But I read it for the usual reason: you have to know what "they" think and hear.
To be fair, I don't know if I'm more sensitive to it, or if they have completely abandoned their standards (of clearly spearating facts from opinion), but their coverage of politics is increasingly one-sided and partisan under the guise of objectivity. I didn't used to be so annoyed at the Economist all the time. In the long run, we're all dead. John Maynard Keynes
Part of that was me becoming a little bit more left wing, but my views only changed slightly. Part of it was me becoming much more strongly partisan. But part of it was them. They'd always been clearly biased in favour of neo-liberal economic solutions, but they became more dogmatic, even as the evidence mounted up that they don't pan out the way they're supposed to. They increasingly remind me of diehard socialists unwilling to come to terms with the fact that while a full blown centrally planned publicly owned economy might sound nice in theory, it just doesn't work that well. The same techniques - point to certain successes while ignoring the larger context of problems, and deny the latter as the result of deviations from the True Path.
Plus they've expanded their bias beyond economics into pure partisanship and shilling for the Republicans. Some of that always existed, but there was more balance.
One thing I disagree with you on - they never had a bright line betwee opinion and news - the news articles always wore their opinions on their sleeve.
I was telling Drew the other day that newspapers should be white. Pastel colours are for toilet paper. Which is what the financial press is (and the Economist and the WSJ are salmon in spirit). Too bad our decision makers think they need to read it to (in)form their opinions. A vivid image of what should exist acts as a surrogate for reality. Pursuit of the image then prevents pursuit of the reality -- John K. Galbraith
