TAP: not dead yet

[Doug Henwood]

["staunchy liberal"? - isn't that an oxymoron?]

Boston Globe - November 1, 2002

Former Globe publisher takes magazine post

By Mark Jurkowitz, Globe Staff, Globe Columnist, 11/1/2002

The American Prospect magazine - on the eve of a redesign and 
restructuring of its publication schedule - announced yesterday that 
former Globe publisher Benjamin Taylor will become the executive 
editor of the staunchly liberal journal of politics and culture.

The decision to appoint Taylor was based on ''his whole package of 
managerial skills, his journalism skills, his politics,'' said 
American Prospect publisher Robin Hutson. Taylor succeeds Harold 
Meyerson, who became the executive editor 17 months ago and is now 
the magazine's editor at large. According to Hutson, Taylor will 
split his time between Boston and the magazine's editorial office in 
Washington, D.C. She also said that he is not a funder of the 
publication, noting, ''It's not a philanthropic arrangement, it's 
journalistic.''

Taylor, 55, said yesterday that he would work closely with magazine 
founder and co-editor Robert Kuttner. ''I think it's a tremendous 
time to be engaged in journalism,'' he said. ''We think there's a 
very solid opportunity ... to help set an agenda for the liberals and 
the left.''

The new executive editor began his career at the Globe in 1972 and 
moved from reporter to executive editor to publisher. In July 1999, 
The New York Times Company - which bought the Globe from the Taylor 
family in 1993 - replaced Taylor as publisher with Richard H. Gilman. 
Since then, there has been speculation that Taylor was eager to 
return to journalism. He is one of a group of majority investors in 
the year-old newspaper Women's Business New York.

The American Prospect, which debuted in 1990, was the brainchild of 
Globe columnist Kuttner and Princeton professor Paul Starr. Intended 
as a counterweight to the intellectual momentum behind the 
conservative movement in the post-Reagan era, the magazine has had to 
search for a clear identity and hustle to find funding. Three years 
ago, in an effort to become, in Kuttner's words, ''a magazine rather 
than a recovering journal,'' the publication underwent a redesign, 
punched up its editorial focus, and moved from a bimonthly to a 
biweekly publication schedule.

In February, the Prospect, with a circulation estimated by Hutson as 
about 45,000, will expand its feature coverage, undergo another 
redesign, and move to a monthly schedule. ''It's a more natural 
schedule,'' said Taylor. ''I think we can do a good job in a monthly 
format.''