How To Become A Jenius On National Security (Or Anything Else)

Kenneth Pollack is one of the more interesting intellectual sluts in the Brookings Institute's line-up of talents, and he has long been blessed by the establishment and Main Stream Media as an "expert" on the Mid-East...presumably for having a high-performance tush, because it was definitely not for his brain. Back in the run-up to the Fiasco, he wrote a forth-right but overwrought little number called The Threatening Storm: The Case for Invading Iraq; I'd previously read Pollack's views in places like Foreign Affairs and had found them as entertaining as new sexually transmitted diseases, so I carefully picked the book up for a clinical examination. I remember thinking, "this thing will probably stay in print as a warning to future generations."

Jon Schwarz has put up a number of crackling-good posts in a row over at A Tiny Revolution (see linkie at left), and this morning he nailed Ken The Pox-Ridden Courtesan and some of his benefactors pretty good:

NY Times headline:

Get Out of Iraq Now? Not So Fast, Experts Say

And who are these experts?

Kenneth M. Pollack, an expert at the Brookings Institution who served on the staff of the National Security Council during the Clinton administration, also argued that a push for troop reductions would backfire by contributing to the disorder in Iraq.

That's a pretty good description of Pollack. But it might have been more informative for NY Times readers if it has said this:

Kenneth M. Pollack, Ted Koppel's son-in-law, husband of CNN's Capitol Hill correspondent, and author of a prominent book that was utterly and completely wrong about invading Iraq, also argued that a push for troop reductions would backfire by contributing to the disorder in Iraq.

What would have been great about this is it both tells us Pollack's views and also how the NY Times determines who is and isn't an expert.

Right on Jon, baby. Troop reductions will "backfire." Chortle. Hoo, that's a good one. See why I read the NYT so much (not)? Oh, and by the way: Pollack was one of the unnamed government officials in the AIPAC (American Israel Public Affairs Committee) spy case. Israel has paid him money to keep them well supplied with state secrets. (It's a living, right?) When the NYT does a story on THAT, and its owners and writers aren't sharing cocktail napkins with and providing cover for a dirt-bag who sold our country and a couple of others for his own personal vanities, then I would start reading it again. After five or six years of integrity I MIGHT even get a subscription.