That said, I still find the visuals as rendered by Gibbons oddly moving.

“This is not a laughing matter. So I want to be clear what I was alluding to when I referred to “borderline criminal incitement.” John McCain has a first amendment right to smear and (at least free of criminal penalties) slander Barack Obama by suggesting he’s in league with terrorists. But as we’ve seen many times, even offhandedly threatening comments directed at a Secret Service protected individual, can earn you a visit from the guys with the earpieces. And McCain and Palin are now routinely holding rallies in which they whip supporters into such a delirium by castigating Obama as a dangerous terrorist-lover that members of the audience shout what can very reasonably be interpreted as threats against Obama’s safety. Am I saying they’re breaking the law? No. But I do think they’re nudging up against the envelope and getting near that line beyond which, if McCain were not a presidential candidate, his rallies would be getting some attention from those charged with protecting Obama’s safety.)

Now, as for Obama… recall that for years Republicans have played politics of wink, wink, nod, nod. Sane people were made to believe that surely the Republican candidates didn’t take all that end times folk religion stuff seriously, while the less savoury parts of the American electorate were led to believe that Republicans didn’t take rhetoric on civil and human rights seriously. So, the idea that a politician might actually think or believe some of the things they say is a bit of a stretch.

I agree about the right-wing blogs. What I can’t understand is what they’re angry about. And that N-word may not be far off.

For the Republicans politics is now the only principle; backing a party has become the equivalent of backing a sports team. They’ve reduced themselves to the status of football hooligans, while the bookish ones[sic] try desperately to find a way to give their anger a moral and philosophical foundation.
Josh Marshall asks today, apropos more outbursts: “How long till the N-word?”
Obama has to be careful. I don’t know if he should keep playing it as cool as he is, or if he should show a little more anger. I’ve been spending a lot of time on right wing blogs and it’s scary.

This is key to understanding the Corners reaction to Obama. They need to turn him into a terrorist to justify not supporting him and maintaining with a straight face that conservativism is the only legitimate ideology. I think this is evidence of part identification becoming such an controlling mechanism that it leads to this kind of madness. McCarthy needs to hate Obama, he needs to affirm that adherence to conservative movement is the one true “faith” every one else is an infidel. Wait. . . . thats not what I meant.

The Chicago angle is the weirdest of all – there is nothing radical at all about Chicago politics. It’s straightforward corporatism, exactly the kind of thing you’d think cornerites would love.

Of course if anyone in Congress was concerned about fairness they would raise taxes and social security contributions now – firstly because doing so means the tax raises won’t have to be as big, and also to avoid a massive redistribution from future social security contributors to current contributors. Of course you can say this about the government keeping taxes low while running deficits higher than GDP growth (absent some compelling need, like WWII or possibly climate change) – again you are redistributing wealth from future generations. I wonder how many people would feel good about planning to reach retirement with lots of debt and then live off their children and grandchildrens earnings?

and via Dave above

Well, first of all she’s [Palin’s] probably one of the foremost experts in this nation on energy issues.

That’s two impossible things. Four more to go before breakfast.

Who does he think energy companies employ? Monkeys?

This is the thing: it’s fun to be tricky with the Democrats because they’re stupid liberals hahaha. Making use of your own base’s stupidity requires spurring it on, not rubbing their noses in it.

Obama isn’t practicing any kind of crouching Rezko hidden Ayers plausibility fu.

This is a very clever line. You should be proud of yourself.

What’s the problem? Who the heck cares what he “really” thinks, as long as he acts appropriately?

Look at it another way. We know that capitalists can be the kind of people who don’t mind employing children in factories, or selling meat that has shit on it. We know that because they’ve done it. But if we have sufficiently strong constraints in place, it doesn’t matter if that’s what they really want to do, because they can’t, and so it’s ok if they’re huge hypocrites who run ads that are set on farms at sunrise.