Yeah - it really pisses me off that journalistic institutions aren’t even following the traditions of their profession. Opinion pieces as part of journalism are supposed to be based in fact - they are not the same as any old asshole’s opinion.

An even simpler test: If the only reason you can come up with for running a bad opinion article is a variation “we need both sides,” your article probably doesn’t do anything useful and shouldn’t run.

Here’s a simple test; if your op-ed contains nakedly false assertions that can be easily disproven by looking at the record, or is made up solely of highly contentious claims not backed up by any evidence within the piece, it SHOULD NOT RUN.

I don’t mind people who have different opinions getting a platform on op-ed pages. But major outlets seem to have such an aversion to “silencing” conservative voices and such a fear of being labeled as having a “liberal bias” that they refuse to hold opinion writers accountable for having opinions grounded in…