Hastings, who spent the run-up to the war as an intern at Newsweek, writes that supporting the war was cast in overlapping media and foreign-policy circles as being on the cutting edge of thinking, that being anti-war meant risking irrelevance as some kind of lefty throwback.

"And what were the consequences for getting it wrong? Zip," he writes, linking to a 2004 Slate piece listing "war rationalizations and mea culpas" and noting that most of the writers cited there have gained in prestige since then, "despite getting what will probably be the biggest foreign policy question of their lifetime wrong."

"That's why supporting the war was always the savvy career move," Hastings concludes. "If the war went bad, you could always change your opinion. And by sticking with the herd, you were assured protection if the herd changed direction."

Over in the far more trivial realm of sports, Will Leitch, formerly of Deadspin and now an editor at New York, calls this "writing for the press box." In his appearance with the melting-down Buzz Bissinger on Bob Costas' HBO show last year, Leitch said that he doesn't apply for press credentials to ballgames because "the minute I start doing that, I start writing for the other people in the press box ... I get a lot of benefit from having that distance."

Here's wishing a few more of the big sluggers in the media game felt the same way.

Photo: Anti-war protest in New York, March 2003. (Flickr/Kevin Krejci)