The New Republic's planned leftward shift is off to a curious start. As I noted before, they still have a strange partnership with the Democratic Leadership Council, the increasingly irrelevant group of illiberal New Democrats. But this week's issue is especially telling.
*Here is an article -- a cover story on how to approach Iran, no less -- by Robert Kagan, an arch-neoconservative who, along with William Kristol, co-founded the Project for a New American Century. What kind of left-leaning paper has one of the world’s foremost unilateralist hawks writing a cover story on "What to do about Iran"? Only the New Republic. And it is not like the Kagan's do not have plenty of other outlets: they have the ear of the President, are called to testify before Congress, and of course, dominate the editorials in the Weekly Standard.
* Also featured is an article by Lee Seigel who is best know for coining the term "blogofacism" to describe liberal election blogs, and then losing his job when he posted comments under his piece pretending to be someone else praising his own work. Under the screenname 'sprezzatura' he wrote: "Siegel is brave, brilliant, and wittier than [Jon] Stewart will ever be. Take that, you bunch of immature, abusive sheep."
Stay classy, TNR.
