I'm kind of freaked out, because I just realized what a lot of Obama supporters are sounding like lately: battered wives who are desperately making excuses for their husbands.

He had to do it.

You just don't understand him.

He had a good reason...

You worry too much.

I don't have anywhere else to go!

Things will get better...

You never liked him!

Remember how great he was before (we got married/he clinched the nomination)? Things will be like that again...really.

But he's really a good person.

It was just a little (slap in the face/amendment to the Constitution). You're making too much of this.

He said he'd make it up to me later.

We need him.

I'm afraid of what will happen if I leave.

This is just how (marriage/a political campaign) is. Everybody does it. You have to live in the real world.

He said I wasn't listening to him.

He needs us!

Gosh, politics is so boring right now. YAWN!

Wake me up when we've all forgotten about FISA and the 1st, 4th, and 8th Amendments - not to mention reproductive rights. I don't want to hear anything that might make me doubt Obama, our Perfect Master.

I'm sticking my fingers in my ears....la la la la, I'm not listening...

This one is incredibly, tragically rare. It was a television special, I think the first Muppets television special, and it was first broadcast in the 1971.

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0068613/

It's a wonderful show, combining live actors and various early Muppets: Kermit, Robin (the little frog), and the first appearance of Sweetums the ogre. There are a lot of songs, lots of comedy...it's a lovely, funny story.

You'll probably find the songs running through your head again and again. As a kid, I actually didn't know that it WAS a TV show; we had the soundtrack, which was pretty much the complete audio of the show on LP (along with a large, beautiful photo-album). When I finally found the videotape on eBay, I was absolutely delighted.

There's also a surprise or two. Watch for a scene when Kermit gets drunk on elderberry wine in the background! That would never make it past censors today.

The sad thing is that it has never been released on DVD, and I guess it probably never will be. I had to scour eBay for a VHS copy. It's not bad, but every time I play it for my son I worry that the tape will snap or tangle.

I wish they still made TV like this!

While I'm at it (and before the comments section gets closed), here are a few more that I love to watch with my son.

I'll enthusiastically agree about The Iron Giant and The Yellow Submarine, of course. But on the more obscure side:

• Batman: The Movie - the original theatrical movie with Adam West and Burt Ward. Yes, there's some cartoon-like hitting (BAM! BOP!) but nothing really scary.
• H.R. Pufnstuf, the complete series - maybe you had to grow up with it (I did), but this may have been the height of psychedelic children's programming. My son loves it.
• Lidsville, the complete series - if anything, this is even stranger than Pufnstuf. Parents will drop their jaws in amazement at the sight of Charles Nelson Reilly as the evil green-faced Hoodoo the Magician, when he dresses up as a "girl bunny" to seduce Raunchy Rabbit (I am not making this up!). But kids think it's hysterical.
• Avatar: The Last Airbender - I hate most modern animation for children. But this show from Nick won me over. It's a remarkably well-done, well-written, well-acted show. We're all fans of it in my house.

Why would Obama support "limited" offshore drilling? Probably for the same reason he supported telecom amnesty, the FISA bill, the death penalty for crimes other than homicide, Bush's faith-based charities, and the scaling back of reproductive rights for women.

It's really quite simple. Obama's a whore.