Descriptive terms

Weekly Example of Media Bias   —   Posted on May 29, 2013

From a post by OpinionJournal.com’s editor James Taranto (original post date 5/28/13):

“A long-simmering feud between establishment Republicans and Tea Partyers broke into full view Thursday, with Sen. John McCain accusing younger colleagues of overplaying their hands and tempting Democrats to change Senate rules that protect the minority party,” the Associated Press reports.

It seems to us this feud has been out in the open for at least several months. But look how the AP describes the dispute between McCain and his younger colleagues, including Texas’ Ted Cruz and Kentucky’s Rand Paul:

Cruz, who like Paul is weighing a 2016 presidential bid, renewed his taunts of the party establishment in a speech Thursday on the Senate floor. The more accommodating Republicans, he said, are in cahoots with Democrats to raise the government’s borrowing limit by disabling the GOP’s ability to mount a filibuster threat that could be used to extract spending cuts from Democrats and the White House

Calling it “a dirty little secret,” Cruz said Republicans “would very much like to cast a symbolic vote against raising the debt ceiling and nonetheless to allow our (Democratic) friends on the left side of the aisle to raise the debt ceiling.” . . .

Supporters of the Tea Party-backed lawmakers say [ongoing] controversies have vindicated their sharply partisan, uncompromising views.

Whatever the merits of the dispute, is “sharply partisan” really the right phrase to describe Cruz, who is in fact sharply critical of fellow Republicans? “Sharply ideological” or “sharply adversarial” would seem to be more accurate.