As many of you know, I have just started writing a nationally syndicated weekly newspaper column through Creators Syndicate. It is appearing weekly in the Denver Post, among others. From the beginning, I set out to make this column different from the typical inside-the-Beltway, divorced-from-everyday-reality bromides that fill our media – and that means more than just being one of the only syndicated columnists in America anchored in and reporting from a non-DC/New York location. It means rejecting the old model whereby a columnist simply issues their edicts to the masses from Mt. Olympus. It means engaging readers in a far more serious way than the rest of the insulated Punditburo. And I feel a special responsibility to this considering I (think) I am one of the first – if not the first – syndicated newspaper columnists with a grounding in the Netroots.
To kick this off, I want to ask readers for some input on my first few columns. As I said, this is just the initial step – I have some more ideas on how to really try to pursue the spirit of transparency inherent in Open Source culture. I want to try to be the first OpenColumnist, if you will – and this is just the beginning.
So, to review, here are my first four columns, from most recent to oldest. I am including a synopsis and a few thoughts on why I chose to write them:
I tried to cover the intersection of foreign policy and economic policy, a take on Washington that very few have explored, and more than a little state/local politics. I deliberately avoided covering any of the presidential machinations because I believe they are grossly over-covered by columnists, primarily because it is the lazy choice (it is far easier to simply write about what some presidential candidate said in a given week than actually doing some real reporting).
At the bottom is a poll asking you which column you think was the best. It is a very blunt instrument, so for those who have a bit more time, please use the comments section to expand further. Which of the columns did you like and why? Which did you hate and why? Do you think my rationale about where to focus and where not to focus is sound? What issues do you think I should delve into? What issues should I avoid because they are too overexposed? And obviously, if you have specific column ideas, send them along.
Clearly, four columns cannot comprise the overall scope that I hope to cover on an ongoing basis. For instance, I plan to write on land politics and some civil liberties issues, and I also hope to focus more intently on Iraq (though again, that issue is so covered by pundits, that I only want to weigh in when I have something to say that few others are saying). But this gives you a flavor, and anyone who follows my writing knows that my passion is economic and class issues, which I think these columns represent.
So thanks in advance for your feedback. The more I hear from readers, the better a writer I can be, and more importantly, the more I can use this platform to represent the unrepresented. Our movement is regularly ignored and vilified by the media – and we rightly complain about mistreatment from the David Broders and Joe Kleins. I want this platform to be a chance for us all to fight back – and I need your input to do that.
As always – if you’d like to see my column regularly in your local paper, use this directory to find the contact info for your local editorial page editors. Get get in touch with them and point them to my Creators Syndicate site.
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I realize you’re looking for constructive criticism, alas, you won’t find it from me. Your columns appear to be well researched, incise..and clearly understandable…and they have a focus of economic justice, basic good sense, and an emphasis on principles that we al can share and support.
Keep up the good work!
So it’s ok for the hard lefty, Sen. Bernie Sanders (D-VT) to travel to travel to Costa Rica to campaign against CAFTA, but not for the American government to try to open the country’s markets to our workers?
David, you’re obviously smart and intense and obsessed. It comes through in your columns that you want to be a Paul Krug, the worst mentor you could choose. Your stuff may find a home in The Nation or The New Republic, but not in respectable daily newspapers.
Your biases are so clear, and when the letter writers get hold of you, you’ll die. Newspapers don’t mind strong opinions from their columnists, but lying with statistics is a no no.
Rethink your approach if you want your column to be syndicated widely and, most important, syndicated by people other than college newspaper editors.
you know, the guy who won the American Economics Association top prize for an economist under 40 (which he isn’t any longer). He’s also an economics professor at Princeton and has written over 200 academic studies and papers in addition to his NY Times column.
The guy has a higher IQ than all of us on this page put together and the whole of the entire Bush family, including Barney and Miss Beazley.
If we’d listened to him sooner we wouldn’t be in the mess we’re in now.
He’s Pinch’s screamer. A disgrace.
He uses data to draw conclusions, and he’s a clear and effective writer.
B.A. from Yale, PhD from MIT, taught at both places as well as Stanford, now a Princeton professor. Published 20 books and over 200 articles, the vast majority of which were peer-reviewed for publications such as Foreign Affairs, Scientific American, and Fortune. Krugman wrote a germane article in 1993 worth reading, especially his “Rules for Research.”
Does “no intellectual integrity” mean “disagrees with you?” Otherwise, I’m not sure you’re using a dictionary definition.
His academic credentials and record got him the job, but he writes like an ignorant netroots flack. I can’t stand him.
rather than third-grade name-calling and strawmen arguments. Which is why the right wing hates him – they know they can’t prove him wrong.
The Great Unraveling should be mandatory reading for anyone with a shred of concience about the state of nation and its descent into madness under the Bush Administration.
There is a difference between campaigning for or against an issue and using strong arm tactics to get the desired outcome.
David, Im interested in why you take such a federalist view. Other than that I enjoy your pieces, and appreciate you posting them.
I meant to type I and hit D.
n/t
Now that says it all doesn’t it? I take it respectable, to you, means following and repeating whatever business and government tells you is best for you! Tell that to all the people whose standard of living has tanked; whose jobs have gone overseas; whose cities have been decimated….like Detroit.
Can you say UNION?
and that canard has been discredited. It flys in the face of this FACT….but then you wingnuts don’t really care about facts.
http://www.demos.org…
Now provide statistics to refute this, not just blowhard bullshit.