Andrew Sullivan smears Ben Smith: "Nobody expects the Spanish Inquisition!"

Ben Smith's profile of Andrew Sullivan was about as respectful -- even loving -- as you can get while still rejecting Sullivan's long-and-ongoing history of just asking questions about whether some groups of people are genetically inferior or superior to each other.

Sullivan opens his response thusly:

Nobody expects the Spanish Inquisition! But the press is mercifully free and Ben Smith can write what he wants. To be fair to Ben, he’s a man with ambitions at the New York Times. After the woke coup there earlier this summer, he had no choice but to call yours truly a racist if he seeks a future at that paper. He knows what happened to James Bennet for crossing the critical race activists now in control of what was once the paper of record. And he reported a lot about my career that the far left wants to erase entirely from the record, for which I am grateful.

In other words: Sullivan refuses to consider the possibility that Smith really believes Sullivan is wrong about this stuff. Even though, as he notes later in the column, lots and lots of people think Sullivan is wrong about this stuff. No, Ben Smith is a careerist with ignoble motives.

Sullivan doesn't provide any evidence behind his assertion, instead puffing his chest about defending free discourse. "I believe that’s what journalists should do: air a debate as responsibly as possible." Fair enough. But if you're going to be a journalist, you can't just say stuff -- you have to root what you say in provable facts, and then show your work. Smith tried to treat Sullivan with respect, even though he disagrees with Sullivan. Sullivan did not reciprocate.