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> and could benefit by hiring a conservative just to function as devil's advocate They do hire conservatives (Brooks, Douthat, Kristol, etc) and they just hire

> and could benefit by hiring a conservative just to function as devil's advocate They do hire conservatives (Brooks, Douthat, Kristol, etc) and they just hired Bret Stephens. > (like Fox News did with Alan Colmes) You make it sound as if Alan Colmes, during his time at Fox, was there to give an equal voice to the liberal side of an issue, but in reality he was just marginalized to be the token "lefty" punching bag for Hannity.

PhantomGremlin 9y ago
I don't follow the Times that closely any more, but from what I can see David Brooks is their analog to what Alan Colmes was to Fox. Somewhat like a court jester. But even Brooks knew enough to publicly declare that he wouldn't vote for Trump, even though Trump's political views probably aligned more closely to Brooks than Hillary's views did.
- mtberatwork 9y ago
  > I don't follow the Times that closely any more, but from what I can see David Brooks is their analog to what Alan Colmes was to Fox. Somewhat like a court jester. Then I'm not sure why you have such a strong opinion of the NY Times? Also, no one at the paper is using Brooks as a token conservative in the same manner as what Colmes was for Hannity. Brooks even appears weekly on PBS. > But even Brooks knew enough to publicly declare that he wouldn't vote for Trump, even though Trump's political views probably aligned more closely to Brooks than Hillary's views did. Political views aren't binary. Brooks can have differing views from Trump and Clinton. I don't understand the underlying need to declare blind allegiance to Trump just because one is a conservative.
  - PhantomGremlin 9y ago
    Political views aren't binary. Not that Trump is a true conservative, but ... Our current political system more or less forces binary choices. E.g. take the case of the Supreme Court. Unequivocally Gorsuch is a much more conservative appointee than Garland would have been. Were Trump's negatives so high (in Brooks' eyes) that Brooks was willing to accept perhaps two or three liberal court appointees from Hillary rather than live with Trump's baggage? Apparently so!
rhino369 9y ago
One issue is that the token conservatives brought on for intellectual diversity are almost always the same sort of conservative. The elitist think thank crowd that formed the Never Trump movement. It's pretty clear that outside of Northern Virginia, those guys don't represent mainstream conservative thought. But even putting someone like Douthat on the editorial side doesn't impact the news side of the Times. I think the NYTimes does a pretty decent job, but there is no question they missed the story of 2016 because their news reporters are all inside the bubble. Agree that Colmes was an unglorified punching bag. Fox is the wrong entity to imitate.
- soundwave106 9y ago
  What is "mainstream conservative thought" to you, may I ask? From where I sit, the Republican party (often called "conservative") is divided into several factions right now. The think-tank side traditionally caters to three of them: neo-conservative / "law and order" type causes, libertarian causes, or business interests. The Republican party also is the home of both a religious / fundamentalist wing, and a cultural-identity / white nationalist wing; these sides are generally not well represented in the think tanks. Maybe the later two are what you consider "mainstream"? The issue with the later two camps is that the representative media can be very populist in nature. And populism can be very us-vs-them / emotion driven, sometimes with disregard for facts. This probably would not fit well at all with the current editorial stance of the Times, even if the populism comes from the left.

PhantomGremlin 9y ago

I don't follow the Times that closely any more, but from what I can see David Brooks is their analog to what Alan Colmes was to Fox. Somewhat like a court jester. But even Brooks knew enough to publicly declare that he wouldn't vote for Trump, even though Trump's political views probably aligned more closely to Brooks than Hillary's views did.

mtberatwork 9y ago
> I don't follow the Times that closely any more, but from what I can see David Brooks is their analog to what Alan Colmes was to Fox. Somewhat like a court jester. Then I'm not sure why you have such a strong opinion of the NY Times? Also, no one at the paper is using Brooks as a token conservative in the same manner as what Colmes was for Hannity. Brooks even appears weekly on PBS. > But even Brooks knew enough to publicly declare that he wouldn't vote for Trump, even though Trump's political views probably aligned more closely to Brooks than Hillary's views did. Political views aren't binary. Brooks can have differing views from Trump and Clinton. I don't understand the underlying need to declare blind allegiance to Trump just because one is a conservative.
- PhantomGremlin 9y ago
  Political views aren't binary. Not that Trump is a true conservative, but ... Our current political system more or less forces binary choices. E.g. take the case of the Supreme Court. Unequivocally Gorsuch is a much more conservative appointee than Garland would have been. Were Trump's negatives so high (in Brooks' eyes) that Brooks was willing to accept perhaps two or three liberal court appointees from Hillary rather than live with Trump's baggage? Apparently so!

rhino369 9y ago

One issue is that the token conservatives brought on for intellectual diversity are almost always the same sort of conservative. The elitist think thank crowd that formed the Never Trump movement. It's pretty clear that outside of Northern Virginia, those guys don't represent mainstream conservative thought. But even putting someone like Douthat on the editorial side doesn't impact the news side of the Times. I think the NYTimes does a pretty decent job, but there is no question they missed the story of 2016 because their news reporters are all inside the bubble. Agree that Colmes was an unglorified punching bag. Fox is the wrong entity to imitate.

soundwave106 9y ago
What is "mainstream conservative thought" to you, may I ask? From where I sit, the Republican party (often called "conservative") is divided into several factions right now. The think-tank side traditionally caters to three of them: neo-conservative / "law and order" type causes, libertarian causes, or business interests. The Republican party also is the home of both a religious / fundamentalist wing, and a cultural-identity / white nationalist wing; these sides are generally not well represented in the think tanks. Maybe the later two are what you consider "mainstream"? The issue with the later two camps is that the representative media can be very populist in nature. And populism can be very us-vs-them / emotion driven, sometimes with disregard for facts. This probably would not fit well at all with the current editorial stance of the Times, even if the populism comes from the left.