Pomaded Lardies on Shit-flinging Binge. posted by Richard Seymour

A couple of lubricious former lefties have been trying to set jaws clapping together down at the slander-mill. First, Marc Cooper, who is by way of joining the Harry's Place tendency of US bloggery (as if that particular niche wasn't amply occupied by Little Green Footballs), has tried to smear Yoshie Furuhashie, the editor of MRZine for a couple of articles about the Save Darfur folks. These articles refer, accurately, to a rag-tag coalition between evangelicals and 'establishment Jews'. The reference to establishment Jews in the coalition derives from an article in the Jerusalem Post with the headline: "US Jews leading Darfur rally planning". Yoshie, quite conscientiously, didn't think it was right to present the information as if all Jews were somehow leading the charge for an invasion of Sudan. That sort of thing could be misunderstood in our very delicate political climate. Some would prefer to say 'evangelicals and leading Zionist organisations', but that too could be misunderstood. And after all, it's not a dirty word is it? The j-word? Certain racists may be persuaded that it is, but who takes their cue on such matters from them? Nevertheless, despite the obvious care taken, Cooper has decided to follow some equally tiresome 'democratic socialist' by the name of Jeff Weintraub in describing the article as antisemitic (Weintraub adds that they involve 'crackpot conspiracy theories' and defense of a 'regime engaged in racist genocide'). Note that no argument is presented in either Weintraub or Cooper's respective whinges - since none could be. To simply refer to a reasonably well reported fact is enough to be accused of antisemitism. To my knowledge, the Jerusalem Post, a Likud-supporting newspaper formerly under the control of Conrad Black and with Richard Perle on the board of directors, has not become an explicitly antisemitic publication, so it might be sensible to infer that the article was not trying to smear Jewish people, some of whom I guess make up a fair proportion of its readership. By the way, this vexatious wheedle was passed to Marc Cooper by a particularly obnoxious character who frequents Doug Henwood's left-wing mailing list, 'LBO Talk', called Michael Pugliese. Sleazy, sneaky little fucker, don't you think?

The other coprological item that is doing the rounds is a bilious article about Juan Cole by the Late Christopher Hitchens, which Cole replies to here. It seems that Hitchens got hold of a couple of confidential e-mails from Cole, and misused them in this polemic. It is almost tautological to say that it is embarrassingly inept (inasmuch as Hitchens engages with what Cole doesn't say, makes glaring logical errors, gets his facts wrong and pads his odyssey of incomprehension out with some tart but irrelevant one-liners), but it is noteworthy that Hitchens refers to Cole as part of the "Muslim apologist community". One is typically an apologist for someone or something considered pernicious. In Hitchens' polemical lexicon, I doubt it has a neutral connotation, so you can add it to the list of anti-Muslim tics in Hitchens' posthumous excretions. Hitchens, of course, used to enjoy his reputation as a Balliol-educated soixant-huitard who could dispense gleefully malicious gossip about politicians and journalists on account of having attended the right parties and listened in on the right conversations. What he enjoys most now is providing pabulum for his audience of imperialist neophytes.

These are just examples, less interesting in themselves than for what they represent. In the former case, you have someone who still claims an affiliation with the left, but takes much trouble to police his comrades when they disturb his imaginary identification as a moral/decent/anti-totalitarian leftie, all the better to service his symbolic identification with the right. In the latter you have - well, just look at him. If the very sight of the man doesn't reduce to hysterics by now, you can chuck it in. Your laughs are through for this lifetime, honey. You may as well flip on the tube and let the studio audience on Will & Grace do your giggling for you, because you're finished.