I just read Andrew Sullivan's scathing review of Sidney Blumenthal's new book, The Clinton Wars. An excerpt:
Reading this book is like listening to music on a Walkman with only one earphone in. Not only is Bill Clinton morally right, he’s close to politically flawless. All the facts of the Presidency are marshaled, sometimes with good narrative skill and smooth prose, to defend this assumption. There is not an argument as such in the book, if by argument you mean an attempt to grapple with an alternative worldview. You’d be unaware, for example, if this was the only Clinton book you had ever read, that anyone ever had a problem with Bill Clinton’s relationship with the truth. You’d be largely unaware of any character defects in the 42nd President at all. In fact, the only reason Mr. Blumenthal ever gives for opposition to Mr. Clinton is resentment that he was elected in the first place. All the legitimate disagreement with Mr. Clinton—from the left all the way through to the center-right—is reduced in this book to the ravings of the right-wing extremists.
Christopher Hitchens also has a review of the book coming up soon, but for now he just wants to correct the record about Blumenthal's personal smears, distortions and misstatements of and about him. (hat tip to AS)
UPDATE: Michael Isikoff goes off on Sidney Blumenthal. Great.
UPDATE 5/30: David Horowitz gets in his two cents.
Posted by dan at May 19, 2003 02:28 AM