Writes Chris Matthews: “I’m not sure if you’ve been reading the Corner much but here’s the layout. David Freddeso and John Derbyshire are sympathtic to Dr. Paul’s campaign, not to say they support him but they watchdog the out of line comments, and occasionally remind other contributors he’s the only actual conservative running. The link you provided to the Corner is one of an ongoing spat between Rick Brookhiser and John Derbyshire.

“Brookhiser started by saying Paul will do well in Iowa because all of the ‘wicked idiots’ will come out of the closet for him, Derb linked Paul’s campaign issues and asked for him to name the one that was most wicked and the one most idiotic, your link points to his rebuttal, which is quite juvenile, and then Derb let him have it again.

Here’s a list of the links that contain the series.

Brookhiser starts here.

Derb responds

Here’s the smear you linked.

and here is Derb essentially laughing at him for his lack of a response.

“The contributors of National Review are a hodgepodge of mostly Giuliani and Romney supporters. One couldn’t claim Derb and Freddeso are Paul supporters, but I personally will never again question those two’s classical conservative bona fides.”