Pointless, Boring Inter-Blog Feud of the Week

So Jonah Goldberg figured out Andrew Sullivan's dirty little "secret" (which anyone could have figured out simply by reading a magazine with a pretty huge circulation, and which would be apparent to anyone who reads his blog regularly). Some folks ain't none too happy. I've seen him called "traitor", "fag", "drama queen", etc. etc., as well as being compared to Yasser Arafat, Howell Raines, David Brock, the guy who writes the Daily Kos, and I don't know . . .Hitler? Satan? I'm sure it's out there. There is also a contingent that believes that he's on the take for the Kerry campaign, or something. (I don't know. The conspiracy theories get a bit complex.)

I agree with Jonah Goldberg's take on the slight dishonesty of trying to portray himself as "on the fence" while having explicitly come out (no pun intended) as being against Bush in the Advocate piece while not linking to it on his blog. I also agree that there is some inconsistency between the his soaring rhetoric about the primacy of the war above all else and his current position of seeming to look at the war as one of many issues (fiscal conservatism, gay marriage Amendment) which could be the basis of your choice in the next election.

But, now he's linked the Advocate piece and made his position more clear, and really substantively it's barely different than the impression you'd get from reading the Dish daily (as I do) anyway. If you follow his writing over time, which because of his superior prose style is a hell of a lot more enjoyable than following most of the political pontification on the internet, it all makes sense and you see the basic consistency of his worldview. It just happens to be a pretty complex, nuanced (not in the stupid, flip-flopping Kerry way but in a good, as in he considers all the angles and stays away from simplistic, easy conclusions) worldview.

So, what exactly is the point of the approximately 6 zillion Andrew Sullivan-bashing posts on the internet right now? That Sullivan's some kind of traitor for not supporting Bush?

And all this stuff about not wanting the "health updates" and the more personal material is just petty, juvenile crap. Um, he has an often fatal disease which would mean that his state of health is often on his mind, no? Most of the time he only talks about that kind of stuff in order to explain a break in posting, because he's a professional blogger and people expect tons of excellent material every single day. And, he does write more and better than virtually anyone else in the medium.

So, really what is the big deal? I understand the complaint about the seeming inconsistency between now and then and the slight dishonesty of not making his position more clear, but I don't get why he's all of a sudden persona non grata. I mean, I support Bush, but I know that there are a lot of people that don't, and Sully is now the most articulate and smartest of those critics. If you're not going to read him, then you're going to have to limit you're reading to only people who are explicitly and strongly pro-Bush, which would be, well, limiting.

As for the "vast left wing conspiracy" stuff, I'm sure there's no dissuading anyone who believes in that nonsense. It's kind of like that episode of Seinfeld where George bought "Jon Voight's" car, but at first he didn't believe that it really was Jon Voight's car. Jerry said, why would they make up a lie like that, why not say it was somebody more famous? George: "Don't you see? That's the genius of it." If it's pointed out that AS couldn't possibly be shilling for Kerry because he barely ever says anything remotely positive about Kerry, you get a similar response. It's the definition of a conspiracy theory: All counter-evidence is said to merely be evidence of how complex the conspiracy is.

Anyway, this bizarre backlash, against a mere pundit of all people, is bringing out of ugly behavior: The name-calling and inarguable hompohobia, as well as the over-the-top comparisons and the stupid conspiracy theories. Purging of heretics? Denunciation of any deviation as treachery? Paranoid accusations of covert operations for the "other side"? Get a grip people. This is how leftists behave. Not conservatives.

Comments

[Karol]

I don't care about him not supporting Bush and I didn't feel misled, per se. He's been hinting for awhile. I didn't like that he immediately attacked conservatives and picked on our worst elements. Those people have always hated him and always will and there are plenty on the left who hate him just the same.

[Joel]

I usually like Sullivan. Howver the past year he has become "Andy one note" with the gay marraige stuff, etc.