Journal-Sentinel editorial board funnies

The Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel's resident funnyman Patrick McIlheran on federal warrantless wiretapping:

"Hey, if it’s fascism when the CIA tracks cell phone calls to al-Qaida suspects ..."

Well no, that's hardly reflective of the objections to the Bush administration's surveillance program. It was the fact that the net was cast so widely that it was intercepting non-al-Qaeda non-suspects, a.k.a. private, law abiding American citizens.

You know, ends versus means, a crucial distinction with which Mr. McIlheran would do well to familiarize himself if he intends on invoking questions of constitutional doctrine (or, for that matter, the world as it exists beyond the feverish delusions of BDS sufferers).

"Patty," as he is known by his anti-fan club, goes on to compare — via one of his highly trusted sources: some anonymous right-wing blogger, who in turn sources the barely competent National Review "editor" Kathryn Jean Lopez — Bush's constitutionally questionable practices with some offhand remark by a Republican member of Obama's cabinet, the substance of which Obama rapidly kiboshed.

And lest we forget, none other than then-U.S. Senator Obama voted in favor of an amendment to the very Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act which Patty sarcastically derides as "fascism."

All of which appears in the immediate wake of Patrick McIlheran's colleague, Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel editorial board member David Haynes's irony-infused admonition to "bloggers who deliberately twist the facts to try to make their opponents look stupid."

Rhetoricians, heal thyselves.