THE LESSONS OF CHAS FREEMAN.

Chas Freeman, Obama's choice for Director of the National Intelligence Council, has two potential problems that should not be confused. The first is a long paper trail that makes it perfectly clear he's not particularly sympathetic to Bibi Netanyahu or the Tienanmen Square protesters. The second is allegations of -- you guessed it -- financial improprieties.

If they manifest, Freeman will likely fall. If they don't, he'll survive. The backlash to Freeman's ideas has generated a backlash-backlash to the narrow band of opinions that's permissible to his critics. Over the weekend, Andrew Sullivan, Joe Klein, Josh Marshall, and James Fallows weighed in with eloquent defenses of Freeman. "This job calls for originality, and originality brings risks," wrote Fallows. "Chas Freeman is not going to have his finger on any button. He is going to help raise all the questions that the person with his finger on the button should be aware of." In The Wall Street Journal, A politically diverse collection of 17 former ambassadors jointly signed a letter supporting their former colleague. Charles Freeman, a conservative Bush appointee, also weighed in angrily and passionately in defense of his father. "The problem with - and the great virtue of - my Dad is that he has no political sensibility at all," said the younger Freeman. "Things none of us would say while we watch our flanks, he says flippantly. He jabs at Congressional perfidies and at established wisdoms and has punched the odd sacred cow in the face. But he's seriously smart."

But for Freeman's detractors, a loss might still be a win. As Sullivan and others have documented, the controversy over Freeman is fundamentally a question of his views on Israel. Barring a bad report from the inspector general, Chas Freeman will survive and serve. But only because his appointment doesn't require Senate confirmation. Few, however, will want to follow where he led. Freeman's career will likely top out at Director of the NIC. That's not a bad summit by any means. But for ambitious foreign policy thinkers who might one day aspire to serve in a confirmed capacity, the lesson is clear: Israel is off-limits. And so, paradoxically, the freethinking Freeman's appointment might do quite a bit to silence foreign policy dissenters who want to succeed in Washington.