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By Gregory Taggart, January 16, 2011 7:39 pm

I’ve always wondered why the front page of The New York Times has no hyperlink to Religion in its online edition. There’s a link to U.S. and N.Y./Region, to Technology and Sports, to Science, Business, Arts, and Sports, among others, but Religion? Apparently not important enough or big enough for a link of its own.

What about The Washington Post? I wondered. Sally Quinn used to edit a section or department called something like On Faith, I remembered, largely because I recalled reading a panel discussion where she betrayed an almost total–maybe it was total–lack of knowledge about Mormonism, my faith. In fact, the only knowledge she had came from Martha Beck’s horrible little book Leaving the Saints. So I check out The Post, and to my surprise, there is a hyperlink to a Religion section on the front page. The link leads to On Faith. Sally Quinn lives!

Of course, even The Times covers religion, where the practice seems to be to cover the subject by region of the World. For instance, The Vatican Welcomes First Anglicans appears in a subsection devoted to Europe, Egypt Sentences Muslim appears in the subsection Middle East.

But The Post’s, approach is more deliberate and gives the impression that the paper takes religion more seriously. That said, Sally Quinn is in charge, so the religion of choice is often the United Church of Perpetual Palin Bashing (the comment at 8:48 PM on January 16 is priceless, reminding me of James Taranto’s Two Papers in One nuggets in Best of Web, which always seems to catch one section of The Times contradicting the other).

Anyway, unless I missed something, The New York Times, its failure to give religion its own section or department is an important and telling omission. Not that The Times ignores the subject. But hey, religion and belief (or non-belief) are a major part of our culture. In contrast, The Washington Post at least has a section devoted to religion and faith. Does the difference matter? Is the difference more than skin deep? I hope to answer these and other questions over the next few weeks.

Next Sunday, I’ll sample the writing on the subject of religion in each paper to see if The Times can redeem itself.

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By Gregory Taggart, January 15, 2011 2:17 pm

The paper of record has a decent piece on Jared Loughner, marred by a concerted effort–four different reporters received a byline, while nine others contributed to the story–to tie Mr. Loughner to the right wing.

For 17 paragraphs, the piece adds piece after piece to the puzzle–“a culircue of contradictory moments open to broad interpretation.”

Talented saxophonist. Check. High school dropout. Check. Clean-cut employee. Check. Frightens tellers. Check. Handwritten notes, indicating premeditation. Check. Obsession with numbers and dreams. Check.

Struggling with “a profound mental illness.” Rejection by military, college, and girlfriend. Alienation from friends.

Bingo?

Probably, but not until The Times forces one of two Paul Krugman exculpatory paragraphs into the puzzle. In paragraph 18 of the story we read:

He became an echo chamber for stray ideas, amplifying, for example, certain grandiose tenets of a number of extremist right-wing groups — including the need for a new money system and the government’s mind-manipulation of the masses through language.

Then in the 3rd paragraph of page 6, we read:

A few days later, during a meeting with a school administrator, Mr. Loughner said that he had paid for his courses illegally because, “I did not pay with gold and silver” — a standard position among right-wing extremist groups.

And so a promising attempt at piecing together the puzzle that is Jared Loughner is marred in a more important effort to save face. Drop a few hints, slip in an editorial comment or two, and voila: The New York Times doesn’t have to apologize for the reckless accusations that have appeared on its pages the last few days. Too bad. Sadly, saving face is more important than regaining trust and credibility.

Enough with the editorializing. As Joe Friday might say to the Grey Lady, “Just the facts ma’am.”

(All emphasis mine.)

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By Gregory Taggart, January 10, 2011 2:21 pm

John M. Roll, a Federal District judge, is one of those killed in the Arizona massacre. He was appointed to that position by President G. H.W. Bush.

His name has appeared infrequently in the news reports I’ve listened to and read about the shootings. Which causes me to wonder: Does his appointment by a Republican president not fit the narrative?

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By Gregory Taggart, January 1, 2011 9:27 pm

My son gave me The 4-Hours Workweek to read, and it’s got me thinking. The take away so far is that we need to think outside the 9 – 5 box that employers put us in. The author, Tim Ferris, claims that by planning, implementing deadlines, and eliminating the unnecessary, you can cut your work week back to 4 hours.

Well, among other things, I teach writing. And I grade writing. Ferris’s book has me thinking about how I can serve my students, make my employer happy, and still cut back on the time I spend grading my students’ writing. A few ideas come to mind.

Since I’m an obsessive copy editor, my first order of business is to cut back on the amount of copy editing I do. I’ve tried this before by stopping after a page or two of pointing out comma errors and grammar problems and drawing two lines across the paper to indicate where I stopped. The idea is that since students can only work on so much, they should concentrate on the types of errors I’ve checked above the line. Once they’ve mastered those, the next time around the errors above the lines should be different.

Another idea is to give my students a list of say five or six problems that show up in most writing, and have them work only on them. That way, all I have to look for are those problems.

Finally, and probably the best idea of all, I need to stress peer review in class and out of class more. That way, the burden is on the student. Again, I could give them lists of five or six things to look for in the writing of others. Such repetitive learning should result in mastery of those five or six things.

Imagine how much better everybody’s writing would be if they simply eliminated the passive voice and mastered the comma. Add a more precise word choice and fewer words, and their writing should be singing in short order.

Is a 4-hour workweek in my future? Probably not, but I may be able to cut it to less than 40 hours.

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By Gregory Taggart, December 16, 2010 2:48 pm

Megan McCardle says it better than I’ve heard it in a long time: “We say give me liberty or give me death, but the moment death approaches, we are ready to sell out liberty.”

Ain’t it the truth.

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By Gregory Taggart, November 15, 2010 4:22 pm

Apparently, I’m a Libertarian:

What about you?

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By Gregory Taggart, November 11, 2010 10:16 am

So, the Pjamasphere has been atwitter about Google’s apparent close ties to the Obama administration. And in the past, some have criticized the technology giant for what it has and hasn’t honored on its search page by tweaking the Google logo to fit the holiday. So, my interest was tweaked just a bit by Google’s logo today, Armistice Day:

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By Gregory Taggart, November 5, 2010 7:29 pm

David Bositis, senior research associate at the Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies, this evening on NPR’s All Things Considered:

If you had a group picture of the Republican members of the Congress, and if you wanted to use Photoshop to distill it into one face, it would probably look like former Sen. Trent Lott.

I’ll be back later to comment.

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By Gregory Taggart, November 4, 2010 5:06 pm

Mumbai Mirror columnist Cyrus Dastur reports that his city is putting on the shine for President Obama’s visit.

And now, as India gets ready for Obama’s visit, we’re once again scrambling around to make our cities look good even when they’re a far cry from being liveable. Certain roads will be hastily repaired, areas will be cleaned, and security will be completely in shape, et al. Basically, everything that makes us cast a good impression will be done. So what if all this crumbles down like a pack of cards the moment Obama’s flight leaves India.

Seems like wherever he goes, the President is a job-creating machine. Except here.

(Courtesy of Bureau of Labor Statistics)

And if that graph isn’t disappointing enough, try this one, which shows the median duration of unemployment year-by-year over the last 50 years: