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Monday, February 18, 2008

Putting away some fine Kristol

Surely The New York Times thought it was hiring a rightwing "voice" and not a "laughingstock" when it took on Bill Kristol as a columnist. Surely it must be embarrassed by his performance so far, and particularly his Kipling/Orwell piece today. I don't want to ruin it for you so I will quote only one passage: "The Democrats won control of Congress in November 2006, thanks in large part to President Bush’s failures in Iraq. Then they spent the next year seeking to ensure that he couldn’t turn those failures around. Democrats were “against” the war and the surge. That was the sum and substance of their policy.... The 2007 Congressional Democrats showed what it means to be an opposition party that takes no responsibility for the consequences of the choices involved in governing."

Of course, the Democrats did have a policy, or several of them (Murtha's and others), all aimed at establishing real benchmarks and beginning a slow withdrawal. Every move was blocked by the president and the GOP, and now we have more troops in Iraq than we did when the Dems took over Congress. Yet Kristol hits them for not putting up or shutting up. But go to the Times site and read the rest. You will get a good chuckle out of it. Kristol is not the new Bill Safire -- he is the new Russell Baker.

1 comment:

BobHanssen said...

Has the author noticed that among the NYT's "most popular" top ten list Kristol's column never appears? Krugman, Dowd, Rich always. One can only conclude that few read Mr. Kristol's silly and poorly written opinions, excepting bloggers who perpetuate the views of this unfortunate man.