Unsurprisingly, that article makes a handful of interesting points but also some completely absurd accusations based on flagrantly wrong interpretations of Greenwald quotes and motivations.

The most glaring I feel compelled to point out is this, they quote Glenn: “It’s hard, for instance, to imagine any group that has done more harm, and ushered in more evil, than the Bush-era neocons with whom Democrats are now openly aligning,”

And interpret that quote this way: “His construction that “it’s hard … to imagine” any worse faction than the neocons is especially telling.”

Do you see the problem there? Glenn is clearly describing the ACTIONS of the neocons and the article writers interpretation is to boil that down to the group itself regardless of actions, allowing them to continue with this: “However dangerous or rancid figures like Steve Bannon or Michael Flynn may be, the possibility that they could match the evil of the neocons is literally beyond the capacity of his brain to imagine.”

Again, Glenn was describing the ACTIONS of a group of people who held a massive amount of power for long stretches of time in recent decades whereas the alt-right and the Bannon crowd came to only partial power a handful of months ago. So, no, there is no conflict in saying that the alt-right is completely rancid AND that they have clearly not “done more harm, and ushered in more evil, than the Bush-era neocons”.

And as an aside, it’s also important to note the over-the-top snideness of the “beyond the capacity of his brain to imagine” comment which itself was another misinterpretation of a quote. “Hard… to imagine” ≠ beyond the capacity of one’s brain to imagine. The writer is clearly on a mission to discredit and any cost here.

So, after that wild misrepresentation (amid an article in which the writer castigates Greenwald for misrepresenting the motivations of others), it was unsurprising for the next paragraph to begin with this sentence: “A second source of Greenwald’s sympathy for the nationalists is their populism.”

A which point I said “Oh, fuck you” to the article writer in disgust. As I said, the article makes a handful of worthwhile points but it’s also a flagrant hit job filled with poisonous nonsense that doesn’t deserve to be part of a thoughtful and nuanced conversation.

Next time you send me an article make sure it’s better than that one.

Look, I absolutely love Greenwald on some stuff (Laura Poitras gets top billing, but his work on Citizenfour was crucial and legitimately epic, and his Brazil stuff is very insightful on a near neighbor we don’t know well enough), but he’s been getting it flagrantly wrong on Trump-Russia for a while now. This article is a good summary of what’s gone awry with him and the Intercept in that regard. As far as jumping to conclusions, this article also highlights that awful twitter “conclusion” that Glenn jumped to about neocons as worst of the late 20th century. I agree they’re bad, but he has a weird blindness there. http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2017/08/the-alt-right-and-glenn-greenwald-versus-h-r-mcmaster.html?utm_source=tw&utm_medium=s3&utm_campaign=sharebutton-b

What exactly are they getting wrong? Your thoughts on them “minimizing” is just a judgment call, not a matter of right and wrong. All I’ve heard them say on the topic is to distinguish between what facts we actually have and what unfounded conclusions people are willing to jump to. Those conclusions may turn out to be right but that doesn’t justify jumping to them without substantiation and that seems to be the stance The Intercept has been taking the whole time. Jumping to conclusions is what loses a person or organization their credibility, not proceeding cautiously and only following confirmed facts.

Well, that bit from the Intercept hasn’t aged well, has it? From Trump giving the game away on Syria, to the revelations about Don Jr, those guys are getting it wrong and minimizing WAAAYY too much on Trump-Russia. And they keep getting it wrong in the same suspicious fashion. I love some of the stuff they do; but they simply aren’t credible on this stuff. Do better, don’t give those shills airtime on things where they aren’t trustworthy.