It Does Not Mean What They Think It Means
by digby
Weigel reports on the Tea Party convention’s reaction to the news that their speaker Lou Dobbs employed illegal immigrants:
Steve Bannon, an organizer of this convention and director of a trilogy of Citizens United-Sponsored films, was disgusted.”It’s the politics of personal destruction,” said Bannon, “and it keeps happening. Sarah Palin. Niki Haley. Bill O’Reilly. Rush Limbaugh and oxycontin. Christine O’Donnell, whatever you think of her. It’s the same thing.
Well, he would know all about the politics of personal destruction if he works for Citizens United. They pretty much invented the modern form.
But here’s the thing. The politics of personal destruction are about political opponents using character attacks against their rivals. There is a case to be made that there has been some of that against Palin, Haley and O’Donnell, although in Haley’s case it was a former staffer who came forward and O’Donnell’s resume is so thin that the lies on it decimate her claim to qualifications for office.
But Bill O’Reilly and Rush Limbaugh deserve every single bit of personal destruction they get. They are themselves personal destroyers and they have begged to have their glass houses exploded all around them. Limbaugh is an admitted drug addict who has shown absolutely no compassion for others and O’Reilly is an admitted crude sexual harrasser. There is nothing unfair about anything those two scumbags have gotten. In fact they haven’t gotten enough.
But it’s typical of the right wing to claim victimhood when they are caught red handed doing the same things they accuse others of. It’s just how they roll.
By the way, Weigel also reports that they moved the convention from Vegas because “this is a movement with a lot of religious people — they don’t want to go to Sin City.” So much for the libertarian revolution.
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