No, What He Said Was....

Over at the Volokh Conspiracy, the host is relentless in his flyspecking of Slate's Bushisms. (I have no real interest in reading the Bushisms themselves, let alone Prof. Volokh's dissections.) Perhaps, though, Prof. Volokh should stop worrying about what is happening in other online publications, and start looking at his own. As Prof. Volokh often notes, the Bushisms are meant as humor. This post by the relentlessly partisan Jonathan Adler was not:

How should one interpret Gore's statement that it is "appropriate to have an over-representation of factual presentations on how dangerous it is." Is this a call for environmental activists to exaggerate or stretch the truth? Or merely an argument for emphasizing certain facts? I'd be curious what readers think.

How about the possibility that he meant exactly what he said - that it is appropriate to keep hammering the facts because the issue is so important?

Adler defends his motives,

UPDATE: Some commenters below speculate about my motives for this post. Contrary to the suggestion of Kieran and some of the others, this was not an effort to ridicule or disparage Gore — various selections from his book or earlier interviews would have better served that purpose. I was pointed to the quote by someone who thought that it was quite damning. Unconvinced, I was curious to see what readers of this blog made of the quote when presented in context.

That's the sort of defense that, in my opinion, should be annotated with "[Bats eyes innocently]". (Crediting mythago for her many amusing uses of that particular annotation.)