You make a great point, Tim- there are times when Emanuel pushes a little too much to the right for my tastes as well. Its really frustrating that there are progressive fighters out there who are not being used. Dean is a great example, and I do have a problem with the current Dean slight.

The motivation for my post is, like you and most of TYT, I am sick of observing the continuous vitriolic conservative nonsense served up intellectual lightweights that are only heard in the national debate because they yell the loudest and bully those who refuse to engage in their zero-sum machinations (those who actually prefer to have an elightened debate about policy rather than engage in Snake Plisken/Ox Baker, Escape from New York-style wrestling match where bludgeons are used more than brains).

I realize that one could call me hypocritical by my advocacy of fighting fire with fire, but I think the critical distinction is that progressive push back has at its base sound ideas. Post-partisan is cool, but only if Republicans understand how much more enlightened that paradigm actually is. The generation that most of these blowhards spawn from see politics as a game and not something that means something very real to people. Based on the fact that they don't get it, and the fact that this is no time to goof around with that nonsense, waiting for them to connect with things is a futile effort.

Legitimate, intellectual conservatives do have something to bring to the table. Bullies and power-hungry small brains do not.