Kevin M. Levin weather vane UPDATE: UPDATE 2:

Kevin M. Levin had this extraordinary posting. The title of which is, "In Favor of Confederate Monuments."

http://cwmemory.com/2017/08/29/in-favor-of-confederate-monuments/

The author we are told is, "a experience instructor in professional military education, who wishes to remain anonymous." Levin also has a disclaimer "Publication of this piece should not be interpreted as constituting agreement with its content."

Since it is anonymous the question has to be asked whether Levin himself wrote it. I don't think he did since I don't think he is a dishonest person. However, without a name of an acknowledged author, we can't entirely exclude Levin. Perhaps the author will step forward, but until he does, we can't exclude Levin.

There was a lot of negative feedback by the people who read his blog. However, Levin doesn't really make a clear statement. Levin in an update writes, "I hear you and will re-consider my policy. I fully admit that I may have dropped the ball one this one." So Levin "fully admits" a "may"?  A self-cancelling statement. Also, he will "re-consider," which means he may not do anything in regards to any "policy" he has.

Normally postings that are anonymous aren't taken seriously, but Levin has adopted a policy to give anonymous postings credibility.

The essay is delusional, a historical and really rubbish.  It is a rant.

Even if you wanted to have a policy where you published counter-pieces to your opinions, I think that you would want the opposing opinions to be credible. You could be accused of picking opposing essays that were bad to support your position.

I speculate what might be happening is this. A lot of civil war enthusiasts, Civil War Round Tables, Lost Cause people, Romance of Reunion and Civil War Centennial types are enraged. A lot of the local historical society types are enraged. The Confederate statues are tumbling down everywhere. They probably aren't happy with Kevin M. Levin's new position. He is probably getting some fairly strong feedback on his recent shift in opinion on Confederate monuments. Enthusiasts for the Confederacy can be fairly vitriolic and faces turn red when you are not buying into their rationalizations.

So it seems to me that Levin has come up with a plan to have his blog push two two opposing opinions on monuments to placate these people and yet still keep his position as being opposed to Confederate monuments. Suddenly the blog with a point of view is becoming a forum.

Levin justifies the post saying it is "getting people engaged with the argument of whether you or I agree with it." I suppose it does. A holocaust denial piece would likely do the same thing.

A posting advocating a flat earth would engage people but would be of little value.

The essay by the anonymous author is so bad does it really engage anyone? As a piece to argue for Confederate monuments is is just ranting and can't be considered an effective argument for Confederate statues. Levin abandons any pretense of editorial quality in publishing it.

As for the anonymity of the posting, it seems to me a little cowardly.

UPDATE:

Levin has this post by himself in which he explains how much he disagrees with the anonymous posting. I think we see Levin's strategy in operation. He can placate Lost Causers and then reject them and position himself as anti-Lost Cause while still providing the Lost Cause people a platform.

http://cwmemory.com/2017/08/31/a-response-to-anonymous/

UPDATE2:

Perhaps the anonymous essay is a soft ball pitched so Levin can hit it with a bat.