I don’t mean to pick on any particular anti-Palin righty voice, I’m just going to pick David Brooks because he called Sarah Palin a cancer, and because, at the New York Times, he has one of the most prominent perches in opinion journalism. He can pick his column topic, and several times in recent weeks he’s felt the need to detail the flaws he sees in Palin, and McCain, and the conservative movement, and Republicans in general, etc., as well as what appeals to him about Obama (he’s a “homeostasis machine.”)
Presumably Brooks has some libertarian instincts, or some objections to abuse of power. Thus, one of these days he might decide to write about Democratic government officials in Ohio going through the state records of Joe the Plumber — Ohio Department of Job and Family Services, the Bureau of Motor Vehicles, in the Toledo Police Department’s criminal records, and in the office of the Attorney General. (Once you’ve donated the maximum allowed to Obama, as the director of the Ohio Department of Job and Family Services did, you lose the benefit of the doubt in my book.)
If you seek signs that Obama is a swell guy, you’ll see signs that he’s a swell guy. If you seek signs that he brings out the worst in people and that some of his supporters have genuinely dangerous ideas of what is acceptable behavior in a free society, you will see signs of that. Perhaps one of these days Brooks could stop looking for signs that Obama is what he wishes him to be (“Wow, what a fascinating discussion of Niebuhr! I’d love to see Sarah Palin try that!”) and take a look for the signs of what is actually done in his name.