The attitude of Broder toward an actual impeachment vs. a proposed one is as revealing as it is nauseating. Setting aside his actual motivation and obvious corruption, the only real distinction he is even attempting to draw is that he supported the first one, therefore sanctifying it, and scoffs at the latterer, therefore rendering it illegitimate and pointless. Such breathtaking arrogance, spoken so baldly, is a rare but nonetheless damning admission of his true commonality with Bush and company; he considers himself as infallible as they do, and is just as annoyed and dismissive when questioned. In short, he feels their pain.

He understands how people abusing their undeserved power and influence can suffer when their cravenness and stupidity is revealed, all too well.

What really fries him is a person who not only does his job well and effectively, but manages to make time to get a blow job from a willing 20-something. Since both things have not, or will ever, happen to him, he's ready to hand out the punishment.

His only regret is the feebleness of his weapon; a dreary, widely ignored column in a hollowed out and declining fishwrapper, when his real heroes can torture, bomb, and intimidate when they're feeling inadequate.

What Comcast is doing is the quintessential practice, considered obvious in a less corporatism-addled world, that would necessarily result from any one voice in the media growing so dominant that it felt comfortable silencing its critics with ham-handed impunity. It is probable that under the next round of FCC "reform," Blue America's ad could have been relegated to the alternative press entirely, and thereby, utterly vanish down the Memory Hole without a trace. I have no doubt that Comcast is measuring the windows in the smaller media outlets with the temerity to run such un-American blasphemy for the heavy drapes they plan to draw against all such offending speech in the salivated-over "future."

As Kovie points out, and as the cockeyed optimist I stubbornly continue to be, I think that they have overplayed their hand and risk their dreams of one corporation, under God, with this petulant, stupid, and overconfident display of Bushian Deciderism. Don't they read the polls? Don't they know how fed up, disgusted, and downright angry the public is from so many years of this crap? And have they any idea that their own customers probably think less of them, due to their poor, overpriced service and "my way or the highway" attitude than even the equally annoyed civil libertarians in this country?

Bring it on, Comcast.

No high-priced lawyer can pull your chestnuts out of this fire.

I will happily contribute to a new ad campaign highlighting this... Especially large (Clear Channel?) billboards along their executives' routes home to their no doubt gated communities.

It seems that a troll here thinks we commies want to "socialize" the cable companies, while every fine American knows that the proper way to do business is to hand out unaccountable monopolies to bloated and corrupt campaign contributors like Comcast. That's the free market at work.

From the same addled brain comes the notion that Air America no longer airs in New York, which is false, of course, but has more to do with other bloated monopolies squeezing it out than anything else. Its affiliate in my home town beats all the right wing blatherers in every time slot. Of course, it's owner, Clear Channel, calls its propaganda arms "News Talk," and lets the "progressive" station subsidize them. More free market at work.

I think the right's greatest "success" is how it has convinced its followers to believe such nonsense so confidently that they spout it, mindlessly, at every opportunity, as we see in this case.

One of the things I like best about McCain (besides the fact that he sounds like Granny in the Tweety and Sylvester cartoons) is that every time he opens his mouth, he shows himself to be the surly, dyspeptic old coot he is, shaking his cane and ranting incoherently. Even Bush, who has never been accused of being civil, knew better than to show his true colors until he was safely reelected and could really get his sneering, domineering groove on.

McCain, on the other hand, perhaps emboldened by having a rich wife who doesn't mind being called a cunt in public, just lets fly at every slight, real or imagined, and his bizarre and maniacal diatribes fall like rain, unencumbered by any sense of decorum or a passing resemblance to reality.

The spectacle must be as disheartening to his followers as it hilarious and delightful to me. No wonder his pathetic, brainwashed "base" can't think of anything better to do than sputter nonsensically about Michelle Obama. Their candidate, clearly unfit for the Presidency, would have difficulty finding a nursing home that would accept him, due to his behavioral issues.

......Yes, Iokannan, it is a "movement," as in "bowel."