The Kinsley Retort

Michael Kinsley responds (sortof) to Brad DeLong's criticism.

Brad,

Seems to me that you wildly misinterpret both of the columns that you say demonstrate my intellectual inconsistency. The column a few months ago about the Downing Street Memo didn’t reject the possibility that Bush & Co had “fixed the intelligence” in order to justify a war they were already committed to. It said that this particular document (the DSM) was not the smoking gun that proved the case. Tthe column yesterday did not assert that Bush & Co had fixed, etc etc etc. It said that the Bush administration now concedes that much of the intelligence used was wrong, and that this undermines the justification for the war whether or not the administration “fixed” it.

Where is the contradiction?

Ps Could you post this on your site? (And by all means reply if you wish.) Thanks.

Like Max, I am impressed by the power of Brad. Kinsley is much more important than the Weisman guy who ccd Brad an e-mail and is also slightly more polite. Brad slyly and effectively refutes Kinsley's claim that Brad misinterpreted Kinsley's original column by quoting the first two paragraphs of the column including "proof positive that President Bush was determined to invade Iraq the year before he did so. The whole "weapons of mass destruction" concern was phony from the start, and the drama about inspections was just kabuki: going through the motions. [snip] Developing a paranoid theory and promoting it to the very edge of national respectability takes a certain amount of ideological self-confidence..." My theory is that Brad is important enough for Kinsley to respond to his criticisms but not quite important enough for Kinsley to actually read those criticisms so that his response makes any sense at all.

I think my defence of Kinsley was much better than Kinsley's (except I wrote impossible when I meant possible)

Now I have a defence of Kinsley. My quote spliced two paragraphs. What if I had cut at the paragraph break ? Would this lead to a passage which made no sense ? Let's see

"Although it is flattering to be thought personally responsible for allowing a proven war criminal to remain in office, in the end I don't buy the fuss. Nevertheless, I am enjoying it, as an encouraging sign of the revival of the left. Developing a paranoid theory and promoting it to the very edge of national respectability takes a certain amount of ideological self-confidence."

Without the preceding paragraph it appears that the paranoid theory is that Kinsley is personally responsible for leaving a proven war criminal in office. This would indeed be paranoid. Now I would say a rule of interpretation is that if a plausible referent can be found within a paragraph one shouldn't look for a referent in the paragraph above. I'd say that is a good bit of what paragraphs (and sentences) are for.

Now reading the column it seems impossible [oops I mean possible] that Kinsley was discussing the theory that he, Michael Kinsley, was the key link in the chain mail protecting Bush. I'd say if Kinsley can come up with a few e-mails saying such a nutty thing, then he is off the hook.

Just an unfortunate misunderstanding that arose because he appeared to claim that the theory that the inspections were kabuki was paranoid. He was not willing to quote crazy e-mails in dead trees and this lead to unclarity.

I'd bet on Kinsley if you gave me 10 to 1 odds.

A commenter who calls herself Ellen 1910 markedly improves my argument

Doesn't it all depend on what Kinsley claims is the subject of the "paranoid theory"?

If I recall correctly, the column was written as a defense to the left blogoshere's charge that the MSM had failed to give the DSM the coverage and publicity it deserved. That was the "paranoia" he was refering to.

Kinsley's argument was that the memo did not rise to the evidentiary level required to prove the MSM's culpability. He made no judgment about whether the memo was true or about whether the Bush Administration had, in fact, "fixed the intelligence around" the decision to go to war.

The two columns are apples and oranges.

Posted by: Ellen1910 | November 29, 2005 at 10:17 AM

In fact, I'd bet on Ellen's interpretation of "paranoid theory" if someone were to offer me 2 to 1 odds.