You know, Readerreader, you bring up an interesting point: The fact that two of your family friends were pushing Jerry Falwell's "Bill Clinton is a murderer" video doesn't exactly reassure me. I truly believe the Republican party lost its moral and political compass during the Clinton administration, with Dan Burton shooting a pumpkin/watermelon (can't remember, don't want to dignify Dan Burton by Googling it) to investigate the "murder" of Vince Foster to, yes, Impeachment Madness, led by members of the GOP Class of '94 who turned out to be the most scandal plagued in recent history. The GOP pulled out all the stops, crazy frickin' allegations, downright lies and hysteria, to beat back Clinton. They just have one more weapon -- race -- in their arsenal with Obama. But the crazy didn't begin with Obama. Thanks for that.

You are relatively sensible, and so I think you might like Kathleen Parker if she hadn't dissed your girl. As she said on Hardball, she doesn't believe Palin is intentionally, consciously racist, she just loves red meat and whipping up crowds -- behind pretty much zero actual policy.

Occasional Observer, I'm going to continue to accept that there are some "Town Hell" participants who show up on their own, out of their own sense of outrage. Outrage cultivated by lies about Obama's agenda, but I am sure there are folks at those meetings who aren't being bussed in or otherwise paid by fatcat corporate lobbying groups like Dick Armey's corrupt Freedom Works.

Readerreader, I may give you too much credit sometimes: It's neither Vernon Jordan nor Andrew Young -- those two prominent black Democrats -- who are responsible for covering up John Edwards's admittedly bad behavior. It's a white guy named Andrew Young who worked for Edwards. Come on now, I know we're post-racial but that baby looks nothing like the OTHER Andrew Young.

banyantree, if you're still reading, I'd love any detail you have about the Lebanon Town Hall. We'd like to promote your letter to the cover. Thanks!

Readerreader, first of all, I said in this post today, I've said it other times: I am disappointed Obama won't say how he'll pay for this. I think that is part of his problem: Somebody has to pay; people need to know who. Otherwise they're susceptible to propaganda like yours -- that it will be middle class folks giving up college and summer vacations. Will he tax gold-plated health insurance plans? Will he support a surcharge on the top 1% of earners? Will he have to do both? He needs to tell us, and then I think his plan will be more palatable.

Second, if you're proud that your girl Sarah has made a completely dishonest reading of Sec. 1223 the norm -- well, then, I've given you more credit for intellectual honesty than you deserve. Living wills and powers of the attorney for the affluent and/or educated; submission to the whims of doctors and insurance companies at the end of life for everyone else. Is that the GOP platform? Run on that, y'all.

Kaishann, thanks for being open minded, but I have to say: Whether or not he's talking about marijuana, he's defending attacking the cops and driving up the "body count" to make his point. I don't like our drug laws, but I don't advocate driving up the body count.

Likewise on your suggestion he's not sympathetic to Birthers: I don't know how you list Robert Schulz as a hero if you don't share his major passion: Proving Obama isn't eligible to be president.

To the many people claiming I'm defending the police when they storm people's homes over drugs, you're not reading either what I wrote, the Reason piece or Kostric's post.

You can make the case that such raids are wrong -- as Reason writer Radley Balko did -- without saying that perhaps "body counts" (of dead cops) are the way to discourage such raids, as Kostric did.

But thanks for trying!

lateagain, I love you, but if my talking about these crazies on Hardball means they're recruiting more crazies, that's the fault of a poor organizing campaign on the part of the Democrats and Obama organization -- not me! I think a lunatic like William Kostric and his Birther, secessionist, cop-shooting impulses deserves reporting on. I think that Grassley's bait and switch with Obama -- I'm a moderate, I want a bipartisan solution, I'm going to back the most insane and cruel and false lies about the president's health care plan!

Limbaugh, Grassley, Kostric -- they're all dangerous, and they all deserve attention. It's why we're here.

Hi Stef, I didn't see your post, I sent an email with her meetup/we surround them 9/12 links to our newsteam Wednesday night! Gabe Winant used some of the info yesterday but when I saw that MLK reference I died.

Swift Loris, I understand your confusion about the good and bad reasons #2! The distinction I was trying to make was between thinking Obama's style would help, and thinking it was either magical, and would tame Republicans, or that the evil Clintons brought all their troubles on themselves. There was a lot of the latter on the progressive blogosphere during the primary.

I'm stunned by the WaPo piece today, that the White House is shocked by the progressive reaction to hints they'd abandon the public option. If you want proof Obama is really just a centrist, there's your proof. Of course a centrist is still better than the far-right loons who ran this country for eight years, but it's disappointing nonetheless.

Many thanks to my defenders here!

And weeping, it's great to see you here again. Can you tell the letter writers who are claiming I've been a slavish Obama supporter from the get-go that, well, that isn't true?