HERE'S HOW BUNDY COULD BECOME A RIGHT-WING MARTYR/HERO AGAIN

Right-wingers are now distancing themselves from Cliven Bundy's racist remarks about "the Negro." But even if his conservative supporters in the media and in public office now want to hold him at arm's length, I assume his armed followers will stand by him, given the likelihood that many of them feel exactly the way he does about African-Americans, or at least don't consider his opinions a dealbreaker.

But will the right-wing media continue to keep its distance if there's another attempt to bring him to justice? No. Let me tell you what the right-wing noise machine's line will be in that case: Cliven Bundy was a martyr to political correctness. Yes, that's right: Sean Hannity and others will ignore his decades of defying the law and say he was fined/arrested/deprived of his cattle because of what he said about black people. He'll be a free-speech martyr.

He'll be compared to the Innocence of Muslims filmmaker and others the Obama administration is supposedly trying to "silence," including Dinesh D'Souza (charged with violating campaign finance laws by a federal prosecutor) and the tea party groups who had trouble getting tax-exempt status from the IRS. Conservatives such as Ted Cruz and Victor Davis Hanson have lumped those folks together as a class of people punished for speech in the Obama years, and Bundy will be added to the list.

Or there might be a different, non-Obama-centric list: Phil Robertson, Paula Deen, Brendan Eich. The liberal fascists destroyed all of them -- for speech! Bundy will be said to be the latest victim.

Trust me on this. If there's any attempt to hold Bundy accountable now, it will be said that his racist remarks were the real reason. Sean Hannity will be his biggest supporter again.

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(This and an earlier post are now edited to remove references to "Cliven Bunker." I'm not sure why I keep making that mistake -- maybe because much of the action in this story takes place in Bunkerville? I'm thinking of Archie Bunker? Or of end-of-the-worlders hunkering down in bunkers? Anyway, I think I've got his name right everywhere now.)

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Oh crap, I was probably confusing Bundy with Jethro Tull's old drummer. You cn tak the boy out of the '70s....)