We couldn’t update the previous post anymore and besides, this Rosen fight has taken on a life of it’s own.
To recap:
Jeffrey Rosen wrote a piece in the The New Republic about Sonia Sotomayor. And the blogosphere, left wing, erupted:
Emily Bazelon in Slate, linking to Greenwald
Reihan Salam defended the Rosen piece. But the hits kept coming:
Atrios called for a blogger ethics panel.
Brian Beutler was on the TPM Mothership calling it “Anatomy of a Sotomayor Whisper Campaign.”
Even the right wasn’t entirely happy with the Rosen piece. Paul Mirengoff at Powerline:
“I’m not in a position to judge the truth of this assessment, but I rate its value as very low. Law clerks as a group tend to be arrogant, self-important, and immature (fortunately, many shed these traits when they grow up). And, like other sources in these matters, their reports may be based more on a personal preference, such as the elevation of an academic, than on a good faith assessment of Judge Sotomayor.”
And Noah Millman:
“Seriously, though, Rosen wrote a hit piece on Sotomayor because she’s not his pick. That’s not very complicated, is it?”
Jonathan Adler at Volokh.
So you see, Rosen-mania swept the country, much like Beatlemania, but without Ringo.
Rosen responded to the mania with two pieces in TNR: here and here. End graph:
“If the piece had a less provocative headline, perhaps it would have been clearer that I wasn’t presuming to make a definitive judgment, but to encourage the White House to weigh considerations of temperament against the many other factors they’ll be considering. Sotomayor is an able candidate–at least as able as some of the current Supreme Court justices–and if Obama is convinced she is the best candidate on his short list, he should pick her. For the next Supreme Court seat, the president needs to be sure that the nominee’s temperament and abilities are not merely impressive but absolutely stellar. She–and the next justice should indeed be a she–must be ready to challenge the conservatives and persuade her fellow liberals from the very beginning. I look forward to exploring some of the other names on the short list soon.”
Greenwald on Rosen again. It is the full Greenwald:
“Jeffrey Rosen and The New Republic really are owed a debt of gratitude for shining a light on how shoddy, arrogant, non-responsive and deliberately misleading so much of our establishment “journalism” really is. Rosen purports to respond today to what he condescendingly refers to as the “energetic response in the blogosphere” to his anonymity-dependent attack on Sonia Sotomayor’s intellect and judgment. Rosen doesn’t deign to name any of the critics and links to only a couple, and is thus free to ignore many of the serious ethical problems and factual errors in his “reporting” raised by numerous commentators and to distort that which he does address.”
Now, more posts on the Rosen-mania:
Sully wonders what it means for journalism here and here.
The last Sully post links to Brian Beutler at TPM.
As a sidebar, Ta-Nehisi responds to Reihan as does Adam Sewer on Tapped. Reihan responds:
“Basically, I know Jeff Rosen and I think he’s sensitive to the concerns a lot of us share about invidious stereotyping. One of my central failings — I have many — is an undue emphasis on personal loyalty. Because I know Rosen is a mensch, I’m inclined to interpret anything he says or writes in the best possible light. I think Rosen’s postscript suggests that this is the right thing to do. But I also recognize, like Rosen, that the original piece was pretty badly flawed.”
I know I’m missing a lot of posts at the moment. Since this is almost an inner-left dispute (although with some right-center contributions as seen above), there’s not much in the right blogosphere about this. But when I find it, I’ll post it. Or let me know in the comments.
EARLIER: $100 on Sonia Sotomayor?
UPDATE: John Cole
UPDATE #2: How I missed Ann Althouse, I’ll never know. Here’s her piece on both the Letterman thing and Rosen. Althouse and Emily Bazelon discuss the Rosen piece on Bloggingheads.
UPDATE #3: Jason Linkins
UPDATE #4: More from Althouse and Lemieux.
UPDATE #5: Dday
UPDATE #6: Matt Y, who links to SCOTUSBlog
UPDATE #7: Jonathan Chait, on people calling the Rosen article “gossip.”
UPDATE #8: John Cole responds to Chait.
UPDATE #9: NPR
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May 8, 2009 at 9:21 pm
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May 15, 2009 at 8:28 pm
[...] Jeffrey Rosen Gets A Post Of His Own [...]
May 26, 2009 at 8:45 am
[...] EARLIER: Jeffrey Rosen Gets A Post Of His Own [...]