Pardon me for finding this very funny:

Yesterday some fellow calling himself Anonymous Liberal, in the midst of an incoherent post, accused me of being “essentially a legal hitman” who “pores over [a nominee’s] record, finds some trivial fact that, when distorted and taken totally out of context, makes that person look like some sort of extremist.” Given that the fellow offered zero evidence in support of his charge—not a single alleged incident of “some trivial fact [that I] distorted and [took] totally out of context”—I figured that I’d just ignore him, as only an idiot would credit such an unsubstantiated allegation.

Only an idiot or Andrew Sullivan, it turns out.

Today, barely a week after I finally extracted a full retraction from Sullivan of his libelous claim that I “regularly defend[] … torture” and am a “torturer,” Sullivan has a short post, titled “The Right’s ‘Legal Hitman,’” that reads in its entirety, “Anonymous Liberal profiles Ed Whelan” (with link). Gee, that’s some “profile” Anonymous Liberal provided. And for Sullivan, after recklessly smearing me, to pass along an unsubstantiated (and baseless) assertion that I am a “hitman” is quite something. Evidently, Sullivan’s disordered conscience was rebelling against him for having apologized to me.

I have dimly in mind that Sullivan a couple decades ago had some intelligent things to say. I gather that some folks still read him (I don’t—I learned about his post only through an automated blog search), but I shall from now on presume that they either know his low standards or share them.