I hear that William Safire is retiring from his spot on the Op-Ed page of the New York Times. That means that one of the most valuable pieces of journalism and opinion real estate will soon be vacant and ready for a new proprietor. Who should the Times pick?
The replacement should have superb writing skills, of course. He or she also must have a distinctive point of view that makes them consistently interesting. That usually requires a talent for relating current events to a larger narrative.
Third, it is helpful, but not necessarily required, for an Op-Ed columnist to have a broad range of interests and a nose for issues that turns up unexpected gems. Finally, he or she must have insight. They need to tell us things we have not already thought about.
With the Koufax Awards fast approaching, I wondered who among the bloggers would make the best Op-Ed columnist. Perhaps that ought to be a category in the Koufax Awards. What do you think?
The skills required to be an Op-Ed columnist are quite different from the skills required by some forms of the art of blog. An Op-Ed columnist writes about 700 words, twice a week. Some bloggers often post that amount of text several times per day. All or nearly all of the columnist's work should be original whereas bloggers often have a higher ratio of text quoted from another source. The category of Best Op-Ed Columnist is likely to be quite different from the category of Best Blogger.
It is also different from Best Writer. Many excellent blog writers are more comfortable in a longer format where issues can be discussed and dissected with great care and often with great skill. That is a wonderful gift but it does not translate well into a twice a week, 700 word column.
I will note any comments on the issue of adding Best Op-Ed Columnist as a Koufax Award category and will discuss it with Eric and MB. If you think it is a good idea or just clutter, please leave a comment or send an email.
I should note that the thought to add the category occurred to me while reading this Digby post.
In fact, it was at the precise time I read the following about a Meet the Press show featuring Jerry Falwell, Al Sharpton, and Tim Russert:
If there is a greater All American, mom and apple pie, flagwaving tradition in the great country of ours than deflating pompous gasbags like those guys, I don't know what is.
After six hours of thought I think I don't know. I mean, I can't think of anyone who's writing (long form original) I respect that I'd want to see stuck doing the NYT OpEd 2x700. Regardless of what any of us think, the Safire slot will be filled by a person who writes garbage on some subjects, say how swimmingly the Allawi/Bush romance is selling on the afternoon shows on IraqTV, or how ultra-dangerous Iran's ultra-huge nuclear weapons program is, or how natural neoliberalism is, ... or how exotic and quaint our brave but gaming-troubled Indian brothers and sisters are.
To be serious, Cole should have 2x700 access to the NYT, but not constrained to be cute and topical on a wide variety of topics, after all, a boat load of loot and lives are wasted every 3.5 days, but after some years the grand Iraqi adventure will be history (or replaced by the grand Iranian adventure, which may be in turn replaced by the grand Chinese adventure, usw).
They could do worse than simply handing off a 1/4 page to us, where us is some set of original or analytical writers.
It won't be an Indian, no matter what.
Posted by: Eric at December 1, 2004 04:53 PM