The Jerome Corsi Paradox

Jerome Corsi, of Swiftboat Veterans for Truth fame, is at it again. This time he's written another piece of shit book riddled with factual errors and baseless innuendo targeted at Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama, entitled, The Obama Nation: Leftist Politics and the Cult of Personality. He's been all over the media pushing his book, and on today's edition of Fox News' Fox & Friends he's made a rather revealing statement:

Here's the relevant bit of the transcript:

DOOCY: You were involved in the writing of the --

CORSI: Correct.

DOOCY: -- Swift Boat book --

CORSI: Absolutely. Right.

DOOCY: -- four years ago, and so a lot of people have suggested, well, the Obama campaign is not going to allow their candidate to get Swift Boated once again by this guy, and do you feel almost as if you yourself are being Swift Boated?

CORSI: Well, in a way, but I also think the Obama campaign is making the identical mistake as the Kerry campaign.

[emphasis mine]

Without a moment's pause, Corsi responds to Doocy's question without the slightest indication of any intention to challenge the use of the term "Swift Boated." In accepting the understood definition of the term, Corsi is essentially admitting that his previous work of fiction, Unfit for Command: Swift Boat Veterans Speak Out Against John Kerry, is exactly what his critics charged -- full of factual errors and baseless smears against Democratic Senator John Kerry. It's clear that that is the opinion he has of his critics now; therefore, it follows that he is using this definition for "Swift Boated."

If, in some twist of crazy, right-wing logic, Corsi believes the term "Swift Boated" is not negative, but an honest, academic analysis of the facts, then we can only conclude that he believes his critics to be correct about The Obama Nation.

This is the Jerome Corsi Paradox -- either way, he's discredited himself in that one statement.