Sad News from the NYT

David Rosenbaum, a political reporter with the paper since 1968, has died due to injuries sustained in what appears to have been a mugging in D.C.:

"He was a reporter with a deep understanding of policy, and of the interaction between policy and politics," said Robert D. Reischauer, the former head of the Congressional Budget Office and a frequent news source. "All of us tend to speak in jargon. He would say: 'Come on! Explain it, explain.' He would get enough from several of us to then turn it into something the average reader would find understandable and interesting. He was one who wanted to peel back the layers of the onion from the smooth and superficial that the spinmeisters would like us to think is the real world, to the core that makes your eyes start to cry."

Mr. Rosenbaum shared the George Polk Award for national reporting for his coverage of the 1990 budget deal in which the first President George Bush abandoned his pledge not to raise taxes. He covered a sweeping range of other long-running stories, from the Senate Watergate hearings of 1973 to the Iran-contra hearings of 1987 to more recent debates over trade, taxes, tobacco, energy, Medicare and Social Security.

Mr. Rosenbaum was 68 years old.   The pro-war WaPo has the story here.   I've written about Mr. Rosenbaum's work in this space.  (here and here)  Reading A1 has mentioned his work as well. (and here)  I didn't have a chance to read too much of what he wrote but in memorium, I'll reprint something of his that was not only candid but accurate:

PRIVATIZATION AND CRISIS From polls and focus groups, President Bush and his Republican allies learned that the public was not receptive to their argument that the Social Security system faced a "crisis" and that the solution was "privatization."

Thus, a switch in terminology. Instead of "crisis," President Bush, in his press conference on Wednesday, talked about "serious problems" and "bankruptcy." Instead of "privatization," he said "personal accounts."

It's too bad the NYT didn't hear what he was saying and hold BushCo's feet to the fire over the GOP's failed and dishonest framing games. 

Comments

[KathyF]

This doesn't sound like a robbery to me at all, since they left his portable music player, watch and ring. Plus it took an ambulance 22 minutes to arrive.

I think this will finally teach reporters not to criticize the Bush administration.

[Thomas Nephew]

Not ready to go there yet, but this was a real bolt from the blue in this particular DC neighborhood. Fairly extensive next-day coverage here (pro-war WaPo, +/-necessarily).

[eRobin]

I didn't know Rosenbaum's work well, but from what he had written recently, he didn't seen to be any threat to BushCo at all. That paragraph I cited was tucked in a weekly rundown-type column and ignored by the NYT.