Last Updated: May 20, 1999
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Nearly everybody carries editorials. Even those newspapers that truly
believe in current fads that assemble a group of self-interested citizens
to write self-serving screeds to reflect the community’s voice.
Stop and think, though, about any editorials you remember. They are
generally not an even-handed examination of the problems of solid waste.
Nor are they the ones that fully delineate both sides of some meaningless
controversy.
The ones you remember are like Howell Raines' defenestration of former
Defense Secretary Robert McNamara or Maura Casey's Javert-like pursuit
of the high-ranking Homer Simpsons of the Connecticut nuclear industry.
It is a Wall Street Journal editorial by Dan Henninger, ablaze either with
the fervor of the right or the Passion of Martin Luther King. Or it’s Morris
Thompson and the Philadelphia Daily News saying perceptive things about
complicated subjects with the basic attitude of a street punk who’s figured
everybody’s angle.
The common denominator here is small-p passion. Every one of these editorials
was written by somebody who cares deeply. And every reader picks up on
that.
We delude ourselves into thinking that we compete with television by
becoming ever more superficial and focus group-driven. We delude ourselves
because television’s singular appeal has very little to do with how superficial
it is.
Television is a great conveyor of emotion, real or feigned. It has its
brutally honest aspects. For instance, Richard Nixon could fool an ASNE
lunch crowd into thinking he was a statesman. On TV, he was an oleaginous
crook.
People identify with television. They feel that the local haircuts who
read them a hysterical version of the news are their families. The haircuts
are personalities.
We can make our newspapers into personalities in a classic newspaper
way. We can write our opinions as if we care about them, as if they matter.
All that requires is doing the editorials that make emotional sense instead
of the ones that seem to be necessary.
These four writers all do that. Please enjoy them. And at the same time,
consider as you react how nice it would be if people cared about newspapers.
The following are the writers’ thoughts on editorials followed by
one of their favorites.
Aregood is editorial page editor of The Star-Ledger, Newark, N.J.
