Michael Kinsley

Last updated

Michael E. Kinsley [1] (born March 9, 1951) is an American political journalist and commentator. Primarily active in print media as both a writer and editor, he also became known to television audiences as a co-host on Crossfire .

Contents

Early life and education

Kinsley was born in Detroit, Michigan, the son of Lillian (Margolis) and George Kinsley, who practiced medicine. [2] [3] Kinsley is Jewish. [4] He attended the Cranbrook School in Bloomfield Hills, Michigan, then graduated from Harvard College in 1972. At Harvard, Kinsley served as vice president of the university's daily newspaper, The Harvard Crimson . He was awarded a Rhodes Scholarship and studied at Magdalen College, Oxford, then returned to Harvard for law school.

Early career

While a third-year law student, Kinsley began working at The New Republic . He was allowed to finish his Harvard juris doctor degree through courses at the evening program at George Washington University Law School.

Kinsley's first exposure to a national television audience was as moderator of William Buckley's Firing Line. In 1979, he became editor of The New Republic and wrote the magazine's TRB column for most of the 1980s and 1990s. That column was reprinted in a variety of newspaper op-ed pages, including The Washington Post , and made Kinsley's reputation as a leading political writer. He shared the 1986 Gerald Loeb Award for Commentary. [5]

In 1984, he wrote that "A gaffe is when a politician tells the truth", giving rise to the concept of a Kinsley gaffe. [6] [7] In 1986, he organized a contest for readers of The New Republic to find a newspaper headline more boring than "Worthwhile Canadian Initiative". [8] The contest was won by "Debate goes on over the nature of reality", and "Worthwhile Canadian Initiative" became a long-running joke among journalists and bloggers. [9] [10] [11] [12] [13] [14] [15] [16] [17]

Kinsley also served as managing editor of Washington Monthly (in the mid-1970s, while still in school), editor at Harper's (for a year and a half in the early 1980s), and American editor of The Economist (a short-term, honorary position).

Crossfire and Slate

From 1989 to 1995, Kinsley appeared on CNN's Crossfire , co-hosting with conservative Pat Buchanan. Representing the liberal position in the televised political debates, Kinsley combined a dry wit with nerdy demeanor and analytical skills.

In January 1995, Kinsley had a cameo on the first episode of the TV sitcom Women of the House , in which the show's main character, Suzanne Sugarbaker, was a guest on Crossfire . He also appeared in three movies during the 1990s: Rising Sun (1993), Dave (also 1993), and The Birdcage (1996). [18]

After leaving Crossfire in 1995, Kinsley returned to his editorial roots, relocating to Seattle to become founding editor of Microsoft's online journal, Slate . In 1998 he was considered for the position of editor in chief of The New Yorker . [19] [20] In 1999 he was named Editor of the Year by the Columbia Journalism Review for his work at Slate.

Kinsley stepped down from Slate in 2002, shortly after disclosing that he had Parkinson's disease. [21]

Subsequent positions

External videos
Nuvola apps kaboodle.svg Booknotes interview with Kinsley on Big Babies, January 21, 1996, C-SPAN
Nuvola apps kaboodle.svg Presentation by Kinsley on Please Don't Remain Calm, May 8, 2008, C-SPAN
Nuvola apps kaboodle.svg Q&A interview with Kinsley on Old Age: A Beginners Guide, May 22, 2016, C-SPAN

Kinsley next moved to the Los Angeles Times as editorial page editor in April 2004. He maintained his Seattle residence and often worked from there, commuting to Los Angeles on a part-time basis. During his tenure, Kinsley tried to overhaul the paper's editorial page and led an abortive experiment with a Wikitorial, while also receiving criticism from USC professor and feminist advocate Susan Estrich alleging a dearth of editorials written by women. Kinsley announced his departure in September 2005 after a falling out with the publisher. [22]

He returned to writing a weekly column for The Washington Post and Slate, and in 2006 he served briefly as American editor of The Guardian . He also became a regular columnist for Time magazine, but in May 2009 wrote that the magazine had "dumped" him. [23]

On September 9, 2010, Kinsley and MSNBC pundit Joe Scarborough joined the staff of Politico as the publication's first opinion columnists. On April 29, 2011, Bloomberg L.P. announced that Kinsley had joined the Bloomberg View editorial board. In January 2013, Kinsley re-joined The New Republic as editor at large. [24] In January 2014, Vanity Fair announced that Kinsley would become a contributing editor and write a monthly column. [25]

Personal life

In 2002, Kinsley married Patty Stonesifer, a longtime top executive at Microsoft and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. (As a Microsoft vice president, she had managed the Microsoft news portion of the MSNBC merger, which included Slate.) Stonesifer has two adult children from a previous marriage. She is president and CEO of Martha's Table, a non-profit that develops sustainable solutions to poverty. [26]

In 2002, Kinsley revealed that he had Parkinson's disease, [27] and on July 12, 2006, he underwent deep brain stimulation, a type of surgery designed to reduce its symptoms.

See also

Related Research Articles

<i>The Washington Times</i> American broadsheet newspaper

The Washington Times is an American conservative daily newspaper published in Washington, D.C. It covers general interest topics with an emphasis on national politics. Its broadsheet daily edition is distributed throughout Washington, D.C. and the greater Washington metropolitan area, including suburban Maryland and Northern Virginia. It also publishes a subscription-based weekly tabloid edition aimed at a national audience.

<i>The Washington Post</i> American daily newspaper

The Washington Post, locally known as ThePost and, informally, WaPo or WP, is an American daily newspaper published in Washington, D.C., the national capital. It is the most widely circulated newspaper in the Washington metropolitan area and has a national audience. As of 2023, the Post has 135,980 print subscribers and 2.5 million digital subscribers, both of which are the third-largest among U.S. newspapers after The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal.

<i>The New Republic</i> American magazine

The New Republic is an American magazine focused on domestic politics, news, culture, and the arts, with ten magazines a year and a daily online platform. The New York Times described the magazine as partially founded in Teddy Roosevelt's living room and known for its "intellectual rigor and left-leaning political views."

<i>Los Angeles Times</i> American daily newspaper covering the Greater Los Angeles area

The Los Angeles Times is a daily newspaper that began publishing in Los Angeles, California, in 1881. Based in the Greater Los Angeles area city of El Segundo since 2018, it is the sixth-largest newspaper in the nation and the largest in the Western United States with a print circulation of 118,760. It has 500,000 online subscribers, the fifth-largest among U.S. newspapers. Owned by Patrick Soon-Shiong and published by California Times, the paper has won over 40 Pulitzer Prizes since its founding.

Martin H. Peretz is an American former magazine publisher and Harvard University assistant professor. In 1974, he purchased The New Republic, and he later assumed editorial control of the magazine. In 1996, Peretz founded the financial news website TheStreet.com with CNBC host and hedge fund manager Jim Cramer.

<i>Slate</i> (magazine) American online politics and culture magazine

Slate is an online magazine that covers current affairs, politics, and culture in the United States. It was created in 1996 by former New Republic editor Michael Kinsley, initially under the ownership of Microsoft as part of MSN. In 2004, it was purchased by The Washington Post Company, and since 2008 has been managed by The Slate Group, an online publishing entity created by Graham Holdings. Slate is based in New York City, with an additional office in Washington, D.C.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Patty Stonesifer</span> American businesswoman (born 1956)

Patricia Q. Stonesifer is an American executive. From June 2023 to January 2024, she was the interim CEO of The Washington Post and is on the board of Amazon. She began her career in various executive roles at Microsoft before becoming the founding CEO of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. She previously was the president and CEO of Martha's Table, a Washington D.C.–based non-profit that provides community-based solutions to poverty.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Fareed Zakaria</span> Indian-American journalist and author (born 1964)

Fareed Rafiq Zakaria is an Indian-born American journalist, political commentator, and author. He is the host of CNN's Fareed Zakaria GPS and writes a weekly paid column for The Washington Post. He has been a columnist for Newsweek, editor of Newsweek International, and an editor at large of Time.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Peter Beinart</span> American columnist, journalist, and political commentator

Peter Alexander Beinart is an American liberal columnist, journalist, and political commentator. A former editor of The New Republic, he has also written for Time, The Atlantic, and The New York Review of Books, among other periodicals. He has written four books.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Marjorie Williams</span> American journalist (1958–2005)

Marjorie Williams was an American writer, reporter, and columnist for Vanity Fair and The Washington Post, writing about American society and profiling the American "political elite."

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Timothy Noah</span> American journalist and author

Timothy Robert Noah is an American journalist, author, and a staff writer at The New Republic. Previously he was labor policy editor for Politico, a contributing writer at MSNBC.com, a senior editor of The New Republic assigned to write the biweekly "TRB From Washington" column, and a senior writer at Slate, where for a decade he wrote the "Chatterbox" column. In April 2012, Noah published a book, The Great Divergence, about income inequality in the United States.

Max Frankel is an American journalist. He was executive editor of The New York Times from 1986 to 1994.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Fred Hiatt</span> American journalist (1955–2021)

Frederick Samuel Hiatt was an American journalist. He was the editorial page editor of The Washington Post, where he oversaw the newspaper's opinion pages and wrote editorials and a biweekly column. He was part of the Post team that won the 2022 Pulitzer Prize in Public Service.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Bret Stephens</span> American journalist (born 1973)

Bret Louis Stephens is an American conservative columnist, journalist, and editor. He has been an opinion columnist for The New York Times and a senior contributor to NBC News since 2017. Since 2021, he has been the inaugural editor-in-chief of SAPIR: A Journal of Jewish Conversations.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Michelle Goldberg</span> American journalist and author (born 1975)

Michelle Goldberg is an American journalist and author, and an op-ed columnist for The New York Times. She has been a senior correspondent for The American Prospect, a columnist for The Daily Beast and Slate, and a senior writer for The Nation. Her books are Kingdom Coming: The Rise of Christian Nationalism (2006); The Means of Reproduction: Sex, Power, and the Future of the World (2009); and The Goddess Pose: The Audacious Life of Indra Devi, the Woman Who Helped Bring Yoga to the West (2015).

<span class="mw-page-title-main">David Leonhardt</span> American journalist and columnist (born 1973)

David Leonhardt is an American journalist and columnist. Since April 30, 2020, he has written the daily "The Morning" newsletter for The New York Times. He also contributes to the paper's Sunday Review section. His column previously appeared weekly in The New York Times. He previously wrote the paper's daily e-mail newsletter, which bore his own name. As of October 2018, he also co-hosted "The Argument", a weekly opinion podcast with Ross Douthat and Michelle Goldberg.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Roger Simon (journalist)</span> American journalist

Roger Mitchell Simon is a writer and commentator, the chief political columnist of Politico and a New York Times best-selling author. He has won more than three dozen first-place awards for journalism, and is the only person to win twice the American Society of Newspaper Editors Distinguished Writing Award for commentary. His book on the 1996 presidential race, Show Time, became a New York Times best-seller.

A political gaffe is a mistake or blunder in speech or action made by a politician that attracts media attention and public scrutiny. While often unintended, political gaffes can have significant consequences, as they may reveal the politician's personal views, highlight misunderstandings of key issues, or showcase perceived flaws in character. The concept includes different types of errors, from factual inaccuracies to statements that expose internal beliefs not intended for public consumption. Gaffes are commonly exploited by opponents and media as part of "gotcha" journalism, which often focuses on the blunder rather than substantive political issues. The rise of social media has further amplified the impact of political gaffes, enabling rapid distribution and increased scrutiny.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Nicholas Goldberg</span> American journalist

Nicholas Goldberg is an American journalist, and is currently an associate editor and Op-Ed columnist for the Los Angeles Times. His writing has been published in the New Republic, New York Times, Vanity Fair, the Nation, Sunday Times of London and Washington Monthly, among other places. He wrote his last column for the Los Angeles Times on June 30, 2023.

References

  1. ↑ Kinsley, Michael E. in libraries ( WorldCat catalog)
  2. ↑ Collins, Nancy (March 28, 2014). "Nancy Collins on Michael Kinsley". Vanity Fair. Retrieved January 20, 2019.
  3. ↑ "Lillian Kinsley Obituary -–Washington, DC | The Washington Post". Legacy.com. December 8, 2009. Retrieved January 20, 2019.
  4. ↑ Weiss, Anthony (December 9, 2014). "What Will 'New Republic' Exodus Mean for American Jewish Thought?". Jewish Journal.
  5. ↑ "Auletta Wins Loeb Award". The New York Times . May 9, 1986. p. D9. Retrieved February 1, 2019.
  6. ↑ "Fritinancy: Word of the Week: Kinsley Gaffe". May 11, 2012. Archived from the original on May 11, 2012. Retrieved May 22, 2024.
  7. ↑ "The Big Apple: "A gaffe is when a politician tells the truth" (Kinsley gaffe)". April 6, 2012. Archived from the original on April 6, 2012. Retrieved May 22, 2024.
  8. ↑ Lewis, Flora (April 10, 1986). "Opinion | FOREIGN AFFAIRS; Worthwhile Canadian Initiative". The New York Times. ISSN   0362-4331 . Retrieved May 22, 2024.
  9. ↑ "In Search of the World's Most Boring Headline". The Washington Post. December 29, 2023. ISSN   0190-8286 . Retrieved May 22, 2024.
  10. ↑ Browne, Malcolm W. (February 11, 1986). "QUANTUM THEORY: DISTURBING QUESTIONS REMAIN UNRESOLVED". The New York Times. ISSN   0362-4331 . Retrieved May 22, 2024.
  11. ↑ "Really, Really Important Canadian Initiative". The New Republic. ISSN   0028-6583 . Retrieved May 22, 2024.
  12. ↑ "A Worthwhile Canadian Initiative". Fareed Zakaria. February 7, 2009. Retrieved May 22, 2024.
  13. ↑ Kinsley, Michael (June 9, 2010). "Worthwhile Canadian Initiative". The Atlantic. Retrieved May 22, 2024.
  14. ↑ "Worthwhile Canadian Example". Paul Krugman Blog. January 30, 2010. Retrieved May 22, 2024.
  15. ↑ Adams, Richard (July 29, 2010). "Worthwhile journalism initiative". The Guardian. ISSN   0261-3077 . Retrieved May 22, 2024.
  16. ↑ Barone, Michael (March 30, 2012). "Worthwhile Canadian initiative: kill the penny". Washington Examiner. Retrieved May 22, 2024.
  17. ↑ Cowen, Tyler (March 13, 2024). "The Canadian economy is a worthwhile Canadian initiative". Marginal REVOLUTION. Retrieved May 22, 2024.
  18. ↑ "Michael Kinsley". IMDB. Retrieved April 30, 2016.
  19. ↑ Colford, Paul (July 16, 1998). "Figures Tell Grim New Yorker Story". Los Angeles Times. Retrieved April 12, 2014.
  20. ↑ Shafer, Jack (June 6, 2011). "I Would Have Loved To Piss on Your Shoes". Slate. Retrieved April 12, 2014.
  21. ↑ Staff (December 10, 2001). "Going Public With Parkinson's". CBSNews.com. CBS Interactive, Inc. Retrieved January 25, 2015.
  22. ↑ Kurtz, Howard (September 14, 2005). "Michael Kinsley and the LA Times Part on 'Unfortunate Note'". The Washington Post. Retrieved May 12, 2010.
  23. ↑ Kinsley, Michael (May 21, 2009). "Backward Runs 'Newsweek'". The New Republic. Archived from the original on November 25, 2009.
  24. ↑ Calderone, Michael (December 12, 2012). "Michael Kinsley Returns to The New Republic as Editor-at-Large". Huffington Post.
  25. ↑ "Michael Kinsley Named Columnist for Vanity Fair by Graydon Carter". Vanity Fair. January 19, 2014. Retrieved February 13, 2014.
  26. ↑ "Leadership". Martha's Table. Retrieved April 30, 2016.
  27. ↑ Kinsley, Michael (July 31, 2008). "The Audacity of Bill Gates". Time. Archived from the original on August 6, 2008. Retrieved May 12, 2010.

Further reading

This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.