Very good criticism, and not nearly as dirty as it sounds.
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Come for the politics, stay for the snark.
An almost top 10,000 blog!
The republican caucus is covering themselves with something, and it is not glory.
“When somebody takes the time to draw up a playbook, they’re gonna use it.”
The cruelty is the point; the law be damned.
We need to vote them all out and restore sane Democratic government.
Only Democrats have agency, apparently.
These days, even the boring Republicans are nuts.
People are complicated. Love is not.
Republicans don’t want a speaker to lead them; they want a hostage.
Take hopelessness and turn it into resilience.
Republican speaker of the house Mike Johnson is the bland and smiling face of evil.
Authoritarian republicans are opposed to freedom for the rest of us.
Shut up, hissy kitty!
My years-long effort to drive family and friends away has really paid off this year.
Dumb motherfuckers cannot understand a consequence that most 4 year olds have fully sorted out.
Well, whatever it is, it’s better than being a Republican.
Fight them, without becoming them!
Wow, I can’t imagine what it was like to comment in morse code.
Roe is not about choice. It is about freedom.
The rest of the comments were smacking Boebert like she was a piñata.
Seems like a complicated subject, have you tried yelling at it?
Teach a man to fish, and he’ll sit in a boat all day drinking beer.
Democracy cannot function without a free press.
One way or another, he’s a liar.
rachel
Good, ’cause it sounds like a daisy-chain.
OK, my tiny mind is boggled now.
Punchy
Can we do Jesus’ General doing commenters doing Freddy Thompson?
If this isn’t spoof, then…well…nevermind. This has to be spoof.
rilkefan
Dunno – Klein’s take on Mearsheimer/Walt is approximately “ok I finally admit the work is shoddy but it’s worthwhile for opening up discussion” which isn’t that different in form from Sullivan’s “The TNR article on Hillarycare was flawed but it provoked discussion”.
rilkefan
And I have seen a lot of criticism of war supporters that insistently blurred the distinction in argument of the crazies and the wrongs. That’s a bad thing per se but also because of the disservice it does to e.g. John Cole or even MY and Drum and Kleiman and [self-serving here] to liberal opponents of the Iraq war who support sane interventions when the circumstances call for them.
sashal
The best Larison post ever (in my opinion):
link
sglover
I’m pretty far left, but over the last year or two I’ve noticed that much (but certainly not *all*) of the sharpest commentary is coming from old school conservatives like Larison, the guy who runs the “Cunning Realist” site, Andrew Bacevich, and (when he isn’t getting the vapors over Mexicans) William Lind. Depending on your point of view, you might be able to shoehorn Jim Henley into this crowd, too.
In fairness to my side, we still have Robert Wright, the bantamweight Robert Reich, David Kaiser, and the (unfortunately mum, lately) Kingdaddy.
Out of all of them, I think Lind wins the originality prize with his genuflections to Kaiser Wilhelm. Not something you’re likely to run across in your standard Beltway Powerpoint spiel.
sglover
Hey, thanks for that cite, sashal. Terrific essay. A real model of clarity!
Zifnab
I need to sit down. This whole thing makes me dizzy.
Pooh
Rilke, this has uhmmm ZERO to do with Walt & Mearsheimer. You don’t like their thesis, we get it.
rilkefan
Pooh, you obviously haven’t been following the Klein/Sullivan conversation. I tend to make comments assuming readers have at least slightly acquainted themselves with the topic at hand.