Your Lying Eyes

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28 September 2009

William Safire, RIP

I read William Safire's Times columns religiously for many years and, while I very much enjoyed his writing and the basic tenor of his arguments, it seemed that over-and-over again he ended up being wrong. His most blatantly off-base argument was his accusing General Schwartzkopf of being a "new McClellan" for his apparent reluctance to take on Saddam in 1990. That was a few short months before the general orchestrated one of the most lopsided victories in the history of warfare. A bit later, just a few weeks before the fireworks would begin, he actually offered as a choice in his annual "Office Pool" predictions that Schwartzkopf would run as a Democrat, McClellan-like, against Bush. But it really wasn't his fault - he was after all an original neocon, and neocons are pretty much doomed to being wrong.

3 Comments:

Blogger gcochran said...

I liked it when he argued that an unrecorded conversation in the Czech Republic between Mohammed Atta and an Iraqi intelligence agent - a conversation that never even happened - was a good enough reason for war with Iraq.

I sure hope that Safire manages to get the air conditioning working in his new digs.

October 03, 2009 2:10 AM  
Blogger ziel said...

That was definitely a pattern of his - it's just not worth my time to look for examples right now - reporting in these various intrigues that his magical sources have whispered to him - and these scoops never panned out.

His pumping of Clifford Irving was also rather bizarre - pretty much showed personal alliances and interests trumped any journalistic ethics.

October 05, 2009 7:44 AM  
Blogger Dutch Boy said...

He was likely an an agent of influence for Israel and faithfully followed the Likud line throughout his carreer.

October 07, 2009 6:21 PM  

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