Times Watch for August 1, 2003
Gross Generalizations OK For Liberal Causes?
Thursdays A1 Danny Hakim
story, Big and Fancy, More Pickups Displace Cars, takes a moralistic look at
the increasing popularity of pickup trucks. The trend toward bigger-than-ever
pickups has broad implications for the safety of American drivers, the
environment, oil consumption and the financial health of the auto industry. Big
pickups, which can cost $40,000 and up, are the most dangerous vehicles on the
road for people riding in other vehicles-much more dangerous than large sport
utility vehicles, according to federal crash statistics. The average pickup uses
more gasoline than the average S.U.V. and therefore produces more gases that
contribute to global warming.
Besides taking as fact the
liberal assumption that humans contribute to global warming, Hakim allows Joan Claybrook, president of Public Citizen, to criticize pickup trucks without
noting the Ralph Nader-founded
groups liberal agenda. Hakim simply calls Public Citizen a consumer
advocacy group.
Hakim also makes some
rather critical and un-Timesian generalizations regarding truck drivers: Pickup
drivers as a group tend to be less careful than people behind the wheels of
cars, according to insurance industry data. They tend to drink more and use
their seat belts less often, figures show.
While its OK to
generalize about the often-rural drivers of pickups, its verboten to
characterize the driving habits of other groups. A Wednesday story, Traffic
Tips for Los Angeles Best Taken With a Pinch of Kimchi, makes that clear in a
story about Korean-American driving habits.
Reporter Charlie LeDuff
sniffs: According to [Korean-American radio personality] Dr. Driving, 34
percent of the general population are traffic violators, but the number hovers
around 70 percent for Korean immigrants here. How does the doctor know that? Not
through any statistics or science, he admits, but simply from his observations
of the carousel of characters who rotate through his office and from what he has
seen in 20 years behind the wheel.One should accept his mathematics with a
quart of skepticism.
For Danny Hakims story on pickup trucks,
click here.
For Charlie LeDuffs story on L.A. radio host Dr.
Driving,
click here.
Asians,
Automobiles,
Charlie LeDuff,
Environment,
Danny
Hakim, Labeling Bias,
Pickup Trucks,
Stereotypes,
SUVs
Krugmans
Dubious Proposition
Fridays op-ed by Paul Krugman, State of Decline, is on Californias recall
vote and the states massive deficit. According to Krugman, the deficit has
nothing to do with Democratic Gov. Gray Davis leadership, but everything to do
with Proposition 13, the tax-limiting measure Californians passed a
quarter-century ago.
Krugman claims the key
factor in rising California spending has been the effort to rebuild a crippled
education system. Proposition 13, the 1978 cap on property taxes, led to a
progressive starvation of California's once-lauded public schools. By 1994, the
state had the largest class sizes in the nation; its reading scores were on a
par with Mississippi's. Voters wanted this shameful situation remedied. Indeed,
much of the recent growth of education spending was mandated by a rather complex
measure called Proposition 98. So when conservatives denounce runaway
government spending in California, what they're really talking about is the
effort to hire more teachers and repair decrepit school buildings.
Since Proposition 13 has
been blamed by big-government liberals for everything but the
heartbreak of psoriasis, some perspective is in order. A
report from the California-based Pacific Research Institute shows that
per-pupil spending in real [inflation-adjusted] terms was significantly higher
in 1994 (the year Krugman cites) than it was before Proposition 13. The report
by Lance Izumi argues (according to a summary by the Chicago-based research
group Heartland Institute): The reason for the widespread failure of the
state's public school system is not lack of money, says the report, but the way
education services are delivered. In fact, real per-pupil spending in
California was 60 percent higher in 1994-95 than in 1969-70.
For the rest of Paul Krugmans California column,
click here.
California,
Gov. Gray Davis,
Deficit,
Paul Krugman,
Proposition 13, Recall
Times
Editor Admits To Media BiasOn the Right
Times editorial page editor Gail Collins appeared on the
C-SPAN call-in show Washington Journal Friday
morning and defended her paper from attacks from the left and right.
To a caller who accused
the paper of socialism, Collins said: We do not have a socialist agenda. No one
who is a socialist would certainly ever accuse the New York times of having a
socialist agenda, Im sorry. Collins completed her thought with a jab against
Bushs tax cuts: Demanding that Congress cut taxes is like demanding that a
two-year old child eat candy if its given to them.
Responding to a caller who
complained NBC was a branch of the GE-military contractor, Collins addressed
the differences between American journalism and European journalism and then
argued the American right has developed an advocacy media that doesnt try to be
objective: [Americans] treasure the idea of objectivity in our news report, and
in general most papers, including the Times on their opinion pages, strive to
present all sorts of different voices. So its very frustrating for people on the
left, I think, when theyre told that the New York Times, for instance, is their
paper or the Washington Post is their paper when-but what they see is something
thats sort of in the middle, trying to just provide all kinds of different
information. The right in this country has been so much more successful in
developing over recent years an advocacy media, a media that doesnt try to be
objective, a media that tries to push its own agenda, which is completely within
its rights. But theres not much on the left side that balances that out, and
that throws all the people on the left into suddenly being told that we or the
New Republic or the Washington Post are supposed to be their media. So I
understand the frustration that your caller has about that."
Gail Collins,
C-SPAN,
Editorial,
Liberal Bias