In today’s edition of Best of the Web, James Taranto juxtaposes these two amusing anecdotes:

The author of “Primary Colors” is growing increasingly unhinged, the Washington Post reports:

A debate between Time’s Joe Klein and New Republic’s Jamie Kirchick spilled off the dais Tuesday into a hallway confrontation where Klein called the younger pundit a “dishonest [expletive]” and “[expletiving] propagandist.”

Klein told us Wednesday that he’s not sure he uttered the “propagandist” bit — reported by a few witnesses–but stands by the “dishonest” part.

“Absolutely. He’s a [expletive],” said Klein, 62. “He’s 25 years old, and he’s one of those people who has opinions but no facts or experience.” . . .

Said Klein: “When I was Kirchick’s age, I was every bit as unnuanced about the war in Vietnam as he is now about this war. He says I patronized him. Guilty as charged!”

For crying out loud, Joe, your “war” with a 25-year-old is hardly the equivalent of Vietnam. The New York Post, meanwhile, reports on a scuffle in uptown Manhattan:

A prominent Columbia architecture professor punched a female university employee in the face at a Harlem bar during a heated argument about race relations, cops said yesterday.

Police busted Lionel McIntyre, 59, for assault yesterday after his bruised victim, Camille Davis, filed charges. . . .

The professor, who is black, had been engaged in a fiery discussion about “white privilege” with Davis, who is white, and another male regular, who is also white, Friday night at 10:30 when fists started flying, patrons said.

In a hilarious example of political correctness, the New York Times reports on the McIntyre-Davis bout omits McIntyre’s race, although it does say he “liked to engage fellow patrons on the subject of race.”

We hear rumors, though, that Klein and McIntyre have been cast in a forthcoming sequel to “Grumpy Old Men.”

At the New Ledger, Benjamin Kerstein asks an increasingly reasonable sounding question regarding the current state of Joe’s acumen.