Re: James Fulford's blog post Michael Brendan Dougherty Thinks We're Either "Race-Obsessed" Or "Racist"—Actually, Unlike Him, We're Fact Obsessed

From: Michael Brendan Dougherty [Email him]

James Fulford says

[Dougherty is] the author of The Castaway, January 14, 2007, which a correspondent described as "that godawful piece on Sam Francis." It is; it's more like a postmortem than an obituary.

One minor point—the Sam Francis piece. It isn't an obit. It was published long after he died. It has only been called an obit because certain people treasure the idea that it was another "hate-obit" like the David Mastio one.

James Fulford writes: I'll admit that Mastio's piece was more directly hateful, and, as Joe Sobran said at the time of Sam's death in 2005, it was simply "cobbled together" out of the files of  SPLC, ADL and other "other victimhood vigilantes who practice character assassination under the guise of fighting bigotry."

That being said, here is the significant quote from Dougherty's 2007 piece

In the Washington Examiner, former USA Today editorialist David Mastio wrote a widely noticed obituary: “Sam Francis was merely a racist and doesn’t deserve to be remembered as anything less. . . . America is a better place without him.” As a summary judgment, this may serve well enough, but it is possible and rewarding to look at Francis, his ideas, and the tragic arc of his career more charitably and, in the process, to salvage a number of genuine insights from the bitterness and noxious race-baiting Francis embraced in the last years of his life."

Sobran wrote that "So brave a man surely deserved better enemies. " That might also be said to apply to his friends.