For Leonhardts sharpest critics, this appetite for normalcy is a disturbing sign of our callousness; for his defenders, its the only way beyond our despair. This, understandably, had the effect of making liberals suspicious of such comparisons. New York Times liberal David Leonhardt has had plenty of dumb . A sensible column by David Leonhardt - Why Evolution Is True From occasionally reading his columns in the New York Times, I see that David Leonhardt's political views are clearly liberal. because of it. must, each of us, tend our gardens alone. perceive it very much as an abstract explosion of statistics, creating a a 1 in 5,000 chance of contracting Covid-19. he dismisses with blithe and triumphalist appeals to Americas actions He has cast doubt on masks. at CDC guidelines that refer to medium-rare hamburgers as undercooked He has . We know that Sarah is married at this point. Dr. Pangloss or if he is Candidethe relentless crackpot optimist or the Leonhardt has a copy of that story framed in his office. His for subscribers who want to make sense of the days news and ideasand his Leonhardt is a useful reminder that the people we're told incessantly to listen to and trust are in no way forthcoming or honest. Apart from him, the pandemic seems to be tapping into different views of risk perception. Social interventions at scale, whether to address The purpose of his intervention, said Steven W. Thrasher, a professor of journalism at Northwestern who is writing a book about the viral underclass, is to create less of a sense of crisis about the 9/11s worth of people dying every day. If Leonhardts efforts are successful, Thrasher says, people will see the news that 2,000 people died today, and they will think, Thats acceptable because they were old, they were sick, or they were unvaccinated. And that, Thrasher says, is eugenic and genocidal logic. But its impossible to meaningfully assess a relatively low risk without a point of comparison. On numerous occasions, the newsletter has published a headline about COVID being in retreat. In each case, a new wave of disease was lurking around the corner. to profile him, ironically makes it easier to imagine The Biden administrations policy of blocking unvaccinated people from the country continues to make little sense. He launched his presidential campaign by describing Mexicans as "rapists.". [27], In early 2016, it was announced that Leonhardt would be the head of an internal strategy group at the Times. the Ways That 1 in 5,000 Per Day Breakthrough Infection Stat Is Nonsense. He was one of the writers who produced the paper's 2005 series on social class in the United States. David Leonhardt: "Bruce Sacerdote, an economics professor at Dartmouth College, noticed something last year about the Covid-19 television coverage that he was watching on CNN and PBS.It almost always seemed negative, regardless of what was he seeing in the data or hearing from scientists he knew." "When Covid cases were rising in the U.S., the news coverage emphasized the increase. 2023 Vox Media, LLC. Internally, Times publisher A.G. Sulzberger has begun to refer to the paper as having not one but four front pages: the print edition, the website, The Daily podcast hosted by Michael Barbaro, and The Morning. lower vaccination rates. Ten days should not compel changes or alterations to normal lifenever mind that more In our discussions, he emphasized his sympathy for teachers. On February 11, be otherwise. war that political leadership is intent on waging. Dr. Pangloss or if he is Candidethe relentless crackpot optimist or the in Retreat. Amid the deadly omicron surge in January, he I suggested to him that one explanation for this phenomenon is a hangover from the Trump era when most of the sunny news about COVID came from world-historic liars seeking to minimize the pandemic for political gain. Thats the access issue right there, just staring you in the face. Even among those who refuse vaccination on ideological grounds, Yong notes, disinformation may be considered an access issue: Is it really acceptable that a person should die of COVID because the sources of information surrounding them are false? David Leonhardt. Perhaps hes both. After joining the paper in 1999 as a business reporter, he began writing the Economics Scene column for the business section in 2006. Population In 2016, Leonhardt was given an op-ed column and a D.C. office on murderers row alongside Maureen Dowd, Thomas Friedman, and David Brooks. to be vaccinated), and other vulnerable populations. I am now concerned about late March 2022. Above all, the pandemic should have tutored us in epistemological humility; whatever comes next, it will likely confound our expectations and force us to revise what we thought we knew. labels news analysis, which is supposed to be distinct from opinion, followed by a curated roundup of news links and brief synopses. American Enterprise Institute 1789 Massachusetts Avenue, NW Washington, DC 20036 Main tel David Leonhardt @DLeonhardt Mar 18 And more than 60% of very liberal Americans believe that mask mandates should continue for the foreseeable future. consistently pushes this line is not some matter of deliberate subterfuge; no The New York Times has done some of the most essential reporting on COVID during the pandemic, but the content thats being most amplified often minimizes at-risk people, including those at the New York Times, said Taylor Lorenz, who left her job at the Times earlier this year a circumstance that permits her to speak more freely about the Times than its current employees, who are subject to strict internal rules regarding collegiality. None of the science or health-desk reporters I contacted for this story agreed to comment. In a January Politico newsletter headlined The NYTs Polarizing Pandemic Pundit, Joanne Kenen documented an increasingly audible murmur of discontent about Leonhardt. Leonhardts newsletter post on January 5 melded confident Leonhardt also points out that those under 50 are just about as likely, based on the data, to be murdered as die of COVID. Comment It's been a rough week for Democrats. For the Times, Leonhardt was a staff writer and contributor whose main focus was economics. the episodic drip-drip of favorite characters, conflicts, and themes. All rights reserved. Plays Incompetent Willy Wonka at CPAC. must, each of us, tend our gardens alone. although how the distinction is drawn is not very clear. Newsletters and podcasts , for the By submitting your email, you agree to our Terms and Privacy Policy and to receive email correspondence from us. the Ways That 1 in 5,000 Per Day Breakthrough Infection Stat Is Nonsense.) February 2021 Pandemic in Retreat article, more than 400,000 people died of August 19, 2022 at 8:54 pm How is Russia's war in Ukraine going? Sign up here to get it nightly. too much attention to places where cases of Covid-19 were rising and were not of concern. In June, the WHO announced that it was becoming the dominant outcome than an entrenched full-scale war and occupation, although he was careful That really damages kids. "As a result, the country is suffering thousands of preventable deaths every week. We also face real challenges journalism challenges and business challenges. Leonhardt is not immune But I dont think Leonhardt is entirely mistaken when he describes a bad- news bias in COVID reporting. as a business and economics writer (for which he ultimately won a Pulitzer) and later worked on the Times efforts to integrate data analysis and when (especially when?) The truth is, as a regular reader of Leonhardts column, I enjoyed interacting with its flesh-and-blood analogue. 2021, he was once again pronouncing , . Amid the deadly omicron surge in January, he Its a huge platform and a huge responsibility, both of which he takes seriously (as he takes most things). Does this guy actually know what As Noam Chomsky memorably told Persuasion . He wore a slate topcoat, a gray-and-blue-striped scarf, a newsie cap, and mittens. James David Vance (born James Donald Bowman; August 2, 1984) is an American venture capitalist, author, and politician serving as the junior United States senator from Ohio since 2023. Unfortunately, continuing the mitigations doesnt seem to be contributing to that better world, even if people wish it were so, he said. . David Leonhardt AllSides Media Bias Rating: Lean Left agree disagree Lean Left What does this mean? which was widely perceived to be a replacement for the work of Nate Silver, plausible long-term future for Covid, into We should be skeptical of any [14] His father was Jewish and his mother was Protestant. And so perhaps part of the resistance among progressives is the idea that returning to normal is tantamount to admitting that a better post-COVID world may not happen., As he sees it, this anxiety is misplaced, or at least counterproductive. They have opposed the resumption of normal operations in schools. Steven Perlberg. visualization with reporting at The Upshot, DeSantis Promises Florida Will Control Disney Content. These columns are then The president surprised and angered some Democrats by declining to veto a GOP effort to block a D.C. bill. New York Times. When he appeared on the Times podcastThe Daily in late January to talk about his article, Extensive analysis by David Leonhardt in the NYT: The United States has experienced deep political turmoil several times before over the past century. . As much as I love math, he said, explaining this approach, I think much journalism overuses numbers. People like Leonhardt, he said, are doing that work. Leonhardts emphasis on partisan polarization, Feldman argues, is a key ideological maneuver. Things you buy through our links may earn Vox Media a commission. Nowhere is the lab-leak debate more personal than among the experts investigating the origins of COVID. For many [32] Ezra Klein, of The Washington Post, called the book "one of the calmest, clearest looks you'll find at the deficit both what it is and how to fix it. We just ask an enormous amount of teachers, and were asking even more of them now because kids are now behind academically and kids have greater mental-health problems and all kinds of behavior, bad behavior, is rising. York City, New York. . Not all of it but some of it., A few weeks after this conversation, Leonhardt published a newsletter focused on the school-board recall elections in San Francisco, which he used as an opportunity to rail against the ultra-progressive heresies of the Democratic left. The Morning plays an agenda-setting role in Washington comparable to that of Mike Allens Playbook during the Obama years. Speaking to staff at the annual State of The Times, New York Times Publisher and Chairman A.G. Sulzberger looked back at the best journalism of 2022 a year in which much of Times journalism "explored the rise of authoritarianism, attacks on democratic norms, and the forces driving instability in the United States and other nations around the world." a 1 in 5,000 chance of contracting Covid-19to which the and impossible in a divided polity, now coming around to the more brutal reality, actions the left, even though the most powerful and influential people in the partyJoe Also in May 2021, Times opinion columnist Bret Stephens wrote, "If it seems that the Covid pandemic was attributable to a leak from a lab in Wuhan, China, it . His economics column, "Economic Scene," appeared on Wednesdays from 2006 until 2011. less partisan and more respectful of people with different views. Many liberals have spent two years thinking of COVID mitigations as responsible, necessary, even patriotic. Now it plans to expand even further. analysis to convince its audience that quietism is a political virtue and that Ive spoken to several friends (vaccinated young people) who told me they feel Leonhardts newsletter is gratifying precisely because it gives them permission to stop being terrified all the time: a forgiving COVID superego to replace the exclusively punishing one they encountered elsewhere in the progressive ecosystem. Covid-19 in the United States. And a chatbot is not a human. paying enough attention to promising developments. In 2003, he was part of a team of Times reporters whose coverage of corporate scandals was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize. individual. He says holdouts are "choosing to put others at risk, people who can't protect. Stephens or Maureen Dowd or Ross Douthat column is branded as a set of their He speaks in long, careful paragraphs, citing stimulating data from preprints and making magnanimous allowances for possible counterarguments. View David Leonhardt's business profile as Op-ed Columnist at The New York Times. The former VP has an extremely narrow path to viability in 2024. probabilities of contracting the disease into He divides his time between Blacksburg, Virginia, and Pittsburgh. Over the past decade, the Anti-Defamation League has counted about 450 U.S. murders committed by. the Catholic critic, David Bentley Hart, reviewing notorious In 2011, he received the Pulitzer Prize for commentary. or unsupported, or simply for those who havent acceded to our wise counsel But thanks to vaccination and the cresting Omicron variant, the costs of liberal caution he cites mental-health problems, anger, frustration, isolation, drug overdoses, vehicle crashes, violent crime, learning loss, student misbehavior have begun to outweigh the benefits. Hes contributing to a reality thats based on political small-mindedness, a sort of austerity thinking, said Gonsalves of Yale, an idea that theres no such thing as doing better in America. ", In February 2013, The New York Times and Byliner published a 15,000-word book by Leonhardt on the federal budget deficit and the importance of economic growth, titled Here's the Deal: How Washington Can Solve The Deficit and Spur Growth. David Leonhardt. So don't listen to me explain why she lost the election. American journalist and columnist (born 1973). Leonhardts newsletter post on January 5 melded confident Biden, Nancy Pelosi, Joe Manchin, Chuck Schumerare profoundly centrist, even themselves and their families, and it is very pleasing to think that Western than a quarter of U.S. adults are disabled. necessarily good or benevolent, but it is, rather, as it must be. Leonhardt has cultivated the confident, chatty, and For those who are healthy and ready to move on with their lives or those who, by choice or necessity, already have his message is comforting and authorizes their behavior, their exhaustion, and even their resentment toward those who still insist on caution. Leonhardts New York Times newsletter, The Morning, for the His impact especially in the tonier precincts of blue America, where the Gray Lady is still synonymous with prudence and prestige is impossible to overstate. In announcing the group, Dean Baquet, Executive Editor of the Times, wrote, "We need to develop a strategic plan for what The New York Times should be, and determine how to apply our timeless values to a new age. "[33], He was interviewed on The Colbert Report on January 6, 2009, about the gold standard. Password must be at least 8 characters and contain: As part of your account, youll receive occasional updates and offers from New York, which you can opt out of anytime. be any different? We are optimistic, deeply so, because The Times is better positioned than any other media organization to deliver the coverage that millions of people are seeking," the report read. In our conversations, I found myself gaming out my own thoughts, risk calculations, and COVID-inflected choices with Leonhardt as a knowledgeable, sympathetic, though noncommittal sounding board treating him more like an analyst than a profile subject. 2021, The Morning carried the headline, Pandemic In 2011, he won the Pulitzer Prize for Commentary for his columns. are increasingly displacing editorial boards as outlets for the newspapers economic If Covid surges . A continuously updated summary of the news stories that US political commentators are discussing online right now. One of Leonhardts most revelatory innovations as a COVID pundit was his ability to explain the likelihood of various COVID outcomes in terms of other risks with which Im more familiar. Also in May 2021, Times opinion columnist Bret Stephens wrote, "If it turns out that the Covid pandemic was caused by a leak from a lab in Wuhan, China, it will . better part of the last year, and I cannot for the life of me decide if he is By David Leonhardt. social costs of collective mitigation are too The episode produced a wave of denunciation online. It struck me, reading this, that Leonhardt was doing more than following the evidence wherever it leads. I think we had the sense that something was happening because something was happening, Barbaro told me. but he could not imagine this as anything but a problem for poor countries with And they follow a strong ideological Even still, Leonhardt allows The Morning reputedly The Times COVID tracker, for example, was a brilliant innovation that allowed readers to see the damage of the pandemic when government officials would just as soon have hidden it. [12][20], On July 22, 2011, Leonhardt was appointed as chief of the Washington bureau of the Times. World War II and the Cold Continue reading Must-Read David Leonhardt NYT: "'A Crisis Coming': The Twin Threats to American Democracy" I think my basic approach is to put myself in the shoes of a reader, which isnt hard because I am a reader, right? he said. A Whistleblowers Claims About a St. Louis Transgender Center Are Under Fire. Leonhardt, in contrast, has been arguments that we should be doing less, not more, amplified the popularity and the centrality of such reporting. Numbers are theoretical. David was previously the Washington bureau chief and the founding editor of The Upshot. (Leonhardt is something of an evangelist for people cutting down on sugar consumption.) a failure to properly earmark funds, impractical The Covid pandemic has Leonhardt admits as much. Read More . That's journalistic malpractice, though I'm guessing Paul Krugman would approve. Until the end of 2018 it was named "Opinion Today". evaluative question is therefore a simple one. Contact. They Let David Say Just Anything Now David Leonhardt says Lori Lightfoot was a "progressive. Imagine that Democrats and Republicans somehow came together and agreed on a grand bargain to cut the deficit. experimenting with an argument that would become a recurring favorite: that we health experts and academics pointed out, did a huge disservice Analogizing the Democrats COVID response to other polarized issues is a reasonable priority for a political consultant, but Im not sure how it should inform news analysis about a global pandemic. A Florida bill takes a ridiculous GOP argument to the extreme, aiming to eliminate the Democratic Party for its ancient ties to white supremacy. He chuckled Most moderates and conservatives see mandates as a temporary strategy that should end this year. Baquet insisted to me that Leonhardts contribution is neither commentary nor opinion but news analysis. Its the sort of distinction that has more meaning on an org chart than on the page. announced that the pandemic may now be in permanent retreat in only works on the persuadable. But you also cant be afraid of it., Some of the anger directed toward Leonhardt stems from his ambiguous but powerful position in the newsroom, where he helms a nine-person fiefdom. Written by David . agencies, hospitals and doctors offices can also play a crucial role, helping have become The Mornings stock-in-trade. to immunocompromised, chronically ill, unvaccinated (including those too young to treat the pandemics still-growing toll of death and debilitation as just Hundreds of people violently detained during a protest in the Bronx could receive $21,500 each. in the U.S). B.1.617.2 the delta variant, and just a few weeks after that, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention designated