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Responding to my concern that we're losing our public, political intellectuals, Sam L writes:
There is also something good in the end of that model. Even in the mainstream (Time, the Nobel Committee), people are starting to realize that the era of Great Men who guide our cultural advancement is coming to a close, and that it is a good thing. That's why the IPCC got the Peace Prize along with Al Gore, and why "You!" were Time's man of the year.O'Reilly and Edward R. Murrow couldn't be more different, but they both fit into a top-down media culture and a top-down political culture that asks us to passively look to these men as leaders. I think we won't see many more men like Galbraith or Friedman or Murrow, or Martin Luther King Jr. for that matter. It is sad, but it is also undoubtedly a good thing that our culture is shifting towards a model where a few intellectuals, a few journalists, and a few leaders no longer dominate our cultural and political arena. Because, lets be honest, for every man of intellect and integrity like Murrow, there was a Joe McCarthy bringing out what is ugliest in all of us.Fair point. On the other hand, I think O'Reilly is still doing pretty well, and Obama's campaign suggests, to me, that we're not shifting too far away from the Great Man paradigm. Including the IPCC in the Peace Prize was laudable, but the impact Gore had on the global warming debate was utterly extraordinary, as significant an individual accomplishment as we've seen in decades. That said, it's certainly true that the media is opening up to more voices, and that in a fractured information landscape, we won't be so dependent on a couple of thinkers who've been credentialed as Respectable Guides to Politics. But whether lots of people following Buckley is worse than many following Malkin and some following Goldberg, well, jury's out on that one...
