that happens to be untrue to drive up the post-count on a thread.

I have been reading Glenn for quite awhile now and can state with considerable authority that he is not a gay activist. He's a civil liberties activist, he's a free speech activist and he's a peace activist. He also happens to be gay but that does not make him a gay activist.

Of course our returning threadjacker has a very particular bone to pick over a very particular Pam Spaulding post and it might even be interesting to examine what the problem is, but to come in and repeat a falsehood ad-infinitum to a community that is significantly more knowlegable than he may be, is the internet equivalent of letting himself into someone else's house and tracking mud across the carpet while complaining that there isn't any beer in the fridge.

for being ignorant when he is clearly being dishonest.

As you said, knowing the difference between a the will of a majority and a Constitutional protection used to be necessary requirment in order to graduate High School. It's the reason that the next balloting on the issue will be a Constitutional amendment and it is, of course the origin of the phrase "tyranny of the majority"

Voters in Peoria IL. might get away with not understanding the distinction but if you're writing for TNR and plead the same ignorance, then your just plain lying.

And I think is appropriate here is that of an alcoholic awakening from a bender.

March 2003 wasn't just notable for the number of people who were flat-out wrong about Iraq and the WMD's, it was astounding and unprecedented for the amount of energy devoted to maintaining the illusion and shouting down anyone who dared to question the conventional wisdom.

I always like to remind everyone of what happened to Natalie Maines because its incontrovertable evidence that we were collectively insane.

Given the energy that went into the War-whooping, it is unsurprising that the morning-after effect would include a strong tendency to downplay the importance of the experience. Who, after all, cares to admit that they had lost control of themselves? Certainly not Michael O'Hanlon.

http://www.time-blog.com/swampland/2008/05/todays_appeasement_smackdown.html#comment-486552

http://www.time-blog.com/swampland/2008/05/todays_appeasement_smackdown.html#comment-486558

For putting the bug in Joe Klein's ear over whether Obama mentioned Mahmoud Ahmadinejad by name when talking about leaders he'd meet. The situation is further complicated by the fact that Obama himself isn't pushing back on that front but is rather sticking by his guns that such meetings are appropriate.

I on the other hand just find it severely depressing that the two guys duking it out for control over the worlds largest nuclear arsenal engage in Jr. high School level namecalling in order to achieve their goal.

Since the telecom immunity issue has been on the back burner for awhile, has there been any movement of the proceedings themselves?

(As soon as I hit submit, I'll head over to www.eff.org to see, but I thought I'd throw the question out there anyway....)

If Obama believes all this, he's not just a Jimmy Carter-style liberal. He's off in Noam Chomskyland." Obama then had to call Brooks, demonstrate his commitment to hating Hezbollah, and was cleared by Brooks (for now) of the charge of insufficient devotion to fighting Israel's enemies

attention is drawn away from the larger point which is that there is a minimum amout of belligerence necessary in order to avoid complete condemnation from the pundit class. Obama passes the test, but the fact that there is a test and a script that it is necessary to follow in order to pass muster and be allowed to run for the office points to the degree to which we are being controlled by a small, self-interested group that certainly fails to have our country's best interest at heart (let alone that of humanity as a whole.)

Was that before or after we invaded and took out the secular regime?

Everyone agrees about and discusses Reagan's puulout from Lebanon.

Am I the only one who has noticed that we've also pulled our basing out of Saudi Arabia? I can't think of any way to characterize that except as a complete capitulation to the demands of Osama Bin Laden. Certainly that is an angle that needs more play in the current stupidity...oops, I meant 'debate'.

He was equally stupid over Valerie Plame and Joe Wilson.

He has a reality sheild that is impervious to certain facts. It's amazing in its selectivty but quite predictable in its overall effect.

Marine Gen. Paul Van Riper had walked out of an Iran scenario war game where he was commander of the opposing forces when he outfoxed the U.S. Navy & Marine attacking forces, sunk over a dozen major American ships and killed over 10,000 U.S. sailors and marines. The headquarters response was to re-start the war game with new rules forbidding Van Riper to employ any of his successful tactics -- using small speedboats and small aircraft packed with explosives in a mass kamikazi attack on the fleet; defeating U.S. eavesdropping by dispatching his orders by messengers; etc.

I have a bit of sympathy for the human impulse to cover your tracks and sweep your shortcomings under the rug. In the context of Di Rita's denials, it can be amusing but troubling. But he is, was and always had been a mouthpiece. When the denials and cover-ups reach into the heart of operations, then instead of troubling, the results can only be descibed as deadly.

We can use Joe Klein as a metaphor for the USA in general. He often tries to do the right thing. He's overly sensitive to criticism. But at the end of the day, he's so convinced of his own infallability that he makes a complete ass of himself.