One Train Leaves Philadelphia at 3:15...
I have to say that I would find Anne Applebaum's criticism of American celebrities who say nice things about Hugo Chavez to Communist supporters of the Soviet Union were contemporary Venezuela to, um, resemble the USSR in some salient way.
-Matt Yglesias
Here's my attempted reconstruction (try it yourself!):
"I have to say that I would find Anne Applebaum's comparison of American celebrities who say nice things about Hugo Chavez to Communist supporters of the Soviet Union more convincing were contemporary Venezuela to, um, resemble the USSR in some salient way."
My version still isn't pretty, but at least the train stays on the tracks.
posted by James | 11:36 AM
1 Comments:
Yeah, that seems about right. Oddly most of the commenters seemed to think that one or the other of the corrections was sufficient by itself.
The substance of the post irked me a bit too. Of course Venezuela isn't as bad as the Soviet Union (at its worst, anyway), or even the worst modern dictatorship. It's still transparently undemocratic, and media personalities who cuddle up to Chavez look like impressionable dupes.
More broadly, I think it's good to have a diversified portfolio of criticism, contra Yglesias's implicit suggestion that a responsible pundit would be directing all their criticism towards Pakistan.
I found one commenter's criticism of Applebaum more cutting if true: is there really a trend of American celebs cozying up to Chavez, or did Applebaum just gin up the sightings of Campbell and Penn into a bogus trend?
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