The Corner’s John Podhoretz informs the world that the
Kos Kids Show True Colors:
According to a much-circulated Daily Kos post from Sunday, Israel is to blame for the provocations that began the war with Iraq: “They are not a country that, in my opinion, represents our values but rather one we generally oppose,” says the blogger Naufragus. If I were Joe Lieberman, I would get this circulated around Connecticut so the Jewish community there would get a sense of just who will be celebrating a Lamont victory.
And if I were Joe Lieberman, I’d have to be pretty stupid to take advice from J-Pod (but I would be Joe Lieberman, so I guess that goes with the territory).But anyway, a few minutes later, John explains why it’s not his fault that he’s wrong about everything.
RE: Kos Kids
I’m getting angry e-mail from people telling me I’m being unfair to the Daily Kos because anybody can post anything there and get promoted from subentry to diary if it gets 10 votes or something and blah blah blah and surely I know all this and therefore I am being unjust, besides which a lot of people on the site are criticizing the original anti-Israel posting. First of all, I am not familiar with the posting rules and systems on Daily Kos, because I have better things to do than know them. Second of all, I received five e-mails from various leftie lists linking specifically to that diary, which suggests it made a dent and is being widely circulated, as I said. And finally, is there anybody who will seriously offer a claim that left-wing activists in the United States tilt toward Israel and not toward the Palestinians? Anybody been to a college campus in the past 20 years? [Posted at 2:58 PM]
To summarize JPod’s position:
1. Although the Kos kids didn’t really show their true colors, in that the item John posted was just a comment by one person that got turned into a diary entry, and many other Kossack disagreed with it, blah, blah, blah, John is much too important to worry his pretty little head with knowing what he’s talking about
2. Since John was emailed the post by five “lefties lists” (all of whom endorsed the comments completely, and presumably sent them to John in the belief that they could convert him to their way of thinking), John was indeed correct in his claim that Lamont supporters believe that Israel is an enemy of the United States.
(BTW, John, those guys who say that they’re the former Nigerian finance minister and they have $50 trillion that they want to share with you if you’ll just send them your bank account number, could be misrepresenting themselves. Ditto the person who says she’s a hot cheerleader who heard that you’re a fun guy and so she wants to take her clothes off for you if you’ll just give her your Master Card number.)
3. Besides, John met a liberal activist when he attended college, and that guy was sympathetic towards the Palestinians, thus proving John’s original claim that the non-Lieberman Democrats hate Israel.
Gentle readers, if you are ever caught making a misstatement, I think you’ll find that if you follow John’s ”I’m sorry that you’re such a doofus as to believe that I was wrong” approach, you’ll emerge with your credibility actually enhanced by the event.
Allow me to offer you a little example: One day you happen to claim on your well-read blog that the neocons have shown their true colors, as it is widely reported in wingnut circles that John Podhoretz isn’t really Norman’s son, but actually the fruit of a union that Midge Decter had with Charles Manson (hey, it was the ’60′s, and Midge was doing a lot of acid back then). You add that if you were Markos, you would widely circulate this fact, in order to let the voters know just whom prominent Republicans like Ronald Reagan and William Bennett had hired to work for them.
But then you get some angry emails telling you that DNA testing, conducted at Norm’s request after John book was such a failure (as was John, who turned out to be quite a putz) confirmed that Norm was indeed John’s biological father.
Instead of apologizing or admitting any culpability, claim that you have better thing to do than familiarize yourself with all the men whom Midge slept with. Add that five neocon newslists emailed you the rumor, so it was widely circulated, proving that there are doubts about the reliability of the DNA evidence. And conclude by asking your critics if there is anyone who will seriously claim that John doesn’t look like he could be a serial killer, or at least the son of one. (Hey, has anybody watched “C.S.I.” in the past 20 years?)
I think this approach will work just as well for you as it does for JPod.
Oh, and that photo of John is from the Frontpage’s Summer Reading list, a feature wherein various conservative personalities reveal what they’re reading this summer, plan to be reading, would like you to believe that they’re reading, and would like you to believe that they actually can read. In it, John reveals that “My major summer reading is I’m A Big Sister.” (Hey, check it out of you don’t believe me!)