CJR Daily reveals ignorance of conservative press

CJR Daily bills itself as "real-time media analysis from the Columbia Journalism Review." And CJR bills itself as "America's Premier Media Monitor."

Today's real-time media analysis from America's premier media monitor carries a piece by Paul McLeary, who writes,

Speaking of the war, The Weekly Standard seems to be starting to lose faith in one of the chief architects of its course to date: Donald Rumsfeld.

Starting to lose faith? Hate to break the news, but that's not real-time analysis.

I understand that the CJR folks may not spend a lot of time reading conservative rags, but they might be interested to know that The Weekly Standard "seemed to be starting to lose faith" in Rumsfeld many a month ago.

For example, let's examine a few pieces from last year in The Weekly Standard and its counterpart, The Daily Standard:

• Fred Barnes wrote in the May 17, 2004 issue, in a piece entitled, "Precarious Rumsfeld: Bush expresses confidence in him--for now":

  For now, the cries for Rumsfeld's head are coming from Democrats and the media.

  Note the ominous use of for now--twice.
  
  
• Then, in a Nov. 18, 2004, Daily Standard piece on the second-term cabinet, Tom Donnelly wrote,
  

  The dog that hasn't barked in this transition... is the ousting of Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld. Given that the Pentagon's management of the Iraq war was President Bush's greatest campaign liability, there's at least a paradox in Rumsfeld's retention.
  
  ... In sum, although Rumsfeld has been part of the problem....

• In the December 15, 2004, Weekly Standard, Fred Barnes wrote,

  In national security, the indispensable person is not Secretary of State Colin Powell or Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld...

• William Kristol was far more blunt in the same issue:

  But surely Don Rumsfeld is not the defense secretary Bush should want to have for the remainder of his second term.
  
  ... These soldiers deserve a better defense secretary than the one we have.

• Tom Donnelly wrote in a December 16, 2004 piece in the Daily Standard entitled "Rumsfeld's War":

  Even longtime supporters and transformation advocates have begun to recognize that Rumsfeld is now a large part of the problem.

Surely not a major transgression on CJR Daily's part, but one that reveals a lack of familiarity with conservative opinion magazines.