The Times decided to commemorate the 4th by running an op-ed by an editor for American Conservative about why you shouldn’t vote.
https://www.nytimes.com/2024/07/04/opinion/not-voting-elections.html
Hmm, the op-ed author chose to contribute these valuable insights to the NY Times but not the American Conservative. Wonder why? 
Whenever the Times offers up its latest clickbait opinion piece, I immediately scroll down to the bottom. Inevitably, the author blurb says something like, “from the Claremont Institute,” or “Ross Douthat’s college roommate,” or “public liaison for the paramilitary wing of the Federalist Society.”
The NYT changed the title a few times from “Why We Don’t Vote” to “Why I Don’t Vote” to “Why I Won’t Vote”, once it was revealed that Walther had indeed voted in the last few elections. And will probably vote in this one too.
Walther is a former student of Hillsdale College in Michigan, although he may or may not have actually graduated. While his current bio photo is a bit more hip, this is what he looked like in 2023:
Yes, everyone has had the same thought you just did.
Well, as long as people are talking about the N.Y. Times and reading its op-eds, it’s a win for the paper.
Reputational damage can be worried about later, readership is what draws in the advertising bucks.
I can’t read the op ed. But it occurs to me that a conservative saying not to vote isn’t necessarily pro-Trump–if the arguments made are designed to appeal to those who would have otherwise voted for Trump. So you’d need to establish the audience.
That said, if they actually posted that now well-known edited video where Biden actually was talking to the paratrooper, then that does seem very anti-Biden. The only valid reason to show it would be in a piece showing the original, un-doctored video, to call out the propaganda.
A bunch of people here have said they are cancelling subscriptions.
91 percent of New York Times readers say they are Democrats.
Presenting op-ed’s with such a wide variety of viewpoints is not going to get Trump supporters to subscribe. A better explanation for why they challenge their readers is principle. If the aim was to make as much money as possible, they would stop running articles that caused subscription cancellations.
What percentage of indignant subscribers fail to go through with threats to cancel, whether through inertia, guilt over supposedly contributing to newspaper extinction or the increasing difficulty or impossibility of canceling subscriptions online?
I suspect that many will stick with the paper regardless.
Whether those who threatened to cancel Times subscriptions not long ago due to “wokeism” will return is an open question.
Still, controversy sells.
Found a way to read it built into my browser that appears to be officially sanctioned.
It does not attempt to appeal to conservatives. It seems very progressive in messaging. Basically, it asserts that the president can’t do anything about the real problems, which is primarily things progressives care about. And thus voting is pointless.
It neglects that you don’t just vote for president, but also for local and federal offices. And it neglects that, even if the president can’t completely fix something, they can work towards it. And it neglects that they can much more easily break things.
It reminds me of why I don’t like op eds: They aren’t challenged. There is no pushback, making them defend their position. I’m not even saying you need contrary opinions, exactly. Just basic interview skills.
But that’s me not liking the format altogether, not proving that the NYT is pro-Trump. I think doing that would require showing patterns. How often do they run anti-Biden (or actually pro-Trump) op eds? And how does their actual news coverage handle things?
I still want someone to show them running that altered video. That should be a smoking gun for them being pro-Trump. Right now, we have a screenshot claiming it happened, but that’s it.
You should go check out the Comments sections of your favorite liberal-leaning Substacks. Publicly dropping one’s NYT and/or WaPo subscriptions is The Thing To Do.
I’m not dropping mine, but that’s because I only got it for my mother and it’s Sundays only.
I’m enjoying the access to the puzzles but when she no longer cares about it, I’ll drop it then.
We can’t forget that the media are generally owned by wealthy people who have it in their selfish interest to get Republicans in office to minimize their tax burden. The talking heads on the air and those writing columns can be neutral or liberal, but the people who write the checks are generally on the right. Also, DJT represents ratings gold and does for US media what Diana did for British tabloids. He puts eyeballs on the screen and makes for more ad revenue.
I think DJT’s strength is exaggerated in the polls that we see, a tipoff is if they use registered voters rather than likely voters. If you’re registered to vote but not likely to do so, you’re likely to be a low information voter and will tell the pollster you support DJT. Having the polls exaggerate Republiacn strength keeps the MAGA crowd salivating and coming back for more and keeps the rational crowd tuning in out of horror. Like most things, follow the money and you’ll find the motivation.
Labour wins a landslide in UK elections
NYT: “Labour In Disarray”
Misteps of the New York Times deserves its own thread. I say this as a long term and unapologetic subscriber. The Times isn’t MAGA, but they are a business newspaper, part of whose audience are people in business and finance so it likes to keep its right wing covered. Their hot takes are not as inane as Slate’s, but they do traffic in false equivalences; it is their oeuvre.
They do fine investigative work, and are the best major newspaper in the country, a national treasure with feet of clay.
To get an idea of the NYT’s flavor of inanity, visit X’s New York Times Pitchbot. Examples from the past 24 hours:
Whether it’s Donald Trump’s felony convictions, impeachments, and liability for rape, defamation, and fraud; or Kamala Harris’s perception as unlikable, voters will be left with an impossible choice if Biden leaves the race.
Trump is trying to disown Project 2025. Could Biden shake up the race by claiming it for himself?
Opinion | I’m a super Catholic Bernie bro who doesn’t vote. Here’s what both parties need to do to appeal to Americans like me.
Is Kamala Harris likable enough to win a presidential election? We asked three Republican consultants at a country club in Alexandria.
Sometimes satire can’t keep up with reality and the Pitchbot just posts a headline:
I am more than a little dubious about people who have multiple Substack subscriptions but don’t support a single newspaper with international reach.
These days I don’t read any news article without asking myself what their editorial slant is and what they’re trying to accomplish by publishing it. And I don’t touch the opinion pages with a 39 1/2 foot pole.
Such is life when one of the major TV networks in your area is a Sinclair propaganda outlet dedicated to telling everyone how awful this place is.
Right wingers think all news reporters have a secret ideological agenda. There is such a thing as wanting to put the facts in front of the public. I can abstract away from spin and rhetoric as long as reporters make it their business to inform their readers.
The Economist is a solid example of this approach. Editorial has a take on the world and it very much filters down into their reporting. But they aren’t afraid to present facts showing the complexity of the world and are not entirely beholden to a simple story. I can end the article disagreeing with the reporter but given enough facts to make up my own mind.
TV news is garbage even when it isn’t disguised propaganda.
I won’t hijack but for fanciful folks like me, “The US without a president” could make for an interesting thread.
Since the June 27th debate, a simple count of articles and editorials about Biden vs about Trump is telling.
About half of this non-paywalled Nate Silver piece is about the thread title question – answer being no:
Blaming the media is what got Democrats into this mess
He’s conceded some from-the-left criticisms of the Times (maybe the business side does have some control over editorial) that I have attacked in this thread, and he also conceds a bit of the right-wing criticism (waited too long to make a big deal over Biden slowing down) that I might also have defended the Times from, but it’s worth reading.
P.S. He also gives a good, if hard to summarize, defense concerning the issue raised in the last post of relative coverage given to Biden’s woes vs. Trump.