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Dorothy Rabinowitz

Dorothy Rabinowitz is a Pulitzer Prize winning American conservative journalist and commentator. She was born in New York City, and was educated at Queens College and New York University. She has worked as editorial writer for the Wall Street Journal since June 1990 and has been a member of their editorial board since May 1996. She is a regular panelist on the Journal Editorial Report.

Pulitzer Prize

Ms. Rabinowitz was awarded the 2001 Pulitzer Prize in Commentary for a series of articles published in 2000 covering aspects of U.S. social and cultural trends. Previously, she had been nominated for the Pulitzer Prize three times, but in 2001 "she was not a finalist [but]... the Pulitzer board, which makes the final decisions, reviewed the jury's original three finalists and decided it wanted 'a broader choice.' The jury offered Ms. Rabinowitz as an alternate selection.". "[A]mong the ten articles cited by the board were five articles challenging questionable allegations of sexual abuse. Four of the cited articles commented on the 2000 U.S. presidential election and the remaining article discussed Rudolph Giuliani's recommending a pardon for Michael Milken."

She had previously been nominated in 1996 for the Pulitzer Prize for Commentary "For her columns effectively challenging key cases of alleged child abuse." She had also been nominated for the Pulitzer Prize for Criticism in 1995 "For her writing about television" and in 1998 "For her tough-minded, critical columns on television and its place in politics and culture."

No Crueler Tyrannies

Rabinowitz is most famous for her exposés of the false sexual abuse charges filed against the operators of day care centres and other individuals, notably that of a family named Amirault in Malden, Massachusetts and those in Wenatchee, Washington. Her writing on this got her a 1996 Pulitzer nomination, formed half of the articles cited for her 2001 Pulitzer win, and was the basis of her book No Crueler Tyrannies: Accusation, False Witness, and Other Terrors of Our Times.

Political commentary

Rabinowitz has written approvingly of Republican presidential candidate John McCain in both the 2000 and 2008 U.S. presidential elections.

Media criticism

She is also a TV critic who gave a generally positive review of the canceled television show Cavemen. Of recent Olympic coverage, she wrote:

[T]he true meaning of the Games ... Olympics-babble informs us, is all about our human connection -- in case we were under the impression that the Games were (as they are) about the ferocious drive to win and leave everyone else, human connections all, in the dust. Or that they have something to do, heaven forfend, with the spirit of nationalism.

Bibliography

No Crueler Tyrannies: Accusation, False Witness, and Other Terrors of Our Times, Free Press, 2003. ISBN 0743228340.
New Lives: Survivors of the Holocaust Living in America, Random House, 1976. ISBN 0394485734.
Home Life, Macmillan, 1970.