The free press is currently under assault in a big way, and its fate will in no small part decide the fate of our society. But we at Cracked are not at all qualified to tackle such a big issue. Instead, we would just like to point out a few times that fancy and respected publications came away looking like a bunch of jerks. In some ways, we are a very petty institution. In most ways, actually.

6 New Statesmen Warns Of "A Kosher Conspiracy"

The critically lauded New Statesman is basically a British version of The Atlantic. Over the years, the magazine has featured writing by distinguished folks like Bertrand Russell, Virginia Woolf, and John Maynard Keynes. It's been described as "radical," but in the same sort of way that, like, Noam Chomsky's theories on generative linguistics are "radical."

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That is, until one morning when the reading public awoke to a picture of the Union Jack being impaled by a Star of David. That was New Statesman's cover in early 2002, accompanied by the title "A Kosher Conspiracy?"

The New Statesman

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Now, there are many valid critiques of, say, Israeli settlements in the West Bank or Bibi Netanyahu's infatuation with the far right. But you'll find most of those don't contain the phrase "Big Jewry," nor do they compare boosters for Israel to tobacco companies. Both of which New Statesmen did -- at the same time!

Here's a good high-water test: If your political thinkpiece implicitly compares Jewish people to cancer-mongers, it's possible you need a broader perspective. Even we at Cracked understand that, and our foreign policy "credentials" are limited to watching half a season of Homeland when we were drunk on our birthday. (It was a sad birthday, but we're not the ones on trial here.)