There's a good piece up at Slate by Sarah Libby about the current dearth of young female pundits. She's responding to a feisty Politico piece about the rapid rise of young pundits—Ezra Klein, the awesome Chris Cillizza, the media maven Brian Stelter—and asking whether these guys are "prodigies" or "pipsqueaks." Libby's concern is something else altogether, though. She writes:
What bothered me about Calderone's ranting wasn't so much whether any of these young men deserved to break into these famously stodgy, old-school institutions...but that they were simply younger versions of what has long been an old boys club.
Perhaps that's part of it, though I would say that all three offer refreshing perspectives and are fun to read. But I'd also find it more refreshing if if the new crop of newspaper and magazine pundits was a more balanced lot. (TV at least has Rachel Maddow.)
It's hard not to be infuriated by this—particularly when I find myself continually blown away by young female reporters. ... Combine that with the fact that journalism schools report overwhelmingly female enrollments, and you do have to wonder why no women are handed the big-time opportunities being doled out to the likes of Klein and Douthat.
She mentions the Daily Beast's excellent Dana Goldstein, whom I regularly read, and the Prospect's Ann Friedman as two of her favorites.
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