Deliver Us From O'Hanlon

Michael O'Hanlon can't be let within 100 yards of a position of power in the next Administration. I mean seriously, there should be a restraining order. Let him be the top foreign policy guy in his buddy St. Petraeus' 2012 run, but let's not believe that this guy helps Democrats in any way with his slavish repetition of right-wing talking points. The problem, of course, is that he sadly passes for a Democrat on the op-ed pages of most of the country.

That said, it may be good to have him around just for Spencer Ackerman paragraphs like this:

Michael O’Hanlon is a Brookings Institution defense expert who doesn’t actually know anything about defense. He does, however, know how to be a reliable barometer of what very-slightly-left-of-center establishment types believe should be said about defense. If anyone in the foreign-policy community respects O’Hanlon, I haven’t met him or her. I remember being at a barbecue in 2005 and remarking that O’Hanlon has never had an interesting thought in his life when an aide to John Bolton stood up, pumped the air with both fists, and bellowed, "Preach it, brother!" Well, that’s not entirely fair: everyone’s throat-clearing caveat about O’Hanlon is that he compiles the useful Brookings Iraq Index, a compendium of Iraq-relevant statistics. So as a foreign-policy mandarin, he makes a good intern.

This guy's an idiot and I'm trying to figure out how you excommunicate somebody from being the token Democrat on the talk show and lecture circuit.