McGurn: Latimer No Star
William McGurn, head speechwriter for most of President George W. Bush’s administration, takes to the WSJ today to discuss what a failure former junior speechwriter Matt Latimer was at his job. Oh, it truly pains McGurn to write this about a young man he hired — indeed, he “would have taken them to the grave” — but Latimer is now peddling a book about what buffoons his former employers were and McGurn could not in good conscience let it go by without fighting fire with fire.
While I could understand, say, The Daily Beast or Huffington Post going with this, it strikes me as rather lowbrow for a prestige outlet like WSJ. An op-ed by McGurn defending the administration from Latimer’s charges, sure, but a frontal assault on a junior staffer? That just seems petty.
About James Joyner
I don’t know if this is surprising. The WSJ opinion page has been losing prestige for years now.
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“…, it strikes me as rather lowbrow for a prestige outlet like WSJ. ”
!?!?!?!?!?! It it’s in the editorial page, that part has been batsh*t crazy for 30-odd years now.
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Combating lies about a former president is lowbrow? Given that the Bush Administration endured eight years of lies I find it refreshing they can counter those now.
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Lets see, the rinky dink writer is trying to sell a tell all book and has loaded it with crap. Said book will get lots of press due to continuing BDS, lots of outlets will quote it as gospel and use it to further their anti Bush agenda. Yet it is McGurn who is the bad guy for setting the record straight before the failing press picks up the story and runs it as gospel. As to the WSJ opinion page, what do you compare it to the NYT, Tribune, Times, the only paper that isn’t going down the tubes and you guys say its losing prestige. Guess it depends on whether you want to read fishwrap or a newspaper. Stick to fishwrap or the beacon of enlightenment: USA Today. mpw
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What was there about the Bush administration that wasn’t petty?
Really James, you make it too easy sometimes :-)
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FTFY.
/you’re welcome
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[...] James Joyner: William McGurn, head speechwriter for most of President George W. Bush’s administration, takes to the WSJ today to discuss what a failure former junior speechwriter Matt Latimer was at his job. Oh, it truly pains McGurn to write this about a young man he hired — indeed, he “would have taken them to the grave†— but Latimer is now peddling a book about what buffoons his former employers were and McGurn could not in good conscience let it go by without fighting fire with fire. [...]
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