Why are conservatives unwilling to admit that pulling “The Interview” was a business decision?

Arizona Senators John McCain and Jeff Flake, along with Rep. Paul Gosar have joined the conservative hand-wringing over Sony’s decision to pull the release of “The Interview”.

That move came after U.S. intelligence linked the North Korean government to hackers who made violent threats about the comedy film. In the movie, a TV crew travels to North Korea to interview dictator Kim Jong Un, and they are recruited by the CIA to assassinate Kim.

“It’s remarkable that a country like North Korea can have that capability,” McCain said. “If they are able to disrupt a film, you can imagine what they are doing or attempting to do to our national defense capability. This is deeply alarming.”

Flake added the hacking incident was a “huge wake up call.”

“If they can wreak that kind of havoc in the entertainment industry, then you’ve got to worry where else their reach is,” Flake said. “It’s very concerning.”

Gosar quipped: “Just show the movie.”

When Americans can’t see one particular Seth Rogen movie the terrorists have won! Like pretty much most people, I think Sony made a bad decision but it’s fairly obvious why they made it and, contrary to what the right wing perpetual outrage machine is spinning,

BREAKING: America apparently a nation of lily-livered pantywaists who let terrorists threats dictate which movies we’re allowed to watch.

— Megan McArdle (@asymmetricinfo) December 18, 2014

it’s not because America is a nation of wusses, or that President Obama is an appeasing girly man and Hollywood is run by a bunch of effete wimps cowering in fear of a monomaniacal dictator. The White House is monitoring the hacking situation but has taken no position on the release of the film from what I can tell and Hollywood figures are furious that the film has been pulled. Movie people are not generally known for being big free expression stiflers. No, this is a purely financial calculation on the part of Sony and some theater owners who feared liability and loss of patrons. That’s all.

But most conservatives won’t admit that because capitalism is a religion to them and wealthy business owners are infallible gods to be worshiped. So they blame the usual leftist suspects instead. It’s similar to when SB1062 was quickly killed after strenuous objections from very big business leaders in Arizona. Cathi Herrod pitched a fit about the gay hippie forces of political correctness destroying her religious freedom but had nary a peep to say about the forces of capitalism that actually put the kibosh on her bill.

Probably the biggest social development that conservatives like to blame on liberal decadence is the decline of marriage, particularly among younger and working class adults. But once again, it turns out that it’s finances and lack of stable employment that are taking people out of the marriage market, not a feminist plot to dismantle the family. Of course, acknowledging that would require conservatives to cast a critical eye at our largely unrestrained capitalist economy and admitting that it fails a lot of people. That’s not likely to happen anytime soon. If anything, right wingers are doubling down on the blame-everything-on-single-women rhetoric, because they are that incapable of blaming anything on capitalism. They’ll pin it on any liberal scapegoat they can find, even when the incontrovertible evidence is staring them right in the face that something (like the Sony decision) is the direct result of businesses acting to protect their profits.