James Taranto Profile picture
Editorial Features Editor, in charge of @WSJ op-ed pages. Best of the Web columnist 2000-17. Pu.
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Feb 14 5 tweets 1 min read
Saw this in former Enron adviser @paulkrugman's column. Image Wondering what it was about, I clicked on the link, which took me to the New Republic. Image
Apr 20, 2022 6 tweets 2 min read
Justice Department spokesman tells AP (in reporter's paraphrase) "the CDC had said it would continue to assess public health conditions, and if the agency determined a mandate was necessary for public health, the Justice Department would file an appeal." apnews.com/article/judge-… "As of Tuesday, the agency hadn’t made a determination, officials said." The mandate had been scheduled to expire Monday anyway, but the CDC extended it for 15 days. Now we're told "the agency hadn't made a determination" that it was "necessary for public health."
Jul 24, 2021 4 tweets 1 min read
Saw this in my Facebook feed. Beneath it, the disclaimer about "independent fact-checkers."
Mar 16, 2020 4 tweets 1 min read
Sanders just called it "the Ebola crisis." "You keep talking about Ebola, you've got Ebola in my head here."
Jan 9, 2020 5 tweets 2 min read
This may be my all-time favorite TDS talking point: The Iranian strike was a masterstroke because there were no casualties. @NickKristof: nytimes.com/2020/01/08/opi… Image This is especially rich given the title of the column. Image
Oct 24, 2019 8 tweets 2 min read
OK, let's consider the argument here. The first two grafs set the piece up as a rebuttal of the claim that Trump has "razed" conservatism "to its foundations."
Sep 3, 2019 8 tweets 2 min read
This clickbait Newsweek headline is pretty funny. newsweek.com/vegan-neighbor… Naturally, I took the bait and clicked. It turns out the "Supreme Court" referenced in the headline is the Supreme Court of Western Australia. Note that's not Australia but WESTERN Australia--i.e., it's a state supreme court.
Aug 25, 2019 5 tweets 2 min read
I watched Joe Walsh on "This Week"--the first time I've tuned in to a Sunday morning show in months. He expressly acknowledged my longstanding point that NeverTrump is about sensibility, not principles: "George, this is not about issues." abcnews.go.com/Politics/week-… Walsh said of Trump (and repeated the point several times): "He's a narcissist. Everything is about him." That may or may not be true of Trump, but it is definitely true that for Walsh, everything is about Trump.
Aug 22, 2019 4 tweets 1 min read
metaphors and analogies from ACTUAL STUDENT PAPERS! mentalfloss.com/article/28828/… nytimes.com/2019/08/21/opi…
Aug 20, 2019 8 tweets 2 min read
This is too easy. Here's Kristol making an appeal to Scaramucci's authority. Punch "scaramucci from:billkristol" into the Twitter search engine, and lots of results pop up. The previous tweet is the first. Here's the second.
Aug 19, 2019 4 tweets 1 min read
Where are we going to find a leader who drives us forward and has a vision for the future? Who knows, but definitely not here!
Aug 12, 2019 6 tweets 2 min read
Harry Reid, former majority leader of the Senate, thinks the president has something to say about the filibuster! nytimes.com/2019/08/12/opi… Also, you have to love this. He doesn't even attempt a high-minded justification of his caucus's decision to abolish the filibuster for nominees in 2013. Instead he defends it by saying it left fewer vacancies for Trump to fill.
Jul 27, 2019 4 tweets 1 min read
The Washington Post publishes the same garbage over and over. July 20, 2018: Jan. 13, 2019:
Jul 25, 2019 6 tweets 2 min read
Here's a nice example of fake news, from @maxboot's column. washingtonpost.com/opinions/2019/… I was suspicious of his characterization of Lesko's questioning, so I went to the link, which turns out to be an @ErikWemple piece. washingtonpost.com/opinions/2019/…
Jun 12, 2019 6 tweets 2 min read
Here's an example of how to lie by omission. The tweet says "former Japanese internment camp." Click through and the headline informs you it's an army base.
Apr 27, 2019 7 tweets 3 min read
Here's a response I received to my earlier tweet about @PolitiFact's uncharacteristically indecisive treatment of the Charlottesville hoax. It echoes this piece from @BillKristol and @SykesCharlie's e-rag. The claim is that Trump was factually mistaken--that no one other than neo-Nazis and white nationalists was present in Charlottesville to oppose destroying the statues. thebulwark.com/the-charlottes…
Apr 25, 2019 4 tweets 2 min read
Here's an example from the NYT of how to report dishonestly while being technically faithful to the facts. nytimes.com/2019/04/23/us/… What is the significance of the qualification "of all the nation's residents?" The Times doesn't explain, but it links to an academic paper that does. georgetownlawjournal.org/articles/311/c…
Apr 3, 2019 5 tweets 2 min read
It troubles few, but by coincidence all of them write for the NY Times. nytimes.com/2019/04/03/opi… nytimes.com/2016/08/02/us/…
Mar 24, 2019 5 tweets 1 min read
As long as the roots are not severed, all is well. And all will be well in the garden. In the garden, growth has it seasons. First comes spring and summer, but then we have fall and winter. And then we get spring and summer again. I think what our insightful young friend is saying is that we welcome the inevitable seasons of nature, but we're upset by the seasons of our economy.
Mar 15, 2019 6 tweets 1 min read
Got a press release this afternoon for an event next Tuesday titled "Growing Alarm across Academia about President Trump’s Mental Fitness Prompts First-of-its-Kind Conference." Subtitle: "Greatest minds in Law, Nuclear Physics, Climate Science, Economics, and more to address real world impacts of the President’s pathology."
Mar 14, 2019 5 tweets 2 min read
Here's the confit de canard--Boot in 2002. wsj.com/articles/SB104… Also, he now plays down the importance in 2002-03 of "so-called neocons in the media."