The same media who smeared conservatives and Sarah Palin in the wake of the Tucson massacre (causing both Palin and Tucson tea partiers to receive a slew of death threats), the same media who ignored Obama’s “bring a gun to the knife fight,” the same media who excused Vice President Joe Biden when he called conservatives “terrorists” (or the other Democratic lawmakers who said the same and worse), who ignored it when an Obama advisor wondered aloud whether they should “kill Romney,” are suddenly mad over Rick Perry’s remarks on Bernake.

Greg Sargent led the pack this morning. His headline:

Rick Perry campaign not disavowing implied threat to Bernanke

I asked Rick Perry’s spokesman if the campaign is offering clarification of his widely discussed suggestion yesterday that Texas would offer some “real ugly” frontier justice to Fed chairman Ben Bernanke if he were to print money between now and election day.

The spokesman, Mark Miner, emailed me this:

The Governor was expressing his frustration with the current economic situation and the out of control spending that persists in Washington. Most Americans would agree that spending more money is not the answer to the economic issues facing the country.The important thing here is that this is the Perry camp’s official considered response — and he is not disavowing the implied threat in his original remarks. Instead, the campaign’s position seems to be that this was a legitimate expression of “frustration” with runaway Washington spending — one that other Americans surely share.

All of this hysteria over what?

[youtube OEnOjE7pZtk nolink]

“… if this guy prints more money between now and the election, I don’t know what ya’ll would do to him in Iowa, but we would treat him pretty ugly down in Texas.”

I was curious as to whether or not Sargent wrote similar retraction demands for President Obama, Vice-President Biden, Nancy Pelosi, Sheila Jackson Lee, whew, we could be here for awhile. I couldn’t find any online and Sargent refused to provide links in case I missed them.

The question apparently made Sargent uncomfortable, as evidence by our Twitter exchange this afternoon.

Reverse chronological order below:

Last question:

Sargent dropped it after that. He did not provide any examples of where he called out Democrats for their #newtone and was hostile when asked to produce them. Be an opinion writer, but at least give readers enough room where they can develop a suspension of disbelief in your bias.

There’s a reason why the media is afraid of Perry. He’s gaining.