The New Republic's Marty Peretz draw a lot of fire a couple of weeks ago when he wrote in a blog post that "Muslim life is cheap" and that Muslims are undeserving of the "privilege" that is the First Amendment. Among those firing back at Peretz is his alma mater (and mine) Brandeis.
Students at the school have drafted a letter to Peretz, asking him to apologize for the comments.
And he has, although he stated "I wrote that, but I do not believe that," which is not something any writer should ever say. If you wrote it, then by definition yes, you do believe it, unless you're talking about something you wrote ten years ago, as opposed to last week.
But more importantly, he's lying- Peretz clearly DOES believe that, because he's a bigoted old coot who's been bashing Muslims verbally and in writing for something like two decades, and has a long, long paper trail to prove it.
I've always loved the New Republic, but the magazine's going to be missing some legitimacy and credibility for as long as Peretz is associated with it.