Here's the irony as I see it:

[xiphias]

So, Sarah Palin says that the violent actions of a person are the responsibility of that person alone: that speech is not a proximate cause of violence. There's a certain sense to that. I may not AGREE with it, but the statement is defensible.

(There is also the separate claim that, even if hateful speech can trigger violence, HER speech specifically wasn't the trigger for THIS violent action, and I do find that provisionally credible.)

She then claims that the rush to judgment that HER speech was a trigger for the media to dogpile on her, and that that was a "blood libel."

The irony here is that a blood libel is very specifically a specific kind of violent hate speech that leads people to take violent actions. That's what it IS. In the very same speech, she says that a particular type of action doesn't exist, that, anyway, she didn't do it, and then accuses other people of doing exactly that same thing. Accidentally, of course -- she was clearly unaware of what "blood libel" MEANS, but the irony still exists.

Comments

[embryomystic.livejournal.com]

That's pretty much how I see it, too.