Newsweek and the Rise of the Zombie Magazine – The New Republic

Writing in The Columbia Journalism Review last year, Daniel Tovrov depicted Newsweek, once one of Americas most distinguished magazines, as a shell of its former self. All that was left was clickbait, op-eds from the likes of Nigel Farage and Newt Gingrich, and a general sense of drift. Nobody I spoke to for this article had a sense of why Newsweek exists, Tovrov wrote. While the name Newsweek still carries a certain authorityremnants of its status as a legacy outletand the magazine can still bag an impressive interview now and then, it serves an opaque purpose in the media landscape.

Last week, Newsweek suggested one possible purpose: The legitimization of narratives straight out of the right-wing fever swamps. An op-ed written by John Eastman, a conservative lawyer and founding director of the Claremont Institutes Center for Constitutional Jurisprudence, coyly suggested that Kamala Harris, who was born in California, may not be eligible to serve as vice president because her parents were immigrants. It was, as many pointed out, a racist attack with no constitutional merit, on par with the birther conspiracy theory that claimed Barack Obama was born in Kenya. Within a few hours, Eastmans op-ed was being brandished by President Trump, who told reporters he had heard Harris may not be eligible to serve.

Three days after the op-ed was published, Newsweek apologized, sort of. In an editors note signed by global Editor-in-Chief Nancy Cooper and opinion editor Josh Hammer, the magazine acknowledged, We entirely failed to anticipate the ways in which the essay would be interpreted, distorted, and weaponized.... This op-ed is being used by some as a tool to perpetuate racism and xenophobia. We apologize. Still, the magazine refused to recognize what was obviousthat the op-ed was intended to spark questions about the eligibility of a Black woman running for high office. Newsweeks editors merely feigned horror that the op-ed was taken in the only possible way it could have been taken.

The publication of Eastmans op-ed says a great deal about the state of Newsweeks opinion section, which has become a clearinghouse for right-wing nonsense. But it also points to a larger crisis in journalism itself: The rise of the zombie publication, whose former legitimacy is used to launder extreme and conspiratorial ideas.

Even by the volatile standards of journalism in the twenty-first century, Newsweeks recent problems are extraordinary. There are the usual issues: a sharp decline in print subscribers, Google and Facebook, the difficulty of running a mass-market general interest news magazine in an age of hyperpartisanship. But Newsweek has also been raided by the Manhattan district attorneys office (a former owner and chief executive pleaded guilty to fraud and money laundering charges in February) and has been accused of deep ties to a shadowy Christian cult, amid many other scandals.

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Newsweek and the Rise of the Zombie Magazine - The New Republic

Reviewed and Recommended by Erik Baquero