I said this suggested Biskupic's true target was Doyle, adding a new dimension of unfairness to Thompson's conviction, later vacated by a state appeals court. Robinson had a different take:
"Isn't this what we expect our prosecutors to do, where they try to flip underlings to get the higher-ups? This is...an utterly common and perfectly ethical practice. And frankly, I would have been shocked if they weren't doing that....
"Honestly, Bill, I read your story and I was like, 'Well, duh.'"
This from a guy whose big scoop that day was a post about "butt facials," the latest spa craze. Also a guy whose idea of an oppressed minority is oil company execs raking in record profits, and who has compared the faith some people have in the science of global warming to believing that the earth is flat.
I don't mean to pick on Robinson. He's a nice young man who posts a truly impressive amount of copy (has he ever had an unpublished thought?) and is well prepared to debate the issues of the day.
In fact, Robinson and others I've been paired with on this show have helped me to see that conservatives can be, all at the same time, smart, principled and wrong.
Despite their distaste for big government, many conservatives want to believe the best about people in power, in both the corporate and political realms. That's not a bad impulse, but it can cause selective blindness.
Thus, Robinson is eager to excuse everything done to Georgia Thompson because that's easier than admitting she was the victim of a great injustice.
This strikes me as a conservative core rule. Let's call it Reinterpret reality to avoid paining one's conscience. Here are some others:
Never be shocked by anything Republicans do. So Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, when he was the president's top lawyer, visited the hospital room of then-AG John Ashcroft, recovering from major surgery, and tried to get him to sign off on warrantless wiretaps. Ashcroft refused, and the incident nearly sparked a host of high-level resignations. Gonzales, also implicated in the political firings of eight U.S. attorneys, later assured Congress there had "not been any serious disagreement" about the wiretap program, which the president authorized anyway.
Normal reaction: Good grief! What does a person have to do to get fired around here?
Conservative reaction: President Bush says he has full confidence in Gonzales, and that's good enough for me. Besides, the people making a fuss over this are just trying to score cheap political points. For shame.
Always blame the poor slobs who get crushed, never the powerful people who crush them. So Kimberly Prude of Milwaukee is serving a two-year prison term for having voted, before learning she was ineligible to do so because she was on probation. Biskupic, under intense pressure from Republicans seeking to milk the phony issue of voter fraud, brought the charges against her.
Normal reaction: Jeez, is locking up grandmas who vote by mistake really what prisons are for? And is this, like the Georgia Thompson case, maybe a politically motivated prosecution?
Conservative reaction: If you can't do the time, don't do the crime. Every ineligible vote (and, for all we know, there could be dozens!) threatens the republic. What would be shocking is if Biskupic didn't make a federal case out of Prude's transgression.
Deny the obvious. Alexander Cockburn once had a great line about a public official holding a gun from which smoke is visibly flowing while declaring, "There is no smoking gun!" That's kind of like Tony Snow, the Fox news "reporter" turned White House spokesman, denying that recent events have undermined Gonzales' effectiveness: "I don't think [so]. A lot of people have been trying very hard to turn this into a big story, to no avail."
Normal reaction: What are you talking about? Of course it's a big story. Even some Republicans are calling for his resignation. Are you daft?
Conservative reaction: President Bush says he has full confidence in Gonzales, and that's good enough for me. And stop trying to score cheap political points!
Ignore outrageous statements by the right while decrying those by the left. (Bonus rule: Anyone who makes outrageous statements and is not a known conservative is by definition a lefty.) Ann Coulter can accuse 9/11 widows of glee over their loved ones' deaths and call John Edwards a "faggot," and she's still welcome on Fox. But let Rosie O'Donnell or some movie star oppose the war or criticize the president, and Bill O'Reilly and the gang blow a gasket over the lunatic pronouncements of "the far left."
Normal reaction: Noam Chomsky is a leftist. So are Katha Pollitt, Eric Alterman, Barbara Ehrenreich and even John "I want to impeach the president!" Nichols. But Rosie O'Donnell? Ward Churchill? Sean Penn? Give me a break.
Conservative reaction: We have to stop the haters from dominating the discussion. It's too bad they already control the media.
Treat perfectly sensible comments as outrageous statements. Witness Rudy Giuliani's slap-down of Texas Rep. Ron Paul at a Republican candidates' debate for pointing out that 50 years of U.S. meddling in the Middle East has something to do with our being targeted by terrorists. Guiliani said he had never heard anything so "absurd." The audience cheered.
Normal reaction: Ignoring historical root causes and geopolitical realities does not make us safer; it just makes us dumber and more vulnerable.
Conservative reaction: Clap, clap, clap! Let him have it, Rudy! They hate us for our freedom! Clap, clap, clap!
