eager to incite

TPM has been all over the Todd hoax and the McCain campaign's role in spreading it (which they of course deny, lying about this as they have everything else in this cycle). Oh, and Todd herself is upset with the media for "blowing it out of proportion." Wow.

Now some may to treat this as No Big Deal: Unbalanced girl gins up hoax on her own, without the campaign directing it. But the point of radical right politics is and always has been to set the tone and let the most extreme supporters draw their own conclusions. They then act to make real what the propaganda has told them already is real, but is not being paid attention to because of the biased media.

And as Eugene Robinson said on the Countdown coverage (paraphrase of around 3:40 in):

If the McCain communications director got out ahead of the police in spreading this story to the press, as it appears he did, it indicates not only a willingness to believe it, but an eagerness to incite racial backlash against the Obama campaign in a part of PA where race can be a very raw and divisive issue to this day.

He properly contextualizes it as the age-old "blood libel" of black predators against "the flower of white womanhood." It's sick, as is the camp's eagerness to spread the hoax.

Update: Perp walk!

Update 2: Youtube guy - "What Ashley Todd did wrong". Funny and understated ;)