Times Select: Take it or...

The New York Times has recently decided to charge you, humble reader, for the privilege of reading its generally talented corps of opinionists. South of the Taiga continues to pledge that, as long as we can still put food in our kids' mouths, we will make no such selfish demands on your wallet. You would think the Old Grey Lady would have learned the lesson that Slate and Salon dispatched long ago: this ain't cable (especially if one is clever enough to get one's wi-fi on) and you, ma'am, are most certainly not HBO.

Times columnists are still syndicated through other media, but apparently only in the processed-forest edition. For instance, Paul Krugman's "Find the Brownie" appears in this morning's Minneapolis Star-Tribune, but not on the Strib website. Perhaps Maureen Dowd is weary from ducking the constant vollies of poisonous darts linked from conservative blogs. I can't say which fancy pants I'll miss most, probably because I won't miss them much at all. And that's my point: For every web-news junkie who hangs upon Frank Rich's every word, there are dozens of us who don't care all that much. Is this simply another example of New Yorkers basking in their self-perceived indispensibility to civilization? 'Cause I still have some dried knish on the soles of my Timberlands that suggests it isn't so.

I read the Times most of all for its reporting, and that's still free. Their slant is close enough to my own, and their breadth casts a shadow across the globe. I was pleased to see that they have not as yet risen to the bait of this useless chaff from today's Washington Post (as headlined in the Strib) :

Masked anchor proclaims hurricane 'joy' on Al-Qaida newscast
Daniel Williams, Washington Post
September 27, 2005

ROME -- An Internet video newscast called the Voice of the Caliphate was broadcast for the first time Monday, purporting to be a production of Al-Qaida and featuring an anchorman who wore a black ski mask and an ammunition belt.
The anchorman, who said the report would appear once a week, presented news about the Gaza Strip and Iraq, and expressed happiness about recent hurricanes in the United States. A copy of the Qur'an, the Muslim holy book, was placed by his right hand, and a rifle affixed to a tripod was pointed at the camera.
The origins of the broadcast could not be immediately verified. [Umm, see headline.] If the program was indeed an Al-Qaida production, it would mark a change in the group's use of the Internet to spread its messages and propaganda. [See! Pop-up adds and user fees for exclusive content just alienate your audience.]


I believe Hurricane Joy isn't scheduled until next season, and Hugo Chavez is already taking credit. Aside from this story's obvious lack of ripeness, I thought I was reading the prospectus for a Scooby-Doo script. I think FOX might want to run a feed on the diamond vision at half-time next weekend defying the infidel Patriots to score. Plenty of people will see and read this "news" and resolve somehow that we should bomb somebody somewhere back to the Pleistocene. And it gives some Koran-thumping nutbag publicity when everyone knows the hottest new shows are on CCCP 1. Bottom line: not news. It looks a little like news, but open it up and all you smell is hype. We are one small step from seeing the Unabomber on "Hollywood Squares."