security interests perfected now, boys and girls.

grackle said...

Too convoluted.

Need a matrix to clarify necessary pc outcomes, e.g., white male v white male, white male v white female, white male v black male, etc. including all ethnic, gender, sexual orientation, cultural, religious, and political variations as to what should trump what.


Many complications abound
so a simple matrix is found
but the final answers it seems
are just more of those old pipedreams.

The Crack Emcee said...

Illuninati,

"Anyone who thinks that the Civil Rights movement can ever succeed in making a society in which white and black people can live together as brothers will be disillusioned by reading Crack Emcee's posts. If Crack is representative, there is just too much residual hatred among American Blacks to make reconciliation possible."

Because you want it on your terms.

How unreasonable of me,...

The Crack Emcee said...

tim in vermont,

"Crack, I am truly sorry you think it is the same as it ever was."

So am I - I get the short end of the stick in this deal.

"That progress is impossible."

I never said that. When whites decide to change, we'll get change. And they do - everyday. Don't let conservatives fool you on that one.

"Now answer me this, what incentive do you leave white people to try to change?"

Ha! It's better for everybody - whites included. Do you know how much wealth we've deprived ourselves of with this nonsense? How much waste we incur, arguing? The only phrase that fits, for white's behavior in this, is "cutting off your nose to spite your face." Everyone's a loser. Nobody's out to get you - we're trying to make you stop hurting others. Once that's done, this country is unstoppable.

"And that 400 years thing... 1609 to 2009? So there was not any point in ending slavery then, things are no better than they were in 1840s Mississippi?"

Reconstruction lasted 12 years. You explain it. And what makes you think blacks should've had to suffer until the 1960s were over for whites to wake up? What gives them -and this country - that right? Lives were destroyed, Man. Families. While whites decided. Figure it out.

"The logical place where that leads is black separatism."

Or white maturity.

You're now the second person on this thread to go there. (Conservative thought travels in packs,…) My God, if y'all can't have white supremacy - the stays quo - you go straight for the totally fatalistic, apocalyptic view. That's weird. Giving in - because you're wrong - isn't even an option. Just chase everybody away.

Get serious. Stop trying to find an out. Do the work. Be the Americans we aspire to - not the ones our culture determined.

It's really not hard.

The Crack Emcee said...

Michael Fitzgerald,

"No, not analyzing everything through the prism of skin color is not"white privilege", because anyone can do it."

You tell yourselves such pretty lies:

"I'll tell you a story. So when I first came to the U.S., I just didn't think of myself as black. And I wrote an essay in class, and my professor wanted to know who 'A-dee-chee' was — Americans often call me 'A-dee-chee,' and often tell me that my name makes them imagine that I might be Italian. And so when I raised my hand, because, you know, 'Who wrote the best essay? This is the best essay; who's A-dee-chee?' I raised my hand. And on his face, for a fleeting moment, was surprise. And I realized that the person who wrote the best essay in the class was not supposed to look like me. And it was quite early on in my time in the U.S., but it was just sort of that very tiny moment where I realize, 'Oh, right, so that's what this is about.' "

Can "anybody" escape it?

"Next, I have never heard of this guy Baquet,...the wondering about what I think he thinks, save it. I don't assume to know what he thinks, don't care, and I don't advocate that he thinks a certain way based on his pigment. That's what liberals do, and why people like Condoleezza Rice, Clarence Thomas, and Tim Scott, for example, drive progressives to such extraordinary levels of racist anger."

Unlike conservatives with those "race hustlers" Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson, right? White conservatives the proper respect for a death, and a good image of racial decorum, when Trayvon got killed, right? A

And don't you realize what you're outlining is the political reality of blacks trapped in liberal and conservative whites' "extraordinary levels of racist anger"?

And how can it not be assumed Clarence Thomas "thinks a certain way based on his pigment" when he was the person to introduce the phrase "High Tech Lynching" into the lexicon when discussing whether his judgeship was imperiled by a pubic hair on Coke can?

"Lastly, the fact that his boss brought in a surrogate to oversee his performance should be upsetting in itself. Should he be more upset because it was a white woman? So, in other words, had it been a black man, then he should be okay with it,…"

Don't make assumptions if you don't understand the landscape.

"Gee, all this thinking like a Democrat party member is giving me a headache."

Are you "thinking like a Democrat party member" or is this a caricature of "thinking"? I'm a Republican so it's important.

"So mixed up, so confusing, so illogical, so much bigotry."

Yeah - like trying to convince people Clarence Thomas doesn't think racially. Why would anyone want to do that? So mixed up, so confusing, so illogical, wrapped in so much bigotry,...

David said...

They called her a bitch just by emphasizing that her firing had nothing to do with the quality of the work of the newsroom.

Now perhaps they can explain why being a bitch is a firing offense.

David said...

Crazy Jane said...

What surprises me is the lack of interest in "Pinch" Sulzberger's competence. This is the second executive editor he's chosen and then sacked -- remember nut job Howell Raines and the plagiarism scandal and Sulzberger's subsequent elevation of the previously passed-over Bill Keller?


Kind of reinforces Althouse's point about whether the NYT is a meritocracy, eh?

Who will fire Sulzberger?

The shareholders can't, his family won't.

That leaves the creditors of the NYT Times. Their day may come.

Jupiter said...

If the NYT were a meritocracy, what are the chances that Pinch Sulzberger would be running it?

chickelit said...

David wrote: Who will fire Sulzberger?

Can't somebody wear a wire? The man can't be perfect without opinions which deeply offend. Come to think of it, his writers offend daily. Somebody could bring this man down.

Bleach Drinkers Curing Coronavirus Together said...

I think that working American women seem stuck in this vicious internal dialogue between an emphasis on either "being nice" and getting along, or going with their convictions, and that this will continue until they develop a better sense of what it means to simply be "fair".

Not that everyone else is fair. But we do have more faith that others might practice fairness in a way that not everyone, including many women, assume that other women would do.

It's not about being mean or being nice. It's about learning a sense of fairness, which we don't emphasize enough and which women still caught up in the mean/nice dichotomy would need to learn if they're ever to finally transcend this stupid argument.

grackle said...

I've been checking out the MSNBC/CNN/FNC take on this situation. It's all shallow, uninformed, nonfactual, biased, tailored coverage. Many Americans form their opinions from these "news" outlets. Sad but not surprising. How else is the average citizen without a lot of discretionary time going to find out about what is happening 'out there?'

I told my son after he told me he and his wife were ready to have babies, "Say goodbye to having time for yourself." These days those 2 are constantly busy with a 4 year old and one just beginning to walk. Also holding down demanding jobs, housework, yardwork, professional training trips out of town, etc. It strains their relationship and I worry.

"Don't buy a house with a pool. You'll rarely use it but it'll ALWAYS be a lot of work." He did not listen.

If you want to really get into the issues you need books, magazines and most of all the best of the blogs; the blogs because they are quicker than magazines and books. And if you are open-minded I believe you can have your mind changed for the better.

Over the years I've had my mind changed about abortion, gun rights and other issues. The blogs had much to do with that, especially the back and forth in comments.

So why do I bother with the cables? Because I want to see what Americans are seeing. I want to know from where and how Joe Blow arrives at his opinions. Right now, anyway.

I notice Crack is in play. He's doing a pretty good job, I think. I mostly disagree with him on things. But he forces me to THINK.

He can inform you if you will let him and you keep an open attitude on the issue. If for no other reason than I want to know what African-Americans believe when they don't have to guard their opinions, I believe such exposure is valuable. Let's get it out into the open.

Don't put him down; think hard about what he says. Don't get into the hate mode, the disgusted mode, the angry mode. Let's not forget that only a few relatively short years ago his kind were hung if they deviated even a little from what was prescribed. And our kind sometimes gathered with picnic baskets and beer in the grass under the trees around the gallows – the children running around playing tag and hide and seek in the sun – happy, free and privileged. I agree we've come a long way since then but maybe we have a way to go yet. Warning: The URLs below are disturbing.

http://tinyurl.com/mfs2n7y

http://tinyurl.com/7ac87rr

Michael Fitzgerald said...

Crack Emcee- Starts off with anecdotal story filled with prejudiced assumptions based on the "fleeting" look of surprise on a teachers face. Right out of the Sonia Sotomayor playbook, "someone once asked me what country I was from, and this proves Affirmative Action is necessary". Rubbish. Next, how telling that you equate Democrat party racists Hymietown Jackson and Tawana Brawley Freddie Fashion Mart Duke rape fake Sharpton with black republicans who have never been indicted for crimes or heard to utter malicious racist sentiments. Because, Trayvon! As far as outlining the reality of blacks trapped in racist anger, those black republicans I cited have been attacked and insulted most viscerally by black democrats, as recent as this week, with Cummings calling Scott "Uncle Tom" just a few days ago. As far as Thomas coining the phrase "high tech lynching", that was a poignant, memorable and accurate assessment of that Kennedy-led mob of democrats that included KKK Kleagle Robert Byrd. He didn't say it because someone looked at him funny or asked to touch his hair. Next, what assumptions did I make, and what landscape do I not understand? So you call yourself republican, so what? So did Donald Sterling... You're a racist, raised by anti-white racists, and you're cousin who "who wouldn't touch a white man" and her husband are racists. You should be embarrassed and ashamed to openly express such retrograde bigotry.

Illuninati said...

The Crack Emcee said...
Speaking of reconciliation Crack Emcee said:
"Illuninati,

Because you want it on your terms.

How unreasonable of me,..."

I have no idea what that is supposed to mean.

If Crack's complaint is that it is not easy to be a black man in America, I agree wholeheartedly but with the caveat that it is not easy to be a black man anywhere. It just happens that the United States is one of the better places in the world to be a African ancestry man because many Americans actually care what happens to you. That's why there are so many black people from around the World including Africa or other countries like Haiti who long to emigrate to the USA.

Nichevo said...

C4, this is really more of a rhetorical question, but do you have the mental ability to process the known fact that Pinch Sulzberger is not Jewish?

Nichevo said...

Crack, maybe the part that you are not getting is that, to judge from your tone, the white people who would apparently have to surrender to you and give you what you want are more or less afraid that you will more or less kill them and eat them.

tim in vermont said...

"I never said that. When whites decide to change, we'll get change. And they do - everyday."

OK, fine. What got me going was your use of the term "saturated," completely full, no room for one other bit.

I just don't accept that nothing has changed and that change is impossible.

Also, I don't accept left wing politics of redistribution because it simply doesn't work, it never has worked. If that makes me irredeemably racist on account of the fact that "anti communism was used to justify slavery," so be it.

Beloved Commenter AReasonableMan said...

tim in vermont said...

Also, I don't accept left wing politics of redistribution because it simply doesn't work,


The progressive tax code and the estate tax, both examples of redistribution, were in place during the 1950's, arguably the peak of US power, and also during Reagan's 'Morning in America" phase. It would seem that redistributionism is a central plank of US prosperity.

The Cracker Emcee Refulgent said...

"The progressive tax code and the estate tax, both examples of redistribution, were in place during the 1950's, arguably the peak of US power, and also during Reagan's 'Morning in America" phase. It would seem that redistributionism is a central plank of US prosperity."

The competition generously inviting us to bomb them to rubble, sink their merchant fleets, hang their leaders, and occupy their countries, may have been a more significant factor in America's 1950's prosperity. ARM's a neo-con!

AReasonableMan said...

Falacrine fails to address the facts.

The Crack Emcee said...

grackle,

"I notice Crack is in play. He's doing a pretty good job, I think. I mostly disagree with him on things. But he forces me to THINK."

Thanks, Man. Nice photos of America's "good ol' days," too.

The Crack Emcee said...

Michael Fitzgerald,

"Crack Emcee- Starts off with anecdotal story filled with prejudiced assumptions based on the "fleeting" look of surprise on a teachers face. Right out of the Sonia Sotomayor playbook, "someone once asked me what country I was from, and this proves Affirmative Action is necessary". Rubbish."

That is your failure as a human being. Michael, blacks have been telling whites about racism for 400 years - not one "anecdotal story filled with prejudiced assumptions" but 400 years of historically documented fact - but, facing the truth, were whites any more agreeable to accepting our words when slavery was in full effect? Didn't we have to fight a war over it? So where's the difference? Don't you see? You refuse to listen - and understand - as always.

Don't you get that, after 400 years of cultural conditioning, whites are inclined to fight for/over things that have no basis in reality? Holding onto honor for lies? Fearing shadows on the wall, still, in 2014?

(BTW - I'm not saying anyone else is any more-or-less inclined, to do the same, but asking you to look at the white majority's behavior,…)

Cont'd.

The Crack Emcee said...

Cont'd:

"Next, how telling that you equate Democrat party racists Hymietown Jackson and Tawana Brawley Freddie Fashion Mart Duke rape fake Sharpton with black republicans who have never been indicted for crimes or heard to utter malicious racist sentiments. Because, Trayvon! As far as outlining the reality of blacks trapped in racist anger, those black republicans I cited have been attacked and insulted most viscerally by black democrats, as recent as this week, with Cummings calling Scott "Uncle Tom" just a few days ago."

Because, Trayvon!

Have civil rights heroes, like Al and Jesse, made mistakes in their honorable work? Sure. But there's an answer for that, too:

If whites got off their asses, and policed their own racism, Al and Jesse would be less at risk of mistakes in the face of overwhelming odds. And - until whites do - not many blacks are going to judge Al and Jesse by any other standard.

Who are our white leaders on race? Al gave up working for James Brown (after working for Congresswoman Shirley Chisholm) to work for us. Jesse's ALWAYS been there. His friends are dead for this and your "side" has the nerve to laugh at his efforts? The shame. These are, and always will be, great men - warts and all.

The rest are slackers, chirping from the sidelines.

Unlike your black conservative heroes, Jesse and Al are there whenever powerless blacks like Trayvon's parents call. They do the work those on your list don't. (I love blacks invoking slavery but, can Allen West ever vocally stuck up for any black person, beyond Frederick Douglass?)

Jesse and Al have risked their lives, careers, and names, over and over again, providing for the poor, hanging out with the desperate, and bringing some sense of peace, pride, and comfort, to those trapped in this nation's Hell holes. Not you, or your black heroes.

Even with all the evidence around them, with the notable exception of Condi, your precious black political heroes like West has never shown support for blacks - and they do that by always siding with the oppressors of those who look like them. Classic black overseers - and "Uncle Toms" - in American culture.

Whites don't like being reminded there's a very real American culture - and they DO play a role in it.

Rather than waiting for blacks to return to our pre-destined place in it, we're waiting for whites to disrupt it themselves.

Cont'd.

The Crack Emcee said...

Cont'd:

"As far as Thomas coining the phrase "high tech lynching", that was a poignant, memorable and accurate assessment of that Kennedy-led mob of democrats that included KKK Kleagle Robert Byrd. He didn't say it because someone looked at him funny or asked to touch his hair."

Someone standing for a party with Cliven Bundy, and Donald Sterling, wants to point at others. Let me help you:

SQUIRREL!!!!

That's sad, man.

Thomas said "high tech lynching" in a debate over whether or not he should be a judge if he'd sexually harassed a black woman.

Perfect time to speak of lynching - out of the blue, like that, you think? And black women are very well-known for helping the KKK, everybody knows that.

If I force race into a conversation, online, white conservatives go nuts. But for your man, it's "poignant, memorable and accurate" - in a way the effects of real lynching will never be acknowledged by conservatives because,...Sharpton and Jackson.

Next, what assumptions did I make, and what landscape do I not understand?

The assumption "had it been a black man, then he should be okay with it,…" indicates you hadn't considered the landscape of American slavery - the original foundation for American business - where whites have historically enlisted select blacks to do their dirty work. It slipped your mind.

"So you call yourself republican, so what? So did Donald Sterling…"

I merely "call" myself one, now, do I? Not fighting in the 130 year Republican tradition FOR blacks and not against them? White people's power to change reality is astonishing!

"You're a racist, raised by anti-white racists, and you're cousin who "who wouldn't touch a white man" and her husband are racists. You should be embarrassed and ashamed to openly express such retrograde bigotry."

In America? Puh-leaze. I was raised by people like me - folks with no option but to give every white person he/she meets the benefit of the doubt.

It's not our fault whites, like you, still fail to live up to it,...

The Crack Emcee said...

Illuninati,

"If Crack's complaint is that it is not easy to be a black man in America, I agree wholeheartedly but with the caveat that it is not easy to be a black man anywhere. It just happens that the United States is one of the better places in the world,…"

Isn't it bizarre that whites think "better" is sufficient for blacks when living fulfilled and prosperous lives is what THEY enjoy? It goes with those studies that show whites don't think we experience pain as they do - we probably don't experience a lack of quality of life as they would either, maybe? If it's "better" then that's something to rejoice - for blacks.

I've been watching "Rome" and the similarities in outlook - towards those in the lower order - is amazing.

White Supremacy is a trip.

And, definitely, not American,...

The Crack Emcee said...

Nichevo,

"Crack, maybe the part that you are not getting is that, to judge from your tone, the white people who would apparently have to surrender to you and give you what you want are more or less afraid that you will more or less kill them and eat them."

My online bio, with the bone in my nose, was the give-away, wasn't it?

The Crack Emcee said...

tim in vermont,

"I don't accept left wing politics of redistribution because it simply doesn't work, it never has worked. If that makes me irredeemably racist on account of the fact that "anti communism was used to justify slavery," so be it."

If you'll let a principle stand in the way of righting one of the biggest wrongs this country has committed in it's short life - even after you discover the defense is a racist ploy devised long ago by racist men to keep us fighting - then so be it. I'm for reversing their work - not for reverse racism or Black Supremacy - but for an America we have rarely experienced or explored.

One where justice has a true voice,...

Stephen A. Meigs said...

I don't know the particulars here, but I do know something about frustration, a suggested reason for the firing.

Girls, and I suppose women too (only less) have a cute way of thinking that ultimately frustrating a male is a terribly mean thing to do. At least when in catty mode, they tend to like to feel hate while feeling love (for someone else), which by its very nature would be frustrating to the hated. It's pretty that they feel a love that is as opposite as possible to the hate they feel then, when being cruel, so as that cattiness works better. Therefore, to make love more opposite to frustration, girls have evolved to feel it very loving to not leave a loved male frustrated. This, I think, is largely why they like to behave as if to frustrate a well-loved male a little so that ultimately, while feeling potentially frustrating hate toward someone else, should they decide to take their love to what love tends to lead to (sex) if sufficient in magnitude, they can simultaneously more easily feel like they are so lovingly casting away all reasons for frustration from beloved male. It's easier to feel contrary to frustrating someone loved (while imagining yourself frustrating and doing cruel hurtful things to someone you hate) if earlier you've felt contrary to him (the loved male) as if to frustrate him.

I suppose mostly the professor was always my favorite Gilligan's Island character, but there's much good to be said for Gilligan's indifference to being almost freed from his island so many times. In particular, if a girl does something pretty and then leaves, that still is better than her never having done anything pretty to begin with. And were I to be unduly disappointed at her having disappeared, that could just be something that might mislead her into thinking that so far as I am concerned, solitude with a prior significant expectation of a pleasant opposite is somehow more unpleasant to me than solitude that seemed inevitable, which is neither logical to my mind nor congruent with the feelings I have.

Gary Rosen said...

"C4 ... do you have the mental ability to process the known fact that Pinch Sulzberger is not Jewish?"

... or the fact that his nickname is Pinch and not "Chip"? Or that he and the rest of the NYT staff hates Israel as much as C4 does?

The Crack Emcee said...

AReasonableMan,

"The progressive tax code and the estate tax, both examples of redistribution, were in place during the 1950's, arguably the peak of US power, and also during Reagan's 'Morning in America" phase. It would seem that redistributionism is a central plank of US prosperity."

Falacrine,

"The competition generously inviting us to bomb them to rubble, sink their merchant fleets, hang their leaders, and occupy their countries, may have been a more significant factor in America's 1950's prosperity. ARM's a neo-con!"

I don't think so - from the Homestead Act to the homes bought through the G.I. Bill, and then redlining neighborhoods, etc. - all government give-aways to whites. Meanwhile, whites were bombing blacks, hanging blacks, and burning our homes to the ground - all with law enforcement's help. Was that a "significant factor in America's 1950's prosperity" too?

If ARM thinks so, you might have him, I think,...

chickelit said...

AReasonableMan said...
Falacrine fails to address the facts.

Other economic structure was in place in the 1950s: a totally different demography; a different ratio of workers to retirees; a tax code which didn't exclude the lower end; no public employee unions; insignificant illegal immigration; more or less no Johnson era entitlements and related work disincentives; little to no off-shoring; a growing academic infrastructure rather than a bloated and stagnant one, etc., etc.

AReasonableMan said...

Which part of 'a central plank' didn't anyone get? Obviously it was not the only economic policy or the only factor affecting the economy. Redistribution was a central plank of the US economy during its halcyon period. This is undeniable. We didn't have a flat tax, nor did we eliminate the estate tax during this period.

Illuninati said...

Crack Emcee said:
"Isn't it bizarre that whites think "better" is sufficient for blacks when living fulfilled and prosperous lives is what THEY enjoy? It goes with those studies that show whites don't think we experience pain as they do - we probably don't experience a lack of quality of life as they would either, maybe? If it's "better" then that's something to rejoice - for blacks."

What a crock of bull. No one said blacks don't feel pain. However, it is hard to sympathize with someone who is so busy feeling sorry for himself.

What I am saying is that things could be much worse. If a majority of blacks in the USA do have your attitude where they blame white people for their problems rather than trying to fix things for themselves then you can certainly count on things deteriorating. Much of the pain American Blacks experience is brought on by other American Blacks. For example the murder rate among blacks is extremely high.

"White Supremacy is a trip.

And, definitely, not American,..."

ditto for Black Supremacy.