A Bright Day For the Blogosphere
New Republic owner/editor Martin Peretz is a man of many descriptions. We like this one from Jack Shafer: "Self-promoter, braggart, Arab-hater, name-dropper, and bad writer."
So what's Marty up to these days, beyond writing unreadable love letters to himself (and Israel!) in his magazine?
He's writing unreadable love letters to himself (and Scooter Libby!) on a crappy new blog!
Painfully collected samples, after the jump ....
* Everyone has a spine. But some people are spineless. I mean this in several ways.
* Contemporary journalism is afflicted by sheer amnesia. It is has no grasp of grand history. That is axiomatic.
* Let me concede: I am a friend of Scooter Libby. But I do not like his boss. And I do not like his boss's wife. I know this gets me no credit with the all-or-nothing crowd. Still, I like Scooter, who is quite brilliant, very honest, and brave.
* Mike Crowley's September 8 posting on The Plank calls attention to the Republican habit of calling the Democratic Party the "Democrat Party" ... or warning about a "Democrat Congress" or, even worse yet, a "Democrat president." But this tick was a custom that went into disuse for nearly 50 years.
* Then there is the spine of my past: a man in his mid-sixties, a family man with children, a teacher at Harvard for almost four decades, formerly of the New Left (very important to understanding my spine) now of the center .........
And he's only on his third blog post! This is going to be some kind of awesome.
The Spine [Martin Peretz]
Marty Peretz Is Does Have [sic] a Spine [Reason]
Marty Peretz's Word Power [Slate]