Brad DeLong is a flip flopper

He radically reverses his views on semantics and, indeed, on the very nature of truth. This post argues directly against this post.
Worst of all both posts are criticizing Matthew Yglesias.

Now Brad writes

"Yglesias believes that the words the neoconservatives spout are right "at the appropriate level of abstraction" because he is not yet old enough to have recognized that when neoconservatives use words, they do not mean what Yglesias thinks they mean. "


which is an attack on the views of Brad Delong who wrote

Matthew (and Atrios) are correct: the esoteric meaning of Hoagland's columns is
often very different from the exoteric meaning--and it is reasonably clear to me
that Hoagland believes in the esoteric meanings that are, as Matthew puts it,
hidden under "this veneer of reasonableness."
But where does Matthew get off saying that the unreasonable esoteric meaning is what the column is "actually about"? 99 out of 100 readers don't get the unreasonable esoteric meaning; what they get is the reasonable exoteric meaning. And isn't the important article not
the one that the writer writes, but he one that the reader reads?
I think Matthew Yglesias has mistaken the nature of reality.

Poor Matt, he spent 4 years studying philosophy and when he is not confused about the meanings of words he has mistaken the nature of reality. He has to fall into one or the other error whenever someone makes a statement with an esoteric meaning different from the exoteric meaning.

Now I agree with Brad that Matthew Yglesias is very young. Therefore he may be impressionable. I think Brad should consider the possibility that Matthew Yglesias has been lead astray on the issue of whether words mean what the dictionary says they mean because he was convinced by Brad's argument that the exoteric meaning is the true meaning. Indeed he responded to Brad's first critique by writing "Perhaps Brad is correct. Still, a writer ought to say what he means."