[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 154 (2008), Part 14]
[House]
[Page 19531]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                      TRIBUTE TO THE NEW YORK SUN

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentleman from New York (Mr. Weiner) is recognized for 5 minutes.
  Mr. WEINER. Mr. Speaker, we have had a great deal of discussion about 
New York institutions, great institutions that have been around for a 
very long time, frankly, succumbing to economic pressures, bad 
regulation, misfortune. But we are in a perilously close position in 
New York to losing another great New York institution, and that is the 
newspaper The New York Sun, which has been operating for the better 
part of 7 years now.
  It isn't often that someone in our line of work rises to pay tribute 
to a periodical, particularly one that is frequently quite critical of 
those of us in public life, but The Sun is a unique New York 
institution. It is arguably the only newspaper, frankly the only outlet 
in New York City right now, that is truly covering civic affairs in New 
York, and doing a very good job of covering civic affairs here in 
Washington and around the world.
  For the purpose of making these remarks, I just grabbed at random a 
copy of The Sun recently and pulled out this copy from September 8th. 
And I defy any of my colleagues to find a publication in their part of 
the world, and even the ones that are best known--The New York Times, 
The Boston Globe, any of them--that has coverage comparable to The New 
York Sun.
  Right here is coverage of how Russian war games have begun in the 
Caribbean, with a long description of how the Monroe Doctrine is 
entangled; coverage by E.B. Solomont on health care, talking about the 
challenges facing children's health care in New York and around the 
country; conversation about arts and fashion. The Arts Section of The 
Sun provides arts coverage second to no one. They even found some time 
to put on the front page coverage of sports, Brett Favre's beginning of 
his career with the New York Jets.
  Now, you might be thinking this must be a newspaper that has been 
particularly kind to my point of view, maybe the editorial page has 
been particularly kind to the values that I share. Very often, if not 
most of the time, I disagree with their editorial page. But it is 
always erudite and thorough and gives us a great deal to think about.
  Not long ago, many readers were shocked to find out what, frankly, we 
are learning about in a lot of newspapers around the country, it has 
fallen onto hard times financially. Well, there are many ways that we 
are going to be called upon to participate in our civic life in this 
election year. Obviously first and foremost among them is we are going 
to be asked to vote. But one of the things that all citizens in New 
York can do--and for those of you who have access to the Internet, you 
can go to nysun.com and take a look at the newspaper online--one of the 
things we all can do is engage in our civic debate well-armed with some 
facts about the issues of the day.
  There is no better place to get it than The New York Sun. You know, 
perhaps it is ``old media,'' but it is good, old-fashioned, substantive 
civic engagement with a balanced coverage and smart coverage. You are 
going to find things in The Sun that, frankly, the other newspapers 
gloss over, the other papers pay no attention to.
  I recently got a lot of attention, and perhaps snickering, by 
referring to how ``tabloidy'' a lot of the broadsheet newspapers have 
become in New York City, and I singled out The New York Times for that 
treatment. Well, frankly, if all newspapers had the level of 
thoroughness and the level of sophistication and the level of respect 
that it shows to readers that The Sun does, I think that, frankly, the 
debate in New York City and around the country would be a lot better 
off.
  This is volume 124, number 101. I don't know exactly what those 
numbers mean. But hopefully for years to come, New Yorkers, American 
citizens of all stripes, will be able to pick up this newspaper, and I 
think they will be better for it.
  Now, while I have the microphone, I should say to any of their 
editorial page who are listening, you are wrong about 90 percent of the 
time, and hopefully you will get better over the course of the next 7 
years. But, by all means, I am not going to stop reading, and I would 
encourage all of my neighbors to do the same.

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