I Smack Down An Obama-bashing "Financial Times" Columnist

By MARC McDONALD

I've long been of the opinion that Britain's The Financial Times is the best newspaper in the English-speaking world. It has everything that has been increasingly disappearing from U.S. newspapers since the 1970s: solid in-depth reporting; outstanding international news coverage; and a welcome absence of fluff, sleaze and sensationalism.

The New York Times often smugly claims that it is the "best newspaper in the world." To which I say: bullsh*t. Maybe the Times was the best 40 years ago. But it's important to note that the The New York Times has been coasting on past glories for decades. (This is a paper, recall, that featured the stories of one Judith Miller, a reporter who worked tirelessly in 2003 to assure us that Bush's case for war in Iraq was solid). It should be no surprise that Miller went on to work for Fox "News." She and Fox were made for each other.

In my opinion, The Financial Times is better than the The New York Times ever was. But even FT has a few weak spots. One is the columnist Christopher Caldwell, who regularly pens articles that unfairly bash President Obama.

In one recent column, Caldwell slammed Obama for supposedly not working with Republicans in addressing the health-care crisis. I've heard this argument before, from the likes of right-wing talk radio and Fox and frankly, it is a crock.

I responded with a letter to the editor that set the record straight. I expect my letter, which appeared today in the FT, will in turn get typically incoherent responses from the handful of wingnuts who read the FT.