Of course. Such a conservative loon.
No, Chait is just an idiot sometimes.
I didn’t say conservative. I said Broder-ish. The irrational worship of the Magical Balance Fairy. Giving far too much respect and weight to the crazy-nation of the American Right. But not a part of that crazy-nation.
There is a difference.
I’m honestly not seeing how that pertains. I’m not saying he’s not a liberal. I’m saying he’s been edging into that particular mindset of certain liberals that go out of their way to look like they’re not taking sides, even in the face of an obviously insane ideology opposing an obviously sane if sometimes wrong-headed one. I can’t be No True Scotmaning him as not being a conservative. I’m not a conservative. I’m not No True Scotmaning him as not being a liberal. He is a liberal. Your post has neither meaning nor logic.
He couldn’t possibly be a liberal that sees the Obama administration’s weaseling on the anti-semitism angle of the terrorist act and doesn’t like it - could he?
I’m not sure how you’re missing something that I’m not in the least trying to obscure. He IS a liberal. There is a variant on the liberal mindset that tries to act like the American right-wing hasn’t stepped into the Abyss. He is becoming a part of it.
I’m not saying at all that he isn’t a liberal. I’m saying that there is more of a spectrum of liberal thought than you’re acknowledging.
I agree I probably shouldn’t, but this isn’t so much ideological blindness as it is simple reading incomprehension. He’s arguing something that I’ve already acknowledged as if I hadn’t posted the very things I posted.
I have no idea how that liberal’s acknowledgment and amazement that Obama administration’s is weaseling on anti-Semitism of the terrorist acts has anything at all to do with “American right wing”'s supposed stepping into the Abyss.
And of course your frame of reference is unquestionable.
An admitted liberal publishes an article “Administration Turns Obama Anti-Semitism Gaffe Into Epic Blunder”.
You think that the reason for the article, somehow, is that the liberal author “tries to act like the American right-wing hasn’t stepped into the Abyss”.
You don’t see the bizarre idiocy of your comment?
So the moral of the story here is that, in their unending quest to find something Obama did that was wrong, the narrative has shifted from “Obama didn’t go to Paris to stand for democracy” to “Obama’s publicist failed to say the right buzzwords fast enough”?
LOL – “admitted liberal”… like “admitted criminal”, or “admitted cheater”?
I think the reason for the article is that Chait is an idiot sometimes. This isn’t the first idiotic article he’s written, and it probably won’t be the last. Liberal idiots exist too.
The nutty part is that you’re insisting that the transcript of the article minus the second part of the statement after “no…” from Earnest somehow gives a better indication of what he meant than the frickin’ video, in which it’s clear the “no” was a brush-off and not an answer.
At worst this was awkward pressmanship. Obama doesn’t hate the Jews. He doesn’t even have anything conceivable, politically, to gain if were to actually try to pretend that the killer at the grocery wasn’t motived by Jew-hatred – unless you really think he’s a secret Muslim terrorist supporter.
There are elements among liberals and conservatives who are ready to jump every time an administration goes soft and won’t tell the straight truth about terrorism. The Obama administration earned a couple of demerits from Chait here. Our leaders are supposed to be plain spoken when talking about national security threats, even if it might offend some people.
His article makes it harder to dismiss it with your "usual suspects" shtick.
Don’t have to be brilliant to be on the leftish side of things, our case is largely common sense. The gymnastic rationalizations of the right, however, requires a stubbornly focused intelligence, usually borrowed.
Someone like Mr. Chait may have enough good sense to qualify him as a liberal and still have plenty of room for boneheaded opinions. It happens , it goes with the navel.
What do you think is so objectionable about the article in question?
I think it’s entirely reasonable to say that something is a “massive blunder” even if it’s in and of itself clearly harmless/correct if it leads to sufficient levels of confusion/tizzy/distraction etc.
For instance, I’m sure Obama would LOVE to be able to take back his “you didn’t build that” comment, even though it was, IN CONTEXT, a clearly reasonable and correct statement. Chait’s article basically says “the administration’s position is clearly that the deli attack was anti-semitic, but they had a massive breakdown of messaging for a while”. Which seems totally accurate to me.
I do not find his opinion particularly objectionable, sorry if not clear.