As far as I’m concerned, there is still no columnist in North American as good as Paul Wells. I started reading Wells when he was the National Post, and I followed him over to Maclean’s. I don’t agree with him most of the time, but his combination of no-holds-barred commentary and aha-here’s-the-jugular wit is can’t-miss stuff for me.
To see what I mean take a look at his missive on the sale of Newsweek. The opening paragraph is priceless all by itself:
Here’s the table of contents of this week’s Newsweek magazine. Right there is the best explanation for why the Washington Post put the storied franchise up for sale yesterday: because if you cannot hope to sell the sucker one issue at a time, sooner or later you are going to have to put the whole wheezing enterprise on the block. And maybe the only buyer will be the editor who has been busily flying it into the nearest mountain.
Read the whole thing; you’ll never be able to hear “eyes” and “sofa” in the same sentence without dissolving into hysterical laughter.
Filed under: Washington Post (D)
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An interesting read. Although I agree with you that there are a few talented writers (Steyn principally), Maclean’s is also a tired, hackned publication with a definite (and progressive) viewpoint to push. It bothers me tremendously that many Canadians get their news about US politics from Macleans. When I go home, I can expect the same tired talking points about what is happening here almost verbatim from the latest Macleans, which they accept as gospel and fact.
The recent coverage of Sarah Palin by Macleans was troubling, as was the profile of Obama — two excellent examples of just how biased Macleans is — and how they cherry pick “facts” to shade their perspective. It’s dishonest and disingenuous.