In your Ode to Mort you suggest that Glenn Greenwald should try sticking to the facts in the future, while you may have “accidentally” omitted a few key facts of your own. Let’s quickly review.

You state that you 1) “know Mort”, 2) “had the opportunity to work with him at the State Department during the Clinton Administration, when I was Chief of Staff to Assistant Secretary Harold Hongju Koh in the Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor (DRL) and he was Director of Policy Planning” and 3) “neither contacted nor consulted him before writing this post.” Very thorough treatment, Mr. Brown. Or is it?

It’s my understanding that while heading Citizens for Global Solutions (formerly a world federalist group), you, along with the Washington Note’s Steve Clemons, your former CGS colleague and TWN contributor Scott Paul (http://www.thewashingtonnote.com/archives/2008/08/the_view_from_m_3/)and Don Kraus, worked VERY closely with Mort Halperin to organize and, more importantly, FUND through private contributions the Stop Bolton campaign (http://www.undiplomatic.net/2008/08/12/wonkd-why-the-un-human-rights-council-blows/). Could this possibly be true?

If so, did you simply forget this itsy-bitsy, teeny-weeny fact? Maybe it just slipped your mind?

If so, doesn’t your loyal reader deserve to know ALL the facts and not just the ones that “support” your poorly constructed case?

If so, don’t your holier-than-thou ramblings ring more than just a little bit hollow?

If so, wouldn’t it be understandable that some might view this as your currying favor with a potential employer or pandering to a potential funder?

Here’s a bit of unsolicited advice. It might be best for you, in debates that revolve around questions of honor and integrity, not to fire rocks in your very, very fragile crystalline house.

I also sincerely hope that the comment left here by “Glenn Greenwald” is a fake. It sounds like it was written by a jilted teenage boy, not someone who I would trust to investigate the very serious issues facing our country.

But there are a couple of factors which exacerbate his often inappropriate tone: My understanding is that he is relatively new to politics and is still learning the ropes of political activism and effective discourse. This, of course, is a very difficult time to do that, since the very rights that we have long taken for granted in that area are rapidly becoming endangered or rendered moot by biased corporate media. His attitude also creates a certain amount of polemic around his discourse which also, I think has vaulted him to popularity, and is reflected in the very sour and reactionary tone of his comments section overall.

Thus as he matures as an activist, he will have difficulty leaving behind the aggressive posturing that has created his popularity. But I believe that he is at his best when he sticks to the facts, which are generally devastating enough. In the areas in which he has been effective, it has been his incredible research, writing and analysis which have sealed the deal. Hopefully, he will come to realize that.

I appreciate your responding to your commenters. But I’d like to ask that you back up what you say here:

“But that does not justify the use of gossip, speculation, and innuendo to mount ad hominem attacks on Halperin’s character. ”

Exactly where did GG use “gossip, speculation and innuendo” and “ad hominem attacks”? Please point those out. Did Greenwald use tough arguments? Yes, his piece was tough but accurate and based on public record and the interview. He didn’t get personal, but was making the case based on Halperin’s own actions. You apparently don’t know what “ad hominem” means.

Your lament about “ad hominem” sounds like whiny rightwingers when they run out of arguments and are backed into a corner. You have not made the case that GG’s post was unfair in any way. Was it tough on your friend? Yes, and in my opinion, deservedly so. You have not made the case that it was any kind of “hatchet job.”

But you DC insiders probably need to come out of your cozy little circles and face the real world and your critics who are fed up with the compromises that you have made and continue to make with the extreme right wing. In that, your blog is a good first step. So I commend you for that.

Here’s a little gem that applies to you and your friend Halperin as well:
//”She’s a bit of a fool that’s the only thing you can say,” said Rep. Neil Abercrombie. ” Don’t forget Cokie Roberts and the whole Washington crowd live in a kind of an incestuous relationship to one another, they talk to one another, they see one another, they know nothing about ordinary people.”//
Think about it.

Am I unhappy that Halperin came out in support of FISA? Yes. Do I believe that it reflects some defect in his character worthy of mockery, as Greenwald does? No. And that is the fundamental difference in our positions.

How is Greenwald “mocking” Halperin’s character? I just don’t see it, and just because you claim these are “ad hominen attacks” doesn’t make it true. Halperin had no explanation for his actions, and glaring contradictions in his statements and position bookending a conspicuous date in which the Obama campaign made known their own change in position. He mysteriously changes his position and when asked why, doesn’t provide an answer.

So if Halperin refuses to provide a reasonable explanation for this change in position and when Greenwald gives him ample opportunity to do so, how is it that Greenwald’s pointing out of an obvious potential motivation “mocking” his character? How do you take that and turn it into an “ad hominem” attack?

Ad hominem:
1. appealing to one’s prejudices, emotions, or special interests rather than to one’s intellect or reason.
2. attacking an opponent’s character rather than answering his argument.

Where is any of this, other than in your accusation in the post? Where is the attack on character in order to discredit the claim rather than disputing the claim itself? Halperin doesn’t even provide an argument, therefore it is impossible to characterize Greenwald’s speculation for this non-answer as and “ad hominem attack”.

All you’ve done is thrown that term out there, and made the accusation, without providing any evidence as such. In fact the irony here is that what YOU are doing is making “ad hominem” attack, not the other way around.

This is no different than the way the right operates, when the president says enough times that “we don’t torture”, well then, we must not torture. Even though there is ample evidence, photographic evidence, that we do torture.

I already posted about this. Either you deleted it or I messed up with the squiggly letter thing that your blog uses.

Greenwald linked to Halperin’s NYT op-ed in the very first sentence of his introduction to the interview. So, why are you basically faulting Greenwald for not copy and pasting the whole thing? Anyone who wanted to read Halperin’s op-ed in full was given the opportunity to do so. And Halperin could have repeated any of it that he might have chosen to repeat during the interview.

Greenwald invited Halperin on to answer any questions or to state anything he might have chosen to state about his position, and why he chose to do what he had done. Halperin chose to run off once he discovered that he would actually be challenged and have to deal with follow up questions from Greenwald. How is that Greenwald’s fault?

I stand corrected on what it was that Halperin allegedly leaked. I’ve changed the piece to make it accurate.

Greenwald never mentions any of this. He doesn’t say that the information Halperin allegedly leaked to the NYT was the Pentagon Papers.

The Pentagon papers were released in 1972, while Halperin was surveilled starting in 1969. Halperin was suspected of being the source of a NYT story revealing US bombing campaigns on Cambodia: see here.