Amen, Roger! This was a passage I found especially howling and Al Goresque:

“As a nation, we wage war on poor people in this country, not on poverty. In many ways we are a nation struggling to maintain our moral compass. Violence and dysfunction in poor black communities are under an especially glaring spotlight.”

First, any honest media critic, liberal or conservative, would tell you that black troubles in the inner cities are absolutely not in “an especially glaring spotlight,” at least not on television news.

But Shaw absolutely embodies the don’t-blame-the-victim mentality that Cosby attacked by using that bunk about “we wage war on poor people in this country.” Accuse most Americans of neglecting the poor in their busy lives? Fine. (I’d have to say I’m too often guilty of that.) But that also means they’re too busy working and supporting their own families to “wage war” on them, either. It’s not like middle-class people drive through poor neighborhoods, stealing their stuff, and trying to destroy their schools or their chances at steady employment. It’s this kind of guilt-tripping ultraliberal hyperbole that Bill Clinton realized was ruining Democratic electoral hopes 12 years ago. Shaw sounds like he’s still trapped in 1973.