N.Y. Times Op-Ed Page Rejects McCain Iraq Piece
Updated 3:55 p.m.
By Howard Kurtz
Prospective authors don't usually make a big announcement when their prose is rejected by the New York Times Op-Ed page. But John McCain's campaign is telling the world that the liberal opinion and commentary page turned down his submission on Iraq, just days after publishing a similar piece by Barack Obama.
The Obama article made the case that his administration could "safely redeploy" most U.S. forces from Iraq over a 16-month period. The McCain camp, sensing an equal-time opportunity, submitted its Iraq piece Friday.
"The success of the surge has not changed Senator Obama's determination to pull out all of our combat troops," it said. "All that has changed is his rationale. In a New York Times op-ed and a speech this week, he offered his 'plan for Iraq' in advance of his first 'fact finding' trip to that country in more than three years. It consisted of the same old proposal to pull all of our troops out within 16 months."
About two hours later, David Shipley, the paper's opinion editor, wrote:
I'd be very eager to publish the Senator on the Op-Ed page. However, I'm not going to be able to accept this piece as currently written. I'd be pleased, though, to look at another draft. Let me suggest an approach. The Obama piece worked for me because it offered new information (it appeared before his speech); while Senator Obama discussed Senator McCain, he also went into detail about his own plans.
It would be terrific to have an article from Senator McCain that mirrors Senator Obama's piece. To that end, the article would have to articulate, in concrete terms, how Senator McCain defines victory in Iraq. It would also have to lay out a clear plan for achieving victory -- with troops levels, timetables and measures for compelling the Iraqis to cooperate.
Sounds like a pretty high bar.
More...
0 comments:
Post a Comment