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I'm genuinely of the opinion that Greenwald was compromised somehow right around the time of the Snowden revelations. Before then, he was an acerbic jerk writi

I'm genuinely of the opinion that Greenwald was compromised somehow right around the time of the Snowden revelations. Before then, he was an acerbic jerk writing with moral clarity about the persistent overreach of the US security state. His writing had crunch and specificity, and his targets were all over the political map. But post-Snowden, he took a hard partisan turn. He'd enter regular tiresome disagreements where really the only argument was over who was being more hyperbolic or hypocritical. And he... ignore stuff you're really expect he'd care about. He spent years flogging the media for overemphasis of Russian interference because it was a "crazy conspiracy theory" but I swear he never once said a peep about Q. Really, if you knew nothing about the guy's history and just read his 2016-20 writing, you'd just figure he was an oddbally high brow Trump fan. And very notably: this was true ONLY in his writing about US policy. His Brazil stuff was widely regarded (by others -- I don't speak Portuguese nor am I an expert on Brazilian politics) as just as good (and acerbic) as his earlier work about the Bush administration. Maybe it's just branding. Maybe he figured he'd do better career-wise selling his work into a right wing market than he would continuing to criticize everyone. But... that doesn't sound right to me, because he's not exploiting typical right wing audiences nor using right wing platforms to do it. Something happened to Greenwald c. 2013-14

lazulicurio 6y ago
To me, I think that the core of his criticisms are still valid, but it seems like he's adopted an accelerationist's take on politics. That it's possible to provoke the security state to self-destruction. Which I feel is, at best, a naive take.
zpeti 6y ago
Come on, you are saying that greenwald is compromised because he attacks the left, yet he’s done good work at the same time on Brazil and bush? So which is it? He’s crazy when he’s talking about others but not your side? Could it be that he is correct and you are unable to process the fact that Obama was in fact absolutely terrible for whisteblowers and journalists? Btw, just look at the statistics.
- microtherion 6y ago
  Alternatively, you could argue that maybe Greenwald when writing about Brazil is doing good work because he has a first person perspective about a country in the grip of an authoritarian whose views are particularly threatening to GG because of his sexual orientation. Whereas when he writes about the US, he argues from a detached accelerationist perspective that letting it all burn down is good because it gets rid of the security state he so detests (and not, I might add, without reason). But this detachment in this case does not do his writing any favors, because it both glosses over the very real harm being done by this burning down, and takes a massively over-optimistic view of accelerationism as a strategy.

lazulicurio 6y ago

To me, I think that the core of his criticisms are still valid, but it seems like he's adopted an accelerationist's take on politics. That it's possible to provoke the security state to self-destruction. Which I feel is, at best, a naive take.

zpeti 6y ago

Come on, you are saying that greenwald is compromised because he attacks the left, yet he’s done good work at the same time on Brazil and bush? So which is it? He’s crazy when he’s talking about others but not your side? Could it be that he is correct and you are unable to process the fact that Obama was in fact absolutely terrible for whisteblowers and journalists? Btw, just look at the statistics.

microtherion 6y ago
Alternatively, you could argue that maybe Greenwald when writing about Brazil is doing good work because he has a first person perspective about a country in the grip of an authoritarian whose views are particularly threatening to GG because of his sexual orientation. Whereas when he writes about the US, he argues from a detached accelerationist perspective that letting it all burn down is good because it gets rid of the security state he so detests (and not, I might add, without reason). But this detachment in this case does not do his writing any favors, because it both glosses over the very real harm being done by this burning down, and takes a massively over-optimistic view of accelerationism as a strategy.