The real problem these particular Republicans have, likely shared by their most avid supporters, is that they're basing their opinions on two problems epidemic among them. First, they CAN'T comprehend even the most basic math. They're not paranoid about money because they know how to handle it and track things carefully, but because they can't balance their checkbooks (or don't bother) and consequently always fear they're going broke.

Second, just like in high school and college where they never read their assignments, they never read all the way to the end of anything. As soon as they find a snippet that can be used to support their point of view, they stop reading, just like they did in high school where they tried to pick the answers out of the chapter they were supposed to read without ever reading the whole chapter.

They use the Bible the same way, picking a word here, a phrase there, then taking everything out of context and adding it all up to make something that is often completely antithetical to the passages from which they've borrowed.

Rather than actually reading even solidly conservative information, as in the late, great William Buckley, they would much rather listen to Rubaugh bloviate on and on and on. They really are the new "know nothing" party, because they're too intellectually lazy to educate themselves enough to know anything about reality, as they have been all their lives.

Perhaps Mr. Sirota does not give President Obama enough credit. Mr. Bush, of course, was out of his league from the moment he took office, but even moreso after 09/11/01, and consequently with the help of his most trusted (as in dominantly Rasputin-like) advisers, blew with whatever wind they were providing him (and being notoriously "incurious" never so much as Googled a single subject seeking independent facts).

I suspect President Obama is taking a very deliberate approach, forcing the Democratic leadership in congress who, although they talk a good game, have been notoriously weak-kneed when it comes down to putting their names and their votes on the line, to commit themselves to what he, in consultation with them, is doing by allowing them to "push" him to the "left."

Of course, if you, Mr Sirota are part of that approach, reinforcing it by patting them on the back for "forcing" him to be more "liberal," than he would have been without the force of their support, I applaud your efforts!

No harm. No foul. The perfect phrase comes to mind... I quote Professor Trewlany, "Together let us cast ourselves into the future!"

Meanwhile, as indicated elsewhere on Salon, the Republicans try, desperately, sooo desparetly, to discover how they might win the support of the American people by casting themselves into the...

PAST (you know, the GOLDEN age, right after they got rid of everyone who could do math, checked facts, actually read and studied history, practiced the sorcery of logic, or wasn't rabidly racist, misogynist, anti-abortion AND anti-gay rights.)

Now that he's left this mortal coil behind, William F. Buckley must be spinning in his grave at what pretends to be "conservative" these days.

Poor, Poor, Poor, Old Richard... If the dollar drops in value, it's only because of the dishonesty and greed of American financial institutions and Wall Street. These "wonderful" institutions have accomplished such great things under deregulation that now they won't even lend to each other because no one trusts what anyone else says about the nature of their assets.

Why would ANY foreign investor want to lend any American a penny!? It's completely impossible to tell what ANY American asset is worth thanks to deregulation. You might as well reach your hand into a muddy pool in which you know piranha and coral snakes are hidden in order to try to pick spare change off the bottom.

Sadly, when the true value of the assets of American financial institutions becomes clear, institutions in which most of us have retirement money invested, it's likely the whole system will drop down to reality - about where it was just before Mr. Reagan took over. We'll start over from there.

You can plan that, the stock market will level off right at that value (if not a bit lower) with a few "dead cat bounces" along the way before it finally settles down. The value of the American dollar will drop from where it is now to a comparable value by percentage.

Obama will have had nothing to do with it. It will simply be the very predictable results of the "invisible hand" of the "free market" doing what it does best - giving anyone who's not among the super rich the finger.

If we're lucky, Obama's stimulous package will begin to rebuild the economy on real value. You remember that from high school econ, don't you: procuring natural resources, manufacturing, the production of crops, new inventions, new ideas, and the education, labor and infrastructure required to accomplish those things.

This, of course would be in place of what we've recently had: speculation piled on speculation piled on leverage used to support still more speculation all based on opaque financial instruments of which no one had any clue to their actual value, all of which only served to inflate, through slight-of-hand the value of things which had actually gained no true increase in value and were bound to crash like a hot-air balloon that's run out of fuel.