Yes, it’s a neoconservative paper

Here is an example of almost medieval fealty in the opinion pages of modern day New York City. In the first sentence of its editorial today, “Bush for President,” the New York Sun states, unsurprisingly, that it endorses Bush over Kerry for the presidency. In the second sentence of the editorial, the Sun references Norman Podhoretz, as the author of the “World War IV” doctrine which, the Sun suggests, is the primary reason for voting for Bush. Podhoretz, who is not a candidate for the presidency, thus appears in the editorial as being of almost equal stature and importance as the candidates themselves, or perhaps even of greater importance—as the architect of the intellectual framework within which the election should be understood. These neocons sure don’t make any bones about where they’re coming from, and about whose authority they are following.

Here is the first paragraph of the editorial:

With President Bush and Senator Kerry having concluded their debates and New Yorkers preparing to make up their minds, The New York Sun endorses the president for a second term. We have little doubt that we’d have done this even without the outbreak of what Norman Podhoretz has called World War IV. The reason we picked up the flag of the Sun in launching this paper is that we were inspired by its long commitment to limited government, honest government, low taxation, economic growth, constitutionalism, and equality under the law. By all these measures Mr. Bush strikes us as the far better candidate - more intelligent, more principled, more trustworthy.

Posted by Lawrence Auster at October 15, 2004 03:54 PM | Send