Equivalence, fake and otherwise.

One of the more annoying habits of the residents of Lower Wankerville is their insistence on drawing an equivalence between the most hysterically incomparable situations, and doing it with a positively straight face. Consider, if you will, the recent episode involving GOP Senator Larry Craig, a married man with a long record of gay-bashing votes, nonetheless caught trolling a public airport bathroom and blatantly soliciting the person in the next stall for a little man-on-man action.

Wankers were, of course, quick with the only comeback they know: "But ... but ... but ... Bill Clinton!!" And why not? After all, on the one hand, you have a married man who has a disappointing but consensual, heterosexual affair, in private, with someone of legal age that he knows while, on the other hand, you have a public homophobe looking to score some quick (and illegal) gay sex in an airport bathroom with a complete stranger. Sure, I don't see any difference. Do you see any difference? Hell, Mitt doesn't see any difference:

Romney declined to endorse a call for Craig's resignation, saying he did not have enough information. But he went on to compare the situation to Bill Clinton's White House infidelities and former Rep. Mark Foley's emails with Capitol Hill pages.

(As you can see, Mitt is quick with the bogus equivalence when he equates Clinton with a hard-right GOP representative who was caught dead to rights hustling young boys by Internet. But, hey, who's keeping track of the details, right?)

And for maximum entertainment value, you can't top the spectacle of some wankers actually portraying the Clinton episode as being somehow more appalling than Craig's bathroom antics:

Why, yes, Craig "tapped his foot." Oh, and he also slid it over to nudge the foot of the man in the next stall, then proceeded to run his hand underneath the stall partition, not once, not twice, but three times. It might have been amusing to add that part to the cartoon above but, hey, details like that only get in the way of a good smear job, know what I mean?

Then there's the magnificently tortured attempt at equivalence you can find here:

A couple of weeks ago, the left was up in arms because undercover cops had been used at the Montebello Summit to allegedly incite protesters to violent action.

Now, the left seems to be applauding the use of an undercover cop to entrap a would-be participant in gay sex.

Under what circumstances is undercover police work acceptable? Is it only if it involves Republicans (or conservatives)?

Ah, quite right -- we on the Left have no problem with undercover officers quietly staking out bathrooms trying to catch trolling perps, but we're outraged -- absolutely outraged -- by masked law enforcement officers wielding rocks and trying to incite violence at a peaceful protest. My word, but what hypocrites we Leftards be! You should be ashamed! Yes, you!

On the other hand, though, after making a living promoting one example of bogus, painfully-contrived equivalence after another, the very same residents of Wankerville will turn around and, presented with two virtually identical situations, now take the position that they are, of course, totally, totally different and how dare we presume to draw such an unfair comparison? You know, like here.

It's still fresh news, but it might be worth watching how many of Canada's wingnuts, having pilloried the Liberals only a couple years back, will have nothing but praise for the identical strategy by their Dear Leader since, well, that's different.

And, yes, the above is exactly why you can't talk to these people. Because, quite simply, they're nuts. And, at times, that's the only appropriate comeback you need to make.

HEH. INDEED.