Reply #4: The greatest crime in the neoconservative universe

[JohnyCanuck]

Using character smears to prevent foreign policy discussions

SNIP

The greatest crime in the neoconservative universe is to criticize Israeli policy or, worse, discuss and express concern about the influence on American foreign policy of neoconservatives and/or its principal American lobbying group, AIPAC. Since Mearsheimer and Walt have committed this grave sin, it is time for the punishment, which begins -- as it always does for this crime -- with a nice, oozing dose of character smear, courtesy of the likes of Glenn “Instapundit” Reynolds, Powerline, and The New York Sun (The Weekly Standard can't be far behind).

The New York Sun kicked off the smearing yesterday with a very lengthy, breathless article entitled “David Duke Claims to be Vindicated by a Harvard Dean.” Apparently, the fact that the utterly inconsequential David Duke expressed support for some of Mearsheimer and Walt's conclusions is highly newsworthy -- meriting an endless article in The New York Sun -- because, well . . . isn't obvious why? Because Professors Mearsheimer and Walt, by virtue of the report they issued, are now evil racists who are the equivalent of David Duke. No need to listen to or think about any of the arguments they advance. After all, they're just a couple of thinly disguised KKK members who are motivated by racial hatred, so we should vent some hatred towards them and then ignore everything they say.

Following along with the character smearing script is, first, Alan Dershowitz, who, in the Sun article, calls the report “trash,” says that it could have been written by “some of the less intelligent members of Hamas,” and obligatorily insists that the report “sounds very similar” to The Protocols of the Elders of Zion, the anti-Semitic tract from the early 20th Century. To make sure there is no confusion about what he means, Dershowitz calls Mearsheimer and Walt “two bigots.” Following along, as always, Instapundit links to The New York Sun article and adds his own character smear:

YALE HAS ITS TALIBAN, HARVARD HAS DAVID DUKE:

http://www.crooksandliars.com/stories/2006/03/21/usingCharacterSmearsToPreventForeignPolicyDiscussions.html