James Fallows observes that the New York Times has embodied the concept of public journalist as he perceives it since 9/11. I haven’t read his book, but I will say that the Times coverage of just about everything (particularly the war in Afghanistan and civil liberties) have been excellent over the past three months. The Washington Post has been outstanding as well. And, to be honest, this has really been journalism’s finest hour. Time, Salon, Slate, Newsweek, the LA Times, the New Republic, the National Review, CNN — all of them have produced tons of excellent stories since 9/11. I had real concerns that the journalistic skills of the nation had atrophied over the years, but as it turns out they were just hibernating. Why have there been so many links to news stories on this site every day? Because there’s been so much real news, and it has been well reported …

I don’t want to give the short shrift to other publications either. The British media in general has been indispensible to me, particularly the BBC (I always hit the BBC first for world news, I have since 9/11).