Megan runs a poll with a margin of 100%

Swinging from their own petard:

As longtime readers of the blog know, I'm related to the Swing Voter, aka my mother. Her vote is an infallible indicator of who will win the general election. We had dinner last night, and somewhat to my surprise, The Swing Voter is completely outraged by the New York Times story--she vows to no longer take the Times, nay, not even for the Sunday crossword. She is also now thinking seriously about voting for McCain just to spite the New York Times.

Ok, so this isn't "Fire Megan McArdle's Mother, but she's giving up on a newspaper over ONE article? I guess we know that there is another trait passed on through only the loins of the legendary McArdle lineage: colorblindness in women.

I found myself offering a tepid defense of what really is a pretty indefensible story: to wit, that reporters in cases like this usually know more they can tell, because so many sources refuse to go on the record. The Swing Voter was unmoved. She feels like the Times, and the sort of people who staff the Times, feel that they are entitled to manipulate the election in order to get teh "right" results--that such a story would never have run about a Democrat. No doubt the folks at the Times would strenuously disagree--but it matters that people feel that way. I seriously doubt my mother is the only one

Oh man, Megan must've been so confused. On the one hand, her mom was totally keying into that "left wing media bias" meme that gives McMoron such a dizzying high. On the other hand, as McMegan becomes more and more entrenched in the putzditocrocy, she has to become more and more fearful of biting the hand that feeds her. Also, she's meeting a few journalists and discovering they're not all about just making shit up so that whatever they want to happen happens.

I love how her "tepid" defenses are of the sort we're offered about Bush's actions. Yeah, it looks like he's doing totally batshit crazy and illegal stuff, but he knows more than we do so trust him. I mean, appealing to her mother's common sense by stating that the notion that the Times is a gigantic organization and cannot possibly be carrying out a conspiracy on level that her mother and herself seem to take for granted without generating mountains of evidence and battaliolns of whistleblowers is completely absurd.

God, do I hope Megan is wrong. If swing voters vote for McCain to spite the NYTs, dear lord, this country deserves whatever it gets.

Oh yeah, insert joke about how she insults the story with no evidence or explanation as to why it's so clearly bad yadda yadda etc etc <thud>