What was your first job as a journalist?
Writing for Quill and Quire, the trade paper of the Canadian publishing industry.
Have you ever used a typewriter?
Yes!
How is social media changing news?
Social media has opened great opportunities for independent journalists, who can escape the clutches of legacy news outlets.
Who's your favorite fictional journalist?
Jimmy Olsen
What does it mean to be a journalist?
to write stories always guided by a commitment to the truth
What's the funniest news-related #hashtag you've seen?
A story about food poisoning at a wedding
How do you prefer to be pitched on stories?
It really depends on the story. It's up to the editor.
What tools and software do you use to do your job?
MS Office, iPhone, iPad
What's your favorite social network?
I stay off social networks as far as I am able; they are a black hole of time.
Who do you wish followed you?
My wife
Why did you become a journalist?
I'm a defrocked professor; I got tired of the nonsense in universities.
Did you work for your high school newspaper? If so, what did you do there?
nope -- I was a DJ for the high school radio station
What story are you most proud of writing or working on?
My current work-in-progress, a book about how rights talk erodes public discourse.
What advice can you offer to aspiring journalists?
“This is what I find most encouraging about the writing trades: They allow mediocre people who are patient and industrious to revise their stupidity, to edit themselves into something like intelligence. They also allow lunatics to seem saner than sane.”― Kurt Vonnegut, Jr.
When's the best time to pitch you?
Early morning -- 5 am to 8 am
What's the best pitch you ever got?
Write what you want --we will take it!
What's the worst pitch you ever got?
To write something "meaningful" about liberalism.
What's your favorite drink?
Coffee
When you're not at a computer, where are you most likely to be?
Walking, reading, listening to music, or playing the guitar and singing off-key
Aside from your own, what's your favorite publication to read?
I read numerous publications: First Things, The Federalist, Claremont Review, Literary Review, and London Review of Books
What's the most common misperception about your beat?
the notion that science and religion are, and must forever be, eternally at war
