When you gaze at politics through the left tinted lenses of New York magazine, you might conjure up some mighty bizarre observations. Such was the case Tuesday in an Ed Kilgore story entitled: "Republicans See an Upset in Violent Texts From Virginia Democrat."

Kilgore's conclusion in his final paragraph about the "violent texts" from Virginia Democrat Attorney General candidate Jay Jones was to slam Republicans for "cynical manipulation." Nevermind the texts were authentic. New York magazine has determined the reaction to them is the issue:

I’m sure there’s back-channel talk about Jones “doing the right thing” and relieving his colleagues of his problems, along with pushback against the cynical manipulation of the “crisis” by Republicans.

The final sentence buttressed the idea of MAGA's "cynical manipulation" of this scandal:

Perhaps Jones and his party can tough it all out, but MAGA folk will incessantly use his example to buttress their absurd argument that the main source of violent political talk is left of center and will perhaps even pull off an electoral shocker in a time and place in which the Boss and his agenda aren’t very popular.

"Absurd argument?" Perhaps Kilgore missed the news cycles of the past few years in which Republicans in general and Trump and his supporters in particular constantly being labeled as Nazis or fascists. Butler, anyone? Utah Valley University? Heck, even Family Research Council way back yonder?

Earlier in the piece, Kilgore hyped the idea of "cynical manipulation" of this scandal by the GOP:

This was years ago, and Jones hasn’t displayed any offline violent tendencies, but as you can imagine, Republicans see a huge opportunity: not just to potentially defeat Jones (who was favored to win before all this controversy) but to divide and defeat the entire Democratic statewide ticket, as Axios explains...

Kilgore also couldn't resist a snarky slam for the same reason at President Trump and Vice-President Vance: "Unsurprisingly, those great advocates for civility in political discourse, Donald Trump and J.D. Vance, have jumped into the fray[.]"

Finally, the same shot at "conservative media" writ large and much the same vein we saw at USA Today:

Conservative media is all over this story, and Jones’s abject apologies for the texts have cut no ice in those circles. He’s not the real target anyway; it’s Spanberger, and as Axios put it, “pushing Jones off the ticket could fracture Democrats’ chances in a pivotal statewide race seen as a bellwether for next year.” To be clear, in Virginia statewide candidates run independently, so there’s not really a “ticket” the gubernatorial nominee can control. For another, Jones is the sole Black statewide Democratic nominee, in a state where Democrats rely heavily on robust Black turnout.

Gee! What's wrong with conservative media? Didn't Jones offer "abject apologies" (without withdrawing from the race) after he was exposed? Shouldn't that be acceptable to them? Well, perhaps IF you live in the New York magazine liberal bubble.