BREAKING NEWS - ROSS TAKES HIS OWN ADVICE - MUST CREDIT COGITAMUS
Dear Editors,
It is with a heavy heart that I must reject the honor of having been awarded a column in the New York Times. (Well, okay, I originally accepted the offer, but the fact is I've spent six months producing forgettable pieces regurgitating the Republican talking point de jour complemented by periodic doses of jejune prudery reflecting my fundamental discomfort with female sexuality, but no one will remember these -- I mean does anyone remember Judy Miller?)
I am giving up the column because I had the sudden realization that I've actually done nothing with my life to date that justifies my being given such a prominent piece of editorial real estate. Hell, I'm 29 and almost a virgin. (I have, on the other hand, seen William F. Buckley naked and lived to tell the tale so that's something.) It occurred to me that I got the column only as a sop by the liberal elite media to conservatives -- and that I got the gig by default. Simply by being right wing, yet presentable in public, writing complete sentences without using the CAPS lock button, and never using the word n*gger, even in private, I got the job.
And that's really not enough, is it? I've never had a job other than as a youthful pontificator, I don't have a graduate degree, don't really have an area of actual expertise (other than knowing that every time a single woman has an orgasm the Baby Jesus cries), and have no life experience of which to speak. How the hell did I become the youngest columnist in the venerable history of the Times? Thomas Friedman has actually spent more time in cabs than I've been on the earth.
I am afraid that I cannot live up to the Times' "implausible expectations." Some of my supporters, liberals among them, had "cloud-cuckoo-land expectations" of my abilities. Soon, however, the "inevitable disappointments of reality" set in -- including the regrettable fact that I use phrases like "cloud-cuckoo-land" while purporting to be a writer.
So I take my leave with the vow to go out and live and learn and get a real job and meet real people and attain actual mastery of something. Only then will I claim the right to foist my opinions upon millions.
I guess I wish that the Times hadn't put me on the spot by making this generous offer to me. I just regret that I wasn't brave enough to say no when the offer came my way.
