Hot, Fat, and Clouded

A pundit is as a king. America replaces its presidents, its senators, and its generals, but a pundit made is a pundit forever. From this, we may determine either that every American pundit is so deserving of his position in the punditocracy that he ought to hold it forever, or that some pundits are in fact not qualified for their roles but nonetheless remain in place by way of inertia. This state of affairs is either very good or very bad for the public's understanding of crucial issues. "Hot, Fat, and Clouded" assumes the latter, and from this position serves as the most damning attack yet written on the failures of the opinion class. Ignoring the nation's more obviously ridiculous media figures, the book concentrates instead on America's "serious" commentators: "The New York Times" columnist Thomas Friedman, "The Washington Post" columnists Richard Cohen and Charles Krauthammer, and "The New Republic" editor Martin Peretz among others.