"Stop hitting yourself!"

David Neiwert, commenting on Sean Hannity's willingness to not only defend Ted Nugent's calls for murdering Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama but to also attack what he sees as instances of hate speech or violent rhetoric by liberals, notes:

Of course, I've pointed out previously that this sort of behavior is part of Republicans' projection strategy: If they accuse liberals loudly enough of a certain kind of behavior, it becomes a permission for them to do so themselves -- though of course, liberals are at worst marginally guilty of this behavior, and the conservative immanation of it is exponentially more egregious.

I think that's part of it, but there's more. In the vein of "the best defense is a good offense", you accuse your opponents of doing what you are actually doing, and you get in there first. That way, if your opponents try to point out reality--"No, you're the ones doing that!"--it makes them seem weak, unimaginative, and childish. It brings to mind the taunt "I know you are, but what am I?" from grade school. So it's an attack on your opponents, which puts them on the defensive, while at the same time removing that same attack from their arsenal to use against you. And then we get back to what Mr. Neiwert says: even if they point out that you're the one actually doing it, it has become permissible for you to do it anyways because "they did it first."

I'm not sure that made any sense, but meh.