In the article the reporter suggests that faux outrage never works and that Brancy's post was calling Erick Erickson out over using it:
Whether or not we agree about the validity of the question, Bristol Palin’s got a point. This is not a winning strategy, and if you don’t grasp why, it’s because you misunderstand the whole reason the “outrage industry” works.
One of the things I’ve been most struck by, whenever I find myself in rooms of people who all share the same beliefs (on whatever side of the aisle) is how ready they are to assume that the people who do not share those beliefs are being disingenuous. That beliefs you disagree with are somehow less genuine than those you share because No Intelligent Person Could Truly Believe Such A Thing or because They’re Just Claiming That They’re Offended To Shut Us Up — as though there were some big red Outrage Button that could be pressed, on cue, to achieve a desired political result.
That would be too easy.
And when you don’t assume sincerity on the part of your opponent, you wind up with fauxtrage.
This of course sent a thrill up the leg of Nancy French:
Well, this rarely happens. Thanks, Alexandra!
But here's the thing that this Washington Post reporter seems to have missed.
Fake outrage was EXACTLY what Nancy French was whipping up with her column.
She was attacking Erick Erickson's refusal to allow Donald Trump to attend his event, by bringing up sexist things that he himself had said in the past. Including one incredibly overblown incident pertaining to Sarah's fake cleavage.
So not only did this reporter not realize that Bristol did not write a word of the blog post, but in her zeal to agree with a Palin she failed to realize she was congratulating Bristol for engaging in the exact same thing that she was condemning others for doing.
If she had taken even five minutes to do a little research she would have found that the Palins have made a cottage industry out of "fauxtrage" as she calls it.
From calling David Letterman a pervert for making a joke about her daughter, to suggesting that Joe McGinniss moved in next door to see in to Piper's bedroom, to taking every question about Trig Palin's bizarre birth story and framing it as an attack on a child with Down syndrome, Palin has refined this practice down to a fine art.
So once again ANOTHER ill informed reporter buys into the Palin mythology, and provides them with unearned credibility.
Well great now I feel outrage. And not "fauxtrage" either.
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