Wow, Virginia Dare, nice racist screen name! Glad to know there's no racism at work here...Jesus.

I'm composing a reply to my friends on the left and the right, but I have to say, I'm loving the insistence, on both sides, that Obama's troubles are ENTIRELY policy, and have nothing to do with race. From the right, his WHITE numbers are declining sharply because he really IS a socialist, from the left, it's because he's a crypto-Republican.

Also nice to know people can take the time to comment but not read the article: For the left, and the right, I did NOT say it was mainly racism, I said it wasn't mainly racism, and it likely was about policy -- but it's crazy to think racism is not motivating the crazy ranters.

Of course, it would be too much to ask people to click through to the Pew poll, but if you do, ideologues on the left will be sadly disappointed. Obama's support has fallen much more among conservative Democrats than liberal Democrats, 12 points to 6 points. They don't break that down by race, but it's an interesting data point.

Finally, this made me laugh: Kanye West interrupting Obama's speech. Have a laugh today, everybody, and think/read before you type:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VxKIcrDsJAs

What was PeeWee's magic chant? Poorly remembered attempt: Mekaleka-hi, meka-hiney-ho? And then repeated with some twist? So sad I can't remember. My ex and I used to get up early on Saturdays to watch PeeWee's Playhouse, a combination of Colbert Report, Daily Show and Mr. Rogers Neighborhood.

Timothy3, when I get home I'll see if we have Retro TV, it sounds like all I want to watch these days.

Going to bed soon (I'm in NY!) but nice to see you all here.

Yes, it's a crazy day, but now I know I'm locked into doing a Friday blog post so people have some place to gather on Friday nights!

Thanks, rtf100, I just put Obama's water down long enough to read your wisdom. Changed my life.

Back to carrying Obama's water. How little you know, rtf100, about anything.

AKA Smith, I'm really sorry to hear you've been ill, let us know if there's anything we can do.

Ann C. Davidson, I'm writing a post to respond to Bob Somerby of the Daily Howler, who likewise gave me only two cheers for failing to talk about the savaging of Bill Clinton. (I appreciate all cheers, and especially Bob's, but I happen to think he's wrong on this one.)

I talked about the partisan witchhunt against the Clintons plenty during impeachment and after; I talked about it during the primary season last year, too, when Obamabots began spouting right-wing lies about about both Clintons (to be fair, I don't think any of them accused the Clintons of killing Vince Foster, so they didn't swallow every piece of BS whole. But close.) So it's unfair to say I didn't/don't criticize what was done to Bill Clinton. And get your history straight: Salon exists as a political force because we were virtually alone in defending Clinton against the witchhunts back in 1997 and 1998 (and beyond). Our reporting on Kenneth Starr, and the Arkansas grifters (plus the now eminent Ted Olsen) who teamed up to bring down the president, was unrivaled. (President Clinton himself hailed us at a White House Correspondents Dinner.)

So it's simply wrong to say Salon and/or I have failed to note the attacks on the Clintons. ALL of that said: There was nothing to compare to what's being done to President Obama. Imagine the pack of right-wing jackals and media morons IF they had been matched in the streets with angry wingnuts toting cigars, blue dresses, berets, Lewinsky posters -- and guns. That's what you'd have to have seen to compare Clinton's poor treatment to Obama's. Amazingly, most Americans saw through the witch hunt and Clinton's popularity soared. It's going the other way for Obama.

I hate people who race-bait and cry race unfairly, but I really have no other way to explain the semi-organized hysteria and paranoia in the attacks on Obama -- which all come down to "he's going to HURT us!" -- than race.

AKA Smith, it's really nice to see you again. I honestly did have some problems with the Ed Dept's Obama lesson plans. And I really do want schools to teach kids to think for themselves, not venerate a leader. But that's not what they're protesting.

Where have you been, anyway? We've missed you.

Timothy3, I'm thinking about this a lot: WHY is it so nasty and polarized today? One thing I've been thinking about lately: We had/have Republicans in our family. We love/d them, they love/d us. (There was no us or them, it was all WE.)

But I do think that something changed with the culture wars of the 60s and 70s. For sure, we became dirty godless hippies who wanted to stop the Vietnam War, destroy America, end white supremacy, kill babies, have premarital sex (preferably in public) and also with a) black people and b) people of our own sex and c) all of the above. But to be fair, we on the left also turned to personal attacks: The people we disagreed with were simply bad people, racist, sexist, classist, they wanted to destroy the environment, hurt children, hold back women, enslave minorities, etc. It stopped seeming like a disagreement over the pace of change or the route to progress -- with the prior agreement being we all wanted progress -- and became a disagreement about human nature, about good and evil.

OK, that's all for tonight. Thanks to those of you who keep this thread going on Fridays, and if I can't sleep for some reason, I know I'll be back!