'Wisconsin Leads Way'

“Times’ Slanted Wisconsin Coverage Contrasts With Their Treatment of Tea Party,” Jonathan S. Tobin writes at Commentary:

In 2009 and 2010 the New York Times covered protests against the Obama administration’s stimulus spending bill and health care plan as the barely legal revolt of an unwashed and uncivil band of reactionaries determined not only to halt what the paper considered progress but also to thwart democracy. But anyone looking at the Times’ front page article on Saturday describing protests against the effort by Wisconsin’s newly elected governor and legislature to balance the state’s books got a very different view of a protest movement.

Gerard van der Luen dissected the root causes of the Times’ headline on Saturday night: “NY Times Propaganda Writers Lead Way by Cribbing from Their Socialist Mentors.”

And as Allahpundit noted concurrently, “Frank Rich mocks GOP for incivility during ‘Scott Walker is Hitler’ weekend.”

Historically, Rich’s columns seem to rotate between comparing the GOP to Stalinists, Nazis and McCarthy. Who was the straw man this week?

A change up — it’s a straw woman argument for Rich this week:

Tickets to see Palin, announced at $185 on Jan. 16, eight days after Tucson, were slashed to half-price in early February. Then the speech was canceled altogether, with the organizers blaming “safety concerns resulting from an onslaught of negative feedback.” But when The Denver Post sought out the Glendale police chief, he reported there had been no threats or other causes for alarm. The real “negative feedback” may have been anemic ticket sales, particularly if they were to cover Palin’s standard $100,000 fee.

What may at long last be dawning on some Republican grandees is that a provocateur who puts her political adversaries in the cross hairs and then instructs her acolytes to “RELOAD” frightens most voters.

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