Time magazine unveiled their list of finalists for the Person or Newsmaker of the Year for 2018. The title isn’t what it used to be. A generation ago, the magazine used to firmly insist that the title went to whoever affected the news of the past year the most, for good or ill — meaning Adolf Hitler won in 1938, Joseph Stalin won in 1939 and 1942, and the Ayatollah Khomeini won in 1979. But in 2001, the magazine selected Rudy Giuliani over Osama bin Laden, demonstrating that they were willing to bend the rules to avoid offense, controversy, and/or bad newsstand sales. The modern criteria is a little fuzzier — it’s now an important figure or group that symbolized a story or trend that dominated the news, that is likely to sell a lot of copies.


This year’s selection of finalists features President Trump (named the newsmaker of the year in 2016); “Separated Families”; Russian Ruler Vladimir Putin (named in 2007); special counsel Robert Mueller; Black Panther director Ryan Coogler; Christine Blasey Ford; slain journalist Jamal Khashoggi; March for Our Lives Activists; South Korean president Moon Jae-in; and royal-wedding bride Meghan Markle.

It’s an odd list. Time is unlikely to pick Trump again, although he probably appeared in more headlines across more media in the past year than anyone else on the list. Picking Mueller before he concludes his investigation would be strange; list him as a favorite for newsmaker of the year in 2019, depending upon what his report says. The leaders of Russia and South Korea were important in 2018, but not dramatically more important than in past years.


Coogler is a creative choice, but figures from the arts world are rarely picked — Bono of U2 was selected in 2005, although that was mostly for his charity work. Most of the others reflect favorite news stories and figures in the demographic of liberal journalists. The March for Our Lives activists faded from the headlines by summer. Ford dominated the news for about a month, then went back to her life. And while the Khashoggi murder is an outrage, was it the biggest news story of the year? And as improbable as the life story of Markle is . . . did she really have the biggest impact on the news in the past twelve months?

Time will probably go with “the separated families” — another chance to denounce the administration’s border policy as cruel and heartless, and feature essays about the “scary, draconian xenophobia sweeping the globe.”