BIKEPGH MESSAGE BOARD ARCHIVE

« Back to Archive
41

WSJ Editorial Board member denounces bike sharing

Right here. When I clicked on it, the ad I had to watch was for a Bentley. Who knew that bikes were a part of the class wars?
ahlir
2013-06-02 19:52:26
What, you never got the memo about the UN conspiring to enslave us all in a socialist utopia starting with bike sharing in Colorado? The WSJ is getting more and more difficult to take seriously, another quality Murdoch production.
headloss
2013-06-02 20:07:50
Best Line @ 2:58 "the bike lobby is an all powerful enterprise" - and she wants us to take her seriously. Hey wait a minute...
marko82
2013-06-02 20:11:36
The WSJ is getting more and more difficult to take seriously, another quality Murdoch production.
I am an investor of decades and used to read the WSJ and follow it a bit, but now that it is owned by that jerk that I am convinced his sole goal is to disrupt other countries, I have no time to read any of it. He is Australian and I really believe has it in for the UK and US. The UK is trying to throw him out pretty much. Wish we could. The WSJ is a joke just like fox.
gg
2013-06-02 21:44:02
Wow, I didn't know the WSJ was so bad Didn't think I was going to hear the word "totalitarianism" dropped in reference to a bike share program
sgtjonson
2013-06-02 23:02:57
This is the opposition? She was seemingly trying to play the wise elder by word choice and diction, but the woman didn't connect anything she was saying to a fact, analogy, tidbit of history, or even bit pithy humor. The segment was mainly a vague drifting characterization of this as part of a totalitarian regime somehow foisting it's evil do-gooder self entitlement under the radar upon a helpless city which she, apparently, represents (never mind, you know, elections). And of course, advancing in broad brushes the idea of a cyclist menace on the streets, blithely ignoring facts (even the one presented by the host). You can't argue because there's nothing there! Sad really.
byogman
2013-06-02 23:11:17
This is the opposition? Well, there is also the Mayor of Toronto, who has said some unpleasant things about cyclists/bike lanes. OOOPs, wrong link. ;) Oh, and Glenn Beck and Donald Trump too, I think.
myddrin
2013-06-03 07:19:40
Hm. That sounds to me like she's more got it in for Bloomberg - and by extension, any policy he supports or promotes, than the bike share program per se. Yes, she parroted most of the old nuggets in opposition, but she saved the strongest - and I thought disproportionate to the "subject", vitriol for the Mayor. Last I checked though, Bloomberg was an elected public official, and Ms. Rabinowicz is simply paid to form entertaining (if misguided) opinions. Finally, someone with her journalistic credentials should know better than to season her commentary with these (grammatically and thematically inappropriate) terms: "authoritarian: Favoring or enforcing strict obedience to authority at the expense of personal freedom." And "totalitarian: Of or relating to a system of government that is centralized and dictatorial and requires complete subservience to the state." Like I said, Bloomberg is an elected public official. The people of New York have been free to vote him out since he was first elected in 2002. As for Ms. Rabinowicz, she works for WSJ/Murdoch. Who takes her or that paper/publisher seriously anyway. If they are against it, it MUST be a good thing.
atleastmykidsloveme
2013-06-03 08:04:09
Lying, fascist billionaire's pet "journalist" opposes bicycles? Who would have EVER seen that coming?
mick
2013-06-03 11:55:49
Paul Krugman weighs in.
ahlir
2013-06-03 21:23:49
I like the thing he linked to even better, and I think it largely applies to Pittsburgh as well. A very weird thing for me for a long time has been urban dwellers who fundamentally reject the actual virtues of urban life. I get that not everybody wants to live in Manhattan, but I have no idea why anyone would want to live in Manhattan and get around primarily by personal car. I get that cyclists can be a pain in the ass - especially for drivers - but it's rather obvious that the biggest pain in the ass for drivers are, you know, other drivers. Reducing car use and car trips in a dense urban hellhole should be seen as win-win for everybody.
salty
2013-06-03 23:34:48
That Petrosino park person has a very odd sense of what it is that makes for an effective protest. A bike share station and nude people, agast! What's next, sandwiches and beer?
edmonds59
2013-06-04 12:48:36
One of the comments at the end of Pierce's linked article: "This is the 4th child under 12 killed by a car in NYC this year. And the Daily News chooses to focus its ire on people riding 45-lb bikes at 8mph. Shame. Shame. Shame."
marko82
2013-06-04 14:22:05
@jonawebb “Sharing is for commies and so is cycling”. That's enough to make me reconsider communism.
mick
2013-06-04 14:27:51
This is outstanding. My perception is that she doesn't hate cycling inherently, but hates what it represents to the city and the people who ride. I used to read the WSJ when I was in school a couple years ago, and I recall it being a very good publication. I won't judge it based solely on this one example of pure idiocy, but it lost a ton of credibility with me.
that_tickles
2013-06-05 07:29:32
This makes a lot more sense when you look at the WSJ as yet another tool of Rupert Murdoch, rather than as a newspaper. A few years ago, their slogan was "The daily diary of the American Dream." That actually made some sense in the 1980s. Today, not so much.
stuinmccandless
2013-06-05 07:55:31
Elmo wrote:I used to read the WSJ when I was in school a couple years ago, and I recall it being a very good publication. I won’t judge it based solely on this one example of pure idiocy, but it lost a ton of credibility with me.
Remember that, like our own Tribune-Review, the editorial and news sides of the paper are different people. The editorial page is filled with people like Rabinowitz; the news side has at least some people who actually think.
epanastrophe
2013-06-05 09:47:06
The WSJ was conservative, but excellent until a few years ago. I often read it because any news reporting was relatively balanced and the opinions were done by thoughtful conservatives. Then it became a Rupert Murdoch rag earlier this century. That was the impetus for my "lying, fascist billionaire" comment. That comment, while largely accurate, is at least on the edge of violating the rules of this board. Stop thinking of the WSJ as a "newspaper." It isn't.
mick
2013-06-05 10:48:01
The WSJ continues to be a prime source of information about American business. As was pointed out, there was always a clear distinction between the news bit and the editorial bit. You could ignore the latter and still find value in the former. I don't read the WSJ but I understand that since News Corp bought it, the news section has started to lose its quality and has acquired a more pronounced political slant. (As a result the cool kids are migrating to the Financial Times.) That someone like Rabinowitz was allowed on the air is simply a symptom of decline. You know, kind of like letting Clint Eastwood just do his thing.
ahlir
2013-06-05 21:29:13
I got a Wall Street Journal the other day, for some reason delivered to my house, and looked at it -- it seems like a pretty good newspaper. Didn't read the editorials. But a lot of news I read is either AP or NYTimes. The WSJ seems to have some depth on business-related issues. The fallout from the Dorothy Rabinowitz rant is sort of interesting. People are responding to it with laughter, not taking it seriously anywhere so far as I can see. And New York Magazine has a bunch of articles on CitiBike: http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2013/06/venn-diagram-why-conservatives-hate-citi-bike.html
jonawebb
2013-06-06 14:52:45
Out of curiosity, I took a look at the citi bikes blog. http://citibikenyc.com/blog They post daily usage statistics. Yesterday over 16,000 trips and over 106,000 since it launched 10 days ago. The first day only 6,000 trips were taken and it's grown steadily since then Seems pretty popular, and like something that this time next year will just be another part of life in NYC. Personally, I'm shocked, shocked to find gambling at this est...er I mean, to find out that people like to ride bikes.....
myddrin
2013-06-06 15:01:47
I'm an economics geek and regularly read the WSJ, the Economist, Financial Times, etc. For a while after the Murdoch buyout, WSJ seemed to maintain its integrity despite fears of it turning into another FauxNews sorta thing. As of late (as in, the last few months) they've been printing more opinion-driven or sensationalist drivel. There were plenty of bad articles that didn't hold water in the interim... but they were at least trying to make it look legit until recently (imho).
headloss
2013-06-07 11:22:58
ALMKLM that was awesome. I want to be able to wheelie one of those m#@$%^&f*&^%$$s. That was beautiful.
edmonds59
2013-06-07 11:59:57
"The bike lobby is an all powerful enterprise” YEAH DUDE! First we take Manhattan, then we take Berlin! The future belongs to us!
mick
2013-06-07 12:32:38
That Daily Show video: Pure Comedic Gold.
lizzimac
2013-06-07 13:47:16
There isn't any more substance in her response (well, not to the actual response her editorial generated, but her characterization of it) than there was in the original segment. It's just the same factual foundation free characterization first argument she started with, attempted at points to be supported by flimsy anecdote (never bothering to mention a specific name or incident, naturally). The longer she talks the more ridiculous the anti-cyclist contingent looks. So I guess it's then better for the cause if she keeps rolling, but that statement is uncomfortably close to schadenfreude, makes queasy, and I really hope she stops.
byogman
2013-06-07 17:00:16
The scary thing is that she is a respected Journalist working with a newspaper with a long, hallowed history. There are probably people taking her seriously. Mark my words: Soon the humble, oppressed billionaires of the world will rise up against their all-powerful bike lobby oppressors! The world will know it as the "Wall Street Spring" when the true light of Randian freedom shines through the canyons of Manhattan. Corporate owners will shake off the shackles of the two-wheeled despots that have been holding them down for so long! The higher you stand the harder you fall! The demonic United Nations-inspired bike lobbyists who currently rule the land with an iron fist will come crashing back to the earth! Rue the day, bicycle dictators! Your days are numbered. John Galt lives!
mick
2013-06-07 17:18:58
She's obviously a caricature, a mole, a plant, by our bicycle overlords. Intended to discredit the opposition by making them look like crazy old privileged arrogant imperious rich fools. And I think they nailed it.
jonawebb
2013-06-07 18:45:05
The best protest I know of for countering this sort of crap is to get out and ride in traffic. If you go down the street in a car, or even on a bus, nobody is going to notice. But if you do it on a bicycle, people will see you, and that infinitesimally subtle act of just being there, over and over, will, eventually, change minds. This, more than anything else, gets me on a bicycle in the morning.
stuinmccandless
2013-06-08 00:12:17
Who is John Galt?
teamdecafweekend
2013-06-08 09:09:54
The best protest I know of for countering this sort of crap is to get out and ride in traffic.
^^^That.
reddan
2013-06-08 09:46:38
@ALMKLM That question could have been a joke, given the first line from the wikipedia article
sgtjonson
2013-06-10 17:38:53
Had the chance to gallivant on the new CitiBikes -- quite fantastic. Pretty seamless experience to get going on the bike and to dock/pick up a new one. Well done, NY.
that_tickles
2013-06-10 19:44:51