Please pass the punishment

'Cause I obviously can't get enough of it.

With so much being said already on the elections, and polls, and what impact and/or portent the OBL tape may or may not have, I'm not sure I've got anything that I can add to the discussion. So, go read Powerline, where guys who are probably smarter than me can inform you better than I can.

I was cruising the web today when I hit a blog from an 18-yr old kid in Australia. He's studying writing, and I wish him luck. His profle states that he's left wing, and that he promotes treating everyone with respect and compassion. All of which is commendable. And then in a post about 1/4 down his page, he states that pro-Bush bloggers are racists, liars, and puppets to the Fox News Channel. Which gets me thinking, that maybe he's for treating people with respect and compassion as long as they aren't conservative, or Bush supporters. Or Israelis.

The press complains that bloggers are attacking them for their outright bias - claiming that it's more than just a few people here and there - that it seems co-ordinated. They are talking about hateful phone calls where they can't get a word in edgewise. To which I suppose my first response is to think about Larry O'Donnel shouting down John O'Neil on Scarborough Country, or Chris Matthews' memorable interview with Michelle Malkin.

But buying into hatred, fear, and anger will destroy us. We can already see the lawsuits being lined up to challenge elections. Have we entered a phase in our country where we're so partisan, so violently opposed to the other guy, that we'll launch lawsuit after lawsuit to get the other guy to win? I hope not. But at this point, what's the answer? Can we back down the escalation? What will it take to prevent this from happening in the future? Would a landslide victory for one side or the other legitimize the process? While we fight over eggs, let's not kill the goose. Respect for each other, respect for the process. And no matter who wins, support for the President.