To what lengths will media go to sully our public life? Now the president's press secretary will have to suffer the humiliation of a derogatory alteration of the middle name she has tried unsuccessfully to suppress.This could only happen in a country where conventional politics has turned into reality TV and the principal actors are comic strip characters. Sarah Sanders was an obscure deputy press secretary when people like Sean Spicer and Anthony Scaramucci ruled the communications roost. But as the breakneck staff shuffle in Trumpland progresses, Sarah moved into the limelight.

And believe it or not? She's still there. Except that now she will have to reckon with a headline that resurrects he recently suppressed middle name, Huckabee, to the derogatory substitute, "Suckabee". Now you could say this is just the transgression of the online magazine, The Root, which is where this designation of the press secretary appeared. But Google gave the designation a big boost when it included it among the three featured stories that appear when you search Google for Mr. Sanders.

And, lo, here it is.

Several sources

The Root is not the only source of the negative version of "Huckabee".

Twitter, it turns out, has numerous sources that echo the Root designation.

Here from Feb. 15 is a reference that reads, "Is Suckabee speaking today?

If so she will say once again she doesn’t know how to fix this issue, now isn’t the time to talk about guns and yada yada blah blah blah." And here is an indication that the whole name is no longer needed to communicate who is being talked about.

The message is succinct.

"Well, well, well...Suckabee doesn’t have a security clearance. Meh, she probably doesn’t really need one just to regurgitate Trump’s lies."

Another side

But there is no unanimity about this descent into nastiness. Roaring back with requisite anger is this rebuttal tweet, skewering the folk at the Root.

Tammy Crossman responds, "I refuse to read or listen to editorial garbage such as this."The Root's writers should be utterly ashamed of themselves!

America this IS your problem. Sarah, you are a good woman that deserves better than this! It's time to repent America!!!"

If there is a better example of people taking past one another, please be my guest. On the one side impotent anger at a power structure that has shown in convincing ways its intolerance toward minorities that are threatening to become majorities. On the other calls for penitence and defenses galore. It's a classic binary bash and it seems to be the new normal.

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