Mathahir Whitewashing with a Purpose
Tags:
update Luskin came to his senses and dropped his suit against Atrios after the blogosphere rallied to the latter's defense.
update Turns out Luskin is a hypocritical jerk. I still think Krugman's "spin" on Mathahir's bigotry as offensive, but I'm sorry that I hitched it to such a jackass.
update Original title was "How Much is Paul Krugman's Soul Worth?"; I've changed it to be less ad hominem, and similar to his column's title.
update Here's Krugman's rebuttal. Thanks, anonymous reader. Methinks he doth protest too much; Krugman seems awfully sensitive to criticism, and overstates the case made against him. To his credit though, he does address some of the specific points, rather than avoiding the issues.
Donald Luskin does a great job of uncovering the reasons behind New York Times columnist and best-selling author Paul Krugman's whitewashing of anti-Semitism: he is has likely profited handsomely from the same Malaysian Prime Minster who called Jews "the enemy" and said they "rule the world by proxy".
http://www.wws.princeton.edu/~pkrugman/smearagain.htm
Posted by: on October 26, 2003 1:01 PM | permalinkI was the reader who supplied Krugman's rebuttal. Joe finds Krugman "awfully sensitive to criticism...overstates the case made against him."
After accusing Krugman of corrupting his judgment in exchange for financial concerns from Mahathir (the charge you picked up), Luskin says "[t]he real issue here is Krugman's apparent acquiescence and participation in anti-Semitism ... [Krugman is] America's most dangerous liberal pundit."
Krugman summarizes this as "if you believe these people, I am a paid agent of Mahathir, and condone anti-Semitism."
Sounds like an accurate summary to me.
Also, Krugman points out that Luskin fails to address the substance of his column, which is about "how badly things are going for U.S. foreign policy." He points out that one thing charges of anti-Semitism do is to crowd out a discussion of other issues. Any thoughts on the substance of Krugman's remarks, Joe?
The column in question will be free at
http://www.nytimes.com/2003/10/21/opinion/21KRUG.html
for a couple days more. You have to register.
Substance? Sure, US foregin policy has its flaws.
But that's changing the subject.
Look at the title of his response: "The Smear Machine Cranks Up Again". It's a typical response from those whose arguments can't stand on their own -- to portray their criticisms as personal attacks, and therefore worthless. (Yes, I realize the irony of my own title being ad-hominem, but Krugman's not responding to me. And I agree it's somewhat overstated.)
He even goes so far as to call his fiercest critics "stalkers"! http://www.poorandstupid.com/2003_10_19_chronArchive.asp#106662451782658062
As far as Alterman refusing to deal with the content of the column, hey -- that's his decision. I've certainly come across things that I thought were stupid and vile enough that they didn't bear criticizing.
Me, personally? I agree with Krugman's premise, that Mathahir's anti-semitic statements serve a political purpose. But *of course they do* -- he's a politician! Adolph Hitler's anti-semitism, Robert Mugabe's anti-caucasian and Slobodan Milosevic's anti-Muslim invectives were also at least somewhat political in nature. So what? They're still evil. And portraying Mathahir's Jew-hatred as simply a political tactic is an attempt to deflect criticism of it.
And last, but not least: "Too bad for these people that I’m Jewish – otherwise they’d claim that I was anti-Semitic myself." I'm sorry, but that doesn't hold water. The self-hating Jew has become so common that it's almost laughable. Almost.
P.S. Thanks for responding/commenting. It's good to have others fact-check my ass, provide alternative perspectives and force me to strengthen my own arguments.
Posted by: Joe Grossberg on October 27, 2003 9:14 AM | permalinkNo more comments! Either someone has violated Godwin's Law, I'm tired of the discussion or, most likely, the ten-week window has closed. You can, however, contact me through email.