James Taranto
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James Taranto (born 1966) is a Manhattan-based columnist for The Wall Street Journal and editor of its online editorial page, OpinionJournal.com. He is best known for his daily online column, entitled Best of the Web Today, in which he links to and comments on news stories and Web sites submitted by readers.
Most of Taranto's commentary is politically oriented and conservative/neoliberal in perspective. He lambastes various public figures and organizations, from John Kerry, often described as "the haughty, French-looking Massachusetts Democrat, who by the way served in Vietnam," to Reuters, for which he uses headlines with excessive use of quotes in mockery of the service's overuse of scare quotes.
Taranto comments occasionally on topics of special interest to him such as the Roe effect (which proposes that parents who support abortion rights will have fewer children, causing support for abortion rights and politically liberal causes to decline among young people) in his column and also wrote an article[1] about it.
Best of the Web Today features a number of recurrent in jokes and self-referential word plays that are not readily apparent to novice readers. One of Taranto's pet peeves is the metric system of measurements, "an outmoded collection of weights and measures based on pagan superstitions about the power of the number 10."
Best of the Web Today also includes non-political items which are concerned with journalism nationwide. Often-seen titles are "You Don't Say", "This Just In", or "Stop the Presses", followed by a common-sense headline such as "Shedding a Few Pounds Beneficial for Obese" (June 1, 2004) or "Sperm May Play Role in Growth of Embryo" (May 13, 2004). Another commonly used title is "What Would We Do Without Experts?", followed by headlines such as "Experts Remind Staying Warm Important After Cold Contributes to 5 Deaths" (January 7, 2004). "World's Smallest Violin" is his lead-in for stories about whiners undeserving of sympathy. A more recent recurring feature is "Bottom Stories of the Day", rounding up supposedly unimportant or unsurprising news items, such as "No E. Coli Reported in Tompkins County" (December 8, 2006).
Taranto exposes what he sees as overly harsh punishment of minor drug- or weapon-related offenses in schools under the title "Zero-Tolerance Watch". He corrects his previous mistakes under the title "Homer Nods". Taranto used to publish a section called "Good News Watch" to counteract what he viewed as liberal media bias in covering the 2003 Iraq war and the subsequent U.S.-led occupation of Iraq.
Other recurring features include "Homelessness Rediscovery Watch" and references to Generalissimo Francisco Franco (in turn an obvious reference to the catch phrase from Saturday Night Live).
A newer feature is "Man (or Woman) Without a Party," taking note of the tendency by many news organizations to avoid mentioning the party affiliation of Democratic politicians caught in embarrassing or corrupt circumstances, while Republican officials usually are so identified.
He also appears occasionally on Journal Editorial Report in the role of "funny man."
Taranto attended California State University, Northridge but "never bothered to graduate".[2]
[edit] Excerpts
The subheading on each item in Best of the Web Today are hyperlinked to whatever Taranto is commenting on. For example:
- Contre le Stéréotype
- A New York Times report suggests maybe the French aren't cheese-eating surrender monkeys after all:
- A Paris court today sentenced a Frenchman with ties to a suspect in the Madrid train bombings to four years in prison for helping Islamic terrorists in Europe.
- The man, David Courtallier, was convicted of conspiring with criminals engaged in a terrorist enterprise and was not implicated in the Madrid bombings, which killed 191 people on March 11. But Mr. Courtallier, a cheese vendor from France's Savoy region who converted to Islam in 1997, had been in contact with Jamal Zougam, one of the first suspects arrested in the Madrid attacks.
- That they have arrested him in spite of his vocation is all the more impressive.
- A New York Times report suggests maybe the French aren't cheese-eating surrender monkeys after all:
One of his signature styles is an alternate headline for a news item, followed by the actual headline. Examples:
- Parry! Thrust!
- "Raiders Safeties to Play Duel Roles"--headline, San Francisco Chronicle, June 12
- ‘This Is a Fashion Disaster!’
- "Frank Critical of Bush on Suits"--headline, Washington Post, June 14
