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By Lawrence Henry
I WAS STILL EXPLORING the Internet, crawling through websites on my old 486
and making my first posts on FreeRepublic.com, when I had the idea for an op-ed
essay: An open letter to Dr. James Dobson, head of Focus on the Family. Dr.
Dobson had just been vilified by the New York Times's Frank Rich as a
"Godzilla of the Right" for suggesting that Christian conservatives might
leave the Republican party "and take a lot of people with us."
My idea: To suggest to Dr. Dobson that, in fact, he was winning, that all the
furor over his statement really indicated liberal panic.
At the time, I lived in Boston. I sent the column via snail mail to Jeff
Jacoby, the Boston Globe's twice-weekly conservative columnist, suggesting
that it might make a good op-ed, but noting, in my cover letter, that I
didn't think of the Globe as a sympathetic venue for the piece.
Within days, I got a phone call from Jeff, and we had a long conversation. He
kindly suggested that the "open letter" form was naïve, and that I ought to
rewrite my essay more conventionally. I did so, and sent it to him again.
Jeff passed the essay to the Globe's op-ed editor, who either buried or
ignored the piece. I eventually published it on Joel Miller's Real Mensch,
and began my career (if you want to call it that) as an Internet columnist.
I've been on Jeff's column mailing list since then, and he's been on mine.
We've talked regularly on the phone. He has helped me with sources on
subjects including national defense and affirmative action. Through Jeff,
I've made friends with Stephan and Abigail Thernstrom, the authors of "America in Black and White: One Nation Indivisible."
We have chewed over,
in innumerable e-mails and conversations, the issues of press bias, the
failings of public education, the positions we find ourselves in (he as an
Orthodox Jew, I as a born-again Christian) as religious people in an
aggressively secular world, and many more.
Jeff Jacoby has always been available to me, and has become a friend. When my
family and I were about to move from Boston to New Jersey, I made a point of
joining Jeff for lunch, just so we could meet face to face. We talked for
hours, and could have talked for a lifetime. When I wrote a series of columns
reminiscing about New England's peculiar culture, I interviewed Jeff, an
interview I ultimately did not use.
Jeff thought it was funny I should want to interview him. As he said, he was
a Cleveland boy, not really a New Englander, despite his long tenure in the
region (and despite his having worked for such notable New England fixtures
as curmudgeonly John Silber of Boston University and for the editorial page
of the Boston Herald). He said notably that, as a Midwesterner, he
appreciated everyday, superficial friendliness all the more after living so
long in Boston. In Boston, he said, the general mood "tends toward the surly."
And now the surly types who run the Globe have suspended Jeff without pay for
four months for writing a column about the fates of the signers of the
Declaration of the Independence - a subject widely explored by Rush
Limbaugh's father, by Jonah Goldberg of National Review Online, and by Paul
Harvey. His offense? Not noting that this historical material had been used
by other writers, too.
The last I looked, history was public domain.
I've just come back from a three-day trip to Guatemala, where my wife and I
adopted our son. The whole Globe-Jacoby controversy erupted in print while we
were gone. Among the dozen or so outraged comments I've read about Jeff's
suspension, none has mentioned one thing Jeff told me when we got together
for lunch: That the Globe has always had a conservative columnist, and that
Jeff replaced their former conservative six years ago, when that holder of
the chair died. The Globe recruited Jeff. They asked for him.
Unfortunately, Jeff has never achieved the pre-eminence of columnists like
George Will or William Buckley (in conversation, the difficulty of starting
and sustaining a syndicate relationship figured prominently). That kind of
pre-eminence could have protected him, and provided him a soft landing, as it
did for the far less significant (and far less talented) Mike Barnicle.
But I can't help but think Jeff will land on his feet. He's grieving now, I
know, for the loss of a job as a columnist at a major daily newspaper. Like
me, Jeff is a real newsman, for whom that position represents the pinnacle of
career achievement - kind of like being the concertmaster in a major
orchestra.
Boston, as I found out from 10 years of living there, is a small town, with
rather funny pretentions to big-city status. It's time for Jeff Jacoby, one
of Boston's significant talents, to find a bigger and better arena. I'm
confident he will.
PLEASE do something about Jeff's plight!
Speak out. Call your local newspaper and ask for an editorial supporting Jeff. Contact talk-radio stations and, particularly, the New York Times Co. at (212) 556-1981. Urge that The Globe be made to rescind Jeff's suspension. To send a letter to the editor about the ombudsman's shocking column, send a fax to 617-929-2098 or click here to send your letter via e-mail. Remember to keep your communications CIVIL -- they have more impact that way.
Jewish World Review July 17, 2000 / 14 Tamuz, 5760
For Jeff Jacoby, a Window Closes, a Door Opens
Lawrence Henry is an Internet columnist. Comment by clicking here.
