So Kevin Williamson has now been fired by The Atlantic because of the furor around his talk of bringing back death-by-hanging for women who have abortions.

I am not clear on why publications like The Atlantic feel they need to go out of their way to add more conservative voices, given that conservatives are not exactly a marginalized group in our public discourse these days. Maybe they think we will all hate-read their columns and help jack up page views.

Whatever the reason, the fevered state of the conservative commentariat for the past decade or more means that the days of a magazine picking up some “reasonable” writer to add a mild dissenting view to the editorial page are gone. They’re stuck with bottom-feeders and outrage artists like Williamson, because that’s mostly what remains in the world of right-wing opinion.