It wasn't me/us!

Paris Hilton and Dr Laura Schlessinger have one thing in common: a desperate need to divert attention from their own actions and words. Paris Hilton claims some cocaine found in her "borrowed" purse isn't hers - although everything else in the purse apparently was. Dr Schlessinger seeks to blame others for her own idiocy - she apologizes for using the word "nigger", and then places the blame for the result on those who seek to deny her any first amendment rights. Dr Stanley Fish points out that the anti-"Ground Zero Mosque" crowd flee any suggestion that their rhetoric and anger had anything to do with an hate-attack on a single Muslim man.

The common thread is unavoidable - if you're caught: blame someone else!

Ms Hilton will have to produce the owner of the bag if she did, indeed, borrow it. She'll also have to prove two things: that the cocaine belongs to the bag owner, and that she really didn't know it was there. That's going to be tough. Dr Schlessinger, and the anti-GZM crowd have an easier time of it: Dr Schlessinger will move to satellite radio, and be listened to by a smaller group that really has no problem with racism, and the anti-GZM bunch will continue with their lies and distortions.

The basic problem isn't that these people try to avoid being responsible for their own actions and words - it's that they deny those things have any meaning, any implication. It's as if they believe their words can float out there, with nary a consequence. All while they want their words to have consequences. They aren't avoiding responsibility - they're denying there is any to begin with! "Hypocrite" seems to mild a term, although it is an accurate one.