GOODY TWO SHOES: Nice Try, Taranto
James Taranto’s "Best of the Web Today" (BOTWT) on Wednesday includes this:
"Our Monday item about John Kerry's Saturday letter about our July 26 op-ed about Kerry's claim that a bloodbath "didn't happen" after America's retreat from Vietnam brought this follow-up from reader R.T. Barber …"
Barber’s e-mail cites U.S. military sources that refute John Kerry’s assertion that "450,000 civilians and 1.1 million soldiers were killed" in the eight years preceding U.S. withdrawal from Vietnam.
All well and good. But Taranto’s July 26th op-ed was not entirely about Kerry. His commentary was largely about Barack Obama’s "blasé cynicism about the possibility of genocide in Iraq" – which Taranto escalated into the unsubstantiated accusation that the presidential candidate believes "[I]t’s OK to allow the genocide of Arabs and Muslims" in a subsequent Wall Street Journal video interview.
Reputable journalists and pundits have not rushed to embrace Taranto’s over-the-top charges – which seem to be based solely on the inflammatory headline of the Associated Press article for which Obama was interviewed. No wonder Taranto desperately wants to get the focus off his unsupportable comments about Obama.
As Taranto’s readers write his jokey headlines for him and - like Barber - do his research for him (um, what is it exactly that he gets paid for?), he’s obviously gotten too lazy to actually read an article in its entirety before making irresponsible charges like those he leveled against Obama.
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