ANOTHER CONSERVATIVE NARRATIVE COLLAPSES

We've all heard various wingers talk about American Exceptionalism and often quote Lincoln's 1862 Annual Address to Congress:

Fellow-citizens, we cannot escape history. We of this Congress and this administration, will be remembered in spite of ourselves. No personal significance, or insignificance, can spare one or another of us. The fiery trial through which we pass, will light us down, in honor or dishonor, to the latest generation. We say we are for the Union. The world will not forget that we say this. We know how to save the Union. The world knows we do know how to save it. We -- even we here -- hold the power, and bear the responsibility. In giving freedom to the slave, we assure freedom to the free -- honorable alike in what we give, and what we preserve. We shall nobly save, or meanly lose, the last best hope of earth. Other means may succeed; this could not fail. The way is plain, peaceful, generous, just -- a way which, if followed, the world will forever applaud, and God must forever bless.

But when it comes to several issues, wingers attempt to justify their positions by pointing out what other people or nations do. This was true of the debate about torture, which some conservatives justified by saying something like "Al Qaeda does it" and it's true of the current immigration debate. Michelle Malkin wants to justify much tougher American laws by pointing out what Mexico does.