Ezra Klein has a great article over at Campus Progress about the right-wing’s penchant for tokensim :

Indeed, leveraging one?s demographic birthright to help the conservative cause is a rich and respected tactic for getting noticed by the Republican Noise Machine. Take Michelle Malkin (please!), an Asian woman who wrote a book defending the internment of other Asian-Americans during World War II and now frequents Fox News demanding a sensible assessment of whether Arabs should undergo similar treatment for the duration of the War on Terror. That Asian internment was warranted isn?t exactly a majority viewpoint, but never mind. Take Ward Connerly, a black pundit who springs forth with jack-in-the-box regularity each time the right trains its guns on affirmative action. And while we?re doing Ward, we can?t forget his partner-in-crime Linda Chavez, a Latina whose primary interest appears to be, yes, assaulting affirmative action. Take Phyllis Schlafly, the woman who led the effort to kill the Equal Rights Amendment, a little constitutional edit that, if ratified, would?ve enshrined gender equality as the immutable law of the land.

In a party that captures a minority of woman, African-Americans, Asians, and Hispanics, it?s statistically stunning for these racially (or, in Schlafly?s case, sexually) charged issues to all find their conservative fulcrums in a member of the affected group. But it?s also good politics.

Color-coding your defenders saves a lot of trouble, as the charges of discrimination that might sink a racially charged proposal fall flat when the initiative?s defender has the correct skin tone. It stands to reason that the proposal can?t be too bad for the affected group, or why would that person be on TV defending it? Similarly, no woman, presumably, would defend something that?s bad for her gender, and no young person would fight for what most of his generation opposes. And yet the ranks of conservative pundits swell with advocates whose primary purpose seems to be using their demographic birthright to defuse criticism of offensive policies.

Now I’d never say that someone’s ethnicity should determine their ranks on the political compass. I can understand why a woman who thinks abortion is murder would align herself with the GOP. I wouldn’t begrudge the decision of a homosexual who worships “the invisible hand” of free markets to decide that economic issues trump issues of equal rights for gays. And I think it’s perfectly acceptable for conservative minorities to take issue with affirmative action.¹

That said, Ezra’s got a point about the specialization at work in the conservative pundit class. For every issue that involves a special interest, there’s a talking head waiting in the right wing to cash in on their individuality. Why haven’t specialists like Michelle Malkin or Ben Ferguson realized that their peers don’t give a shit about their views on Social Security or forcing Christianity into public schools? Hell, they’re not even expected to provide any real insight. As long as they can cleverly regurgitate talking points and provide the illusion of diversity, they’ll keep getting calls from the producers of cable news programs all too willing to assist in the right-wing’s one-trick-pony game.

^{1 : Personally I think these hypothetical people are nuts, but to each his own.}