New Republic: We're Non-Partisan Now

It’s official: the new “New Republic” will no longer be intellectually honest and has decided instead to join all the other lying liars in media who claim their left-wingery is objectivity.

From Chris Hughes [pictured], the new owner and editor-in-chief:

The journalism in these pages will strive to be free of party ideology or partisan bias, although it will showcase passionate writing and will continue to wrestle with the primary questions about our society. Our purpose is not simply to tell interesting stories, but to always ask why these stories matter and tie their reporting back to our readers. We hope to discern the hidden patterns, to connect the disparate facts, and to find the deeper meaning, a layer of understanding beyond the daily headlines.

But what Hughes is doing is The Obama Way — using dishonest but clever rhetoric to manufacture a reality that in no way represents truth. And like Obama, Hughes (a former Obama soldier), knows he can count on the media to back his charade.

Since its founding almost a century ago, even those of us who disagreed with TNR could at least respect the fact that the publication was honest about its worldview and biases. TNR was proudly liberal, well-written, and respected its audience enough to not insult them like so many others with some absurd claim it wasn’t partisan or ideologically driven.

Now what we have on our hands is just another dishonest, left-wing media outlet — and that’s a shame.

“National Review’s” Jonah Goldberg puts it well:

And there’s nothing to be ashamed of in being an opinion magazine. Good opinion journalism, I’ve long argued, is superior to most “objective” journalism, precisely because it makes an honest argument. An author of a long essay in National Review or The New Republic says “I believe in X. Here are my reasons why I support X. And here are the best arguments for those who say X is wrong and support Y instead.” Everything is out in the open, as in a court of law. Indeed, in a courtroom the prosecution is “biased” toward conviction, the defense towards acquittal. But both sides understand that they must address the opposing side’s best arguments or they will lose. And both sides understand they cannot take liberties with the facts. Supposedly objective journalism is very often far less honest about such things.

The new New Republic claims it will be free of party ideology or partisan bias. I honestly don’t know exactly what Hughes means by this, but it strikes me as a very bad start.

It’s the end of an era.

 

Follow John Nolte on Twitter @NolteNC