The Dumbest Columnist Ever! Richard Cohen, Washington Post

[autorank]

This is what passes as a Democrat on the Washington Post editorial page...God save us!

ConsortiumNews.Com

Is WP's Cohen Dumbest Columnist?

Granted it would be quite a competition, but is
Washington Post columnist Richard Cohen the dumbest
columnist ever?


By Robert Parry
June 19, 2007

Cohen accuses special prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald of violating longstanding Justice Department guidelines on when to bring a case; he denounces the trial – over Libby’s lying about his role in unmasking covert CIA officer Valerie Plame – as “a mountain out of a molehill”; he asserts that there was no “underlying crime”; he even pokes fun at Americans who thought the invasion of Iraq might have been a bad idea.

Snip

Yet, beyond a talent for reprising the conventional wisdom from Washington dinner parties, it is hard to tell what justifies Cohen’s long career as a political columnist. On nearly every major development over the past couple of decades, Cohen has missed the point or gotten it dead wrong.


"...a likable guy who will make things better
not worse." Richard Cohen, 2000. Washington Post

For example, during the Florida recount battle in 2000, Cohen cared less about whom the voters wanted in the White House than the Washington insiders' certainty that George W. Bush would be a uniter, not a divider. “The nation will be in dire need of a conciliator, a likable guy who will make things better and not worse,” Cohen wrote. “That man is not Al Gore. That man is George W. Bush.”

Cohen also joined the Washington herd in the disastrous stampede for invading Iraq. After Secretary of State Colin Powell’s deceptive Iraq War speech to the United Nations on Feb. 5, 2003, Cohen mocked anyone who still dared doubt that Saddam Hussein possessed hidden WMD stockpiles.

[AX10]

1. Washington Post, Washington Times, what's the difference?

[autorank]

3. Rev. Moon versus Rev. Graham?

[gratuitous]

2. You start handing out superlatives . . .

You start calling Richard Cohen the "dumbest" columnist (and make no mistake, he IS dumber than a fucking bag of hammers in this column), and the rest of them take it as a personal challenge.

[autorank]

5. Hey, just what we need, a race to the bottom.

I think they take these challenged effortlessly.

I'd say that Cohen is to print as O'Reilly is to video.

Maybe Cohen could write for The Factor...

[bunkerbuster1]

4. I think Greenwald's right--it's a "tour de force"!

from
http://www.salon.com/opinion/greenwald/2007/06/19/cohen/index.html

Richard Cohen's Washington Post column this morning is a true tour de force in explaining the function of our Beltway media stars. Cohen's column -- which grieves over the grave and tragic injustice brought down upon Lewis "Scooter" Libby -- should be immediately laminated and placed into the Smithsonian History Museum as an exhibit which, standing alone, will explain so much about what happened to our country over the last six years. It is really that good.

(...)

Indeed, it is so terribly unfair to investigate powerful government officials because, as "white-collar types," they have a "morbid fear of jail" -- in contrast, of course, to blue-collar types, and darker ones still, who really do not mind prison at all. Why would they? It's their natural habitat, where they belong. That is what prison is for.

That has been the real point here all along. The real injustice is that prison is simply not the place for the most powerful and entrenched members of the Beltway royal court, no matter how many crimes they commit. There is a grave indignity to watching our brave Republican elite be dragged before such lowly venues as a criminal court and be threatened with prison, as though they are common criminals or something. How disruptive and disrespectful and demeaning it all is.

[autorank]

6. Great column.

Devastating!

[bunkerbuster1]

11. I was impressed at the speed and accuracy...

Greenwald was on this like ugly on a monkey, this morning.

[Supersedeas]

13. Beltway accomplices and apologists to the rescue of po' po' Libbers

[annabanana]

17. "It's best to keep the lights off"

This guy believes in the opposite of journalism...

[bunkerbuster1]

25. I really think that ought to be the Beltway Wankers' battle cry

All those establishment "liberal" columnists like Cohen, Broder and Friedman can scream it in unison as they're driven from their cushy gigs and socialite engagements by the dirty-hippie hordes.

IT'S BEST TO KEEP THE LIGHTS OUT.

?

Really, couldn't be a more despicable sentiment if you tried to compose one yourself. A tip of my hat!

[glitch]

35. Lol! thanks for "Beltway Wanker" I hope it catches on. Also the visual

"driven from their cushy gigs and socialite engagements by the dirty-hippie hordes"

[Uncle Joe]

7. From the Daily Howler, a good read.

Thanks for the thread autorrank.


http://dailyhowler.com/

<snip>


"Readers, what is up with the Washington Post? What explains its childish obsession with this former vice president? In the past year, Gore has won an Oscar; he’s been nominated for a Nobel Peace Prize; and his film and book, An Inconvenient Truth, have transformed the world’s discussion of warming. But so what? At the Post, he’s still too fat, his words are too large—and he’s still just too godd*mn annoying. When he speaks English, the newspaper howls. This isn’t Howell’s fault, of course—but she has been forced to spend two Sundays back-tracking for her paper’s clowning. But uh-oh! Unless somebody hires a good solid shrink and lets the children get much-needed help, it looks like she’ll be spending more time explaining their inane, childish groaners.

Readers, what is up with the Post? What on earth is going on inside this inane, childish newspaper?

TOMORROW—PART 2: Reading Gore."

[demnan]

8. I haven't liked the guy since they took him off the Metro page

and that had to be 30 years ago at least.

[CTyankee]

16. I lived in the DC area from 1976 to 1984 and Cohen was considered

almost a liberal. I stopped reading him when I moved to CT and replaced the Washington Post with the NY Times. Several years ago I read one of Cohen's columns where he came out as antichoice, having been prochoice earlier. I wondered what had happened to him.

[depakid]

9. "..is Cohen just a clueless incompetent?"

Yes, that's how he keeps his job at the Post!

This column pretty much sums the fool up:

What is the Value of Algebra

I confess to be one of those people who hate math. I can do my basic arithmetic all right (although not percentages) but I flunked algebra (once), barely passed it the second time -- the only proof I've ever seen of divine intervention -- somehow passed geometry and resolved, with a grateful exhale of breath, that I would never go near math again. I let others go on to intermediate algebra and trigonometry while I busied myself learning how to type. In due course, this came to be the way I made my living. Typing: Best class I ever took.

Here's the thing, Gabriela: You will never need to know algebra. I have never once used it and never once even rued that I could not use it....

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/blog/2006/02/15/BL2006021501989.html

[NJCher]

12. actually, I agree with that column

Writing teaches more about reasoning than algebra could ever hope to. And what good is the reasoning if it cannot be articulated? Writing is roughly twice as difficult as algebra because not only must the reasoning be in place, the means to articulate it must be, too. Oh and let's not mention a command of the English language, one of the most difficult languages to master.

But that doesn't make Cohen any less of an arse.



Cher

[depakid]

15. Innumeracy and inability to understand basic science

has led to as many (if not more) problems than lack of basic literacy, algegra of course, being the root language of logic.

Cohen and his ilk are sterling examples of this....

[Orsino]

34. Just because math never stimulated Cohen's opium-dulled wits...

...is not an excuse for his recommending that no one get educated. He's wrong, tragically wrong, but in exactly the way we would expect from him or from his hero president--both are profoundly incurious, and their ivory-tower pronouncements are based on correspondingly less wisdom.

No, you don't need math if you are a pampered and highly compensated Beltway opinion-maker whose writings have nothing to do with the interests of working Americans. You can even betray your ignorance in public by proclaiming that nobody needs such fancy book-learnin', when none of your colleagues have the courage or insight to call you on your mistake.

Cohen probably doesn't need to know how to tie his shoes or mop the gravy from his chin, either.

[NJCher]

38. ah, but

Here you are making a contention ("Innumeracy and inability to understand basic science has led to as many (if not more) problems than lack of basic literacy, algegra (sic) of course, being the root language of logic") and making a broad statement with no backup.

You leave the reader sitting there, scratching his head, saying, "I'd like to know more but...?"

That is what writing teaches. You cannot gain credibility with a broad statement without some sort of example or backup.

So as they say, I rest my case.




Cher

[Reterr]

21. Why should there be a competition between the different types of basic

fields a student should have some basic command of before they can graduate?

I think Math is an important skill to possess even if you don't end up going into an area of the sciences. There was an article in the NYT a while back about how a lot of people run up high credit card debts because they have difficulty having a basic sense of what 20% APR amounts to. I think his argument about the computer and the calculator is just sad. When I see stuff like that, I find it hard to have any degree of righteous outrage over our jobs requiring expertise in Math and Science being shipped overseas to countries where they still have some respect for the sciences, as is the case with many Asian countries. Of course the other extreme is just as bad too.

[Reterr]

20. Good God-the guy is a bigger idiot than I had any idea he was

That would be hilarious if this IDIOT wasn't writing for the fucking Washington Post -and then we wonder why our technical jobs ges outsourced :eyes:.
That column perfectly captures the contempt that a certain sub-section of American society has for Math and science:

>>
Here's the thing, Gabriela: You will never need to know algebra. I have never once used it and never once even rued that I could not use it. You will never need to know -- never mind want to know -- how many boys it will take to mow a lawn if one of them quits halfway and two more show up later -- or something like that. Most of math can now be done by a computer or a calculator. On the other hand, no computer can write a column or even a thank-you note -- or reason even a little bit. If, say, the school asked you for another year of English or, God forbid, history, so that you actually had to know something about your world, I would be on its side. But algebra? Please.

Gabriela, sooner or later someone's going to tell you that algebra teaches reasoning. This is a lie propagated by, among others, algebra teachers. Writing is the highest form of reasoning. This is a fact. Algebra is not. The proof of this, Gabriela, is all the people in my high school who were whizzes at math but did not know a thing about history and could not write a readable English sentence. I can cite Shelly, whose last name will not be mentioned, who aced algebra but when called to the board in geography class, located the Sahara Desert right where the Gobi usually is. She was off by a whole continent.

Look, Gabriela, I am not anti-algebra. It has its uses, I suppose, and I think it should be available for people who want to take it. Maybe students should even be compelled to take it, but it should not be a requirement for graduation.
>>

Wow I mean just wow....

[shenmue]

10. That photo... ugh...

:(

:puke:

Bleh!

[autorank]

18. Sorry but can you imagine what the photos look like when they're "unguarded":)

[Johonny]

14. What I find funny is

the fact Newspapers hire OP ED writers based on popularity than the writers ability to actually write opinions that reflect some sort of truth. How many times can a person be horrifically wrong before his opinion doesn't appear in your paper... forever as long as that person sells papers. Ugh.

[Missy Vixen]

19. Hey, Mr. Cohen,

are you accusing Patrick Fitzgerald of malpractice? ARE YOU? Seriously. If you think he filed charges against Scooter Libby for partisan ends, why don't you say so?

What a HACK.

Julie

[Reterr]

22. Move over David Brooks!

All hail the new king...

[autorank]

24. Brooks is a good competitor for "dumbest" but Cohen has that record;)

[bunkerbuster1]

26. But they're so different!

Brooks is a sensible conservative! Cohen is a sensible liberal!

It makes for journamalistical balance.

[Jim Sagle]

28. Funny isn't it, how the sensible people ALL agree that Republicans rawk and Democrats suck?

;-)

[bunkerbuster1]

30. Democrats "Scramble," Goopers "Re-position"

as I've noted before.

We could probably compile a list of IOKIYAR terminology that slams Dems and beatifies Goopers, similar to the double-standard lists for men and women (i.e., Rudy is forthright, Hillary is a bitch; Fred is an outsider, Barak is inexperienced...)

[autorank]

36. When do two balances equal an imbalance?

Brooks-Cohen Syndrome:evilgrin:

[Kurovski]

23. K&R.

'...a likable guy who will make things better and not worse,” Cohen wrote. “That man is not Al Gore. That man is George W. Bush.”'

Didn't work out to well at all on that one.

[mod mom]

27. How much you wanna bet he is friendly w Libby just like Andrea Mitchell

(remember how she stated the majority of Americand wanted Scooter pardoned despite a CNN poll stating the exact opposite? Most of the beltway "journalists" are just too chummy with these crooks imho.

[bunkerbuster1]

32. Dunno, but remember David Broder's chummines with Karl Rove?

That's ok, I do...it spawned monstrosities like this:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/09/06/AR2006090601648.html

Newsweek, in a July 25, 2005, cover story on Rove, after dutifully noting that Rove's lawyer said the prosecutor had told him that Rove was not a target of the investigation, added: "But this isn't just about the Facts, it's about what Rove's foes regard as a higher Truth: That he is a one-man epicenter of a narrative of Evil."

And in the American Prospect's cover story for August 2005, Joe Conason wrote that Rove "is a powerful bully. Fear of retribution has stifled those who might have revealed his secrets. He has enjoyed the impunity of a malefactor who could always claim, however implausibly, deniability -- until now."

These and other publications owe Karl Rove an apology. And all of journalism needs to relearn the lesson: Can the conspiracy theories and stick to the facts.

in case you were wondering why he defends Rove, here's Broder, from a May 18, 2003 column:

"Let me disclose my own bias in this matter. I like Karl Rove.... I have eaten quail at his table and admired the splendid Hill Country landscape from the porch of historic cabin...."

I suspect that Cohen and other "liberals" have scarfed down some of that quail as well.

[mod mom]

33. laced with koolaid.

[The Backlash Cometh]

29. Does anybody know how Cohen feels about Bush being a uniter now?

Because of his track record, he needs to SIT DOWN AND SHUT UP!

[bunkerbuster1]

31. Oh, like all Sensible Liberals, Cohen has strongly condemned the President

He just always makes sure to balance it with equally vociferous condemnation of the dirty hippies who'd actually do something to stop the President.

File Cohen under "With Friends like these, who needs a wood-chipper?"

[autorank]

37. Backlash, "sensible" suggestoin for Cohen.. Note in his column

he said little to nothing about the crime - AGAINST THE PEOPLE AND SECURITY OF THE UNITED STATES.

Does he have some special knowledge that anti WMD tracking is unnecessary, which is IS NOT.

So his standard is that of the elitists in England regarding the spy and traitor Kim Philby;
it's ok to do dreadful things if "you're one of us."

What a dreadful point of view but how convenient for those in power - insulation against any
wrong doings because, well, just because "they're so special!."