The Political Spectrum

Unlike a certain newspaper which shall remain nameless, the Washington Post op-ed page remains free on-line, (though you still have to register). Of course I get both papers at work, but it's nice to be able to peruse the net versions while at work (or simply blog about them). And the Post writers, by and large, are much superior to their brethren at that other paper (save for Brooks and Friedman).

But for as long as I have been reading the Post, I have not really read much of Eugene Robinson. Judging by this this piece, I'm not missing much. There is not a single substantive point made in this piece. It's just one bit of hyperbole stacked on top of another. It's not as though I'm upset with a critique of Tom DeLay, but it would be awfully nice if the argument could be made by someone who didn't write like an angry thirteen year-old.

Alas, EJ Dionne answers the call. I think he overstates his case, and whatever is being charged it is NOT money laundering, but at least Dionne makes an actual attempt at argumentation.

And of course there's Krauthammer. Oh, he can be as guilty of hyperbole as the any pundit, but he makes up for it with trenchant analysis. Writing of Cindy Sheehan, he observes:

The antiwar movement has found itself ill served by endowing absolute moral authority on a political radical who demanded that American troops leave not just Iraq but "occupied New Orleans." Who blames Israel for her son's death. Who complained that the news media went "100 percent rita" - "a little wind and a little rain" -rather than covering other things in the world, meaning her.

He also echoes Christopher Hitchens' obervations of earlier this week about some of the war protesters.

You don't build a mass movement on that. Nor on antiwar rallies like the one last weekend in Washington, organized and run by a front group for the Workers World Party. The WWP is descended from Cold War Stalinists who found other communists insufficiently rigorous for refusing to support the Soviet invasion of Hungary. Thus a rally ostensibly against war is run by a group that supported the Soviet invasions of Hungary, Czechoslovakia and Afghanistan, the massacre in Tiananmen Square, and a litany of the very worst mass murderers of our time, including Slobodan Milosevic, Hussein and Kim Jong Il. You don't seize the moral high ground in America with fellow travelers such as these.

Anti-war? Only when it's the Americans doing the killing.

I'd also like to mention the main editorial on Washington Mayor Anthony Williams, who announched he will not seek a third term and will be retiring. For all his faults, Williams was an outstanding public servant who saved the city from financial ruin and restored its place of prominence. Judging by the cast of characters seeking to replace him, I'm kind of glad I'll be oving out of the District.