Levraphael writes:

Why on earth is Oliver Broudy unnerved by Lévy's unbuttoned shirt, and why does he feel he needs to mention that lack of buttoning and his reaction to it?

Who cares? It's inane and distracting.

I couldn't agree more. I know where this comes from though. The "interview with a prominent person over a meal" is one of the oldest, hoariest clichés they teach writers at Journalism School, and editors insist on it when they assign these kinds of stories in the real world.

The writer is expected to make some observations about the appearance of the person and describe the food that person eats, maybe sprinkled with some of the emotional experiences of the interviewer. If these kinds of observations aren’t there, the editors will assert the ancient legend and make you put them in. If you don’t, the company probably won’t reimburse you for the meal. Ugggh. That’s why you’ll see this formula again and again where we have to read about somebody’s ideas interspersed with what they were stuffing their face with.

Why is it that people who make their career out of original writing continue to hew so closely to this cheesy dogma about interview form. Yes, it is inane and distracting.

At the risk of being accused of "sycophantic drivel" or some other colorful personal attack, Farhad Manjoo and Andrew Leonard are top-shelf reporters and a part of the reason I pay to subscribe to Salon. This thread has degenerated, at best, into pissy bitching and nitpicking, the expression of the common visceral reflex in America today to go on the attack when you can get to anybody with a platform to speak from. That's different from the truely substantive issues with Howell's writings. I'm sure there was some of the reflex present in her case too, but it comes with the Omsbudmans' territory, especially in the brave new world of anything-gets-published blogland. As reporters, I'd hope you guys would spend your energies on new reporting, rather than feeding this crap. I’d hate to think you guys would get bitter or lose your passion thinking these responses show readers don't appreciate your work. We do.

In relation to this story, I also see an agenda here to provoke a response from Salon or its staff so as to be able to smugly say “See, they do it too.” So much effort to prove that everybody is just as bad as everybody else, so there’s no point in participating or having a point of view. It's nihilistic.

The likelihood of violence against judges is increased by comments like Coulter’s. It’s a dress rehearsal of the real thing, which makes real violence more thinkable.

The murderous radicalization of the Germans during WWII was accomplished through a process whereby men and women were hardened first by violent political speech and then by little actions that were successively one-upped to larger acts of violence.

I’m curious though about the issue of free speech versus hate speech. As I recall from my college J-school days, the metaphor for the law’s protection of speech my professor used was of a circle, with political speech at the center of the circle being the most protected, while other kinds of speech were on the edge (such as commercial speech) in a gray area where some regulation was allowed, and some speech was flatly outside of the circle of the law’s protection (such as hate or advocacy for violence).

In Coulter’s latest pronouncement, we have violent political speech (and I’m not ready to believe that she’s off the hook because she said what she said in the passive voice). I wonder where advocating for political violence falls in relation to the circle of the law’s protection. I’d be interested to see Salon go talk to some law professors about this so we could have some authorative clarification about whether her language is out of bounds.

Not too long ago Time Magazine did a lovefest cover story about Ms. Coulter. If anybody reading this still subscribes to Time Magazine, please cancel your subscription. They shouldn't be allowed to get away with legitimizing this dangerous person.

leme

Perhaps that would be more accurate?

Bombing Iran’s known nuclear facilities might slow—but it won’t prevent—Iran’s eventual entry into the nuclear club. An American attack would be experienced as humiliating and shameful by the Iranian people, thereby increasing the likelihood that they would be (further) polarized into a national consensus against us and our allies, which would probably lead to further Iranian support for terrorist activities abroad of their own borders.

Also when discussing bright ideas like attacking Iran, someone really needs to bring up the budget. We can’t afford it…we've (needlessly, it turns out) shot our military wad on Iraq. Shades of the medieval kings whose endless wars bankrupted their national economies and destroyed their nations.

If we can live with a bombastic, threatening, nuclear North Korea, then we (and Israel) can live with a bombastic, threatening, nuclear Iran.

Sorry wise and understanding, but that’s a cop out. It does matter who you vote for. If you don’t like what you see in the Democrat party, then work to change it to better reflect Progressive values. And I don’t mean to get all preachy, but Democracy means living with some compromises and compromisers.

It makes a great point to juxtapose Burr and Cheney. Burr is one of the most bizarre and malevolent characters in American political history. I like the idea that Cheney is going to be put off in an annex with another guy whose legacy to the country is valued at the level of dogshit.