2) It's also valid and important to call out bigots & cranks who inject themselves into those debates. Nobody who cares about conservative causes can justify giving the opposition ANY ground for smearing them by association. What we are & aren't arguing must be crystal clear.
3) @YAF is unquestionably right to denounce bigotry, conspiracy-mongering, & violence (whether it's being fair to the Proud Boys may be another question, & I don't pretend to be familiar enough w/ that group to offer a valuable opinion. But Fuentes & his fans are clearly scum).
4) At the same time, @YAF's statement falls short because it fails to get into names and details about the parties involved, presumably because the group is trying to ruffle as few feathers as possible.
5) There are a lot of different factions at play here, & I am entirely open to the possibility that @BenShapiro painted with too broad a brush. I faulted his speech for inflating the Alt-Right's significance, but not for the content as applied to actual Alt-Righters.
6) The problem for @MichelleMalkin is that she didn't make the point by citing any (theoretical) undeserving victim of a broad brush, but by specifically citing Fuentes, a bigoted cretin who deserved every word @BenShapiro threw at him.
7) She then compounded the problem by describing him merely as a "New Right leader," refusing to disavow "any of them," & deploying the "I do not agree with every last thing they’ve said" fig leaf, as if HOLOCAUST DENIAL is a normal view on which honorable people can disagree.
8) It's also infuriating BECAUSE her immigration stance is so important. We need conservatives of her stature standing up to the open-borders establishment. And such positions of trust & leadership come with a basic moral duty not to hurt the cause with stupid crap like this.
9) I've gotten a lot of pushback on this over the last week, none of which makes a lick of sense. Nobody has offered an explanation of how disavowing Fuentes for Holocaust denial would hurt the immigration-sanity cause or empower the establishment.
10) I've admired Michelle for years. I cannot for the life of me understand why she's digging in her heels on this, and it’s honestly depressing. Conservatives, border control, sane immigration policy, and the country deserve better.
