James Taranto over at Best of the Web noticed something a tad peculiar:
Has anyone else noticed that The Washington Monthly isn't exactly on the cutting edge anymore? Here's an excerpt of a piece by Joshua Micah Marshall that appears in the current issue:Makes me nostalgic for the old style pork barrel Democrats. At least they weren't providing aid and comfort to barbarians.The president and his aides don't speak untruths because they are necessarily people of bad character. They do so because their politics and policies demand it. . . . George W. Bush campaigned as a moderate, but has governed with the most radical agenda of any president since Franklin Delano Roosevelt. Indeed, the aim of most of Bush's policies has been to overturn what FDR created three generations ago. On the domestic front, that has meant major tax cuts forcing sharp reductions in resources for future government activism, combined with privatization of as many government functions as possible. Abroad, Bush has pursued an expansive and militarized unilateralism aimed at cutting the U.S. free from entangling alliances and international treaty obligations so as to maximize freedom of maneuver for American power in a Hobbesian world.This sounds awfully similar to the observations of Joelle Fishman:As the seemingly endless lies and betrayals of the Bush administration come into the light of day, the insidious nature of the right-wing agenda is becoming more widely understood. Many national leaders now speak of the intent of the Bushites to bankrupt government; dismantle every public entity from education to Medicare; destroy union representation, civil rights and civil liberties; appropriate the spoils of the earth and dominate the entire world.
Marshall's article was published Sept. 1. Fishman delivered her report to the National Committee of the Communist Party USA on June 28--more than two months earlier. We know magazines have long production cycles and all, but c'mon, guys, get the lead out!
