In the '70s, just two newspaper editorial pages seemed to understand the necessity of addressing the energy crisis via free-market remedies. One page was The Dallas Morning News', for which I then wrote; the other was Bob Bartley's. He probably never heard of us at the time, but his invisible comradeship helped keep us going.

With equal distinction -- and eventual success, thanks to Ronald Reagan -- the Journal opposed Soviet communism and helped focus political minds on the need to rebuild our post-Vietnam military.

No human enterprise is on the money every day. In the '90s, the Journal editorial page seemed sometimes to have a weird fixation on Bill Clinton (different in kind from Clinton's fixation on himself). But about the same time, the honesty and courage of staffer Dorothy Rabinowitz were transfiguring the editorial page. Again and again, Rabinowitz slammed the national witch hunt for day-care operators identified as child abusers by the children themselves, children duly prepped for the task by adults. Her efforts in behalf of operators unfairly imprisoned finally won her a Pulitzer to match Bartley's -- his own awarded for economic commentary.

At 66, and semi-retired, the "old" guy still writes on Mondays for America's model editorial page. To make the acquaintance of a model American journalist, read Robert Bartley. Assuming you don't already.