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I call the Washington Times and ask for their managing editor. I get a guy named Bill Giles. Giles tells me that there is no way that McCaslin’s story is true. He’s adamant. An editor would never insert something into a columnist’s copy without consulting him. It would be a total violation of every journalistic tenet.

Well, that threw me for a loop. So I call McCaslin, and he says no, it wasn’t the managing editor who inserted the copy. It was Wes Pruden, the executive editor. My next call is to Pruden, who answers his own phone.

I tell him who I am and explain the situation. And I ask him, “Do you ever insert copy into a column without consulting the columnist?”

A pause. Then, “Yes, we do that.”

I thank Pruden and call back Giles. “Yeah, I just talked to Wes Pruden. And he confirmed McCaslin’s story. You know that policy you said you had? Your paper evidently violates it all the time.”

There was silence on the other end of the line. Then, “Okay. Thanks. That’s good to know.”

“One other thing,” I say. “When do you plan to tender your resignation?”

Another beat of silence, then, “Thanks. Thanks for calling.”

So I went to the dinner, told the group the same story I just told you. There was sort of a collective shrug that said: “Yeah, that’s the Washington Times.”

24

Paul Gigot Is Unable to Defend an Incredibly Stupid Wall Street Journal Editorial

Sometimes you read something so stupid it just takes your breath away. You can’t quite believe that someone actually wrote what’s on the page. The effect is heightened when the source is, if not necessarily reliable, at least literate and usually capable of masking its distortions beneath a patina of institutional credibility borrowed from its news division.

On February 3, 2003, the Wall Street Journal wrote an editorial so startlingly dumb that it may, in fact, be the single most idiotic piece of writing my fourteen Harvard research assistants found during their many, many hours of labor. (With the obvious exception of the entire Hannity book.)

Now, I don’t want to bore you with the entire editorial. It starts reasonably enough, praising Attorney General Ashcroft for putting criminals who use guns while committing crimes behind bars. Their point, I gather, is that it’s better to enforce gun laws than not to enforce them. Kudos.

Then the editorial makes one slightly stupid point, as if to foreshadow the tsunami of stupidity that is to come. It cites increased prosecutions of federal gun crimes as evidence of Ashcroft’s effectiveness against crime. The problem with this point is that prosecutions tend to go up whenever crime rates go up. Which started happening the moment Bush took office.

But this is just standard Wall Street Journal distortion. It’s in the next paragraph of their editorial that things really get weird. The Journal charges that the Clinton administration “spent its time devising new ways to keep average citizens from getting guns, while leaving bad guys on the street.” In other words, Clinton’s crime policies, especially on gun violence, failed—and Ashcroft’s were working. To clinch their case, they cite a statistic that they claim is an indictment of Clinton’s approach and “a vindication for Mr. Ashcroft.” Are you ready for Mr. Dumb? Here he comes!

“In reality,” the Journal writes, “gun violence has declined from 12% of violent crime in 1993 to 9% in the most recent Justice statistics. Any gun control advocates out there care to apologize?”

Okay, reader. Let’s take a moment to test your political IQ. Who became president in 1993 when gun violence comprised 12 percent of violent crime? Was it George W. Bush? Or was it Bill Clinton? If you said Bill Clinton, give yourself a point.

Now, the “most recent Justice statistics” mentioned in the editorial came from the year 2001. Who ended his presidency in 2001? George W. Bush? Or Bill Clinton? Again, a point for Clinton.

This next question is a two-pointer, because it involves a logical induction. Here it is. If Clinton was president during the time