Derbyshire appears to be the
voice of reason today over at NR's The Corner:
I seem to have tapped into some deep vein of insanity here.
A reader: "Just admit you want to have a gay marriage with John Kerry... And stop digging yourself a deeper hole like he is."
I just watched the clip again. It was a botched anti-Bush joke. I don't see how it could be plainer.
If you're all going to go nuts here, I'm off to do a little shopping.
While Derb doesn't "see how it could be plainer," others see the botched joke for what they think it is: a political opportunity.
He goes on:
Hope you guys are sending foam-flecked emails to Jay Nordlinger, too -- he agrees with me about Kerry's remarks.
I'm getting VERY peculiar emails. Like this one: "[Quoting me] 'Something is owed to honesty'? No, it isn't..."
Perhaps this character, and a couple of similar ones, should form a club & get some lapel buttons printed up: LIARS FOR BUSH.
OOOH! Mighty shrill Derb...
K Lo adds her usual witticisms:
As I've said before -- maybe it was a botched joke. It's plausable. But it was a disasterously botched joke. A sore-loser joke, too, for that matter. But it's not only people who think you want to move to Massachusetts and marry John Kerry who disagree with you, Derb.
They sure do get testy when they're about to lose...
Ponnuru is simply the best:
Kerry may have meant to make an anti-Bush crack--he probably did, even--but the plainest reading of what came out of his mouth was an anti-troops crack. So he should have said that he botched the line and never meant to insult the troops. That wouldn't have ended the story, since it's too good for Republican partisans to let go, but it would have caused it to die down considerably. As for John Derbyshire, he needs to learn to take criticism as well as he dishes it out.
Uh, Ramesh, he did...hours ago