Really, it almost seems at times as if the wingnut bloggers delight in setting themselves up for mockery and parody.

The latest winger pratfall-in-the-making concerns the video we posted the other day of Rudy screaming "bulls#$t" at a cop rally 15 years ago.

Bloggers Michelle Malkin, Ann Althouse, and Ace of Spades are all taking shots at us for posting the vid, arguing that it was absurd to do so because it has no significance in any way.

It's the usual ham-fisted and heavy-handed stuff. Malkin says it "makes the Left-o-sphere look even more ridiculous than they already are." Althouse says we're simply "trying to hurt" Rudy (sniffle, sniffle) and even tries to claim that Rudy isn't "screaming," but rather is "shouting" (now there's a critical distinction). And Ace of Space grinds the gears furiously to produce something that is apparently supposed to constitute some sort of satire -- truly something you don't want to miss.

Memo to wingnuts: There's a little something about Rudy's "bulls#$t" moment that we know and that you don't know.

As just noted below, today's Times contains a lengthy look at what happened at that cop rally and what it suggested about Rudy's approach to race-relations at the time. Yep -- turns out it was a very important moment, indeed.

Let me re-run the Times description of the day's events:

Mr. Giuliani took a fateful step that would for years prompt questions about his racial sensitivities. In September 1992, he spoke to a rally of police officers protesting Mr. Dinkins’s proposal for a civilian board to review police misconduct.

It was a rowdy, often threatening, crowd. Hundreds of white off-duty officers drank heavily, and a few waved signs like “Dump the Washroom Attendant,” a reference to Mr. Dinkins. A block away from City Hall, Mr. Giuliani gave a fiery address, twice calling Mr. Dinkins’s proposal “bullshit.” The crowd cheered. Mr. Giuliani was jubilant...

The Giuliani campaign later conducted a “vulnerability study” to identify their candidate’s weaknesses in 1993. This study, obtained by Wayne Barrett, author of “Rudy!” — an investigative biography — offers an unsparing critique: “Giuliani’s shrieking performance at the cop rally may be his greatest political liability this year. Giuliani has yet to admonish those who attacked the mayor with racist code words on signs and banners. Why not?”

Note to wingnuts: This moment actually had great resonance for African Americans in New York for many, many years. It was a key chapter in the history of both race relations in the city and of Rudy's own rise to power. And Rudy's own campaign internally conceded that this was really, really bad -- that he'd sought to rile up an audience carrying signs saying things about Dinkins like "dump the washroom attendant" without denouncing their crude displays of racism. This is all actually common knowledge to lots of people. You could have established this basic history and context with five minutes on Google or Nexis before holding forth on it.

But let's say it's not even your fault that you didn't know anything about this. And let's even concede that we should have spelled the history and context out better in our initial post. Now that you actually know a little something about the topic at hand, isn't it time for some follow-up posts explaining to your readers whether the moment's worthy of attention and what people should think of it?

Update: It gets better. Althouse has now linked to The Times piece -- with no comment at all as to whether she now thinks the moment is significant.

Update II: Here's some clown who writes that Rudy's "bulls#$t" moment makes Rudy more attractive to conservatives. Hmmm -- wonder if he's still stick by that now that he knows a bit more about the racial context here. Come to think of it, he probably will stick by it.