Publius of Obsidian Wings has a piece on Peter Beinart that is absolutely spot on:
A childhood friend of mine had a brilliant strategy to avoid losing basketball games. Actually, he always lost them, so it was more like a brilliant strategy to convince himself that he didn’t lose. After we’d score the last points, he’d immediately grab the ball and say “if I hit this, I win.” Then he’d hit it and march off the court cheering loudly to avoid hearing us.
That’s pretty much Peter Beinart’s latest column in a nutshell.
[….]Here’s what’s really going on underneath Beinart’s reasonable sounding column. Beinart has been – and remains – committed to the idea that the use of force to solve problems is a good manly thing that Democrats should embrace. The problem, of course, is that Exhibit A of his argument – Iraq – didn’t turn out so well. (To his credit, he openly admits this point).
He still, though, wants to salvage his larger argument that force is good. In that sense, his surge cheerleading is sort of like grabbing the ball after the game is over and saying, “See, I win. Force can be good.”
This is, of course, yet another example of Calvinball.
Sadly, the only thing American elites are good at anymore is changing the rules so that they win. The media were all for investigating Clinton because they wasted a lot of time bloviating about his personal life and bringing him down would be a win for them. They’re against investigating torture, the cooking of intelligence, the politicization of the DoJ, and such, because they ignored these issues and a prosecution of these misdeeds would be a loss for them. Our banks were all for deregulation and free markets when they thought they were making money off it; now that they’re near bankruptcy, they want an anti-free market hand-out from the government.
What’s fascinating is that so much of this come from the types that are always decrying “relativism”. Good God, what could be more relativistic than defining the rules according to your needs at the moment.
“Four legs good, two legs bad”…make that “four legs good, two legs better”.
This shit is going to be the death of us all.
Update: Here’s the money quote from Beinart (h/t Lesley):
Being proven right too many times is dangerous.
Guess that’s one thing Beinart doesn’t have to worry about.
MarkusB
Relativism is irrelevant. Gimme what I need nao. kthxbai
TenguPhule
All Animals are equal. But some are more equal then others.
Paul L.
So the media’s portrayal of Ken Starr was the same fawning coverage of Patrick Fitzgerald and Mike Nifong (before it was revealed he hid exculpatory evidence).
I remember the media defending the Clintons and demonizing the Republicans for impeachment.
TenguPhule
Paul L’s memory and a dollar will not buy a decent cup of coffee.
gil mann
This might veer into neo-phrenology, but I’m convinced there’s a physiological component to these guys’ (neocon warmongers and their neolib enablers) perennial wrongness.
I mean, look, you can be wrong about everything important without being a sanctimonious douchebag and without wearing a smarmy smirk that makes your face ever-so-punchable. Hell, I’ve been wrong about everything important since I learned to speak, but I don’t get that "just trust me on this one, peasant" look on my face when I’m misjudging something or talking out my ass. The nature vs. nurture argument as it relates to DC insiders and their unbelievable assholery needs to focus a little on the former, IMHO.
DougJ
It’s hard for me to get how they don’t preface all of their foreign policy statements with “I’ve been wrong before but I think…”
quickwood
Beinart’s ‘Calvin Ball’ habit runs deep. See Angry Bear for his breakdown on Beinart’s favorable views of welfare reform. It’s been a big success you see – the last time he checked.
demimondian
@DougJ: If they did, some peasant would respond by saying "You think? Wow! There’s a first time for everything."
Toujours l’audace, peasant. Toujours l’audace.
Shinobi
There was actually a great book that I can’t recommend enough called "mistakes were made (but not by me)" that touches on this. It talks about how politicians rationalize their decisions. It’s a few years old now, but it is an amazing insight into how people can continue to insist they are right in the face of the evidence that they are fucking wrong. At first you’ll be all ‘So how does cognitive dissonance explain why politicians are assholes?" But it makes sense eventually.
KG
I remember telling a young professor while I was in college that I was cynical. She, not much older than me at 22, told me that I shouldn’t be cynical. And so I tried not being cynical over the last decade (I earned my BA in 2000). I should have trusted my instincts – all these bastards are out to get theirs and they don’t give a shit if you get yours or not. It’s a fucking game to them and all of them: politicians, banks, pundits, big businesses, big unions; simply don’t give a shit about anything other than their own material well being.
As much as I care about all this shit, I’m about ready to say, "fuck it" and go find a nice little tropical island with ales from England and Ireland, cigars from Cuba, and the best yoda money can buy to live out my days.
DougJ
You know, you’d get bored fast doing that if you have half a brain, which you seem to.
rawshark
huh?
Bubblegum Tate
@Paul L.:
Actually, that’s what the public at large did.
gil mann
Contextually, I’m guessing "yoda" means "weed." Plus I’m at the age where pretty much every word under four syllables that I can’t immediately identify means "weed."
You’re off to a pretty auspicious start here, new kid, but I’ll be damned if I’m going to sit here and allow you to make bigoted statements against my fellow Wastoid-Americans.
Notorious P.A.T.
Maybe I’m losing my mind, but I clearly remember being told that we needed The Great Surge to give Iraq’s government time to forge a political solution for peace. Has there been such a solution? I haven’t seen it, but again, maybe I’m just completely in La La Land.
KG you had a woman professor who was 22? Iiiiiinteresting. . .
Notorious P.A.T.
I’m trying to find the quote by David Broder where he says Bill Clinton "trashed" DC when it wasn’t even "his" city to begin with.
DougJ
@gm
Don’t blaze up in here, wastoid.
Notorious P.A.T.
Here’s how much the media defended Bill Clinton during his impeachment troubles:
mediamatters.org/items/200704280002
tballou
How pathetic do you have to be for your first source to be O’Hanlon and his fellow neocons at the Brookings Institute?
And how pathetic is it that at the ripe old age of 38 you are a "senior fellow" at the Council on Foreign Relations?
gil mann
"blaze up" means what, "light a joint?" Jesus, I’m fucking ancient.
Wicked pathetic.
Hella pathetic.
Was this country’s smart set ever a meritocracy? Oh, wait, I don’t have much in the way of merit. I should quit bitching and start applying for thinktank gigs.
DougJ
@gm
It’s an unhip movie quote.
Notorious P.A.T.
Hey, when you’re wrong 99% of the time, you’re right 1% of the time.
Thought that sounded familiar.
Xanthippas
I’d say Beinart has definitely shot his credibility-such as it was-back down to 2004 levels.
One would almost imagine Beinart is a conservative mole, given that the "advice" he doles out to Democrats is the same they get from a conservative. Can anyone please explain to me how kissing Bush’s ass while the guy is on his way out the door is supposed to help Democrats?
Also, did Dems do that well embracing his advice in 2003? Seems to me some fairly prominent Democratic politicians had a little trouble with that whole supporting the war thing.
bago
That’s from before my time. I was thinking more along the lines of the Jet using Raiders in the store in Fallout 3.
Boy George is damned queeny. Also.
cleek
Sally Quinn reported it here.
Grumpy Code Monkey
@Paul L.:
"media bloviating about [Clinton’s] personal life" != "fawning over Ken Starr"
You would make a lousy magician, because you really suck at misdirection; I’m surprised you didn’t sprain something on that attempt. The media (especially CNN and MSNBC) could not fucking shut up about Monica and cigars and stained dresses, and breathlessly reported on every leak from Starr’s office. They didn’t have to like Starr to bust on WJC.
Yes, there were saner heads in the media who thought Starr’s investigation was a wholesale waste of time and money; unfortunately, they weren’t the ones with primetime slots.
Lesley
The most hilarious paragraph of all:
Tom65
Check out the op-ed over at CNN:
cnn.com/2009/POLITICS/01/19/wall.bush/index.html
This is just the beginning. These bastards are going to flood every available media outlet with revisionism and CYA for the next four years at least. And of course the media will be all to willing to fill air time with that crap.
Thank you, 24-hour news cycle.
harlana pepper
If we go by this sort of "logic," we will indeed be in Iraq forever.
IDIOTS!!!
Brick Oven Bill
I really hope deleting the Lincoln Douglas debates on an Orwell thread talking about revisionism was humor.
John S.
24-hour news cycles are perfect for 2.4-minute attention spans.
Ah, but Paul L. did manage to find a way to tie in Clinton, Patrick Fitzgerald and… DUKE LACROSSE! He’s a one-trick pony, so that’s all he’s really good for. If he were a magician, he would be the Not-So-Amazing Jonathan.
Fulcanelli
comrade rawshark
@Paul L.:
No you don’t. You don’t watch the MSM so you wouldn’t have any first hand knowledge of anything said. You only know what your approved sources told you they said. Sad liitle man you are.
demimondian
@Xanthippas: Um, wife of Socrates, about this…
Why do you think that Peter Beinart is interested in helping Democrats?
Keith
I got as far as "Tara Wall is deputy editor for The Washington Times" before I slammed on my mental brakes. It’s a habit I picked up from reading where the hyperlinks on Drudge actually *go*.
Notorious P.A.T.
@cleek:
Good show.
The Other Steve
I think Peter Beinart’s complaint is nobody is giving him a job.
These pundits are really quite irritating.
Cris
do what now
Brick Oven Bill
Because many on the left have a funny habit of projection, I will translate my Newspeak. The dayorder (‘order of the day’) is issued by the executive (campaign manager), and after he comes across the actual words of Lincoln and panics. The FFCC handed out cigarettes and sweets to Ingsoc members serving in the Floating Fortresses, and reneged on its promises (read: $500 checks to voters) and bases his righteousness upon this good will.
The executive then bans Lincoln’s words (memory hole), but decides that they are bad enough that they must be vaporized, thus the link to Lincoln’s words. Following the vaporization Lincoln becomes an ‘unperson’, or one to whom you are no longer refer. This is why I thought it funny that the words were literally vaporized from this thread. Google ‘Newspeak dictionary’ for more.
In any case, Lincoln is not yet an unperson, as far as I know, so here is the Lincoln-Douglas debate at Alton.
Brick Oven Bill
I, by the way, am to the left of Lincoln on this issue. I believe that political empowerment should be available to all Americans, so long as they meet some modest performance standards. I’ve been kicking around $3k/yr in minimum federal income taxes for my ideal theoretical government. Representation without taxation can be unstable too.
comrade rawshark
@Brick Oven Bill:
i bet you loved Liberal Fascism.
LongHairedWeirdo
Beinart:
"Post hoc ergo propter hoc" is the name of a famous logical *fallacy*, not a famous logical *method*.
HTH. HAND.
Jay C
@Brick Oven Bill:
Interesting link there, Bill (Lincoln-Douglas debate at Alton).
A couple of questions popped into my head. First: did 19th-Century Americans really sit/stand in a hall/pasture – for hours – and listen to these lengthy orations? How the hell long did it take Lincoln to deliver this (and/or Douglas’s response)? Still less keep track of what he was saying. Fascinating.
Secondly, WTF does this have to do with the thread? Still less the Orwellian gibberish in your 4:42 comment?
Brick Oven Bill
What does this have to do with the thread?
The thread, as I understand it is about the government twisting reality for political expediency, as explained by Calvinball and Orwell. The twisting of reality for political expediency is at a pretty high pitch in our nation’s capital right now. In my mind, it all tied together with the language of Newspeak, which I am trying to learn.
So I provided a current example of twisting reality, presented in Newspeak format. This inauguration is very Orwellian to me.
And it is very sad to witness the level of debate that our Senators were achieving only one hundred and fifty years ago. If a space alien were to compare the Lincoln-Douglas contest with the 2008 election, where slogans have become single words and pictures, he would come to the conclusion that we are regressing.
libarbarian
If they didn’t win then the rules obviously were unfair and should be changed retroactively to create a fair outcome which means one in which they win.
azportsider
“I’ve been wrong before but I think…”
Thinking not required, in fact, discouraged.