NYT Writer Slammed for Suggesting Libs Should Talk to Climate Change Deniers

Bret Stephens won the 2013 Pulitzer Prize for commentary, wrote for The Wall Street Journal where he was the deputy editorial page editor, and then moved to the New York Times.  When they introduced him to their readers, they quoted their new columnist’s explanation of what true opinion journalism is.  “What a columnist owes his readers isn’t a bid for their constant agreement. It’s independent judgment,” he wrote.  “Opinion journalism is still journalism, not agitprop. The elision of that distinction and the rise of malevolent propaganda outfits such as Breitbart News is one of the most baleful trends of modern life. Serious columnists must resist it.”

And so, in his first piece, he resisted it.  In what the Federalist described as a tepid first article, he suggested that “both sides of the climate-change debate might fare better if they were open to hearing out the opposition’s arguments. Perhaps then, he argues, they could better work toward some sort of solution.”

The readers of the New York Times, however, apparently weren’t down with the “independent judgment” thing.   The newspaper closed the comments, but not before over 1,500 people shared their thoughts — and they weren’t happy.  In the top reader-selected comments, Stephens was called “baffling,” accused of making false equivalencies, promulgating ignorance, logically absurd, and manipulated by the GOP.  Here’s one indicative of the hundreds:

This is the new columnist? Meh. The first foray is weak tea. We scientists are reporting alarming observations about a changing planet. But we’re vilified by one political party, and not the other. Perhaps an essay on why one political party in one country in the world is hysterically opposed to peer-reviewed science would be in order.

I honestly don’t care of readers of the New York Times like or dislike this new columnist.  But it’s becoming abundantly clear — the left is sick and tired of anyone who doesn’t agree 100% with them.  And that is really not good for America.

Photo Credit: Christopher Michel on Flickr