Democrats can be Asshats, too.

I try to be even-handed. Usually I fail, more often due to lack of time or interest. But I certainly deplore it when Democrats act badly- particularly since it gives ammo to Republicans.

So let me briefly weigh in on the following issues:

- Don Imus. World-class jackass. Possible misogynist, racist, and general dislikeable douche. IMO, didn't deserve to get fired. Or at least not by coercion through popular outrage. By the same token, wasn't apparently smart enough to help himself avoid it.

Comedians and commentators interviewed over the past several days offered numerous explanations for why Mr. Imus failed the funny test so spectacularly this time, after years of dealing in the same kind of material.
For one thing, they said, the danger was more acute for his show because it confused the kinds of expectations that humor needs to succeed. While Howard Stern’s guests, for example, tend to follow the stripper-bum-drunk-fallen-celebrity continuum fairly closely, Mr. Imus made his name by making his show a forum for serious thought and serious thinkers.
“It really is about expectations when you get down to it,” said Larry Wilmore, a longtime comedy writer who is a correspondent on “The Daily Show With Jon Stewart.” (He is billed as the show’s “senior black correspondent” though he is also its sole black correspondent, and he often uses raced-based humor.)
“I mean you just can’t say, ‘So let’s talk about what’s happening to the economy this week, and up next, nappy-headed hos!,’ ” he said. “People get confused.”
He added that while Mr. Stern and many other white comedians trafficking in race-and-gender-based humor — Sarah Silverman, Sacha Baron Cohen — make it clear to one degree or another that they are playing a role, Mr. Imus has presented himself more or less as Don Imus, a craggy-faced contrarian in a 10-gallon hat.
And while he might have been trying to sling street lingo for its discordant comic effect — as if to say, “Isn’t it ridiculous to hear this coming from a guy who looks like me?” — he was not able to pull it off. Instead, it seemed merely provocative, another sop thrown to his more Neanderthal fans, the kind he has been throwing for years.
“I have a mathematical equation for all this,” said Mr. Wilmore. “White guy plus black slang equals comedy. But here’s where the equation breaks down. White guy plus black slang minus common sense equals tragedy.”
“I think he failed comedically more than anything else,” he added.
As many people have remarked, he also fumbled badly in choosing a target for his joke — a specific and sympathetic target, a come-from-behind women’s basketball team that had just lost a tough championship game. He did not level his lampoon at all black people or all women or, alternately, the kinds of supposedly bulletproof figures used for target practice by the comedy world all the time — politicians, reality-show contestants and celebrities like, for example, Jennifer Lopez.
“That kind of humor works pretty well from below, when you are blasting people who are powerful and rich and who can’t be hurt much,” said Victor Raskin, a professor of English and linguistics at Purdue University and an editor of the International Journal of Humor Research. “But here, it doesn’t work, racist or not.”
Or as the Harvard scholar Henry Louis Gates Jr., put it: “If he had decided to parody the hip-hop world or whomever he got this lingo from, then maybe that would have been funny. But I think his primary goal was to elicit shock, not to make people laugh.”
Some people interviewed suggested that Mr. Imus’s career might have had at least a slim chance of survival if he had parried the attacks by simply being really funny, instead of making the customary rounds of repentance and apologia.
Mr. Kelly cited the example of Ms. Silverman, who was criticized for using an epithet offensive to many Asian-Americans in a joke during “Late Night With Conan O’Brien” in 2001. She never apologized and even worked the incident itself into a new comedy bit that continued to use the word — in essence, defending her comedy with comedy (though many viewers were not placated and will never find the joke funny).
Mr. Wilmore said that instead of apologizing Mr. Imus probably “should have said, ‘You know, it’s hard out here for a pimp.’ Or something like that. Say something really funny.”
“It’s his job to remind people that he’s irreverent, and he’s a satirist,” he added. “I certainly would have done that. I’d have tried to entertain my way out of it.”

While I don't think Imus deserved to get fired, from a strategic point of view, his responses all but ensured he'd get canned. This is not to say I'm opposed to people apologizing when they've done wrong, but the trend seems to support folks who act like Ann Coulter- if you refuse to acknowledge you did anything wrong, you've got a better shot of weathering the storm. The real blame here is less on Imus and more on whatever idiots he's got giving him advice, and letting folks like Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson (I'm not a fan) control the discourse. Incidentally, lest anyone start ranting about how it's just the left that wants to control speech, I offer you this gem from FOX. Conversely, here are a few examples of liberals who still believe in free speech. Not conclusive, but not to be ignored, either. Ironically, Rosie O'Donnell defended Imus' right to be a jackass, but her enemies at FOX and elsewhere have used the Imus incident as another weapon to beat her over the head with. Interesting. Some more analysis here and here.

Of course, let's also not forget that while we're all wanking off about Imus, real problems in the black community are still getting ignored. Put some of that righteous anger to some good use for a change. Take home message- at the end of the day, free speech good, national distractions bad.

- On the other side of the coin- no, I don't agree with Rosie O'Donnell's 9/11 comments, hopefully for obvious reasons. However it occurs to me that the Fox News crowd is beating this story to death. Yes, Rosie has a following, but there seems to be little indication that her legions of fans are becoming recruited into the 9/11 truth movement or other such nonsense.

- Duke Rape Case. I paid no attention to this. I have much more interesting things going on in my life. However, it looks like Nifong took America for a ride and the media swallowed it whole. Not cool. Throw the book at him. (I'm not fond of ambush journalism, though, but that's a personal thing.)

- And of course, there's Congress being a bunch of dill-holes. Hey guys, I know that compared to the Republicans' last spending jag, you guys are still in the chump change range, but this really doesn't look good (oh yeah, and you're wasting our money). Combine this with your post-election muzzling of the Republicans, and we really aren't off to that good a start. Traveling on Congressional business (when it's ACTUALLY business) is fine. Five-star resorts? A bit much. Throw us idealists a bone and rise above this stuff a little.

Hat-tip: Boker Tov, Boulder.