That Sweet, Sweet Wingnut Welfare
The winger plagiarism battle Rob linked to below is entertaining in its own terms, but I wanted to highlight this remarkable fact:
Boot, who was in Thailand at the time, was hesitant at first and asked for time to think it over. But Rosen was encouraging, offering $4,000, for 2,000 words, more than a week to write, and editorial guidance from Sam Walker, the Journal’s Sports editor.
The context of somebody already having submitted pretty much the same hacktacular argument already makes the $2 a word offer even more amazing. Nor did Boot have the slightest expertise on the specific subject; he needed not only the help of Sam Walker, the Journal‘s Sports editor, but of his RA at the CFR. Yup, Max Boot has an RA to help him write unoriginal op-ed pieces for which he gets paid $2 a word.
If you’ll excuse me, I have an apocryphal cocktail party full of people who shop at Zabar’s to be offended by. The party left me!
…you also have to be impressed that Boot starts off with 3 paragraphs of cliches before getting to his knowingly false and pernicious argument. You can visualize him lying on a hammock while “earning” his 2 bucks a word.