Will the real Marty Peretz Please Stand Up?

By Ed Lasky

First, at the end of December The New Republic's Martin Peretz writes that he is has qualms with Obama's Foreign Policy advisers and lists, in particular, Zbigniew Brzezenski, Anthony Lake, Susan Rice, and Robert Malley as being sources of his anxiety.

Then, apparently in response to entreaties from the Obama campaign (he supports Obama) he wrote a blog item that there are spooky rumors circulating regarding Obama's Foreign Policy advisers. He tries to dismiss these concerns by , in his own words, taking "one example"- Robert Malley. Peretz goes on to write that Malley is not a foreign policy adviser to the campaign-without even mentioning his own previous post just a few weeks before when he discussed his worries about Malley's role as a foreign policy adviser to Obama (the Washington Post listed Malley as an adviser late last year).

Peretz never went on to touch upon the role of other foreign policy advisers-apparently assuming his readers would assume that if Malley was not an adviser, than we should just assume the others are not foreign policy advisers either or we should not be concerned about them. Now he goes back to the other Martin Peretz and writes that we should be concerned thatObama has Zbigniew Brzezenski, Tony Lake, and Susan Rice as foreign policy advisers.

In the wake of the kerfuffle over Obama's Foreign Policy team, the camapign has been making the rounds denying that Malley has a role as an advisor. The camapign never objected to the Washington Post's reporting he was an advisor, or Martin Peretz confirmation until it became a political problem.

According to Ben Smith of Politico, Malley has "given his advice to the campaign." This is a rather anodyne statement. Malley has been obsessed with Israel (and not in a supportive way) and has advocated repeatedely for outreach to tyrants and terrorists. How likely was it that his advice did not focus on Israel? Seems like wordplay and spin is at work.

In the end, will the real Marty Peretz stand up?