Wieseltier Takes Down Andrew Sullivan
 

Damn, this feels good. Here, in the parlance of Mr. Sullivan, is the "money quote:"

Sullivan's outrage at my failure of transcription disguises a problem. It is that he is a hero-worshipper, but all his heroes do not go together. He reveres Reagan and he reveres Obama. That is to say, he admires conceptions of government that contradict each other.

No, no, no, Leon, don't you see? Andrew is a true conservative! If he believes it, it is automatically the conservative position!

To Andrew's liberal admirers, I suggest you go back to the Daily Dish archives from 2001/2003/2004. His thuggish hawkishness from the time was breathtaking. Don't forget he accused us of planning to mount a fifth column!

Why anyone respects this clown is beyond me. I cannot believe a magazine as serious as the Atlantic hosts his blog. Or perhaps the "face of the day" is just too stimulating to pass up?

Re: Wieseltier Takes Down Andrew Sullivan
 

As one of Andrew's liberal admirers, I'll say that I am (1) aware of his past work and stances, (2) appreciative that he changed his views and apologized so handsomely for what he had said earlier, (3) respectful without being reverent of him; i.e., I don't accept or agree with everything he says, (4) willing to believe anyone who posts 200 entries a week is going to make mistakes, (5) as much entertained as informed, (6) also happy for all the links and other writers he introduces me to, and (7) overall, delighted by his wit, intelligence, breadth, and find his mercurial nature engaging, if sometimes infuriating.

Oh, and (8) thrilled that someone who believes in God takes such a harsh view of the Christianists.

As to the Atlantic and its supposed standards, I have two words for you: Megan McArdle.

Re: Wieseltier Takes Down Andrew Sullivan
 

Once again, Brendan articulates my answer to a question better and quicker than I ever could. But I keep hope alive!

An example of the reason why I find Sullivan interesting, is that he blogs about stuff I wonder about:
Such as the reason for the continued popularity of Mickey Kaus?

Exhibit A:
In 2001, Mickey Kaus's blog became devoted almost entirely to insinuating that Gary Condit was a murderer. Among the many, many sentences Mickey wrote on the subject - largely mocking any and all who questioned Condit's guilt - was the following:

Kausfiles' goal is to have no unpublished thoughts on the Chandra Levy story.

But since Condit was cleared, Kausfiles' thoughts are unaccountably private.

Re: Wieseltier Takes Down Andrew Sullivan
 

Who needs to be quick off the draw when you come up with finds like that?

That's a major league Oh, snap!

Thanks for passing it along.

Re: Wieseltier Takes Down Andrew Sullivan
 

Sullivan is a weird dude. I think more than anything he's gullible. He fell for the Iraq adventure, he fell for that nice G.W. Bush, he fell for Ron Paul, etc. He fell for The Bell Curve. Now he's dancing with the Austrian cultists.

Then there are those awful awards, which are a holdover from his 9/11 witchhunt days. Plus the Krugman hatred: "I have long found Paul Krugman an insufferably pompous, shrill, Bush-bashing pseudo-populist". At least he gave shrill to The Order of the Shrill.

I'm reminded of a comment on DeLong's site:

Re: Wieseltier Takes Down Andrew Sullivan
 

Agree about Iraq and Bush. Don't remember him on The Bell Curve or Ron Paul, although the latter surprises me. Not to remember, I mean -- I was reading him regularly before Paul came to prominence.

I won't quibble about that, though. There is something to your charge -- that's what I meant by calling him mercurial in my last. Seems like everything with him is the worst ever or the best ever for about two weeks (Iraq/Bush, unfortunately, longer.) I also suspect he sometimes just tosses stuff out there to stir up the pot, or to air an idea out, or to show that he's edgy and/or intellectually pure enough to consider an idea that's emotionally distasteful. Or to use it as a cudgel, say, in the case of Paul versus every other guy running for the GOP nomination. Or, as I said earlier, if you post 200 times a week, odds are certain you're gonna say some dumb stuff.

"Lagging truth-teller" is a good line, and it may have the added advantage of being true. On the other hand, at least he gets there eventually, right? Compare Sullivan to that tiresome bunch at The Corner, still insisting that George W. Bush was a good president. I'd also say that when he eventually gets to the right place, his passion is rarely matched.

I also think he's sometimes ahead of the curve. He was the first self-described conservative I was aware of to come out strongly against Sarah Palin, for example. At a time when the MSM was still gushing over her, too. And while he took heat for fixating on the whose baby is it, really? question, I kind of liked that as a counterexample to all the craziness being hurled by the Cult of the COLB at Obama.

And speaking of Obama, he was ahead of the (right-leaning) pack on that one, too.

Maybe I'm being too charitable, but for all the reasons I listed before, I like him. And, to repeat for emphasis, I don't accept or agree with everything he says. I'll make no excuse for his being wrong about Krugman, for example.

P.S. As to the awards: you're right about some of them. A commenter on my blog just observed that specifically about the von Hoffman Award. I still think most of them work, though. In fact, looking at the list, I'd say all the rest still do. Arguably, Yglesias doesn't earn his eponymous award so much anymore, and I suppose one could prefer a different name than Moore for that one. But hey, if we can give out peace prizes named after the inventor of dynamite ...

Re: Wieseltier Takes Down Andrew Sullivan
 

The worst of these has got to be the Poseur Alert. Whenever prose is too sophisticated for Simple Sullivan to comprehend, he attacks the writer as a 'poseur.' This from a person, who in a hilarious display of both solipsism and false modesty, claims to be partially responsible for the Iraq War.

Re: Wieseltier Takes Down Andrew Sullivan
 

And Sullivan has the last laugh, and cattily (and I'm a total cat person, so that's a good thing) serves notice of it in an unrelated post:

Andrew, FTW.

Re: Wieseltier Takes Down Andrew Sullivan
 

SULLIVAN SELF IMPORTANCE WATCH:

"But there are several factual errors, e.g. that I endorsed Bush in 2004, which I famously didn't,"

(italics mine)

Re: Wieseltier Takes Down Andrew Sullivan
 

Play fair. Supply a link when you're quoting someone.

Re: Wieseltier Takes Down Andrew Sullivan
 

sorry, forgot:

http://andrewsullivan.theatlantic.co...wiki-bleg.html

Re: Wieseltier Takes Down Andrew Sullivan
 

Thanks.

I don't know that I'd call this a legitimate "self-importance watch" bust. He's a public figure, with a reputation to protect, and if it's important to him that he be known not to have voted for GWB in 2004, what's so bad about that? And you have to give him a couple of points for not linking to his own Wikipedia page. Is Ann Althouse self-important because she won't stop trumpeting that she voted for Obama? Okay, bad example. ;^)

You could more plausibly mock Sully for cluelessness about Wikipedia etiquette, especially the part where he wonders aloud about editing his own page. On the other hand, this could be seen as a clever way to get his loyal minions over there on the double. (FWIW, the page now shows him as a Kerry supporter in several places, and perhaps related, perhaps not, there have been a flurry of edits the past couple of days.)

You wanna see self-importance run amok? I still treasure this classic moment from the last campaign.

If you're wondering who that is, I say, first, "Exactly." And if the name seems familiar but the details won't come, I'll just say that she was among the more deranged of the B-list Hillarhoids during the primaries, realized her looming irrelevance as April turned into June, and leaped with obvious relief upon HRC's call to her supporters to throw their weight behind Obama. Note the post date -- four days after HRC's concession speech.

Re: Wieseltier Takes Down Andrew Sullivan
 

P.S.

Nikki:

I've had my attention called to the fact that you italicized famously, which I read right over originally. Is this what you meant by "self-importance?"

If so, eh, maybe. But it also seems to me that Sully's taken a boatload of grief for changing his tune on Bush, so I'd call that a legitimate use of the word on his part.

Re: Wieseltier Takes Down Andrew Sullivan
 

I've been a regular reader of Andrew Sullivan since 2000-2001, and he has done great harm to himself and his career in the last 3-4 years I think. He's all over the map these days politically, and he has never been totally honest about his move away from neo-conservatism to an anti-Bush (he's a war criminal), progressive, pro-Obama world view.

I like the guy. He's e-mailed me back bunches of times and even published one of my e-mails to him in his blog. However, he's no longer someone I find to be totally objective or to know exactly what he's talking about more than half the time. He even name calls people now and throws the term wingnut around like he's being totally objective. He's a journalistic disaster at the moment, in my opinion.

Although I continue to read him, I have lost a good bit of respect for him.

Re: Wieseltier Takes Down Andrew Sullivan
 

A few contributions from the esteemed public "intellectual" and renowned "deep thinker" Andrew Sullivan today. Gosh, he's a modern day Cicero!

Shep Smith is the only "sane" person left at Fox News.

Stephen Baldwin is as "dumb as a post."

A post about - I'm not making this up - sneeze porn.

Brilliant! That's the kind of wisdom and deepthink that led a person to simultaneously endorse liberal Democrat Barack Obama, and rightwing lunatic conspiracy theorist and probable racist Ron Paul.

It's not hard to see what's in front of our nose: an incoherent hack. Cut him loose!

Re: Wieseltier Takes Down Andrew Sullivan
 

You're never going to make a case about supposed shallowness by cherry-picking three posts from a guy who puts up eight times that many items every day. Big deal, he passes along "caught my eye" kinds of items. It's a blog. And having a taste for silliness says nothing about one's intellect.

Re: Wieseltier Takes Down Andrew Sullivan
 

SHOCKING LACK OF SELF AWARENESS WATCH:

Andrew Sullivan, writes today of the " shameless, unaccountable, relentless upward failure of the neocons in Washington."

My my, Sullivan has a point! Thank God this deep thinker, who supported Dubya in 2000, accused liberals of mounting a fifth column after 9/11, and flayed anyone who didn't support the Iraq war hasn't failed upward. I mean, it's not like someone with a track record like that would go from self-publishing, to being hosted at Time Magazine, to having his blog at one of the most prestigious mags in America, is it?

Re: Wieseltier Takes Down Andrew Sullivan
 

LOL, maybe when Conn Carroll hears, he'll walk over to his bookshelf and throw away Sullivan's book, too. Oh, wait: that reactionary would never have bought Sullivan's book in the first place.


And, don't forget, he was and remains an outspoken and aggressive proponet of the racist theory of Murray and Hernstein's The Bell Curve. In a post not too long ago, Sullivan pointed to the lack of widesread internet service in Africa as evidence of the genetic inferiority of black people.



LOL. Indeed. The village loves its idiots.

Re: Wieseltier Takes Down Andrew Sullivan
 

I feel a bit odd saying this, considering how much I dislike Andrew Sullivan's style, but ...

Is there no point at which someone can forgive someone for what he says? Even when he makes a sincere apology, figures out where he went wrong, and devotes the rest of his effort to fighting against what he used to believe?

Re: Wieseltier Takes Down Andrew Sullivan
 

That is an excellent question.

Re: Wieseltier Takes Down Andrew Sullivan
 

I feel conflicted about Sullivan. When he's not talking about Ron Paul or the genetic inferiority of black people, I love him. And there is no question that he's a Master Blogger. Agree or disagree, his blog is a constant source of interesting information.

I do think you can forgive people if they retract their previous positions -- and Sullivan has, with respect to Bush and the war and a bunch of other stuff.

For me, the problem is his continued advocacy of The Bell Curve.

Re: Wieseltier Takes Down Andrew Sullivan
 

[QUOTE=TwinSwords;108850
For me, the problem is his continued advocacy of The Bell Curve.[/QUOTE]

There's that - and there's also the (to me, pretty unforgivable) fact that in the run-up the war, he constantly ascribed bad motives to war opponents. He made it personal and ugly, and I'm not going to forget that, now that he's had a "change of heart."

I rarely visit his blog anymore; contra to Twin Swords, I just think there's way too much crap on it. (Face of the day?! WTF?!)

Re: Wieseltier Takes Down Andrew Sullivan
 

The difference is, unlike the wingnut welfare queens, Sullivan has earned his promotions. He's ranked #30 among all blogs on Technorati. According to Alexa, 56.7% of all visitors to theatlantic.com go to andrewsullivan.theatlantic.com, which means, according to Quantcast's data, that he alone is responsible for about 7 million page views per month.

Find something else to hurl at him. This won't fly.

Also, he realized and apologized handsomely for his errors, as I've pointed out before. Again, unlike the wingnut welfare queens.

Also, your link is broken. Here is the correct one.

Also, it wasn't him who wrote that line. He was quoting someone else.

Did you actually get anything right in your comment?

Re: Wieseltier Takes Down Andrew Sullivan
 

Actually, it was he who wrote the line I quoted. Check the link again.

Page views do not equal quality or integrity of intellect, either. Fox News is #1 in Cable News.

Re: Wieseltier Takes Down Andrew Sullivan
 

What's wrong with face of the day?

Didn't you just post this?:
http://bloggingheads.tv/forum/showpo...5&postcount=18

Re: Wieseltier Takes Down Andrew Sullivan
 

Oops. Right you are. So you're 1 out of whatever, instead of 0, for that last post.

That wasn't your original point. You were saying he was undeserving in his promotions. I say that he is. Those data show that he makes money for those who hire him. I would not say that Fox News has not earned its market share, no matter what I think of the quality of their content.

As to "quality or integrity of intellect," it's largely a matter of opinion. You don't think he has it, I do, the end.

Re: Wieseltier Takes Down Andrew Sullivan
 

Good point. I agree. I'm sick of being called a traitor by the right. And now that the Democrats have taken back power in Washington, we have wingnuts contemplating revolution because they feel the country is in the hands of a foreign enemy. The rightwing mind is a bizarre, frightening thing. (Note for sensitive people or idiots: I'm employing a bit of hyperbole.)


Face of the day? I enjoy that. It's photography -- and art. I like art. I like photography. I like his View from your Window, too. It's awesome getting to see all those snapshots from around the world.

Re: Wieseltier Takes Down Andrew Sullivan
 

Agreed. And he has some awesome links to video art.

Re: Wieseltier Takes Down Andrew Sullivan
 

Who was he quoting? Why didn't he put it in quotes? (Or a blockquote?)

Update: Nevermind.

Re: Wieseltier Takes Down Andrew Sullivan
 

LOL. Peevish much? http://www.spartantailgate.com/forum...milies/lol.gif

Re: Wieseltier Takes Down Andrew Sullivan
 

I do, too. I love looking at pictures of people's faces.

Re: Wieseltier Takes Down Andrew Sullivan
 

But that doesn't include yours on the Apollo project... keep the myth alive.

Re: Wieseltier Takes Down Andrew Sullivan
 

Exactly. You're right: they're pictures of people, and therefore inherently interesting. So face of the day is good for three reasons:

-- photography
-- art
-- people

Re: Wieseltier Takes Down Andrew Sullivan
 

Yep; hes still an idiot:

http://andrewsullivan.theatlantic.co...different.html

Look; I am completely sympathetic to the Iranian protesters, but comparing them to holocaust victims is lunatic and offensive. And acting as though Anne Frank has anything in common with "twittering" is, again, so insanely stupid as to defy belief.

Just like Sullivan's continued presence at the Atlantic.

Re: Wieseltier Takes Down Andrew Sullivan
 

He is excitable! I remember Sully comparing Tony Blair to Winston Churchill back when he was warblogging.

LMAO
 

Simple Sully's past keeps coming back to haunt him.

Today, James Fallows, when discussing the nauseating right-wing demagauge Betsy McCaughey, was forced to concede this:

(For the record: Yes, I am aware that my friend and current Atlantic colleague Andrew Sullivan, who was then TNR's editor, is the one who decided to publish this article. In the 15 years since the article's appearance, the magazine and its writers have, to their credit, repeatedly pointed out its errors and apologized for spreading its misinformation. Mickey Kaus was doing so immediately after the article's embarrassing selection for a National Magazine Award for "Excellence in Public Interest." Jonathan Cohn, author of the indispensable book Sick, did so early this year. The TNR site has a "link" to the original McCaughey piece, but it's not connected to the article itself.)

Boy, Andrew must find himself having to do a lot of repenting, eh?

Re: LMAO
 

Not sure you had to go back 15 years to sully sully. Of course, you might if you want to make sure the sully pointed right and not left.

Re: LMAO
 

It's not a matter of his being "right," "left" or whatever. I will concede that he's closer to my "side" now than he used to be.

His current orientation (of the political kind!) doesn't change the quality, or clarity of his thought. He was overemotional and unreflective when he was a right winger, and he's overemotional and unreflective now that he's a leftwinger.

He's kept the same bad habits all along: rushing to judgment, vilifying his opponents with unmatched zeal, being a complete and utter hysteric.

Oh, and through it all, he's fought for the rights of white people to call black people stupid.

Re: LMAO
 

In this light, I will then concede that my post lacked a point and that we are in agreement with the rest.

Re: LMAO
 

Your peculiar obsession with Andrew Sullivan notwithstanding, thanks for the link to the Fallows piece. That one is worth reading, as is his link to Tim Dickinson's piece in Rolling Stone, "The Lie Machine." I highly recommend the latter to anyone not familiar with the right wing's Astroturfing organizations, their close connections with senior Republican officials, and how they work to stir up "the base."

Here's an excerpt:

The article goes on to document many specific players and their funding sources. As I say, well worth the read.