Double standard

In a previous post, I mentioned in an aside that Democrats are held to a higher standard when it comes to foreign policy crisis management and national security in general--and linked to the infamous footage of George W. Bush being told of the 9/11 attacks at a photo-op and just sitting there for seven whole minutes. A Democrat would have been impeached for that.

Well, the door swings both ways: on race, liberals get a free pass. Maureen Dowd has this throw-away line in her Sunday op-ed:

(In fact, there is no red phone in the Oval Office, but maybe Obama will redecorate. He wants to put in a hoops court.)

Coming from the mouth of a liberal, it's a snarky riff on Obama's background as a high school basketball star. If this were uttered by a conservative, however, we'd have a national firestorm on our hands with accusations of racism a-flyin'.