An interesting test of the Public Intellectual 2.0 argument

An excellent reason why Kristol should not be renewed. His columns are absolutely soporific. If the Times wants a conservative voice they should look elsewhere. I agree that the Atlantic Monthly would be a good place to look though I'd prefer Ross Douthat to Andrew Sullivan.

[...] Drezner makes a really interesting point about the role of bloggers that I want to explore a bit. He claims: [B]logs can function as an [...]

Often and carelessly wrong, utterly predictable and a bad, boring writer: that's quite an indictment.

The Times kept its online editorial and Op-Ed pages behind a subscription wall for years, and during that time I got out of the habit of reading them. I never really regained it, and haven't read Kristol in particular more than a few times. I don't remember any column of his that might enable one to disagree with Packer, but there may well have been some I missed. I well remember Safire's column, though, which was always interesting and usually clever, the work of a man who obviously cared as much about how he said things as what he said. If that is what the Times was trying to replace it's curious that Kristol was tried to begin with.

I vaguely remember suggesting somewhere that the Times fill this space with Virginia Postrel instead, a thought that occurred to other people as well. Postrel herself, as I recall, said she wasn't interested in this kind of writing. In any event, though she's no Safire, a regular Postrel column would have been interesting. Perhaps what the Times was really looking for was a columnist who could reliably reflect the essence of today's conservativism, which David Brooks really doesn't. If they wanted a hard core Bush Republican, then Kristol met that need. We'll see if, with Bush at last on his way out, the Times thinks it still needs that kind of writer.

The Times would do well to find a different brand of conservatism. Finding another red meat, Sarah Palin style commentator would be easy, but I'm not sure how that voice would contribute to relevant debates. Instead, the Times should project out to a new generation of conservative thought and tap fresh Republican voices.

From what I remember of his columns they were pretty much standard, boring, token conservatism--but that's what the Times seemed to want from him, no? Just like the Times wants the gay theater-crowd view of things from Rich and the aging bitch view of things from Dowd. None of the above interest me much, but a weekly column from Judge Posner would at least give a more intellectual take on conservatism.

[...] Drezner is making the bold prediction that Kristol will not renew his NYT contract. Andrew Sullivan of The Daily Dish agrees, it seems. Even Kristol himself is not [...]

Even on the air, Kristol always looks like he's in pain, trying hard to come up with some cogent observation. I started thinking of him as the afterthought guy. Agreed, his writing has been unimpressive, too. I do take some of the criticisms with a grain of salt, considering the not-so-humble "illuminati" sources (Andrew Sullivan?).

Prior to the Gulf War I used to really like reading Kristol even though I often disagreed with him. Sometime after the war started going bad he became a caricature. It's as if he didn't believe half the stuff he was saying. It was funny since the last truly sincere moment I recall him having was on the Daily Show of all places where he was just throwing his hands in the air about Bush and going in with too few troops. (This was about a year after the beginning of the invasion as I recall)

While it might be unfair since I sort of tuned out on the guy after that I got the impression that he felt like he could be a critic of Bush and lose a lot of gigs or have a career as a talking head. It's too bad as the earlier more academic Kristol I kind of liked.

The mostly liberal blogswarm at OpenSalon is working on it.

Wasn't Kristol let go by TIME for the same reasons Packer cites? And does the Times need another conservative columnist? It already has David Brooks.

[...] An interesting test of the Public Intellectual 2.0 argumentMore like an interesting test of whether the NYT has any hopes of retaining the few micrograms of respectability it has left. [...]

[...] Drezner is making the bold prediction that Kristol will not renew his NYT contract. Andrew Sullivan of The Daily Dish agrees, it seems. Even Kristol himself is not [...]