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Jurek Martin has been with the FT since 1966 and has spent 24 years of those years reporting on and commenting about the US. He has written about his long love affair with America. His column is written mostly with Americans in mind, not only about its policies but also about the highways, byways and people.
He first came to the US straight out of Oxford at the age of 21 and spent three years in California as a school teacher, bartender and encyclopaedia salesman. For the FT he has served as Washington bureau chief twice and as head of the New York office, covering six presidential election campaigns.
He was Far East Editor, based in Tokyo, from 1982-86, winning two British press awards for his coverage of Japan, followed by six years as the newspaper’s Foreign Editor, based in London. He then moved back to full time writing in Washington. He notionally retired from the newspaper in 1997 and did not resist the invitation to return to write his column. He was awarded an OBE by the Queen for services to journalism in 1997.
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Prepare yourself for Palin-Dobbs
Lou Dobbs, who resigned as America’s chief prime-time xenophobe last week, is hinting that public office beckons. Perhaps Sarah Palin should take note, writes Jurek Martin
You can read too much into an election
Forthcoming US elections, including two governorships, one House seat and a handful of mayoralties and referendums, will be scrutinised for what they imply for mid-term congressional elections a year from now. But beware the ‘narrative’, says Jurek Martin
Outside Edge: When presidential siblings go rogue
None of America’s 44 presidents has been an only child; and many siblings have proved thorns in the flesh, writes Jurek Martin
The right to bear grudges
In the land of the free, there is no prima facie reason why anybody should not own a sporting team, but it is pretty obvious that Rush Limbaugh was black-balled because of his politics, writes Jurek Martin
Pavlov is alive and well in America
There is a lot of conditioning in America these days – from the laughter of the Letterman audience to the politicians on Capitol Hill, writes Jurek Martin
American libertarianism is dancing to the shock-jocks
Outspoken peddlers of socialist-and-worse conspiracy theories on US television and radio are stealing a veneer of unearned respectability, says Jurek Martin
Outside Edge: Health and hot air on the sabbath
On Sunday morning, Barack Obama goes on five TV shows, probably a record, and on Monday he is on David Letterman’s late-night show, where gentle evisceration occasionally occurs. The US president’s calculation is that healthcare reform demands no less, writes Jurek Martin
‘Liberal lion’ admired by friend and foe
Edward Kennedy did not fulfil the ambitions of his dynastic family by becoming president of the United States, but he became a lion of the US Senate, liked and admired by friend and foe alike
Obama can afford to take the pain for now
I’m a political not an economics junkie. But I know that if an American president takes an economic hit early in his first term, he will be re-elected; if he takes it late he is a goner after four years, writes Jurek Martin
The First Family
A study that traces the origins of the Mafia in New York provides texture to and fills in the gaps in the popular knowledge about the organisation, says Jurek Martin
