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The Right Whines

This is so typical of the BPAC (Bush Policy Apologists Cabal) and is just too irritating to ignore. You have this little smart ass college kid with too much time and money on his hands, all dewy-eyed because his hero, the Great Deceiver in Chief is in town and he gets in the face of burly blue collar worker who is struggling to meet his mortgage because of Bush's economic policies. What did they expect? That the union guy was going to thank this spoiled brat, whose parents are probably still paying his bills, for his input?

If Margolis really wanted to make a civilized statement, he should have waved his sign on his own side of the street or kept his mouth shut. Instead he paid the price for his bad manners by -- oh, the horror -- getting pushed down on the sidewalk and now the BPAC has jumped on the story like a flock of ravenous vultures and turned it into another plastic turkey in a teapot event.

Guess it's not that surprising since they certainly can't find anything substantive to defend in Bush administration policy. When in doubt, they throw the facts out and focus on the inane.

It's going to a long election year.

UPDATE: I'm surprised at the reaction I'm getting on this post. To all of you who are accusing me of excusing thuggery, let me clarify my position.

Don't be ridiculous. I don't condone violence, but neither will I condemn it when Margolis deliberately provoked it. By his own account he continued to engage this man in uninvited debate, even when he saw that he was upsetting him.

Margolis, enjoying the privilege of an expensive college education, verbally pushed this guy first. The union guy probably didn't get the same advantage, so he fought back with what he had, his fists - and Margolis is, or should have been, smart enough to know that he was likely to do so.

There's a difference between voicing your opinion and abusing your First Amendment right by inciting violence and Margolis crossed the line. Further, he admits that the injuries were minor. By his own description of the event, it appears to have been on the level of a bar scuffle and judging from the photograph, I have no doubt that if the union guy had wanted to, he could have seriously injured any one of those kids.

That aside, what irritated me initially was the right's rush to turn this into a big incident. They would have ignored it or dismissed it had the players' political affiliations been reversed. Instead they turn it into another toy for Tim Blair, who is probably getting very tired of chewing on that plastic turkey by now.