These are not remotely the same thing. Irrelevant politically-charged asides versus mentioning politics in an article about politics. Overt hostility to a particular group versus limited ability to portray a group accurately.

It's not that he was mentioning politics in an article about politics. Talking about political slurs would be relevant to an article about politics. Making political slurs generally wouldn't be.

But altogether lost in the brouhaha over my original objections to Kaj's post was that his false characterization made for a bad argument. He did worse than be uncharitable, he did worse than slur his opponents, he made a bad argument relying a smear for much of it's force.

And as far as I was concerned, the people who upvoted him did much worse in circling the wagons around a bad argument dependent on a cheap slur, even after it was pointed out to them.

Is it your opinion that if an article or comment contains anything in it that is less than perfectly charitable to the author's political opponents, it should be downvoted?

No, less than perfect is not my standard for downvotes.

Mischaracterizing your opponents as supporting something morally reprehensible probably qualifies. Making a bad argument based on such a mischaracterization certainly does. Defending the mischaracterization would as well.