Via John Cole, Sullivan makes a similar point to the one I've been highlighting about the Both Sides meme:
The right and the left both have intemperate voices. But here’s the key: only the conservative movement counts the most vile blowhards as leading lights, embraced by the leadership. Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, Mark Levin, Sarah Palin: these are among the most popular conservatives in America. Who are the folks on the left with equivalent popularity and influence?
Exactly. Again, Olbermann, Maddow and Schultz occupy three hours of daily cable news content. That leaves 21 more hours, multiplied by three cable news networks, with non-liberal opinion hosts. And how many hours of talk radio are occupied by conservatives? Close to all of it. Liberal talk show hosts are practically nonexistent. We're talking about thousands of weekly hours of conservative hate speech on publicly owned airwaves compared to, generously, dozens of hours occupied by liberals.
In what fucked up imaginary bullshit world do these kinds of vast, chasm-wide disparities equal parity?