Hack Squared

In a great catch by a commenter, we find Mr. Glenn Harlan Reynolds endorsing Megan McArdle’s “Obama caved to the Bishops!” post based on the original argument made in its title, which turned out to be based on a glaring factual error that renders her argument wrong on its face. It seems worth noting here that McArdle was writing more than 4 and Reynolds more than 7 hours after the details of the plan were first released, so unlike for those of us who wrote about it as the news was breaking it didn’t even require much effort to get the basic details of the plan right. Unless you get all of your news from a few PUMA dead-enders it was hard to miss the fact that both supporters and opponents of the new regulation believed that there was no substantive concession (let alone a “180.”)

But Reynolds doesn’t just stop with an endorsement of a post anyone who knew anything about the issue would know was based on an erroneous premise. No, he goes on to argue this imaginary “caving” proves that the Obama administration was “living in a bubble.” Right. Of course, in the real world Obama’s position is popular, including among Roman Catholics; it’s Romney, forced to pander to a minority of cultural reactionaries, whose position is extremely unpopular here. And anybody who finds this surprising must be living in a bubble.