The Issue Regarding TCS

This isn't important. About 3000 more important things happened in the world this week. But some people still seem to think that somehow the whole TCS brouhaha comes down to whether TCS publishes crap and/or tells people what to write. That is, a few lefties seem to be arguing: TCS is a sort of astroturf lobbying front -> TCS publishes crap. Most righties seem to be running this argument in reverse. Since TCS does not publish crap, i.e. it's OK or even quite good, thank you -> TCS cannot be some sort of astroturf lobbying front. It is in fact totally irrelevant whether the content is any good AND whether 99% of the contributors have been told what to say. Cease and desist thinking a determination of the quality and overall autonomy of content at TCS has anything to do with resolution of this admittedly not world-historical question of journalistic ethics.

Put it this way: Eugene Volokh writes for Tech Central. Eugene is smart, fair and honest - more of these things than most people. (Anyone who thinks otherwise is probably NOT some subset of those three things.) Let it be the case that almost every single thing TCS publishes is that good, so TCS is deservedly America's leading opinion journal on a wide variety of topics. You would be a fool to have anything else as your homepage. There's still just as much of a problem, allegedly. The problem - allegedly - is that TCS is - allegedly (did I remember to say allegedly?) only acquiring all this good stuff by way of assembling respectable cover in which lobbying pieces that want to masquerade as independent journalism can pass for what they are not. This isn't the worst thing anyone has ever done. It's not the sleaziest thing that will happen in journalism this year - if it's true. Its just: a violation of journalistic ethics ... if true. if you can imagine feeling annoyed if the NY Times started selling ads that looked like articles and weren't identified as ads - if you can understand why that might be regarded as a slip in quality-control, you can understand what the concern is here.

There are exactly two bits of evidence, one of which is in Confessore's article: namely, the lobbying firm, DCI, that owns the place has always operated like this in the past. Why shouldn't they be operating like this now? (Not a proof, but not a frivolous argument I warrant.) Second, the extremely tolerant editorial policy, actually. Everyone gets paid a little to write pretty much whatever they please. I find it hard to see what advantage a lobbying firm would see in funding everyone saying what they want, unless all the firm wants, in effect, is a generically respectable body of content in which to nestle a few targeted bits. And it doesn't even really matter if people, like Drezner, write pieces attacking the sponsors from time to time. The point (again, unproved): some corporate sponsors want to be able to point to independent sources that say what they (the corporations) would dearly like someone who isn't them to say. The fact that there are also independent sources that say the opposite is OK. Merely having a live debate produces the strong impression that reasonable people - disinterested people - can disagree; which may be all one wants to achieve, by way of gaining a little opinion leverage. And the question whether it's OK to do this - whether you would be willing to help people do it, for example - is the issue. Are you OK with maybe being a sort of a prop? That's the issue. Now that Confessore has outed the owners, it almost automatically isn't even an issue any more. Because now everyone knows to consider the outside chance that any given TCS piece might be penned and planted by a lobbyist.

And all this could be completely imaginary. Could just be Glassman get funded to publish by someone happy to see sort of libertarian stuff out there.

Whatever the truth of the matter, it's sort of funny in the abstract to think of someone getting an entire magazine up and running, day in, day out, with the primary intention of planting a few lobbying pieces. But it's cheap to run an online magazine. The trouble is: it's hard to make money running one. Hmmmm. Although I must add: being able to click and see the sponsors does militate in favor of the view that this whole grand conspiracy does not exactly qualify as a riddle, locked inside an enigma, locked inside a conundrum.

Whatever did I ever think TCS was up to before? I figured they were losing money like Slate, that someone with money hadn't pulled the plug - or was holding on in hopes of a profitable business model. Which may be the case. Even if not: not the worst thing anyone has ever done. It's just words. No one died. All the stuff in the Confessore article in which he sort of reads the tea leaves of TCS content like a Kremlin watcher is pretty off. He just found out who owned the place. That's all he did. And a good thing he did. His article should have been about two paragraphs long. A good two paragraphs.

For damn sure the issue isn't whiny left-wing types unable to deal with intelligent, libertarian opposition.

Comments

[PZ Myers]

I agree with you that the ownership of TCS does not taint (or enhance) the quality of the articles published there. No harm, no foul on the authors.

I also agree that this whole issue is relatively minor and undeserving of all the attention paid to it.

I really think the bottom line is a little different, though. The real question is, now that you know that it is owned by a lobbying firm, would you publish there again? Would you have published there before if you'd known?

Whether that's good or fair to TCS, no matter what your answer, is another question, I think, and one on which reasonable people can disagree.

[William]

Like everyone else, I agree that this is relatively minor. What I'm interested in is: how do people feel this maps onto the rightist indignation that some anti-war demonstrations were organized by ANSWER? My reaction to the ANSWER issue was not to care. I don't see any reason why this is significantly more important.

[Brett Bellmore]

"if you can imagine feeling annoyed if the NY Times started selling ads that looked like articles and weren't identified as ads..."

Thought they did, every election. Except, of course, they don't charge for 'em, they're "in kind" contributions instead.

Doesn't bother me, except for the pretense of objectivity.

[William]

To be precise, you say:

That is, a few lefties seem to be arguing: TCS is a sort of astroturf lobbying front -> TCS publishes crap. Most righties seem to be running this argument in reverse. Since TCS does not publish crap, i.e. it's OK or even quite good, thank you -> TCS cannot be some sort of astroturf lobbying front.

My feeling is: TCS doesn't publish crap, therefore it doesn't really matter whether or not it's an astroturf lobbying front. Likewise, the anti-war demonstrations were things that were worth holding, so it didn't really matter that ANSWER were involved in them.

[PZ Myers]

Oooh, ANSWER makes for an excellent analogy, and I feel exactly the same way.

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