Through a McCardle, Darkly

I don't know enough about climate change debate to weigh in on the cage match between Levitt/Dubner, the environmental blogs, and, it seems, most of the liberal environmental blogosphere. I know enough about journalism to know that asking your sources to feed you a quote you have written is a fairly major no-no, and doesn't make me inclined to trust the rest of the critique that kicked this brouhaha off. It's bad enough when journalists pull the "would you say" trick, because human cognitive evolution being what it is, too many people will allow you to put words in their mouth. But no one I know would even consider announcing to their sources what they would like to hear.

I usually only read Megan while hiding in the shelter of Susan of Texas's big strong arms. I can't take that stuff unadulterated. But today I made the mistake of going over there unaccompanied and. oh.my.dying.gods.and.goddesses. I thought I might lose my mind. Can anyone on this green earth figure out what that woman thinks she's saying? Because its utter gibberish in four four time. Can we all admit now that Megan's function in this world is to be a kind of white noise generating program. just as white noise machines help anxious businessmen and householders to fall asleep when the world around them is too noisy and scary so Megan's columns block out unpleasant or noisy facts which might alarm her libertarian readers. Shh. Don't wake the sleepers! Megan's lullaby of Wallstreet keeps them from having to worry about pesky job loss, environmental disaster, or really anything else.