I bet there will be more now.
37 karma · joined December 22, 2012
When i was younger and trying to educate myself into a higher class, I read a couple of his books. The only good one was From Beirut to Jerusalem, which was published in 1989. Everything after that was just crappy analogies.
I really don't understand how an "expert" in Middle East affairs could think that the USA going to war in Iraq was a good idea.
How many clients get lost in this kind of shuffle? Millions. Eliminating this sort of pain point could save many companies from extinction each year.
- Endless war-mongering. They pushed heavily for the disastrous war in Iraq. After the Boston bombing, they asked whether America was getting complacent. They post a lot of stuff implying that America should go to war in Syria.
- Their coverage of American presidential politics is horrible. In 2000, they endorsed George W Bush, a political scion who was clearly an anti-intellectual and bit of a fool, over Al Gore, a visionary vice president who had co-presided over the longest economic expansion in American history. In 2004, after 4 disastrous years, their "endorsement" issue was titled "Incompetent vs Incoherent".
This stuff, especially the war-mongering, has made me care a lot less about the Economist than I did when I was, say, 18. Given that SV is a very forward-looking place, it is unsurprising that the Economist is less respected than it is in many other locales.
- America is a geographically enormous country, so it's pretty easy to get away from reality and cling to your views (the rural vs. urban divide).
- A rapidly changing ethnic composition in a country with a history of slavery. Civil rights abuses are in many ways still active and ongoing (see all the gerrymandering).
- Several generations of people were inundated with Cold War propaganda.
The ironic thing is that, if they'd just let people browse, they'd sign in on their own.
I wonder if the wall is being worn down now that RM owns it.
EDIT: People who are interested in the middle class squeeze should really check out Elizabeth Warren's book The Two-Income Trap.
This is a terrible citation format. It should cite the URL and/or the name of the publishing company (Twitter).
I also wish they would fix their current classes. A couple of bugs are keeping me from finishing their Jquery and web(original) tracks. I emailed them about it, but still doesn't work.