In a disappointing but ultimately unsurprising turn of events, the Lincoln Project super PAC ousted its stellar video editor Ben Howe over — you guessed it — bad tweets. Howe’s offenses? A few attempts at humor several years ago, some effective, others not, using a handful of crass words related to female anatomy as ways to insult his (usually male) adversaries. None could be interpreted by a reasonable person as attempts to sexualize or objectify women or promulgate sexism, in any real sense of the word.
But Howe, one of the Lincoln Project’s (former) rare staffers who ordinarily has remained civil and retained actual conservatism while criticizing President Trump, is out anyway, leading to one massive question: How the hell is Rick Wilson still there?
Consider this: The top brass at the Lincoln Project essentially is treating Howe worse for calling a man who was cyberbullying conservative radio star Dana Loesch a “twat” and for defending police officer Darren Wilson — a stance the Obama FBI eventually agreed with — than it is treating Wilson, a guy who published photos of a Confederate cooler on his boat.
Unlike Howe, who has remained a critical and sensitive commentator of Trump’s base, especially in his well-researched book The Immoral Majority, Wilson discarded his conservative credentials long ago. His political ideology can be summarized with two simple beliefs: The Republican Party is no longer run by people who like to bomb other nations without impunity or tact, and (2) anyone who still wants to vote for Trump over Joe Biden is so sophomoric that they cannot possibly find Ukraine on a map.
The arrogance, the dismissiveness, the smug cackling, the accents.
If Donald Trump wins re-election this year, I’ll remember this brief CNN segment late one Saturday night in January as the perfect encapsulation for why it happened. pic.twitter.com/8kQ6zN9AZV
— Steve Krakauer (@SteveKrak) January 28, 2020
Consider, the above clip wasn’t a late-night tweet or hot mic of an out-of-control happy hour. Those were sentiments, making nasty fun of conservative voters, that Wilson willingly aired on national television, yet the Lincoln Project was still happy to brand him the poster child of its somehow “conservative” crusade, not just to oust the divisive Trump from office but also the pro-choice Susan Collins.
And if we’re going to cancel people for using female anatomy as a slur some eons ago, have at it:
There are a few dozen more … pic.twitter.com/0RRIZXLTDp
— Tom Elliott (@tomselliott) July 14, 2020
The moral of this story isn’t that Wilson should be canceled. It’s rather that the mob might eat you last, but it will indeed eat you, and it only came for Howe first because he doesn’t cloak himself in the flag of the anti-Trump grift and instead engages conservatives with actual arguments opposing Trump. Wilson thinks cozying up to Don Lemon and Democratic donors will save him, but as evidenced by Monday’s bit by Stephen Colbert, even the most pro-Biden foot soldier can be canceled for having worked for W. once upon a time.
If Wilson doesn’t deserve to be “canceled” — that is, fired not for workplace insufficiencies but rather because of external failings — then Howe sure as hell deserves his job back.
