Ezra Klein, who once said no one pays attention to the constitution because it is so old, has decided Jimmy Carter’s “malaise speech” was popular. You will no doubt be not exactly surprised to learn that Hendrik Hertzberg totally believes the malaise speech was awesome too. Hertzberg was the speechwriter.

But that gets history wrong. Twenty and thirty-something pundits should know better.

As Ben Domenech, himself a former speech writer, notes in the context of Presidential speeches, the Carter speech was popular at first, but historically it is wrong to say it was popular as it came to be viewed very negatively. A pundit claiming it was popular should really note the popularly was fleeting instead of simply claiming it was popular. To this day, when seasoned politicos reference “malaise speeches” they do not mean popular speeches…

Matthew Yglesias is another example of pundits who just have no basic awareness of things that lead them to ask dumb questions like “Why does Ohio have so many separate medium-sized cities instead of a single giant metropolis?” and pondering why Miami didn’t expand more to the west, etc.