Matt Stoller, tendentious liberal

Matt Stoller has a post over at Blogging of the President entitled, “Daniel Drezner, The Mediocre Reasonable Conservative.” I’m going to reprint the bulk of it here so no one can claim anything was taken out of context:

It really does seem like there are no grown-ups in the Republican Party anymore. There are just infants who don’t throw tantrums and get tenure because of it. I speak, of course, of Daniel Drezner and his cowardly ilk. The guy’s dishonesty and defensiveness has been amply demonstrated [See my response to the linked post here–D.D.], and since the Iraq tar baby happened he’s turned almost exclusively towards talking about outsourcing. This is an evasive escape hatch if I’ve ever seen one. Now he’s defending the anti-semitic attacks on George Soros:

As Stephen Bainbridge points out, there’s some evidence to support Blankley’s claim that Soros accused the Jews of fomenting anti-Semitism… I’ve concluded that Soros is a political loon of the first order. It is ridiculously easy to attack George Soros without ever discussing his religion.

Two points on this. One, the attacks on Soros were anti-semitic, and ignoring this piece of the pie is to ignore the hate-filled mess that is the modern GOP. Drezner’s point is that an attack on his religion is analytically unnecessary – what about the fact that it’s really a bad thing to say, and what that fact says about the attackers? Two, calling a serious thinker on international politics a ‘loon’ without evidence is tantamount to intellectual cheating. I don’t care how often you’re published in the New Republic, this is not respectable discourse, this is the aiding and abetting of toxic politics. This is not surprising, because it’s what Drezner and other desperately pathetic ‘moderates’ do all the time. [See my response to the linked post here–D.D.] First, they join in the catcalls and jeer at liberals for being unserious. Then, as the bad news trickle in, they moderately distance themselves both from the Democrats and the extreme Republicans. As the bad news gets worse, they continue to act appalled at the level of political discourse, without pointing fingers at the people whose motivations they completely misinterpretted and whitewashed. Finally, they ignore the situation and pronounce themselves independent, with both sides meriting disdain and maybe Bush their vote. At no point is their a glimmer of recognition that they were seriously, disastrously, horrifically wrong, and that lots of people are dead because of it. Nor do they realize that they are wrong because the people they rely on are far far more extreme than they are believe. These guys are like the business elite who dealt with Hitler, hoping they could control him because they held the money. Drezner thinks he has good ideas and speaks at academic conferences, so he bears no responsibility for policing his own side. ‘I don’t have a side’, he’d probably jeer back, ‘Neither candidate represents my viewpoint’. Yes, you do have a side, professor, and it isn’t just that you advised the original Bush/Cheney campaign. When you say that ‘first-rate political loon’ and holocaust survivor George Soros has accused the jews of fomenting anti-semitism, you’ve picked your side.

Wow — how to respond: 1) Yep, it’s true — I was clearly defending “the anti-semitic attacks on George Soros” when I said in the post Matt linked to that I thought Tony Blankley excelled at “saying unbelievably stupid things,” or when I said “Blankley is clearly an ass. As a Jew, I find that last bolded sentence repugnant” or when I approvingly linked to Eugene Volokh’s post on why Blankley’s statement was anti-Semitic. It’s a good thing Matt wasn’t selective in how he quoted the post, or someone might have gotten the wrong impression. 2) As for the charge that I’ve neglected Iraq as difficulties have mounted — once again I’ll plead guilty to Stoller’s charge. I’ve only discussed the mistakes made in Iraq here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, and here over the past six weeks. 3) Stoller has a fair point in stating that “calling a serious thinker on international politics a ‘loon’ without evidence is tantamount to intellectual cheating.” Of course, I think have a fair point in saying that Soros is not a serious thinker on international politics. Part of the reason I didn’t go further into thoughts on Soros is that they’re going to appear in another venue. However, if Stoller wants some evidence, here’s a brief snippet from my forthcoming review of The Bubble of American Diplomacy:

The most obvious example of Soros’ inconsistencies comes on the question of whether the war on terrorism is really a war or a law-enforcement operation. He starts out by saying that it should be the latter (p. 26): “We need detective work, good intelligence, and cooperation from the public, not military action.” A scant 16 pages later, however, he allows that, “The invasion of Afghanistan was justified by its role as the home base of Al Qaeda.” The Bubble of American Diplomacy is riddled with assertions that are either wrong or contradicted a few pages later. For example, on pages 59-60, Soros makes the jaw-dropping claim that compared to nation-building in Iraq, “conditions were much more favorable in Afghanistan.” Clearly, neither country is a walk in the park when it comes to statebuilding. That said, on what possible basis can Soros claim that a country with one-third the per capita income, one-tenth the amount of paved roads, three times the infant mortality rate, and double the number of primary languages and ethnicities than Iraq is a better candidate for nation-building?

4) Finally, for someone who gets outraged at offensive and anti-Semitic rhetoric (a truly bold position), I’m not sure whether it’s rhetorically useful for Stoller to say I’m “cowardly” or compare me with “the business elite who dealt with Hitler.” After reading that latter point in particular, my first reaction was, “gee, Matt Stoller is an anti-Semitic schmuck.” My second reaction is the title of this post. Stoller would probably label this post as “defensive” — because it is. I have no qualms labeling his original his post as “dishonest.” UPDATE: Stoller has another post up on this, as well as this comment to this post. Shorter Stoller:

1) “Frankly, what I said was inappropriately written in anger and just based on the tone probably deserved a lot less effort than he gave it.” 2) “[Calling Soros a “loon”] set me off. Calling someone insane who is clearly not to score political points is central to this mindset.” 3) “The problem as I see it is the essential unwillingness of someone like Drezner to admit what he knows is true – Iraq is an attempt at empire perpetrated by deeply illiberal individuals.”

My short responses: 1) Don’t worry Matt — I won’t be devoting much time or effort to your prose in the future. 2) For the record, George Soros is clearly not insane, and I apologize if I gave that impression (thouh I don’t think I did). He’s accomplished many great things as a philanthropist. But even he describes his political views as “rabid.” When they’re not that, they’re banal. If Stoller wants to take Soros seriously, fine — that’s his waste of time. 3) Oh, please — an empire that sent in fewer troops than was necessary? An administration that now seems hell-bent on getting out of the country? Where’s your evidence for empire?