We suspect that James Taranto are just being disingenuous when they claim to be surprised that it's so hard to find anyone who is willing to defend Michael Savage.
They are, of course, absolutely right that those who likened the Dixie Chicks controversy to censorship or crushing of dissent were quite mistaken. That was ridiculous. But do Taranto really mean to say that Natalie Maines's disrespectful, inappropriate, banal comments about the President are in any way comparable to Savage's having told a gay caller, on the air: "you should only get AIDS and die, pig!"? It seems to us that that is indeed what Taranto are implying.
Where's the outrage? (Yeah, they actually asked "where's the outrage?" Check it yourselves.) We know the double-standard posts seem to write themselves sometimes, but come on. You're starting to give asking where the outrage is a bad name.
UPDATE: Here's our favorite comment on Savage so far.
Posted by Dr. Frank at July 8, 2003 10:30 PM | TrackBackWe thought your response to Taranto was brilliant. Dr. Frank are to be commended.
(By "we," of course, we mean "I"--not to be confused with the other people at my home blog.)
Personally, we've thought for a long time that whenever people demand OUTRAGE(!)(?) from others, they're usually overlooking something obvious, being purposefully obtuse, or overworking a poor analogy.
Posted by: Greg at July 8, 2003 11:13 PMWe think you all brought this up as an excuse to talk funny.
Posted by: Dave Bug at July 8, 2003 11:14 PMMan. This is one of the reasons I quit reading Taranto....he takes partisan whining/drek to a new level.
Posted by: Jane Finch at July 8, 2003 11:22 PMWe are not amused, either, but we are confused. This is like waking up in a Twilight Zone episode to find that nobody talks the way I remember. Er, uh, "we" remember.
Posted by: Jason Toon at July 9, 2003 02:58 PMWe hates it! We hates it!
Posted by: Chris Kerstiens at July 9, 2003 04:39 PM