We need to get the vitriol out of politics.

[Scootaloo]

29. Oh yes. The problem is tone, and nothing else! Golly!

Sorry chief, but for two sides to have reasonable discussion, both sides need to be reasonable. Ever tried to have a reasonable discussion with someone who believes, oh, say, that 9/11 was engineered by the Masons?

For an example I've used before, go to Stormfront. Unless they've changed format in recent years, they have a forum dedicated to "discussion" with anti-racists called, appropriately enough "the anti forum." I've participated in that mess. Rhetoric is heated on both sides. But when one side is arguing for the purge of nonwhites from the entire country, and the other side is arguing against that, doyou think perhaps one side has some honest entitlement to be heated?

You want me to be reasonable with people who categorize rape into acceptable and less-acceptable categories? Who think the Voting Rights Act is "racist entitlement"? Who think Obama is raising a black army to institute white slavery? Who think Iraq was an awesome idea, and ought to be repeated in Iran?

That's not going to happen. I can accept a difference of opinion, but I cannot accept a difference of reality.