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Time Tramples Iwo Jima Image to Push
'War on Global Warming'
Mark Finkelstein
News
Busters
Friday, April 18, 2008
In our nation's history, there are few images more heroic, more
sacred in a civil sense, than that of the Marines raising the flag
at Iwo Jima. Time has now twisted, and enlisted, that image for its
"war on global warming."
Time editor Rick Stengel, making his regular Thursday appearance
on Morning Joe to tout the week's cover story, naturally thought it
was a wonderful idea. He also explained why Time decided to editorialize
in favor of a "massive" effort to combat global warming.
View video here.
RICK STENGEL: The cover story, I mean there's been so many stories
about the environment and we see them all the time. And they're
often just descriptive. And what we decided is we wanted to do something
something that was prescriptive. We we wanted to say, you know what?
We know there's a problem, we acknowledge there's a problem, global
warming exists. Here is a strategy for how to handle it. And by
using that famous Iwo Jima image and saying basically what we have
to do is what we did before World War II by creating a great national
effort, national endeavor, to combat this problem. Using cap-and-trade
policy and using new research into renewable energy and having an
efficiency surge with energy all across the country. This is this
massive effort that is needed.
JOE SCARBOROUGH: Rick, was it a difficult decision
for you all to take a position where you actually were advocates for
a position or is it something that the entire editorial staff decided
was the direction you needed to go?
STENGEL: I think since I've been back at the magazine,
I have felt that one of the things that's needed in journalism, is
that you have to have a point of view about things. You can't always
just say "on the one hand, on the other" and you decide.
People trust us to make decisions. We're experts in what we do. So
I thought, you know what, if we really feel strongly about something
let's just say so. And we've done that a number of times since I've
been back. We did the case for national service, a cover story last
summer. The end of cowboy diplomacy where we said that foreign policy
had to change. I think readers expect that. I think, look. You guys
are up there all the time. On cable television, people are giving
you their point of view, giving their opinions on something and people
want to know that.
So Stengel says readers want to know people's point of view? Well,
since he asked, I think Time's cover is a disgrace.
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