Despite the criticism, the New York Times is better than it has ever been. And it is still the best newspaper on the planet in any language that I read. (Which would, if you insist, cover English, Spanish, Portuguese and French. I do not understand spoken French.) But its headline writers have been falling down on the job lately.
First they suggest that Nicaragua is fighting an insurgency. But when you read the article, it becomes immediately clear that is not what’s going on.
Now we learn that “Culture Gap Impedes U.S. Business Efforts for Trade With Cuba.” Fascinating! I would have imagined that the U.S. would have had the smallest possible culture gap in the world with Cuba. After all, we have Florida! And they have baseball. Perhaps they are talking about some Communist mentality? Fascinating! After all, Cuba experienced one the few genuine Communist revolutions not imposed by the Red Army. It might have altered the mindset deeply! In fact, it almost certainly did. So I started to read with fascination.
Only to learn that the problem is that “threading the needle between Cuba’s rigid rules and the restrictions that the United States continues to impose is tricky.” They do toss in one paragraph about Americans baffled by slow Cuban official decision-making.
Uh ... legal problems and a slow bureaucracy do not a culture gap make, fellows.
I read the article too, and the headline seemed justified; "cultural" is a good way to describe a different approach to doing business.
Posted by: JKR | March 13, 2016 at 10:05 AM
But it doesn't describe a different way of doing business; it describes a slow bureaucracy. If that's cultural, then everything is cultural, and the word has no use. Or did I miss something else?
Posted by: Noel Maurer | March 13, 2016 at 11:13 AM