With so much political attention focused on Washington and the balance of power in both the House and the Senate, we tend to forget that there are over three dozen gubernatorial races that not only have a huge impact on how the majority of our individual states will be governed, but have a critical indirect impact on the balance of power in Congress, as well.

As was astutely noted during Netroots Nation, if the pen that will sign redistricting bills changes from Democratic hands to Republican hands in key states, that could easily translate to lost House seats via gerrymandering in 2012. Indeed, if the GOP comes up just short of the majority in 2010 (as a number of pundits are currently projecting), some carefully calibrated strokes of the redistricting pen in GOP-controlled processes around the nation can quite easily fill that gap.

So...yeah, the governor's races matter in Washington DC every bit as much as they matter in Olympia, Sacramento, and Annapolis.

Aside from their critical importance, the gubernatorial races deserve the eye of the political junkie for another reason--they are bound to be top-flight political theatre. The cast of characters and villains is second to none (I see your Rand Paul, and raise you a Tom Tancredo!), and the implementation of term limits in most states mean that more than half of the races on tap could easily be defined as competitive.

What follows is an early analysis of where we expect the races to be come November. Everyone's definition of terms like "toss-up" and "leans Democratic" vary, so let me define mine:

• Toss-Up is defined as a race where the final margin of victory is currently projected as being between 0-5 points.
• Leans D/R is defined as a race where the final margin of victory is currently projected as being between 6-10 points.
• Likely D/R is defined as a race where the final margin of victory is currently projected as being between 11-20 points.
• Comfortable D/R is defined as a race where the final margin of victory is currently projected as greater than 20 points.
• An asterisk (*) indicates a race where a switch in partisan control of that governorship is anticipated.

Let's start the journey through the 37 contests for Governor with the races least likely to be exciting, and finish it up with the races that could easily be on a knife's edge all the way through November.

COMFORTABLE DEMOCRAT: Hawaii (*), New York
COMFORTABLE REPUBLICAN: Kansas, Nebraska, Tennessee (*), Wyoming (*)

As you can see, three party shifts are virtually assured, heading into November. The Democrats are overwhelmingly likely to pick up one in Hawaii, although the identity of that Democrat remains unclear: the state awaits a competitive primary next month between former Honolulu Mayor Mufi Hannemann and former Congressman Neal Abercrombie. The GOP actually fielded arguably their best prospect in Lt. Governor Duke Aiona, but it is hard to find a pollster giving him much of a shot. Meanwhile, in New York, the GOP is busy trying to pick a winner between a guy who wants to house welfare recipients in prisons and a guy who used graphic 9/11 footage to highlight how insensitive it would be to 9/11 victims to build a mosque a few blocks away. Simple conclusion: there are no winners. Andrew Cuomo holds in a walk.

On the GOP side, it is hard to imagine that too many folks are expecting Tennessee and Wyoming to stay in the Dem column. In Tennessee, Democrat Mike McWherter faces enormous money and terrain shortfalls against GOP nominee Bill Haslam, the multimillionaire mayor of Knoxville. Meanwhile, Wyoming is Wyoming, and the Dems probably needed a far more acrimonious primary to overcome what is an enormous (and, if anything, growing) generic deficit. The GOP is also overwhelmingly favored in Kansas and Nebraska, two plains states where the GOP has comfortable footing and established candidates in current Governor Dave Heineman (NE) and retiring Senator Sam Brownback (KS).

LIKELY DEMOCRAT: Arkansas, Colorado, Connecticut (*), Minnesota (*), New Hampshire
LIKELY REPUBLICAN: Alabama, Alaska, Arizona, Idaho, Nevada, Oklahoma, South Dakota, Utah

On the Democratic side, two incumbents are probably not as safe as they normally are, but still are pretty close to locks for re-election: Mike Beebe (Arkansas) and John Lynch (New Hampshire). Some polling has suggested that Colorado is a little more hostile to Democrats than it was in 2008. Two things are keeping that statehouse secure for the Democrats, though. They have their cleanup hitter coming off the bench in the form of popular Denver Mayor John Hickenlooper, and they are the beneficiaries of a good old-fashioned FUBAR on the other side in the form of a schism which has flawed nominee Dan Maes in the GOP slot and former Republican Tom Tancredo in the slot of the Constitution Party. The Dems, post-primary, are also favored to pick off two GOP-held mansions in usually blue territory: Connecticut and Minnesota.

On the Republican side, a few incumbents reside here, although three of them were not elected originally to their posts: Sean Parnell (Alaska), Jan Brewer (Arizona), and Gary Herbert (Utah). Brewer, pre-immigration debate, appeared somewhat vulnerable. The race may tighten again, but multiple polls have shown her pulling out a bit of a lead on Democratic state AG Terry Goddard. One incumbent to watch here is Idaho's Butch Otter. Polling here has suggested that this race could shockingly move towards "Leans GOP" status, as former college professor Keith Allred is hovering around 10-12 points behind. Nevada probably lost a lot of its potential when Brian Sandoval ended the career of scandal-enmeshed GOP incumbent Jim Gibbons. The remaining trio of open-seat races (Alabama, Oklahoma, and South Dakota) get rated here largely on terrain.

LEANS DEMOCRAT: Massachusetts
LEANS REPUBLICAN: Georgia, Illinois (*), Iowa (*), Michigan (*), Pennsylvania (*), South Carolina

Only one race gets rated "Leans Democrat", and it might be headed the other way were it not for a surprising and somewhat counterintuitive turn of events. In 2009, incumbent Democrat Deval Patrick learned that one of his fellow Dem statewide officers, treasurer Tim Cahill, was running for Governor as an Independent. The notion of two Democrats running against a GOP nominee seemed daunting, but then polls revealed something intriguing. Instead of Patrick and Cahill splitting the Democratic vote, Cahill and GOP nominee Charlie Baker split the anti-incumbent vote. Patrick has led in virtually every poll taken this year.

On the GOP side, we see a quartet of Dem-held seats leaning the other way, all in the Midwest or Industrial states. Two races (Pennsylvania and Michigan) are open seats where Democrats have to overcome the drag of outgoing two-term incumbents who have entered into that window of unpopularity that often accompanies longtime officeholders. The other two races (Iowa and Illinois) feature incumbents whose approval numbers are flagging. The only saving grace in that pair of races is GOP frontrunners (Terry Branstad in Iowa and Bill Brady in Illinois) with potentially exploitable flaws. In Iowa, the Dems can still mine the long political history of Branstad in the Hawkeye State (where he has already served as Governor for 16 years). In Illinois, Brady is a little-known downstate legislator whose politics are considerably to the right of the state. In the South, there are two races (South Carolina and Georgia) where the ideological excesses of one candidate (SC GOP nominee Nikki Haley) and the ethical excesses of the other (former GA Congressman Nathan Deal) might open up windows of opportunity for the Democrats to pick off a seat in nominally hostile territory.

TOSS-UP (6 D, 5 R): California, Florida, Maine, Maryland, New Mexico, Ohio, Oregon, Rhode Island, Texas, Vermont, Wisconsin

In these eleven races are the key to whether November will be greeted with smiles or frowns in DGA or RGA headquarters. If all the lean/likely/comfortable races fall as projected, the GOP is looking at a net gain of three governorships, which would place the balance of power at near-parity (26 R/24 D). If the toss-ups fall disproportionately to the GOP, then they could have a pickup of anywhere between 4-9 seats, which would ensure that a solid majority of the nation's governors will be Republican when redistricting kicks off in 2011. But if the toss-ups swing back toward the Democrats, they could hold or even slightly pad their majority of the statehouses, an almost inconceivable show of strength in a trying electoral climate.

CALIFORNIA: This is a classic battle of terrain versus money. California is a blue state, one where the generic lean to the Democrats is fairly profound. But the GOP has a candidate (Meg Whitman) who has already spent nine figures out of her own pocket to hold the seat for the GOP. Whitman has been within the margin of error of Democratic nominee Jerry Brown throughout. Should Democrats be concerned that Whitman has been able to pull close in what is admittedly an ugly climate, or should Republicans be concerned that Whitman has all of these inherent advantages, and still can't pull into a consistent lead?

FLORIDA: Few races have shifted more in the last few months than the race in the Sunshine State. The GOP primary in Florida (which comes to a merciful end of Tuesday) has been one of the most expensive, ugliest affairs in the 2010 cycle. Rick Scott spent nearly $40 million to win the nod, and polling in the past week shows that his efforts will be for naught. But Bill McCollum has gone from a lock to hold the seat for the GOP to a guy with no money (having blown his war chest fending off Scott) and badly damaged favorability. Democrat Alex Sink, meanwhile, has been able to look like the grown-up for the past few months, and has moved into a slight lead. Bud Chiles (the son for former Governor Lawton Chiles) looked like a potential Dem spoiler when he announced early in the Summer, but polls show him drawing fairly evenly from both parties. This would truly be an improbable pickup for the Dems, who were watching Sink trail by double digits to McCollum just four short months ago.

MAINE: Maine's gubernatorial elections are often a mystery to predict, because this is a state that is not afraid to embrace Independent candidacies (witness Governor Angus King, who served two terms here as an Independent from 1995 to 2003). The pattern holds in 2010, as Democrat Libby Mitchell and Republican Paul LePage (a surprise winner in the GOP primary) are joined by Eliot Cutler, a former Democrat who has polled in the double-digits as an Independent candidate. Sadly, only Rasmussen has deigned to poll the general. Their predictable results (great news for the GOP!) have yet to get outside confirmation, but one wonders if a teabagger-friendly candidate (LePage was the weapon of choice for the movement in the primary) can win in a state that Barack Obama carried easily in 2008.

MARYLAND: In the mid-Atlantic, one of the most high-profile races in 2010 is this sequel of one of the more high-profile races of 2006. Democrat Martin O'Malley, the former mayor of Baltimore, scored a clear win over then-incumbent Republican Robert Ehrlich four years ago. This time around, Ehrlich is back, but the strong Democratic tailwind of 2006 has been replaced by a headwind whose strength might be debatable, but whose existence at this point certainly is not. O'Malley still holds a slight lead, which might be legit. Ehrlich is clearly a known quantity, so the usual rules about challengers having a lot of upside may not apply here.

NEW MEXICO: This race has a lot of intriguing quirks to it. This was a state that seemed to shoot from a bellwether state to at least a light blue state in 2008, when Obama carried the state by 15 points. But outgoing Democratic Governor Bill Richardson is another one of those relatively unloved second-term outgoing executives, and the GOP nominated a Hispanic woman from bluish Dona Ana County in District Attorney Susana Martinez. Democrats counter with Lt. Governor Diane Denish. Every recent poll in this race (although it has been a while since we've seen one) has been a pure coin flip.

OHIO: If there is a race of the eleven that is flirting with leaving "toss-up" status, it is this one. Ted Strickland is an incumbent that is clearly struggling with public approval, and polls show him starting to trail former GOP Congressman John Kasich. Strickland's ace-in-the-hole might be Kasich himself, who cashed in big time in his post-Congressional days and will have to defend a few things (Lehman Brothers comes immediately to mind) that might be tough to defend in the current environment.

OREGON: This race joins Florida as a race that has changed markedly in recent months. Former Democratic Governor John Kitzhaber has come out of several years in the political wilderness to reclaim the job he held between 1995 and 2003. The national climate seems to be holding him back a bit, as well as the unique opponent he faces--Chris Dudley. The GOP nominee is largely known to Oregon voters as a bench player for the NBA's Portland Trailblazers. While Dudley built up a fair amount of name recognition from that gig, his political chops are still somewhat of a mystery. The DGA is helpfully trying to fill the gaps with a new website which is a fairly effective attempt to define Dudley. Expect Team Kitzhaber to work hard to define Dudley politically in a state where the terrain should still favor Democrats incrementally.

RHODE ISLAND: One thing is near-certain--the GOP will lose their nearly two decade stranglehold on the Rhode Island governor's mansion. The question is whether the GOP will be replaced by a Democrat (state treasurer Frank Caprio) or a Republican-turned-Independent (former U.S. Senator Lincoln Chafee). Chafee is not a standard-issue Republican, of course. He endorsed Barack Obama in 2008, and was the least conservative member of the U.S. Senate when he served from 1999-2007. Caprio dodged a primary when state Attorney General Patrick Lynch elected to stand down several weeks ago.

TEXAS: One would suspect that, in this climate, an incumbent Governor in a traditionally Republican state should be safe and sound in 2010. In the Lone Star State, at least, that suspicion would be way off. Incumbent Republican Rick Perry survived a high-profile primary from Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison, but the fatigue that comes with longtime incumbency (he has already been on the job for nearly ten years) has put him in a fairly difficult position against Bill White. White may well have been the strongest Democrat the party could have fielded: a popular former mayor of Houston who has been able to go blow-for-blow with Perry on the fundraising front. The polls have been so close here that it is impossible to call this a "sleeper race" anymore.

VERMONT: This race, despite being a toss-up, has received little attention and scant polling. Republicans have held this seat since 2002, when Jim Douglas replaced outgoing Governor Howard Dean in an upset over Democratic nominee Doug Racine. With the seat open in 2010 upon Douglas' decision to retire, Racine is back. He is not alone this time, however, as a quintet of potentially competitive Democrats are in the mix. The Democratic field will shake out next week, with Tuesday's primary. Secretary of State Deb Markowitz is generally considered to be the favorite, but this could be close. Republican Lt. Governor Brian Dubie has been quietly waiting, raising more cash than the Democrats and hoarding it (Dubie doesn't have a primary). This one could be extremely close: while Democrats dominate the state in federal elections, the GOP is often competitive in statewide offices.

WISCONSIN: It is a battle of the greater Milwaukee area in 2010, as three candidates repping the region are the frontrunners to replace outgoing Democrat Jim Doyle. The Democratic nominee will almost certainly be Milwaukee Mayor Tom Barrett, who also served for years as a Congressman from the region. On the Republican side, Milwaukee County Executive Scott Walker and former southern Wisconsin Congressman Mark Neumann are squaring off in next month's primary. Walker was considered the strong favorite, but he did not have the best week, as charges of latent racism followed a video put out by team Walker that meant to criticize the President on mass transit, but wound up being a pretty ridiculous unforced error by Walker. Polls give Walker a narrow edge, but Barrett is still very much in the game.

Let's say you're the key operatives and media strategists behind the party out of power. Let's say that your party's nominee challenging the Senate Majority Leader hates black football jerseys because they're the tool of Satan. And let's say that another of your Senate candidates wants to do away with the Americans with Disabilities Act, or kidnapped a girl in college to go take some bong hits. And let's say that your semi-official slogan is the "Party of No" because you've been obstructing every single badly-needed piece of reform that the majority party has been trying to institute since the beginning of the term. And for some reason, you still have the momentum entering the November election. Under these circumstances, it would stand to reason that your official propaganda arm would do anything to change the subject. And so it has: by focusing on the one subject that no Senator, Governor and Congressman can do a thing about.

It should come as no surprise that as the November election draws closer, the conservative movement would choose to stop focusing on things that legislators are responsible for (such as what sort of legislation to pass--and focus instead on something they have no control over (such as where a private entity builds a community center and house of worship). Democrats may be unpopular right now, but Republicans are just as unpopular. Meanwhile, the last thing conservatives want is to have a fight about actual legislation; they tried running briefly on the idea of repealing health care reform, but that fizzled. They certainly can't run on opposition to Wall Street reform, or the Lily Ledbetter Act, any other of the good pieces of legislation passed by the Democratic Congress and signed by President Obama.

But fortunately for them, they don't have to. This may seem as surprising: after all, elections are supposed to be about giving the voters an opportunity to decide which candidate is going to enact policy that would be more aligned with their interests. If only. This topic is explored in depth in Drew Westen's seminal work, The Political Brain. In one sentence, the book's upshot is this: Democrats spend all of their time trying to appeal to the rational brains of voters through facts, figures and laundry lists of legislative accomplishments, while Republicans focus on more emotional topics, such as narratives and values. And guess which side of the brain is stronger?

If voters were completely logical and practical, it would make no sense whatsoever for an entire movement to all of a sudden focus on an issue over which its candidates have no control. Even if the Republicans retook the House and the Senate, there would be nothing they could do to prevent Imam Rauf from developing Park 51 at its currently intended. location if he managed to raise the funds and get his team in place. But as Westen has conclusively demonstrated, that's not how voters make their judgments.

From an emotional point of view, people are uncomfortable with Park 51, regardless of where they stand on the more practical, legal issue of whether the government ought to ban it. And when conservatives express their own animosity toward the project, they are expressing an emotional shared value with voters. And during a time when voters seem fed up with both parties in terms of actually getting anything done, this source of emotional connection could end up just as strong a driver as any agreement with a checklist of stated platform positions: after all, if a candidate shares your basic fundamental values, you just might implicitly assume that they'll vote the right way on complicated legislative issues.

This issue puts Democrats on their heels: the typical Democratic response citing the First Amendment guarantees of free exercise of religion is a statement simply on whether or not Park 51 has a right to be built, but it doesn't address the issue of how the Democratic candidate actually feels about the issue--the emotional, hazy question of "should" or "shouldn't." Actually answering that question forces Democrats to either go outside the majority of American sentiment, or seem like they're making a much-delayed attempt at latching onto the majority opinion in a desperate attempt to save face. Neither of these options is acceptable.

This sticky political situation is fraught with danger, but there is opportunity in it as well. The Republicans are trying to go back to the  playbook from 2004 and 2006 and use the Park 51 project as a referendum for exploring how concerned Democrats are about "national security" and "protecting America"--and the debate is playing out along similar lines to the old debates about FISA legislation, domestic spying, and our rights under the Fourth Amendment.

As thereisnospoon pointed out to me recently, though, Democrats have an opportunity to use their support for Park 51 to reinforce their existing narrative about supporting the little guy. Democrats support the right of middle-class moderate Muslims to worship in peace for the same reasons that we support extending unemployment insurance for those hard-hit in these economic times. For the same reasons that we support the right of the LGBT community to get married. Because even when it's slightly unpopular, our fundamental values is to stand up for people's basic fundamental rights to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Meanwhile, the Republicans are hating on hardworking immigrants who likely escaped oppression in their home countries to come here in search of a better life, all while doing their absolute best to protect the bankers on Wall Street who nearly wrecked the world just four blocks away.

That's what the Democratic Party is about. And we shouldn't hesitate to include Park 51 proudly into our narrative, rather than trying to defend it from theirs.

So, the Republicans have figured out an election strategy. It can't be the economy, because they're already getting the full benefit of the Obama economic recovery program's shortcomings, and too much focus on the recovery would necessitate a focus on why a recovery was even necessary; and the electorate hasn't forgotten who is most to blame. It can't be corporate corruption, because the Republicans are wholly owned subsidiaries of the corporate plutocracy, and have opposed any Democratic attempts at regulation or forced responsibility. It can't be the environmental awareness that has awakened in the aftermath of the BP oil disaster, because criticizing the president necessarily leads to questions of an alternative response, and the Republican alternative of doing even less is not going to lead to more votes. Unemployment is out, because the Republicans don't want to help the unemployed. Health care doesn't work, because the Republicans don't want health care to work, and repealing the president's health care plan would start the whole mess all over again; and nobody wants to start the whole mess all over again. When you're the Party of No, you have to give the voters a reason to say "yes." Abnegation and abdication aren't good campaign themes.

So, the Republicans want to make the planned Islamic center and mosque that would be built sort of near Ground Zero into a nationwide campaign theme. And never mind that it has nothing to do with national politics. And more specifically, never mind  the pain and suffering it inflicts on innocents who already have endured far too much pain and suffering. Certain Democrats deserve condemnation for their own efforts at playing politics with a bigotry that deserves scorn and vilification, and the best advice for elected Democrats has been that repeatedly offered by Big Tent Democrat: stop talking about it; but the Republicans aren't merely floundering around trying to sound nuanced and wise while at best only embarrassing themselves, they're deliberately exploiting the worse devils of human nature. They're not seeking understanding or reconciliation, they're seeking to inflame. It's what Republicans so often do, particularly on the national level. They stand for nothing that is good for the common humanity, so they try to divide humanity by inciting people to stand against one another. Fear-mongering. It's a tired and decrepit template, but it may be all they know to do.

The Cold War is over. The Soviet Union is gone. No one is afraid of China or Cuba or Nicaragua or Venezuela. Terrorism is a tricky topic, because Republicans don't want people to remember that 9/11 should have been prevented, and that the man most responsible for it got away when he should have been caught. People just aren't as frightened about what's out there in the world, right now, so the only way to fear-monger is to focus attention on what's right here at home. That the Islamic center and mosque would be a place of worship and dialogue and community-building is irrelevant. That it's not actually at Ground Zero is irrelevant. That there are other houses of worship in the vicinity is irrelevant. That the people who want to build and use the center and mosque had nothing at all to do with the devastating attacks of 9/11 is irrelevant. That they might not even have the funding and plans to build it is irrelevant. The only thing relevant to Republicans is that it is a possible opportunity to identify an Other against whom paranoia, xenophobia, and plain old bigotry can be used for political gain. If there was a viable alternative Other, even the Republicans wouldn't be wasting time and energy on this waste of time and energy. Many of those caterwauling about this probably aren't even really bigots in their own hearts. But that only makes them worse. Because bigotry often is based on ignorance and irrational fears. It often can be alleviated, and sometimes even eliminated, by communicating and educating with compassion and wisdom. But deliberately exploiting ignorance and irrational fears is something far more sinister. It is not ignorant, it is fully conscious. It is not irrational, it is meticulously planned.

As previously noted, the modern Republican Party was build on the exploitation of racism. Nixon's Southern Strategy. Reagan refining it, beginning with his speech on "states' rights" in Philadelphia, Mississippi. The first Bush and Willie Horton. And even now, we have the continued idealizing of the Confederacy, and the normalizing of racism by the likes of Beck, Breitbart, Coulter, Faux News, Limbaugh, and O'Reilly. But to some on the right, racism isn't an ends, it's a means. And race is but one aspect of that means. The key is to turn people against one another so that reason is clouded, fears are heightened, and just enough people are demonized and marginalized. If bigotry against blacks isn't enough, there's also homophobia. Lee Atwater, who ran the elder Bush's political operation, may at the end of his life have come to regret some of his behavior, as he famously apologized to Mike Dukakis, but he never apologized to the black community whom the Willie Horton ads so viciously attempted to stereotype. And when the younger Bush built his political career on the strategies of Atwater's old friend Karl Rove, it was the same basic idea but with a different targeted demographic. Rove has been called a lifelong gay baiter, and while he was working for Bush, Republicans nationwide began promoting state ballot measures banning gay marriage, often in states that never would have legalized gay marriage in the first place. The real goal was to drive turnout of homophobic voters, which was understood to equate with improving Republican electoral prospects. As Republican strategist Charles Black admitted, in 2006:

"It’s a game of margins," said Charles Black, a Republican strategist who consults frequently with Karl Rove, the chief White House political strategist. "You’ve got about 20 House races and probably half a dozen Senate races that are either dead even or very, very close. So if it motivates voters in one or two to go vote, it could make a difference."

Of course, by that year, the countless failures and disasters of the Bush-Cheney administration weighed more in the minds of even those marginal voters than did their fear of gay love. What had helped in 2004 didn't do much in 2006. But it was the attempt that mattered. It's hard to believe that most smart Republican strategists seriously worried about the mythical negative social impacts of gay marriage, but they certainly wanted to exploit those who did harbor such false fears. It's the demonization that counts; and if demonizing blacks or gays doesn't work, there are other demographics to target.

In 1994, California Republicans promoted the xenophobic Proposition 187, and Republican Governor Pete Wilson rode its coattails to re-election. In this case, the strategy ultimately backfired, because the law was struck down in court, Wilson's presidential ambitions went nowhere, and the political backlash ended up devastating Republicans among California's increasingly diverse populace. Democrats ended up controlling all state offices, and only the arrogance and ineptitude of Gray Davis allowed Republicans even but a foot back in the door. What is now happening in Arizona also seems to be helping an incumbent Republican governor, but an increasingly purple and also increasingly diverse electorate might soon enough coalesce around a different attitude. But once again, the specifics are less important than the intentions. Once again, the Republicans are seeking political gain by stereotyping a minority population, while consciously inflaming bigotry against it.

As campaign strategies, much of this makes sense. At times, it works. When it doesn't work, a new demographic group can be targeted. But for the Party of No, it's the only game in town. And by persistently pursuing a politics that attempts to turn people against one another, that deliberately shreds the very concept of a social fabric, and that can only succeed by exacerbating demographic distrust, the humanity of Republicans is called into question. What kind of people would do such things? What kind of people would do such things again and again? They are hurting the people they target, and they are also hurting the nation. Bigotry is bad enough, but this is worse. And they continue to get away with it, even when it doesn't produce the electoral results they intend. Because too many are too afraid to call them on it. The traditional media usually enable it. Their typically inane attempts to turn all facts into relativist partisan debates prevent an honest assessment of what really happened and what continues to happen.

Republicans exploit bigotry. They inflame it. They attempt to capitalize on it. This is not about politics, it's about that forgotten concept of basic human decency. People pursuing such strategies should not be enabled. They should not be tolerated. Because if anything should be absolutely intolerable, it's intolerance and the exploitation of intolerance. Pundits and reporters should not be allowing this to continue as an acceptable aspect of our political process. It should be identified for what it is. It should be condemned. Those responsible should be condemned. This isn't about Muslims or blacks or the LGBT community or immigrants, it's about all of us. It's about who we want to be. And the only people these strategies should be casting into the spotlight of public scorn are the people who create and use these strategies. How is it possible for such people to be allowed anywhere near the halls of power? How is it possible for such people to be taken seriously? The only question about them that really should be asked is how they live with themselves. How do such people become such people? Who are these people?

"He has endeavored to prevent the population of these States; for that purpose, obstructing the laws for naturalization of foreigners, [and] refusing to pass others to encourage their migration hither."

--The Declaration of Independence

That was included among the principal grievances against George III enumerated in the Declaration of Independence. Both practical and principled men, they recognized that the new country would have to be populated and they were anxious to attract large numbers of immigrants to this continent. The economic viability of the new country depended upon having a diverse and skilled populace.

On the principled side of things, they of course wanted to expand their vision of the blessings of liberty to all [propertied, white, male] persons of the world. Why shouldn't they? They were the beneficiaries of their forefathers (and mothers') ability to settle in this new land. Creating a new, flourishing democratic nation for the world to see and perhaps emulate meant not pulling the ladder of opportunity up after them.

But let's assume they took the attitude that the Dred Scott Republicans of today and would deny the benefits of citizenship to anyone whose parents weren't both born in the colonies. That would mean 22 of the 56 men who signed the Declaration, well, would probably have been denied that distinction.

• George Clymer: his mother was born in the colonies, his father in England
• Benjamin Franklin: mother born in the colonies, father in England
• Thomas McKean: both parents emigrated from Ireland
• Robert Morris: born in England
• Benjamin Rush: his father was English, his mother probably Irish
• James Smith: born in Ireland
• George Taylor: born in Ireland
• John Morton: parents were Finnish
• George Ross: his father was born in Scotland
• James Wilson: born in Scotland
• Matthew Thorton: born in Ireland
• Francis Lewis: born in Wales
• Philip Livingston: father born in Scotland
• Button Gwinnett born in England
• Thomas Nelson, Jr.: father born in England
• William Hooper: father born in Scotland
• Edward Rutledge: father born in Ireland
• John Witherspoon: born in Scotland
• Samuel Chase: father probably born in England

And how about those who wrote and signed the Constitution? Two of them, Richard Bassett and Daniel of St. Thomas Jenifer have parents of unknown national origins. Eighteen of them were either born outside of the colonies or had one or both parents, including from the list above, Benjamin Franklin, Robert Morris, James Wilson, George Read, and John Rutledge. The others:

• Charles Cotesworth Pinckney: his mother was born in the British West Indies
• Alexander Hamilton: born in the British West Indies
• Pierce Butler: born in Ireland
• James McHenry: born in Ireland
• Richard Dobbs Spaight: parents born in Ireland and England
• Hugh Williamson: parents born in Ireland
• William Few: parents born in England
• William Paterson: born in Ireland
• Thomas Fitzsimons: born in Ireland
• Jared Ingersoll: parents born in England
• William Jackson (Secretary): born in England

Taken to its logical extreme, the desire to exclude anyone from the rights of citizenship on the basis of where their parents were born would invalidate the participation of those men in founding the nation. Not that there's much logic in the extremism of Lindsey Graham, Mitch McConnell, Jon Kyl, Jefferson Beauregard Session, III and, of course, John Boehner. Would they take it to this extreme? Of course not, but where would they draw the line on birthright citizenship? Would they let Michelle Malkin stay? Gov. Bobby Jindal? Former Senator Pete Domenici? Astronaut Jose Hernandez? Alberto Gonzales?

Gonzales, in fact, just wrote about the debate:

Like most Americans, I am a descendant of immigrants and a grateful beneficiary of the opportunities available to our nation's citizens. My grandparents emigrated from Mexico in the early 20th century seeking a better life, and they found it working in the fields and dairy farms of Texas. Diversity is one of the great strengths of the United States -- diversity fueled by the migration of ethnicities, cultures and ideas....

Based on what I have observed, most illegal immigrants come to America to provide for their families, and by most accounts, they contribute to our economy.

How embarrassing is it for these lawmakers to be schooled on the principles of the rule of law by Alberto "The Geneva Conventions are Quaint" Gonzales?

And of course, there's also the reality of this ginned up "drop and leave" epidemic Lindsey Graham swears is ruining the nation. That reality is, according to PolitiFact:

Because citizen children cannot sponsor their parents for citizenship until they turn 21 -- and because if the parents were ever illegal, they would have to return home for 10 years before applying to come in -- having a baby to secure citizenship for its parents is an extremely long-term, and uncertain, process....

Undoubtedly, citizenship plays some role in the decisions by undocumented immigrants to come to the U.S. After all, they have made a decision to make their future in the United States rather than in their home country, and part of building a better life in the U.S. is having citizenship for their children. But on Fox, Graham termed the practice "drop and leave," which suggests that illegal immigrants are coming here for the primary purpose of having babies with citizenship, then rushing home to wherever they came from.

Graham's comments on this are misleading. While that does appear to be happening with affluent "birth tourists," it's important to understand that those affluent "birth tourists" are not the ones illegally crossing the Rio Grande or the Sonoran desert. They are coming here with the proper legal papers and giving birth. Thus, whatever public policy challenges arise from "birth tourism" are separate and distinct from the public policy challenges of illegal immigration -- which is not at all the impression that Graham gave in his Fox appearance.

The motivating factor for people coming to the United States, legally and illegally, remains unchanged from when those men listed above signed their names to declare freedom--through the Civil War and the passage of the 13th, 14th and 15th Amendments, through the fight for suffrage and the passage of the 19th Amendment and finally full voting rights with the 24th and 26th Amendments. Opportunity. The whole idea embodied in the Preamble: "To secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity."

The great American idea has always been about creating a better life for each successive generation: "our posterity." It's been a long evolution to extend that vision beyond the white, male, property owners who were the original "We the people" to every person inhabiting this land. There's one amendment in particular that secures those blessings of liberty.

Constitutional historian Richard Beeman writes in his newly issued Penguin Guide to the Constitution: "Perhaps the most significant and far-reaching amendment to the Constitution, the Fourteenth Amendment is viewed by many scholars and jurists as the provision of the Constitution that has brought the principles enunciated in the preamble of the Declaration of Independence into the realm of constitutional law." In other words, equality, life, liberty, property and pursuit of happiness were now constitutionally protected rights.

Messing with that is just downright un-American.

There are other words to keep in mind in this debate, words that are so integral to the American experience that they grace the very symbol of the nation.

The New Colossus

Not like the brazen giant of Greek fame,
With conquering limbs astride from land to land;
Here at our sea-washed, sunset gates shall stand
A mighty woman with a torch, whose flame
Is the imprisoned lightning, and her name
Mother of Exiles. From her beacon-hand
Glows world-wide welcome; her mild eyes command
The air-bridged harbor that twin cities frame.
"Keep ancient lands, your storied pomp!" cries she
With silent lips. "Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!"

• Science Daily:

  By 2100 only 18% to 45% of the plants and animals making up ecosystems in global, humid tropical forests may remain as we know them today, according to a new study led by Greg Asner at the Carnegie Institution's Department of Global Ecology. The research combined new deforestation and selective logging data with climate-change projections. It is the first study to consider these combined effects for all humid tropical forest ecosystems and can help conservationists pinpoint where their efforts will be most effective. The study is published in the August 5, 2010, issue of Conservation Letters.

• The New Yorker has the last interview with François Truffaut, which previously had only been available in a book. Richard Brody on its revelation:

  I long felt that Truffaut’s pursuit of craftsmanship, sentiment, and charm apparent in his later films overwhelms, even obliterates, the drive for artistic individuality and expression. I don’t think so anymore; I’ve come to think, instead, that he emulated the Hollywood filmmakers he admired, and turned his films into satisfactory simulacra of the mainstream productions of the day, while leaving the most personal and daring elements just out of view and below the surface but available to viewers who approach them with the inner eye of reflection and sympathy. (What’s more—as I wrote earlier this year—the increasing distance of his ideas from the images that convey them is also a function of his increasing technical command.)

  For what it's worth, I've always considered the charming and sentimental Two English Girls to be Truffaut's most under-appreciated masterpiece.

• You have to respect this:

  The controversial proposed New York City mosque and Islamic center is not the "ground zero mosque" and its location two blocks away is "near" – not "at"— ground zero of the 9/11 World Trade Center attacks, The Associated Press’ style arbiter told staffers in a memo Thursday.

  AP staffers also were reminded that the mosque would be but part of a larger Islamic center, and that Muslim prayer services have been held at the proposed site since 2009.

• Roscoe Bartlett is the sole Republican member of Maryland's Congressional delegation.

  An audit by the Federal Election Commission has uncovered significant errors in Rep. Roscoe Bartlett's campaign account, the agency disclosed this week.

  A final audit of the Bartlett for Congress Committee for 2007 and 2008 found that it failed to report dozens of expenses and significantly under-reported the amounts he raised and spent during that period, which covered his '08 re-election run.

  The FEC, which enforces federal election law, has not imposed any penalties. Nor did it describe the errors as intentional. However, it said it reserved the right to take enforcement action.

• Students and programmers from Columbia Engineering, NYU, and Princeton have created a visualization of the events revealed by the WikiLeaks Afghanistan logs.

  As The Times noted in one article, "The archive is clearly an incomplete record of the war. It is missing many references to seminal events and does not include more highly classified information."

  But the visualization shows surges of activity over this five-year period, growing drastically as the war progresses.

  The direct Vimeo link is here.

• In England, legal and medical experts are not allowing the strange case of David Kelly to be forgotten.
• The Department of Housing and Urban Development holds a conference on housing, and somehow neglects to include affordable housing advocates.
• Sometimes, there is a happy ending:

  Blanca Catt -- the Portland teen who was at risk of being deported even though she was adopted by American parents -- has learned she's on the fast track to legally live, work and go to college in the United States.

  U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services sent Catt a letter informing her that she should have her U visa within two months.

  Catt was eligible for the U visa because she was a crime victim as a child. Catt was born in Mexico, was brought into the U.S. as a toddler and seized from abusive parents by state child-welfare workers. She was placed in foster care with American foster parents -- the Catts -- when she was 5. She was adopted when she was 8, and her parents say caseworkers told them their daughter automatically became a U.S. citizen because of the adoption.

  They eventually learned that wasn't true -- the first inkling of trouble began when Catt was 16 and tried to get her driver's permit. Three years later, it looks like the end of their long fight may be in sight.

  After her story appeared in The Oregonian, the offices of Sen. Ron Wyden and Rep. Earl Blumenauer called Catt's attorney offering to help.

• Act surprised:

  The economic crisis in the United States has reduced the use of routine medical care, and the cutbacks here are much deeper than in countries with universal health care systems, researchers say in a new report.

  The study, published by the National Bureau of Economic Research, finds that "Americans, who face higher out-of-pocket health care costs, have reduced their routine medical care" much more than people in Britain, Canada, France and Germany.

• Sometimes, the facts speak for themselves.

From a modern day perspective, the US airplane sprang up in the Wright Brother's bicycle shop, and came into its own over European battlefields a decade later. And that's reasonably accurate with one caveat: most of the iconic biplanes that dueled above the muddy trenches of WW1 weren't made in the USA. In 1914 the Europeans had already mass produced thousands of aircraft while only about a hundred hand-made prototypes existed in the US¹. American manpower made a big difference in the outcome of the war, but US airpower arrived too little and too late.

After the war domestic aircraft production continued to lag. Alarmed by the slow pace of progress and now well aware of the military and commercial potential of airplanes, the US government stepped in with the Kelly Air Mail Act of 1925 which allowed the US post office to hire private pilots to carry mail. It saved a ton of money and time: if the government had to design and build their own aircraft, it would take years before airmail was available. The true price, at least as far as taxpayers were concerned, would have been the development, acquisition, maintenance, and operating cost of the planes divided by the number of parcels/pounds delivered. By hiring private owners the cost was much lower and airmail service could begin immediately.    

US aircraft companies that had been struggling saw demand tick up. Just two years later Charles Lindbergh flew the Spirit of St Louis into the pages of history, and US aircraft manufacturing, aided by investment capital flowing from Wall Street to main street, exploded. The 1930s, a decade otherwise marked by mass unemployment and a slow faltering recovery, is considered the golden age of aviation. Aircraft design enjoyed the largest peace-time burst of progress in history and employed thousands of people. Howard Hughes and Amelia Earhart became household names. Mass production took hold, larger, reliable monoplanes with retractable landing gear and even pressurized cabins began rolling off assembly lines. And none too soon.

Without that golden age of innovation, America's influence in WW2, from the lend-lease of aircraft that served in the Battle of Britain to the D-day invasion, might have been reduced. How that would have affected the war is anyone's guess, but it's a good bet it would have lasted longer and millions more might have died. Instead, because of US air superiority, not only did the allies prevail faster, the spin offs in science, materials, electronics, and even progressive social changes like women in the workforce are today the stuff of legends.

No analogy is perfect, and I have grossly simplified this one despite suggestions from expert sources. But the similarities to NASA's proposed commercial crew program are striking. After the shuttle program ends, foreign manufacturers will once again be ahead of us and US astronauts will have to catch rides on Russian rockets. Just as the post office avoided enormous development costs and years of delay by capitalizing on domestic aircraft, NASA could get people and instruments to space way sooner using new spacecraft made by smaller emerging companies without paying the billions in development costs. Just as the US now leads the world in aerospace and employs hundreds of thousands of people who actually build things rather than trade paper for banks and insurance companies, the US space industry could lead in this field. And just as wealthy railroad barons and their army of political lackeys bitterly opposed competition and lobbied against the Kelly Act, powerful interests are working against commercial space: about 85% of NASA's current budget goes to the aerospace wing of the military-industrial complex and the defense industry is eager to keep that goose laying big fat golden eggs.

Something like the Kelly Act for the space-age will be up for a vote in September, along side legislation that would effectively kill it. The first bill in the Senate (S.3729) provides modest incentives to smaller, emerging spacecraft manufacturers who already have vehicles flying. The latter bill offered by the House (H. R. 5781) all but kills commercial space development in favor of a token version of George Bush's defunct Constellation program. HR 5781 as written would charge US taxpayers tens of billions for traditional aerospace contractors to develop new rockets that may not fly until 2020, if ever. I'll have some ideas about how to steer Congress in the right direction soon.

Ninety years ago, a young man named Harry T. Burn, at the insistence of his mother to “be a good boy,” changed his vote from “nay” to “yea,” and the generations-long struggle for women’s suffrage was at last won.

It is easy to catalog the progress of the last nine decades. Women can vote, own property, earn a paycheck and keep the money in their own bank accounts, go to college and play sports there, and yes, run for and hold elected office. Three of the last four Secretaries of State have been women. The Speaker of the House is a woman. Three of the nine Supreme Court justices are women. And let us not forget that a woman very nearly won the Democratic nomination for president in 2008.

But -– and of course there is a but –- it is not enough. Because despite these achievements, control of our economy and our government still rests almost exclusively within the hands of men. For women to achieve full equality, they must have a real role in making the decisions that affect their lives. And that role requires real, and proportionate, representation -- something 90 years of struggle for equality has yet to achieve.

In the private sector, while women now comprise the majority of the labor force, they are still vastly outnumbered by men at the executive levels. As of 2009, only thirteen of the Fortune 500 companies were run by women. And those women CEOs make only 85 percent of what their male counterparts make.

In fact, a study by the non-profit research group Catalyst found that at the current rate, it will take another 40 years for women to achieve "parity with men in the corporate officer ranks."

Forty years.

Will it take that long for women to achieve pay equity as well? Maybe. The incremental progress toward pay equity has not come without legislation guaranteeing women the right to work and to earn the same wages as their male counterparts -- and even then, a significant pay gap still exists today. As does the forceful opposition to such legislation.

Despite protestations from those who scoff at evidence of this disparity, like the Chamber of Commerce -– who has, for decades, opposed every single piece of legislation intended to address this disparity, including the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act, the Family Medical Leave Act, the 1964 Civil Rights Act protecting pregnant women from discrimination, the Equal Pay Law, and the Paycheck Fairness Act -- the pay gap is real, and it is not merely the result of women choosing lower-paying jobs. It is a reflection of our deficiencies as a nation to recognize the obstacles and needs of half the labor force.

Just look at the utter failure of our country to address the reality of working mothers. Our country continues to treat working mothers as if they were an aberration, rather than the norm, and as such, any difficulties women encounter in trying to earn a living and care for their children is a problem for them to solve, a problem in which the government has no interest. Those women who "choose" to work and have families are left to their own devices, unworthy of the government's care or resources.  

But working mothers are, in fact, the norm: 80 percent of American women have children, and of those, 66 percent of them are employed, mostly in full-time jobs. A country that valued women, and mothers, would address the obstacles women face, rather than dismiss them as a consequence of women's choices, a consequence for which the solution is, according to the Chamber of Commerce, "choosing the right place to work and choosing the right partner at home."

That's really no solution at all.

From the moment a woman enters the work force, she will earn less than her male counterpart -- and if she has children, as the majority of American women do, it will cost her. She will end up making significantly less than men, according to a recent report by The New York Times.

And it will cost her in other ways. Unlike 168 countries that provide some form of paid family leave, most of which offer a minimum of 14 weeks and as much as a full year, the United States has only the Family and Medical Leave Act, which applies only to companies with 50 or more employees, and which guarantees only 12 weeks of unpaid leave. For most American women, three months without a paycheck is simply not a possibility. And even then, women still face the very real threat of losing their jobs anyway if they actually exercise that right.

Once working mothers do go back to work, they face the enormous expense of childcare -- an expense that ranges from $3,016 a year to $13,480 a year -- or more. Without any aid from the government because, according to those like the Chamber of Commerce, the government and society in general should not have to concern itself with the "choices" women make to work and have children.

But in a nation in which women are so severely underrepresented in positions of power, is it any wonder that the "solution" offered them is simply to figure it out for themselves?

For all the progress women have made, they still comprise a mere 16 percent of Congress and 12 percent of governorships. That's not real representation; it's token representation. And token representation is not enough to implement real, systemic changes that are necessary to improving the lives of women, and therefore all Americans. Such under-representation is not without its consequences.  

During the debate about health care reform, for example, Republican Senator John Kyl argued against a requirement that insurers offer basic maternity coverage. Why? Because it didn’t affect him.

"I don't need maternity care," Kyl said. "So requiring that on my insurance policy is something that I don't need and will make the policy more expensive."

Senator Debbie Stabenow was quick to point out to him, “I think your mom probably did."

Yes, John Kyl’s mother -– and 80 percent of all American women. Yet when the government is run largely by men, who see no need for something as basic as maternity care, is it any wonder that our system still refuses to acknowledge the needs of half the population?

That's what you get with token representation: the government's blind eye to problems that disproportionately impact women -- but, in reality, impact everyone. Senator Kyl certainly isn't the first to argue against legislation to help women, on the grounds that since he doesn't need it, it doesn't matter.

The antidote is greater -- much greater -- representation, a critical mass of representation.

Critical mass is an idea that has moved from science and sociology to political science and into popular usage over the last 30 years. The concept is borrowed from nuclear physics: It refers to the quantity needed to start a chain reaction, an irreversible propulsion into a new situation or process.

...[O]nce women reached a critical mass in an organization, people would stop seeing them as women and start evaluating their work as managers. In short, they would be regarded equally.

The report by The White House Project, assessing women's level of involvement and progress throughout the public and private sectors, offered the example of the Supreme Court (before Elena Kagan became its newest justice):

• One woman is newsworthy -– she’s a first.
• Two is better –- but still an exception, not the rule.
• Three out of nine -– one in three -– stops being unusual.

We are a long way from women holding at least a third of the seats in Congress. It's no wonder, then, that legislation to address the needs of women is still the exception rather than the rule. It's no wonder, then, that too often, Congress dismisses as unnecessary programs to help women and their families -- programs that exist in every other industrialized nation in the world.

The answer, though, is not only to elect more women. There are now, as there have always been, women who work against the best interests of other women. Sarah Palin’s Mama Grizzlies are merely the latest incarnation of the anti-women’s movement -- a movement to oppose real solutions for women, dressed up in a skirt and lipstick, as if to legitimize their efforts to block progress. Palin is really no different from Phyllis Schlafly, the woman who made a career out of telling women not to have careers, the woman who fought –- and continues to fight -– against equality for women.

More Sarah Palins and Phyllis Schlaflys and Mama Grizzlies are not the answer. Just as progressives work to elect more, better Democrats, so too do we need more, better women in politics, so that women are not just the exception, so that the obstacles women face are deemed significant enough to merit real solutions, so that the most basic needs of women cannot be dismissed as unnecessary just because men have no use for them.

Ninety years after that young Tennessee representative cast the deciding vote to enfranchise women, a battle was won. Women could, at long last, have a voice in the process of choosing their leaders. But the last 90 years have shown that it isn't enough. To create a nation that truly recognizes and values women and their contributions, women need to do more than just have a voice in the process of choosing leaders; they must have a voice in the process of leadership itself.

And that battle is far from over.

There is a clash of civilizations going on, and it has nothing to do with the Burlington Coat Factory Community Center. It's more fundamental than Christian vs. Muslim. It's reason vs. fear. Civilization vs. anarchy.

That clash is happening right here in America.

Don't misunderstand me. I don't believe that being a conservative equates with being evil. Over the course of our nation's history, many conservative figures have raised questions deserving of an answer. They framed their issues with ideas that were testable. They contributed to the national conversation in a meaningful, beneficial way. They acted not just out of raw self-interest, but with sincere desire to do what they believed best for our nation and its people.

After more than two centuries of trials both at home and abroad, we have results from those tests. Conservative economics haven't just brought on repeated failure here, they've done the same everywhere and in every time. Conservative social policies aimed at producing a country that's joined around a less diverse set of ideas haven't engendered strength through unity, but an inflexible fragility. Those questions have been asked and answered, but the results don't mean those who raised the conservative position were any less dedicated to discovering the truth and serving the nation.

Only that's not what's happening now. Those conservatives, the men and women who argued with reason and passion for the positions they believed best for our nation, have been replaced by something else altogether. The two sides in our national debate can no longer be characterized as simply "left" and "right."  In a remarkably short time, we've witnessed the overthrow of the right by something new... only it's not really new at all.

For a long time I viewed this new crew with something of the same assumption that Jesus made on the cross: "forgive them, because they don't know what they're doing." Surely those tearing at the foundations of science would not have done so if they recognized the real danger their actions represented. Surely those calling for defense of the Constitution through limits on the freedoms it enshrines didn't grasp the contradictory nature of their positions. Surely those working to wrest the last crumbs of control from the powerless and carry them back to the powerful were unaware of years spent and lives lost in obtaining even this modest share of equity.

I no longer believe this is true. When Rush Limbaugh blames the BP disaster on "eco-terrorists," I don't believe he really thinks this is in any sense factual. When Newt Gingrich compares Muslims to Nazis, I don't believe he does it out of ignorance. When Glenn Beck says that President Obama will force doctors to perform abortions and Michael Savage says that the president will disband the Marine Corps, it's not because they are badly informed. When Sen. Pearce insists that the 14th Amendment doesn't apply to the children of immigrants, when Fox news moves the beginning of Obama's presidency so that the disasters of the Bush years land on his plate, when those who were so shocked that Godwin's Law might have been dented in a blog post two years ago are now shouting "Hitler" on the floor of the House and Senate -- I don't think it's because they've been pushed there through no choice of their own. Death panels? Do you think the people making that claim really believed it? What about global warming being caused by sun spots? How about the threat of Muslim terror babies?

The question of protecting the nation or the principles on which it was built is no longer the focus of "conservative" arguments -- it's not even a side note -- because this group no longer makes any distinction between the common good and their own self interest. They have reached the conclusion that their success is worth any price, even if that price is fatal to the founding principles of the nation. They have no canon but victory, no concept of restraint.

It's not surprising that this generation of Republicans has made a hero out of Joeseph McCarthy. They admire the way in which he cowed his enemies and the way in which he distorted the meaning of liberty. They admire him because he generated fear.

The question of "have you no sense of decency" has been answered. They do not -- at least not one that rises above their hunger for power.

For the unobservant, what's happening this November is just another in two centuries of mid-term elections. The press is already dusting off their talks from past cycles, ready to note how the numbers of each party in the House and Senate have been altered. They expect to devote an hour -- maybe two -- to highlighting what these changes say about the popularity of the president. They may go so far as to discuss how the results affect the fate of some bit of legislation (but don't count on it). You can bet that have some absolutely spectacular new charts prepared to show poll results and the rearrangement of seats in the legislative chambers.

But the story in this cycle isn't just numbers. What's at stake this November isn't holding Democratic gains in the House and Senate. It's not protecting Barack Obama's mojo. It's not advancing a progressive legislative agenda.

What we're facing in a few short weeks is a critical test; one that I believe may do more to determine our future than any action inside our own borders for over a century. More important even than the election of Barack Obama in 2008. Because the ideas put forward by men like Glenn Beck are not "just like fascism," they simply are fascism. It's the idea that personality can outweigh facts, and that force can author "justice" as well as any law. It's the conviction that those with hard-won knowledge are dangerous, and need to be overruled by "common sense." It's the view that history has an unfortunate bias, one that can be adjusted with a careful "correction" of the textbooks. It's the doctrine that only a portion of the populace is Real Americans deserving of liberty, and the rest must be dealt with as enemies. Those poisonous thoughts are sickeningly familiar, and they have lost none of their vile potency in the last sixty years.  

Those that have taken the place of the traditional Republican Party (and the once reasonable politicians who have thrown over their long held ideals to grovel for these new masters) are not just battling with some aspects of science, they're waging war on reason. Not just tinkering with immigration policy, but sharply narrowing the meaning of the word "American." What's at stake isn't whether laws will be passed favorable to our positions, or whether laws will be passed that we don't like -- the real question is whether the United States will continue as a nation of laws.

We've been told, and polling data reflects, an "enthusiasm gap" between those who saw Barack Obama into office in 2008, and those who want to unseat him. Those massing on the right -- the birthers, Beckers, and baggers -- smell blood in the water. They've already seized the Republican Party and they mean to seize the nation. Somehow, for those not part of that movement, this election remains just another election. If that's going to change in the few short weeks that remain, it's going to have to be because some were willing to work, to raise the alarm, and to elevate what's at stake beyond a squabble between "left" vs. "right."

This was the week that President Barack Hussein Obama's secret Muslim past finally caught up with him. But with all of the Muslimy things he's done, the only real surprise was that it took as long as it did.

I mean, there were only so many Sundays that he could reasonably expect to hide his true faith on the golf course.

When you actually stop and think about it, Obama has nobody to blame but himself for the growing misperceptions about him. The fault certainly doesn't lie with the people feeding those misperceptions.

In fact, to say that it does would be downright un-American.

This evening's Rescue Rangers are claude, srkp23, grog, shayera, and watercarrier4diogenes, who's also scrounging around in the pockets of the Robes of Objectivity, looking for the Wand of 'Seriousness'(™Glennzilla), wondering if maybe Dumbledore took it with him...

The rescued diaries are:

• Yet another lesson in the long history of Indians in the US, from Ojibwa: Indians 101: The Third Seminole Indian War. (claude)
• Fire bad tree pretty analyzes the Australian Election Results: None of the above? (grog)
• davidseth muses: There's More To Being An Elder Than Being Old. (claude)
• Lightning Rod examines the perils of Agribusiness -- Eggs In One Basket. (grog)
• Keith Pickering reports on research that indicates Earth's plant life: dying on land, dying at sea, not a good sign. (watercarrier4diogenes)
• danps analyzes some news concerning the war on terror, so-called, and executive power, in America's Bad Reputation Gets a Little Worse. (srkp23)
• leftyparent examines the role of religious dogma in creating Five Themes of American Conventional Wisdom. (claude)
• A Siegel sets the record straight with this review of a misleading volume from the Energy Bookshelf: Power Hungry gushing of lies. (srkp23)
• The search for an addition to his "pack of 2" takes Dixiedemocrat through the Dog Days of Summer. Come along for the ride. (watercarrier4diogenes)
• There was a woman named Paula, and what a wonderful woman she was. murphy reminisces. (claude)

jotter has wrought his data-gathering majik in High Impact Diaries: August 20, 2010 while carolita has carefully collected and crafted Top Comments – 8-21-10 – Adaptability Edition.

Enjoy and please promote your own favorite diaries in this open thread (even if you're the author! Here's where that's actually appreciated). And, of course, since it's an open thread, PLAY NICE, OK? 8^)

All week, we have been offering birthday wishes to various folks. Today, a tangent on that--happy 51st birthday to...Hawaii! The beautiful archipelago became our fiftieth state on August 21st of 1959, when President Eisenhower signed a proclamation that came on the heels of the passage of a statehood bill in Congress and the overwhelming support of Hawaiians in a statewide referendum.

So a hearty mahalo to the state of Hawaii for being a critical part of the American fabric. With that, onward to the (very full) weekend edition of the Wrap...

THE U.S. SENATE

AK-Sen: Hotline On Call focuses on the forgotten primary
With just three days until the next time Americans head to the polls, most of the attention has been focused on Florida and Arizona. Lost in the shuffle, meanwhile, is a race that got a lot of early hype and then faded into the ether: the Senate primary in Alaska between incumbent Republican Lisa Murkowski and Mama Grizzly's preferred candidate, attorney Joe Miller. Hotline on Call looks at the race, and comes up with a pretty decent reason why it fell of the radar screens: it might not be all that competitive. Despite the support of the Palin and Tea Party express crowds, Miller does not appear to have made any headway in his battle against Murkowski.

FL-Sen: Greene's biz dirty laundry hits Florida newspaper
When you are running for office, in part, of imparting your business acumen on the swamp in Washington, stories like this on Election Eve are bound to be a little bit unhelpful:

"We thought it was super. Somebody was going to invest money into the stores, get supplies, get us everything we need to run a business," she said, referring to Greene, whose Sunshine Energy LLC acquired the lease to her gas station and others in September 2009. "In the beginning, it seemed like that was going to happen. Then suddenly, nothing."

By February, Rose was having problems with vendors, who refused to deliver beer or soda unless they were paid cash. Her store and others occasionally ran out of gas because of supply problems. Payroll hours were cut. She put buckets around the store whenever it rained because a leak in the roof was not fixed.

"It started spiraling down, getting worse and worse," Rose said.

The convenience stores in question were eventually seized by the local landlord, who claimed that Greene's company breached contract by not providing proper maintenance of the properties. Greene, not surprisingly, is vehemently protesting the seizures, in a matter that has now gone to the courts.

GA-Sen: Second poll confirms Isakson is no lock in the Peach State
Less than a week after Rasmussen, of all people, showed that Republican incumbent Johnny Isakson could be potentially vulnerable, their finding was echoed by Insider Advantage. The southern-based pollster has Isakson under 50%, with the Republican at 47% and Democratic nominee Michael Thurmond at 35%. In what could provide an intriguing twist, I-A has Libertarian candidate Chuck Donovan at 7% of the vote. This means, of course, that 2010 could mimic 2008, when GOP Senator was forced into a post-November runoff election before he finished off Democrat Jim Martin.

IL-Sen: GOP pollster first in some time to claim a Kirk lead
It has been a good long while since a pollster has put Republican Congressman Mark Kirk out front in his battle with Democrat Alexi Giannoulias (early June, to be exact). But a GOP-leaning pollster, We Ask America, is claiming just that, releasing a survey showing Kirk with a 39-33 lead over Giannoulias. The difference is a large lead for Kirk with Independents (other pollsters have shown this metric far closer), and the fact that W.A.A. claims that Kirk is claiming 12% of the Democratic vote.

LA-Sen: Vitter dominating GOP primary, still wigging out about it
Here are two pieces of news out of the Pelican State that seem to lack a bit of congruency. Item #1: incumbent Republican David Vitter is not reacting particularly well to the hard-hitting new ad from GOP challenger Chet Traylor. Indeed, his campaign is throwing out lawsuit threats against any state radio stations that agree to run the ad. Item #2: Traylor is apparently not a dire threat to Vitter. A new poll out from Clarus Research gives Vitter a little sixty-nine point advantage (74-5) over Traylor, with perennial candidate Nick Accardo at 3%.

The pollster also hit on the Democratic primaries and general election. Congressman Charlie Melancon has a clear lead in the Democratic Senate primary, with 43% of the vote (both of his challengers combined log in at 5%). In the general, Vitter maintains a solid-but-not-dominant lead over Melancon, leading the Democrat by a 48-36 margin.

NH-Sen: Hodes latest Democrat to call for Warren nomination
Another day, another prominent Democratic challenger calling on President Obama to nominate Elizabeth Warren as the head of the newly-created Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. This time around, it is New Hampshire's Paul Hodes, who wrote the following on Friday: "Middle class Americans need a tough fighter like Dr. Warren to hold the Wall Street banks and credit card companies accountable. She saw what an out-of-control Wall Street was doing to our economy, and has fought hard every step of the way to tip the scales away from special interests and back towards average hard-working Americans."

WA-Sen: SUSA poll claims modest post-primary lead for GOP's Rossi
This is a rather eye-popping result: the first post-primary poll for SurveyUSA shows Republican Dino Rossi having no trouble consolidating the GOP vote...and then some. Rossi, according to SUSA, holds a seven-point edge (52-45) over incumbent Democratic Senator Patty Murray. It does seem somewhat peculiar that Murray will not be able to even hold down the 46+% that she earned just this past Tuesday. Evidently, SUSA is forecasting a surge of GOP voters to the polls in November that simply won't be matched by the Democrats.

WV-Sen: Manchin has huge lead in Senate special election
Local pollster RL Repass looks ahead to November in the Mountain State, and finds that Democratic Governor Joe Manchin is going to ride his high popularity (65% job approval) into a new gig in Washington DC. The local pollster gives Manchin a twenty-two point lead over self-funding GOP businessman John Raese (54-32). Repass also looks ahead to 2012, and finds Republican Congresswoman Shelley Moore Capito and Democratic Secretary of State Natalie Tennant as the frontrunners to replace Manchin in the governor's mansion.

THE U.S. HOUSE

AZ-08: Kelly's final pre-primary gambit--dissing Mama Grizzly?
Wow...this is pretty damned interesting. Jesse Kelly, the twenty-something veteran who is running as the GOP teabagger alternative in the hot primary to challenge Democratic Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, took a pretty interesting swipe at Sarah Palin. Kelly knocked Palin (who he still says has his 2012 support, given the current field) for making politically safe endorsements (Carly Fiorina and Terry Branstad come immediately to mind), saying that voters want "political courage" right now. Kelly's establishment challenger, former state legislator Jonathan Paton, immediately wedded himself to Palin, lambasting Kelly for saying not-nice things about the self-appointed GOP kingmaker. In the strangest footnote to this quite-strange story, this may well be the only competitive race in the Union in which Palin has not offered an endorsement.

FL-22: Allen West's near-Macaca moment?
Memo to all Republican officeholders and office-seekers: those guys with video cameras at your events are called trackers. It is an accepted action in American politics. You do yourself absolutely no good wigging out about it. Just ask this dude. Allen West is the latest to step in. While his gaffe might not rise to George Allen level, it is pretty bad nonetheless. Noting the presence of a tracker for the Democrats, West jumped on the young man, saying the following:

"I know here today we have a representative from the Florida Democratic party and he is here to film me and his whole purpose of filming me is to take what I say and allow other people to distort it so they can misrepresent me. You know if we allow those Gestapo-type intimidation tactics to prevail in the United States of America what happens to our liberties, what happens to our freedoms?"

If saying that a tracker represents Gestapo tactics is a bit over-the-top, consider it even a bit more so when you consider that: (A) West's opponent, incumbent Democrat Ron Klein, is Jewish and (B) the tracker himself, who worked for the Florida Democratic Party, was the grandson of Holocaust survivors.

West might have other problems, however, like finding his district. An article in the Broward New Times two weeks ago noted that not only does West live in the adjoining 20th district, he recently held a town hall in the 19th district, and opened a campaign office in the...23rd district. He has, to his credit, opened some offices in the 22nd district in which he is running, as well.

IL-10/IL-11/IL-14: GOP takes two of three seats in GOP poll
In three potentially competitive seats, it looks like a net gain of one seat for the GOP, according to new polls out Friday from the GOP-friendly pollsters at We Ask America. The pollsters give the GOP two seats held by Democratic incumbents, claiming that Adam Kinzinger has an eye-popping twenty point edge in IL-11 (52-32) over Democratic freshman Debbie Halvorson, while GOP state legislator Randy Hultgren has a more modest seven point advantage over Bill Foster (44-37). The lone bright spot for the Dems: W.A.A. also looks at the open 10th district (vacated by GOP Senate nominee Mark Kirk), and finds that Democrat Dan Seals has a lead (43-40) over Republican Bob Dold.

NY-13: GOP field may splinter in McMahon seat
Democrat Michael McMahon is running for re-election in a potentially hostile district, but his GOP competitors are doing their best to pave his path to a second term. The latest move came from GOP challenger Michael Allegretti, who filed 5000 signatures to form a new party line for November. Dubbed the Taxpayer's Party, Allegretti seeks the ballot line because of a schism in the local Conservative Party, which endorsed Allegretti's GOP foe, Michael Grimm. What this means, if it goes through, is that both Grimm and Allegretti will be on the November ballot, no matter which of the two gentlemen survives next month's GOP primary. All hail intrasquad discord!

THE GUBERNATORIAL RACES

CA-Gov: Whitman has issues with her right flank as GOP confab opens
Apparently, $100+ million has not bought peace between GOP gubernatorial nominee Meg Whitman and her right-wing base. As a semi-annual Republican convention looms this weekend, several delegates who represent the more conservative members of the caucus are quite vocal in their discontent with the nominee. Echoing a charge made by many progressives, the rightward base is nothing with contempt that the Meg Whitman of the general election sounds dramatically different than the Meg Whitman of the primary election. One noted derisively: "There's almost nothing left of primary Meg...As long as that's the case, she's not going to get Republican voters to turnout." At issue, in particular, are the issues of immigration and taxes.

FL-Gov (R): Frontrunners bludgeon each other all the way to the finish
It will be a miracle if either business magnate Rick Scott or state Attorney General Bill McCollum have favorabilities over 30% when their long and brutal primary finally lurches to a conclusion this week. New campaign finance documents report that Scott dumped eight figures into his flagging campaign in the last twelve days ($12 million in total). Meanwhile, Scott was waylaid by the revelation (conveniently dropped on Election Eve by Team McCollum) that he invoked his 5th Amendment rights against self-incrimination an eye-popping 75 times during a 2000 deposition. The deposition came in the midst of a massive Medicare fraud investigation that the government was undertaking against Scott's company, Columbia/HCA.

FL-Gov (D): Get me Buddy Chiles...stat!
Best political proclamation of the year comes from minor Democratic candidate Brian Moore, who is pretty likely to be on the unpleasant end of a landslide in the Democratic Primary, courtesy of state CFO Alex Sink. Moore assailed Sink's selection of former state legislator Rod Smith as her choice for LG, and issued a press release today saying that after his victory on Tuesday, he plans on calling up "Buddy Chiles" and offering the LG gig to him. Bud Chiles (who, as far as we know, has never been known as Buddy) is currently waging an Independent bid for Governor. The son of former Democratic Governor Lawton Chiles, his campaign made clear today that despite the overwhelming temptation, they'll stick with their own Indie bid for the office.

GA-Gov: Runoff highly possible in competitive guv's race
The new Insider Advantage poll out of Georgia referenced earlier vis-a-vis the Senate race has even more intriguing numbers for Governor. The poll gives Republican Nathan Deal a narrow lead of just four points over Democrat Roy Barnes (45-41). What's more, the poll gives Libertarian challenger John Monds 5% of the vote. If the undecideds break anywhere near evenly, it becomes very possible that this election will be forced into a post-November runoff. Another wildcard, of course, is the potentially ongoing investigations about ethical issues which helped to hasten Deal's resignation from the Congress. While Deal maintained that he resigned to focus on his gubernatorial campaign, he was under an ethics committee investigation, one that was rendered moot when he left office. There have been persistent rumors that a federal investigation into the affair is still rolling along.

MN-Gov: Indie candidate carves center (center-right?) path in 1st ad
Anyone wondering which of the major nominees was going to be impacted most heavily by Independence Party gubernatorial nominee Tom Horner is probably still wondering in the wake of the third party challenger's first ad. Horner carves a pretty post-partisan path, assailing both parties for looking too far to the ideological edges (using the fairly disturbing graphic of a man whose eyes...one red and one blue...look in polar opposite directions). However, Horner's radio advertising features his former boss, moderate GOP Senator Dave Durenberger. That might be a nod to moderate GOPers nonplussed by the ideological rigidity of their party's nominee, Tom Emmer.

OR-Gov: Kitzhaber catches break as leftish third party stands down
Democratic gubernatorial nominee (and former two-term Governor) John Kitzhaber has one less electoral headache to deal with, as the presumptive candidacy of left-leaning third-party challenger Jerry Wilson was denied by the party itself Thursday evening. Wilson, who drew 7% of the vote in a recent SUSA poll, lost his ballot line when the party elected not to fill their spot on the ballot for Governor (they did, however, choose to do so in several downballot races). There are a couple of competing theories as to why this happened: some question Wilson's plan to wage an internet-only campaign, while Wilson himself says he was told that the party was concerned that he might fail to reach the 1% of the vote standard, which would cost the party their guaranteed line on the ballot. Kitzhaber has had great luck with left-of-center Indie candidacies. Three weeks ago, the Pacific Green Party also declined to field a gubernatorial candidate.

THE RAS-A-POLL-OOZA

Given that the Ras-sies have "some dude" (much love to Swing State Project for that term) within sixteen points of Barbara Mikulski in Maryland, I think it is safe to say that the House of Ras hasn't lost their touch yet, despite having some numbers that have been mimicked by other pollsters in recent days. I'd also place bets that the Alabama Governor's race is closer than the betting line Rasmussen puts up to close out the week.

AL-Gov: Robert Bentley (R) 58%, Ron Sparks (D) 34%
AR-Gov: Gov. Mike Beebe (D) 53%, Jim Keet (R) 33%
AR-Sen: John Boozman (R) 65%, Sen. Blanche Lincoln (D) 27%
MD-Sen: Sen. Barbara Mikulski (D) 55%, Eric Wargotz (R) 39%
WY-Gov: Matt Mead (R) 58%, Leslie Peterson (D) 24%

Who knew?

Republican Allen West is the Tea Party candidate for House in Florida’s 22nd district ... said:

[A]s I was driving up here today, I saw that bumper sticker that absolutely incenses me. It’s not the Obama bumper sticker. But it’s the bumper sticker that says, ‘Co-exist.’ And it has all the little religious symbols on it. And the reason why I get upset, and every time I see one of those bumper stickers, I look at the person inside that is driving. Because that person represents something that would give away our country. Would give away who we are, our rights and freedoms and liberties because they are afraid to stand up and confront that which is the antithesis, anathema of who we are. The liberties that we want to enjoy.”

West went on to call Islam a “very vile and very vicious enemy that we have allowed to come in this country because we ride around with bumper stickers that say co-exist.”

Before starting his much-deserved summer vacation, President Obama made four long-overdue recess appointments.

President Obama  made four recess appointments Thursday for nominees that have waited an average of 303 days for confirmation, the White House said.

"At a time when our nation faces so many pressing challenges, I urge members of the Senate to stop playing politics with our highly qualified nominees, and fulfill their responsibilities of advice and consent," Obama said in a statement announcing the appointments. "Until they do, I reserve the right to act within my authority to do what is best for the American people."

The most contentious of the appointments is Maria del Carmen Aponte, the administration's pick for ambassador to El Salvador.

Senate Republicans questioned her during a March confirmation hearing about a former romantic relationship with a Cuban national connected to Cuban intelligence.

I wonder how many past romantic relationships of men the Senate Republicans give a shit about. The other appointments he made yesterday include "Elisabeth Hagen as the Agriculture Department's undersecretary for food safety, Winslow Sargeant as chief counsel for advocacy at the Small Business Administration, and Richard Sorian as assistant secretary for public affairs at the Department of Health and Human Services."

What's coming up on Sunday Kos ….

• Mark Sumner thinks that 2010 isn't just another mid-term election, it's the real "clash of civilizations" in Hannibal ad portas.
• While most of the attention on who will be in charge of Congress after November, Steve Singiser will shift gears and put the spotlight on what might be the most competitive and intriguing set of races on the calendar this fall—the three dozen gubernatorial battles where future balance of power might well be at stake.
• Joan McCarter will look into the nation's collective family tree, and expects to find a few "anchor babies" there.
• Ninety years after women finally won the right to vote, Kaili Joy Gray will speculate as to what the next 90 years will bring in women's struggle for equality.
• DarkSyde will examine the historical precedent for one smart government partnership that happened to serendipitously save the world as we know it.
• Laurence Lewis will wonder what kind of people would build a political movement based on bigotry.
• The brouhaha over the Cordoba House is not a spat over facts and rights. It's a debate about values. Dante Atkins will explore the dangers and opportunities underlying the situation.

Via Greg Sargent, here's Charles Krauthammer on August 13, arguing that government has the right -- through zoning laws -- to block development of the Islamic community center and mosque near Ground Zero (my emphasis):

America is a free country where you can build whatever you want -- but not anywhere. That's why we have zoning laws. No liquor store near a school, no strip malls where they offend local sensibilities, and, if your house doesn't meet community architectural codes, you cannot build at all.

These restrictions are for reasons of aesthetics. Others are for more profound reasons of common decency and respect for the sacred. No commercial tower over Gettysburg, no convent at Auschwitz -- and no mosque at Ground Zero.

Build it anywhere but there.

The problem, of course, is that because there are already several churches within one block of Ground Zero, the only way to zone out the proposed community center and mosque would be to specifically target one religion. And here's Krauthammer on August 20, changing his tune (also via Sargent):

No one disputes the right to build; the whole debate is about the propriety, the decency of doing so.

It's a small measure of progress, but lest I give Krauthammer too much credit, he's still wading into very murky constitutional territory, arguing that President Obama should encourage the developers into "accepting the New York governor's offer to help find another site."

The problem with that is obvious: a state should never get in the business of finding land for a religious institution. The First Amendment doesn't just protect from religious discrimination, it also protects from religious favoritism.