cognitive dissident

Controversy swirls around the Washington Post’s hiring of RedState blogger Ben Domenech—a plagiarist in addition to being a bigot, not that I’d expect anything more from an editor for Michelle Malkin and Hugh Hewitt—to balance their nonexistent left-wing blogger. Joe Conason has good summary in his “A Portrait of the Blogger as a Young Plagiarist” at Salon.

As all this attention is being paid to Box Turtle Ben (so called due to his speech written for Senator Cornyn comparing same-sex marriage to the “union of man and box turtle”) while one of the Post’s sensible voices is crying out in the wilderness. Bill Arkin writes in his “Early Warning” column about an exchange he had with a Marine Corps Brigadier General during a talk on information warfare:

General: 'Mr. Arkin, do you consider yourself a journalist or an American.'

I took a drink of water as my blood boiled.

Me: 'Well General, because I am an American, I cherish the fact that I can call you a f***ing idiot for asking the question.'

All hell broke loose: The general lodged a complaint up the chain of command to get me punished and my sponsors were reprimanded.

It was tough for the General to be faced with an inflammatory and insubordinate response that he could do nothing about. Too bad he learned nothing (happily for America, he has since retired).

I was punished as much as the military could punish me. I wasn't disappeared nor thrown in jail. In the America I cherish, I just was dropped from the speaker's list. And even then, it was only for awhile, until the dust settled, and then intellectuals and brave souls in the military who dare to stand up to the conformity machine agitated to get me invited back, knowing that if they were going to ponder the media and information warfare, they'd better listen… [emphasis added]

Of course, the mere act of publicly disagreeing with a general is enough to have Arkin branded a “liberal” by some, especially those who confuse dissent with treason, and conflate patriotism with blind sheep-like obedience. The rest of us recognize and celebrate the patriotism of people like Bill Arkin, who recognize that the right to speak freely means little if no one actually speaks.

(Thanks to John at AmericaBlog for the tip.)

update (3:12 PM):
Domenech was hired, according to WaPo executive editor Jim Brady, because "we were completely unrepresented by a social conservative voice." Does Brady not realize that his newspaper regularly publishes George Will and Charles Krauthammer?

update 2 (3:25 PM):
Box Turtle Ben has resigned, as Jim Brady recounts here. How will the Post ever find another conservative blogger of his caliber?