I honestly don’t understand why I’m spending any amount of time on this story at all, except for the fact that Andrew Sullivan gets himself Bitch-slapped by Mike Goldfarb of the Weekly Standard: [1]
Does Andrew Sullivan read stories before he comments on them? In this case, I suspect he didn’t, otherwise he’s engaging in pure military-related fantasy. In response to this article [2] from the Houston Chronicle reporting that Ron Paul and Barack Obama lead all candidates in fund raising among “donors identified as affiliated with the military,” Sullivan headlines a post [3] “Whom the Troops Support,” with this stunningly self-indulgent conclusion (actually this is the whole post):
Just one indicator, of course: campaign donations from active service military members. And guess who’s first? Ron Paul. Second? Barack Obama. Those tasked to actually fighting this war get it, don’t they?
Except this isn’t about campaign donations from “active service military members,” whatever they might be, but “donors affiliated with the military,” which Sullivan might have noticed had he slogged through the whole first sentence of the story. In fact, the first “active service military member” and Ron Paul supporter interviewed for the piece is 72-year-old Lindell Anderson, a retired Army chaplain from Fort Worth.
Of course, Sullivan isn’t the only one who leaps before he actually reads. But you have to wonder how many of the left, of which Sullivan is unquestionably one, come to their conclusions similarly under informed. My take is the majority…
Goldfarb by the way, is becoming a regular read, around here.