One of the downstream effects of Trumpism is that the fact of having a President Trump has given conservatives a hair-trigger on defending every marginal figure, no matter how stupid or malicious. It’s easy to understand why: Trump is close to these people in form and substance, so allowing them to be attacked can be seen as a proxy argument against Trump. No conservatives would have felt duty-bound to defend Milo Yiannopoulos had Mitt Romney been president.

But we are where we are, so various conservatives have risen to defend Alex Jones in the wake of Facebook, YouTube, and Apple kicking him off of their platforms. Their defenses come across three vectors, each of which is flawed.