Earlier this week, I questioned Sullivan's publishing of the Elizabeth McCaughey article when he was editor of The New Republic. Classily, he sought to make my age, rather than the honesty of the piece he published and championed, the issue. I guess that didn't do the trick. Because now he's accusing me of seeking the "subjugation of free inquiry and free ideas" and calling my writing "chilling." I'll let the argument of the post in question stand on its own merit. But I will answer the basic smear, which is that I lack integrity as a writer, and sacrifice the truth in order to elevate an agenda.
So let's talk honesty, and commitment to speech, as that's the issue here. It was Sullivan, remember, who accused the anti-war left of mounting a "fifth column." Who went on a rip evaluating the patriotism of the war's critics. Who doesn't even allow comments on his site. Tell me again who's trying to marginalize speech. And it is Sullivan who brags, in his bio, of winning a National Magazine Award for the article written by Elizabeth McCaughey. Here's the letter from a National Magazine Award judge that The New Republic, under Sullivan, didn't publish:
