The editors uttered the oh-so-tired “I” word in their latest defense of the Beauchamp Scandal, posted (deliberately?) to their site on a very quiet Friday:
“While many of these questions have been formulated by people with ideological agendas, we recognize that there are legitimate concerns about journalistic accuracy.”
I see. So it’s those ideological agendas, is it? Well, Messrs. Foer, et al, let me make myself, at least, clear. I have no ideological agenda, because I am sick and tired of ideology. Let’s put it this way. Remember the old Samuel Johnson canard “Patriotism is the last refuge of scoundrels”? Well, to me “Ideology is the last refuge of scoundrels.” Not to mention a monumentally boring rehash of Eighteenth and Nineteenth Century thought. So I don’t have an ideology anymore. I’m pro-gay marriage and pro-war on terror. What does that make me? Left of John Edwards on the former and right of him on the latter and 3.2 degrees north, north east of Boise, Montana on somebody’s worn out Mercator Projection. In other words, get over it. Ideology is not the point. The truth is.
And speaking of the truth. Here it is – or part of it – buried in parentheses five graphs down in TNR’s own vague non-defense defense of Mr. Beauchamp:
“Our investigation has not thus far uncovered factual evidence (aside from one key detail) to discount his personal dispatches.”
They themselves used the word “key.”
The reputation of The New Republic hangs by a thread. I suspect they know it.
Join the conversation as a VIP Member