The blogger Angry Bear offers a perfect case study of the principles and priorities of leftwing bloggers generally. After a long and revealing pile of excerpts, quotes and leaps of factual and logical fancy (including getting my first name wrong) he writes:
Memo to Jonah Goldberg – there are some leaks that are truly beyond the pale as in the PlameGate matter. Too bad your organization is defending those leakers as you shown your disdain for a free press.
Me: Get it? Leaks that objectively undermine the war effort — which definitionally means putting peoples’ lives at greater risk — are necessary in order to live in a free country. But alleged leaks of Valerie Plame’s name are so beyond the pale they must be prosecuted at all costs. Of course, to date there’s no evidence that Plame’s name was leaked in order to put her life in danger. Indeed, to date, there’s no evidence that leaking Plame’s name was even against the law or that it caused any damage whatsoever — save forcing us to endure listening to Joe Wilson talk about what a hero he is. Meanwhile, the CIA prison leaks, the NSA leak and the SWIFT leak all did real and tangible harm to the effort to fight terrorism. But since these leaks don’t promise to hurt Bush or get Karl Rove in trouble they are not “beyond the pale,” rather according to this guy, such leaks are in fact the bread and butter of a free society.
Classic.