This part really got my attention:

"Meanwhile, conservative talk radio, which I have been following with interest for almost 20 years, has become a tornado alley of hallucinatory holograms of Obama. He's a Marxist! A radical leftist! A hater of America! He's "not that bright"; he can't talk without a teleprompter. He knows nothing and has done less. His wife is a raging mass of anti-white racism."

She's talking about right-wing radio, but she could just as easily be talking about this very blog.

"It's gotten to the point that I can hardly listen to my favorite shows, which were once both informative and entertaining. The hackneyed repetition is numbing and tedious, and the overt character assassination is ethically indefensible. Talk radio will lose its broad audience if it continues on this nakedly partisan path."

What she fails to grasp is that right-wing radio HAS BEEN on the "nakedly partisan path" for many years now. It's not like they've changed in any serious way. I too have listened to right-wing radio (well, at least as many hours as I can hack) for a good many years, and Paglia's statement shows, to me, that she hasn't really been paying attention so much. They won't LOSE their audience if they stay on their nakedly partisan path because that is how they MADE their audience. They've only ratcheted up their nakedness, so to speak, because the hatred they're feeling is almost more than they can bear.

Craig: The line that caught my eye on your comment is that she could be talking about this very blog. You are, of course, not serious. Or, if you are serious, you are foolish. I am very happy that Obama will be the nominee for both an American and then some simply partisan reasons: I wanted him to beat Hillary Clinton even though he is more liberal because in beating her we move away from the mafia style politics she (and Bill) represent. This worked in perfectly with my thought (and hope) that he is more beatable because he is more liberal and because he has less experience and because the Democratic Party is now weakened (because of Hillary' mode). Also, his liberalism isn't fully formulated, and I have some little reason to hope that it goes it beyond, is more interesting than, that of, say, Dukakis or Kerry or Kennedy. We shall see. Yet, in nominating and maybe electing him the fact that he is a black man (and the son of a foreigner, from Kenya no less) will help the country work through--imperfectly, to be sure--some problems that may not be able to be worked through but by going through this process with such a man. It also helps us with our, shall we say, public diplomacy problem abroad. It already has. I don't see how any of this makes me naked or one who halucinates.

No, she's right, numbing and tedious sums up conservative talk radio quite nicely. Rush has been unlistenable lately. It was never palatable to listen to a whole show because of the repetition. He's as bad as my husband, but I could turn him off or change the station, which isn't possible when you have ties that bind. I have tried the alternatives, and they are ok. Really, the problem is that this campaign is a very long one. There is only so much that can be said, who could be interesting in this situation, which we will have to tolerate for months more.

"Nakedly partisan" can be interesting and provocative, but currently it isn't. Though ratcheting up nakedness is an interesting idea and something the porn industry has been working on for a long time, profitably, though not with aesthetic success. Who cares about aesthetics when you can make a buck? Maybe that is Craig's point?

Also, the right is having one heck of a time getting used to the idea of backing McCain. It is difficult to get enthused about him, which we have to do.

Maybe someone wonderful on here could explain to me why he is our candidate?

That woman (Paglia) can write, no doubt about it! And that other one (Daniela Mercury) can ... she can definitely... sing? dance? weep? -- well, whatever it is, that's one very watchable middle-aged woman.

This site doesn't seem to have spent all that much time talking about Obama. The only major dicussion had to do with his race speech, and that indicated a range of opinions.

Jim Geraghty has some interesting thoughts about whether Obama has changed his tone over the course of the campaign. Follow the internal link for Geraghty's larger discussion.

The key question is whether the more tolerant, frank, and open-minded Obama is going to be more present than it has been of late.

Richard Adams, yes, that piece is interesting. It helps me understand why I liked Obama better early on, sort of for the reasons PWS mentions above. I wanted to like him and in the fall, I could and wished I could like his politics since I liked him, and for other reasons, too, including that he was black man and that is significant for America. It just is.

For the last few months, I don't even like him. He seems like just another politician. What happened? If Geraghty is right and there has been some sort of transformation of Obama in the campaign process, how horrible. We are watching the destruction of a human being.

Camille has missed something important in recommending Sebelius. I don't know if a VP who has been told publicly by her Archbishop not to take communion is going to help in Pennsylvania, so to speak.

Paglia strategizes for Obama and trashes conservatives who dare to raise serious questions about him. Schramm laps it up.
Ye gods.

Mr. Schramm (PWS), it's true that Paglia referred to the radio haters as calling Obama a "Marxist" and a "radical leftist." It's probably true that no one here (excluding your commenters, of course) has called him those things. I've only seen him called a "a class warrior" and "Lenin" .

Aside from that, I'm glad that you're able to see a bit of silver lining to Obama's possible election (apparently it's already made you a tool for the liberals, according to the commenter above me!). Sure, it's not exactly the "year of the black Republican", but that's the way it goes. I trust that you're not naked or hallucinating, but all the rhetoric that NLT/Ashbrook is principles-before-party still doesn't convince me that this is a rather partisan enterprise. NLT is non-partisan in the way that Glenn Beck (a talk-radio DJ and Ashbrook Memorial speaker) and Bill O'Reilly are "independent" and non-partisan. Believing that nearly does require one to be hallucinating.

Camille Paglia is not wrong about Obama choosing Clinton. She is also not wrong about Gov. Sebelius having a certain charm -- if you are not a faithful Catholic, that is.

She seems to have that uncritical ObamaTingle thing going. And she comes across, at least to me, as just another Bush-hater and a proponent of change for its own sake.

She also seems to be indulging in the last safe prejudice: anti-WASP. What next? Jokes about the results of first-cousin marriages in Alabama?

Craig Scanlon, I think it's funny that you archive NLT comments. Also, I have yet to see in Obama what PWS describes, however, thanks to his comments I have a better understanding of why serious conservatives are fascinated by him. I will look into this further as my time permits.

No, Andrew, I definitely don't "archive" NLT comments. NLT does that. I simply remember (at least the gist of) what was written here, and do simple Google searches to find it. I recalled that he had been slammed here numerous times, so I just searched for him along with NLT. And I also remembered Mr. Schramm complaining how the press was supposedly ignoring the supposed "Year of the Black Republican" so that was easy to find, too.