The filibuster is an affront to commonly understood democratic norms, but then so is the Senate.

A person's character is what it is. It's a little like a marriage - only without the option of divorce. You can work on it and try to make it better, but basically you have to take the bitter with the sweet.

A political ideology is a very handy thing to have. It's a real time-saver, because it tells you what you think about things you know nothing about.

[If the Democratic nominee turns out to be] Walter Mondale, I hope he picks Representative Geraldine Ferraro as his running mate. It would be a desperate move, but that's what it'll take to get rid of Reagan. Ms. Ferraro is no more unqualified than a lot of Vice Presidential candidates have been, and anyhow Mondale's in good health.

A "communist/socialist/progressive" is an oxymoron, like an "atheist/evangelical Christian/Muslim."

Where is it written that if you don't like religion you are somehow disqualified from being a legitimate American? What was Mark Twain, a Russian?

The dismaying truth is that birtherism is part of a larger pattern of rejection of reality that has taken hold of intimidating segments of one of the two political parties that alternate in power in our governing institutions. It is akin to the view that global warming is a hoax, or that the budget can be balanced through spending cuts alone, or that contraception causes abortion, or that evolution is just another theory, on a par with the theory that the earth is six thousand years old.