I agree with most of what you are saying. But, while canonization is an overstatement (and I would suggest, a pretty obvious one), I think you are underrating the over-correction.

I was not confining my reaction to what has been written in these pages, but even here, after it was clear that the edited version of the tape had cast Shirley Sherrod in an unfairly bad light, there were descriptions of the full speech that portrayed her in an unduly positive light. Steve, for example, was quite right to encourage people to view the entire tape, and gave a very good summary of the speech. But when he moved from reporting facts to gleaning the lessons we might draw from those facts, he described her speech as being “about overcoming racist views,” and said that she doesn’t view whites with a prejudiced eye anymore. Rich was persuasive in explaining how Ms. Sherrod had been done in by “the culture of offense,” in which she was condemned before having a meaningful opportunity to defend herself. But he portrayed the speech as “the tale of someone overcoming hatred and rancor when she had every reason not to.”

After watching the whole thing, I must respectfully disagree with these assessments of the speech and of what we’re to make of Ms. Sherrod today. I agree that she has great cause to be spiteful, as you ably recount. But real transcendence stories are inspiring because it is so hard to overcome hatred when one is justified in hating. From what I can see, she hasn’t transcended the hatred. She has redirected it at a different, narrower target. And even after evolving, as it were, from racism to class warfare, she is still obsessed by race (as are the NAACP and, broadly speaking, the Obama administration). Of course she shouldn’t have been forced out of her job without due process, but that doesn’t mean the full speech should give anyone great comfort that she is in her job in the first place.

In any event, here at NRO, the revisionist lionizing of Ms. Sherrod has been tame compared to the treacle gushing out of the legacy media, and that is what I was mainly reacting to. As I should perhaps have made clearer, I did not pay the story any mind when it broke. My window into it has been the media pendulum swing after the full context of the speech became known. Maybe I’d have a different view if my first impression — like yours, Steve’s and Rich’s — had been formed by the lousy way Ms. Sherrod was forced out. And maybe I am sensitive to the attacks on Andrew — not only because I know and like him, but because, only last week, I posted something without checking it out thoroughly enough to learn it was a parody, and in so doing cast Sen. Chris Dodd in an unfairly bad light. I know first-hand (and it’s not the first time) that you can be rash without being malevolent.

Nor am I saying Ms.Sherrod should not be restored to her job (assuming she still wants it). No one has been a harsher critic of Attorney General Holder than I have, but I’ve also disagreed with those who say he should be fired over his policy judgments. My beef with these folks is philosophical, and President Obama’s subordinates in the sprawling executive branch are just the fall-out, not the problem.

I’d love to see other people in their jobs — and in many cases, see their jobs trimmed down or eliminated. That way, the federal government would do far less and would not have the wherewithal it now has to divide Americans. But we have to win that argument and then follow through. Until then, while I don’t like being ruled by Leftists and bureaucrats, a Leftist won the presidential election and the bureaucracy is simply implementing his policies. I want to beat them fair and square, not slander them. Neither, however, should they be portrayed as something more noble than they are.