ink-stained wretches

Tina Brown Admits ‘Swashbuckling’ Niall Ferguson Could’ve Maybe Written a Bit Better

The cover of Newsweek … yeaaaah … ” Morning Joe’s Mika Brzezinski pretty much summed it up today while questioning editor Tina Brown about Niall Ferguson’s contentious, misleading article on President Obama’s first term. “Niall is a swashbuckling, you know, very, very aggressive thinker,” said Brown, but she did concede that the line between the writer’s opinion and the facts about health-care reform was blurred. “What Niall was saying there was his skepticisim about those conclusions — not that they were the CBO’s conclusions,” Brown explained. “That could have been a little more clear, but the fact is he’s clarified that in his rebuttals.”

Ferguson’s critics haven’t exactly been convinced. But then again, neither was Brown: “I actually don’t agree with most of what he says in the piece,” she explained this morning, “but I do think the cover of Newsweek is a place to have a war of ideas, to have battles of ideas, and that is certainly what happened.”

As if her name wasn’t already on people’s tongues enough this week, Brown was also ranked the 77th most powerful woman in the world by Forbes today. You know what they say about power and responsibility.

Tina Brown Speaks on Niall Ferguson Cover Story