Jay Currie

Great fun in the blogosphere. Christopher Hitchens wrote a piece in Slate in which he suggests that the pretend Arabist Juan Cole’s Iranian apologetics are simply wrong as a matter of translation. Cole does not actually respond to Hitchens’ position but, instead, states

Well, I don’t think it is any secret that Hitchens has for some time had a very serious and debilitating drinking problem. He once showed up drunk to a talk I gave and heckled me. I can only imagine that he was deep in his cups when he wrote, or had some far Rightwing think tank write, his current piece of yellow journalism. I am sorry to witness the ruin of a once-fine journalistic mind.
informed comment

Nice bit of argumentation that.

Unluckily for Cole,

Cole, however, trashes whatever high ground he might have sought by accusing Hitch of writing the piece drunk, or, worse, having it ghost-written. By pure coincidence, I was at Hitch’s yesterday as he filed the piece. He was stone-cold sober. And on top form. It is Cole who owes Hitch an apology. Hitch stuck to the issues; Cole got personal.
andrew sullivan

Of course Cole has been nailed before and simply keeps going. The idea that he might be ashamed would imply he has sufficeint integrity to feel shame. Cole’s political commitments have trumped his integirty and such scholarship as he possesses on other occassions. Basically, Cole is more than willing to make stuff up if it serves his particular anti-American, pro-Palestinian agenda.

Now, taking on Hitchens is not for the faint hearted. Especially when Sullivan can pretty much prove that Cole’s speculations about Hitchens filing while legless is only the beginning of Cole’s partisan inventions.

The only question is whether Hitchens will once and for all finish Cole and his ongoing lies. I hope so.