General Commentary on Durbin and the Media

Blogpulse informs us that the "burstiest" person this week is the Honorable Richard Durbin.  It appears that the conservative hemiblogosphere is jumping all over his case, for comments he made about Guantanamo.  This impresses me as manufactured rage.  He did not say anything that hasn't been said before.  To use a favorite McClellanism, it is old news. And if you read the full text (PDF file hosted on TalkLeft) of what he said, you see that he was not condemning our military personnel categorically, as so many have implied.  His speech was carefully written; the wording is sufficiently precise to make a clear distinction between those who participated in the abuses cited in the FBI memos, and the rest of the military.  He was not "slandering his own country" as stated on Powerline.  In this post, I refute the criticism leveled against Durbin, speculate about the possible reason for the manufactured rage, and suggest the topic for the mainstream media to latch onto next.  Continue reading here.