The subsequently revised Washington Post headline over the obituary of the killin’ caliph is a headline that will live in infamy among those who follow the mainstream media with a gimlet eye. In the eyes of the Post, the maniacal murderer was an “austere religious scholar.”
The Post headline aptly reflected the Trump derangement that has gripped the Post and its peers. If Trump had something to do with al-Baghdadi’s death, well, then he couldn’t have been all bad, could he?
The headline also reflected the derangement of the left more generally. The late James Burnham called it Suicide of the West in his “essay on the meaning and destiny of liberalism” (as Burnham’s subtitle has it).
Many of the observers taking to Twitter to mock the Post wittily captured elements of the Post’s derangement. Middle East analyst Michael Doran was one of them. In the tweet below Doran takes a “stab” at the Post’s putative headline for the obit of Psycho‘s Norman Bates.
Transgender pioneer, hotelier, and devoted son, Norman Bates, dies after devoting his golden years to solitary contemplation. #WaPoDeathNotices pic.twitter.com/W8OmPzeSZb
— Mike (@Doranimated) October 28, 2019
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