Andrew Sullivan has written a book: The Conservative Soul: How We Lost It, How to Get It Back. Hugh Hewitt, in an unusual interview (by virtue of the fact that Hewitt had read the book carefully and had come prepared for a serious discussion of the book), made Sullivan look like a dodger and a fillibusterer. Hewitt's take on the interview:
The interview is tough but fair, and my observation that he didn't know the basics of American Constitutional law wasn't an insult, but an obviously correct assessment.
The reason Andrew has been the subject of quite a lot of scorn today is that he could not defend his mess of a book. He wrote a book about theology, but objected to questions about theology.
He made obvious errors of fact, and objected to those errors being pointed out to the audience.
And he is simply ill-informed about American Constitutional law, and I called him on it. It is, I suspect, embarrassing for
a would-be intellectual giant to be called on a lack of knowledge so profound on a subject on which he has presumed to write, especially as one theme of the book is the necessity of "knowing what you do not know." But I didn't write the book, and he is trying to promote it. Is it Andrew's position that he is above criticism and that his errors should go unremarked upon as an exercise of courtesy.
... In short, I think the book is an attempt to pass off easily exposed half truths and worse as objectively true assertions of fact in the service of a political agenda that Andrew Sullivan passionately wants the country to embrace but which it refuses to do. His anger throughout the interview stemmed, I have to conclude, from the sudden appearance across the microphone of a host who had read the book in detail, could call out its many flaws, and who refused to be diverted into non-book related subjects which required no defense of his own written words.
A transcript of the interview can be found here and the audio here.
Update: Listen here for a hilarious Hewitt-James Lileks seven-minute interview in which Lileks (a humorist and columnist) answers questions about the weather in the mode of Andrew Sullivan.
Update #2 - Ramesh Ponnuru, in another context, tells why he views Andrew Sullivan as "daft and dishonest."
Update #3 (10/28/06) - Hugh Hewitt amends a statement he made in the interview with Andrew Sullivan.
A digression: Andrew quotes an anonymous law prof who points out --correctly-- that race isn't the only classification that requires compelling reasons for the state to make distinctions when employing it. As all of my law students over a decade know, there are other such classifications, most especially religion.
But the anonymous law professor must also know that Andrew's book claims --in studied and proofed black and white, not in the rush of an interview-- that government must have a compelling reason to make distinctions between its citizens, which is flat out wrong, and which was my point, as is obvious from the interview. I won't accuse the law prof of bad faith unless I know who he or she is and what he or she wrote. Yes, I gave an incomplete account of the strict scrutiny classification. Here is the relevant exchange:
HH: Andrew, it’s not. It’s your book. You write, for example, on page 240, that the government needs a compelling reason to treat citizens differently. That’s flat-out wrong. That would flunk any law student in America. Are we supposed to ignore the fact that you do not have a basic grasp of Constitutional law?
AS: I deny that. I think that’s an insult, and you should withdraw it.
HH: Well, it says, page 240…
AS: I just want to know why you support torture.
HH: The government needs a compelling reason to treat citizens differently. That is 180 degrees wrong.
AS: You don’t think the basic equality of people in this country, the civil equality of people in this country, isn’t a critical element…
HH: Andrew, the government…the only time the government needs…
AS: …is a critical element of the American experiment?
HH: We’re going to a break. The only time the government needs a compelling reason to treat people differently is when they do so on the basis of race. I mean, that’s what’s so astonishing about this book, is that you purported to write a book about the Constitution, and you don’t know how it works.
AS: I didn’t write a book about the Constitution. I wrote a book about conservatism.
HH: We’ll come back and continue the conversation with Andrew Sullivan, who apparently wants to forget the last third of his book.
What I ought to have said is:
We're going to a break. One of the very, very few times that the government needs a compelling reason to treat people differently is when they do so on the basis of race. I mean, that's what's so astonishing about this book, is that you purported to write a book about the Constitution, and you don't know how it works.
That was an error on my part, one of many I have made in 17 years of broadcasting and a decade of teaching, but nevertheless an error. I should have taken the time to more fully school Andrew in the intricacies of Equal Protection analysis. I am glad to correct the error. But I note that the context in which I misspoke was a radio interview when I was pointing out that Sullivan had radically misstated the law completely, not incompletely stated it.
The key point: Sullivan's book's error is a major one as he argues the opposite of what is true. He does so on p. 240 of his book:
There is, in other words, a presumption in the way a government interacts with its own citizens. That presumption is that they will treat each citizen absolutely alike, unless it has a very compelling reason not to. And it is up to the government to prove it has a good reason to discriminate rather than up to a citizen to prove she is equal under the law.
If Sullivan would let us know the name of the professor, we could ask the professor if he or she agrees with Sullivan. He or she could not. No licensed lawyer much less Con Law professor could.
No one with a legal education in America can agree with Andrew on a major premise of his book.
Unlike Andrew, when I make a mistake, I am happy to come forward and say "Yes, that was wrong. I was careless in the statement, but not deceitful in making it."
Sullivan's refusal to admit error here is taking him close to deception, and not just about Con Law.
The theologians are now examining Sullivan's arguments on Vatican II and much more. Too late for him to issue a correction and an apology? His reputation, what was left of it, is in ruins. It will take a mighty effort to rebuild it. Possible, but not likely. But possible.
But believe it or not, I am hoping he tries. As Joe Carter has pointed out, Sullivan is a brother in Christ, and C.S. Lewis has made a declaration of extraordinary relevance here:
You have never talked to a mere mortal. Nations, cultures, arts, civilizations — these are mortal, and their life is to ours as the life of a gnat. But it is immortals whom we joke with, work with, marry, snub, and exploit — immortal horrors or everlasting splendors.
Like Sullivan, I am a sinner and in need of God's mercy and grace. I do not want to snub or exploit him. But I am concerned that his errors not gain traction in the Amerian public, for they are destructive of the Republic and quite obviously wrong. I would welcome the opportunity to find common ground, and perhaps an encore interview could proceed on the premise that we would only discuss those matters on which we agreed. Mark Roberts is already about the project of correcting Sullivan, but Dr. Roberts is pretty much a saint, and I am just a scribbler. I hope Sullivan reads Roberts very closely. Very closely indeed.