That’s the simple, unadorned reaction posted by a commenter on the Steve Clemons article to which Joe linked earlier. It’s also the recurring reaction I had this afternoon, as I caught up on the events transpiring in Iran. For all the angst that many of us felt about the Bush administration — and despite the horrendous, isolated actions of James W. von Brunn and Scott Roeder — our nation can still, on balance, manage the transfer of power in a responsible, peaceful manner....

From Think Progress: … conservative blogger Pamela Geller, who writes at Atlas Shrugs, titled a post, “Please Shepard Smith Out the Door!” She followed it up with a post saying, “Shepard Smith has got to go.” Geller’s call for Smith to be fired is beginning to get traction with some conservatives online. For those interested, let’s ask Fox News to not only keep Shep Smith — but dramatically increase his air time. Here’s one reason why and here’s how.

Smith strikes me as consistently honest and direct; and he’s at it again in this segment. H/t Andrew Sullivan.

UPDATE BY HOLLY IN CINCINNATI: Grief, Shock After ‘Outstanding’ Guard Loses His Life in Line of Duty Traces of Gunman’s Online Life Begin to Vanish Officer Stephen Tyrone Johns Holocaust Museum Shooter Had Close Ties to Prominent neo-Nazis The U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum issued the following statement on today’s shootings: “Officer Stephen Tyrone Johns died heroically in the line of duty today. There are no words to express our grief and shock over these events....

He’s at it again — all calm and logical and fair; this time on the subject of Sonia Sotomayor’s Supreme Court nomination. If only more Republicans behaved that way. And yes — Rush, et. al. — we’re looking at you. Not that you care.

Labour Leader Brown and Tory Leader Cameron; their expressions may soon switch faces * * * Do the Republicans in the U.S. think they have nothing to learn from the the Tories in the U.K.? If so, the R’s may want to reconsider, given the T’s strong showing in recent U.K. elections. Granted, those election results may have less to do with a sea-change in U.K. politics than they do with old-fashioned dismay with the incumbents. I suspect it’s a combination of the two: The Tories’...

So the WaPo’s Dionne and TMV’s Stickings agree that “the right wing’s rants get wall-to-wall airtime,” while the most progressive voices are too-often ignored — and thus “the range of acceptable opinion” for American media “runs from the moderate left to the far right and cuts off more vigorous progressive perspectives.” One potential translation of this Dionne-Stickings premise would be that — if the media only paid as much attention...

Tzipi Livni, current leader of the opposition party (Kadima) in Israel * * * I published a post last night with the same title as this one. Something about the prior version troubled me. So I revisited it and finally decided (i) it was not balanced enough, and (ii) I didn’t have enough expertise on Israel/Middle East matters to be making the suggestions I had made. Unable to immediately correct those deficiencies, I deleted the post and shut down for the evening. This morning, I took...

When you read something like this from Conor Clarke (h/t Andrew Sullivan) — it’s tough not to be just a little cynical about the so-called “arguments” from the so-called “conservative” camp. Of course, the so-called “liberal” camp also distorts reality. Case in point, Rachel Maddow’s report last night re: the alleged criminal past of Dr. Tiller’s suspected killer, Scott Roeder. Confession: I like Maddow and generally find her reports...

I am but shouldn’t be surprised by the swift, largely unified right-wing reaction (a sampling) to President Obama’s remark during an interview with a French television station: “And one of the points I want to make is, is that if you actually took the number of Muslim Americans, we’d be one of the largest Muslim countries in the world,” Mr. Obama said. “And so there’s got to be a better dialogue and a better understanding between the two peoples.” Sure, the president might...

… you know the rest.

On Sunday, May 24, Gen. David Petraeus said, in an interview on Radio Free Europe (RFE), that he backed the “responsible” closing of Gitmo and the end of torture during interrogations. Less than a week later — on May 29, this past Friday — the General repeated those points on FOX News, going a step further to say, “When we have taken steps that have violated the Geneva Conventions, we rightly have been criticized … ” Other than Petraeus’ back and forth...

Though we try to avoid them, errors are part of the reality of volunteer/citizen media like TMV and other blogs. Even at traditional, commercial media, mistakes happen because … well, you know, “to err is human.” That said, it’s reasonable to hope that mistakes are less common among the professional class than the volunteer class — and that “doh!” moments are virtually non-existent in the former. Or maybe not. Consider this report filed this morning at...

The Senator from Texas counters the primary tempests of the seething stew. This is perhaps not a surprising reaction, given the sizable Hispanic population in Cornyn’s home state. But it’s also not the first “big tent” move the Senator has made.

“People without emotions cannot make sensible decisions because they don’t know how much anything is worth. People without social emotions like empathy are not objective decision-makers. They are sociopaths who sometimes end up on death row.” — David Brooks

Rob Wasinger, a former chief-of-staff to Sen. Sam Brownback, is now a candidate for Congress in Kansas’ first congressional district. He’s a relatively new dog who has already learned — or at least enabled — one of the oldest tricks in the political playbook, namely: Parrot national party talking points, no matter how out of context and misleading they might be. In an email from Wasinger’s campaign I received today, soliciting a contribution, the candidate (his consultants)...

Thus Kevin Drum [h/t Andrew Sullivan] describes the contrast between Barack “Super Calm” Obama and his detractors: [Obama] gets to be the calm at the center of the storm, providing his usual striking contrast to the seething stew of preachers, radio screamers, and Gingrich acolytes who will be making themselves ever more tiresome to Mr. and Mrs. Heartland with their ranting jeremiads. I don’t blame conservatives for opposing Sotomayor even though they know that she’d only...

I confess: Over the last 24 hours, I did not understand the rationale behind the GOP’s decision to toss its spin machine into high gear vs. Sotomayor. If confirmed, she would not replace a contemporary-conservative favorite like Thomas, Scalia, Roberts, or Alito. She wouldn’t even replace swing-voting Kennedy. She’d replace Souter. Days ago, leaders of the modern conservative movement would have equated Souter with Ginsburg and Breyer. So why the fuss? Chris Cillizza offers...

McClatchy reviews the accuracy of Cheney’s remarks yesterday. The third paragraph of this report from the FT points to conflicting opinions (re: Gitmo) within Obama’s administration.

That would be Nancy “Ball” Pelosi and Harry “Chain” Reid. After Pelosi’s stammering press conference about what she knew (or not) and when re: waterboarding … we get this from Reid. REID: I’m saying that the United States Senate, Democrats and Republicans, do not want terrorists to be released in the United States. That’s very clear. QUESTION: No one’s talking about releasing them. We’re talking about putting them in prison somewhere in the United States. REID: Can’t...

From today’s NYT: [New York's] Roman Catholic bishops have been somewhat distracted, too, having focused their lobbying energies this session on defeating a bill that would extend the statute of limitations for victims of sexual abuse to bring civil claims, and have appeared unprepared for the battle over marriage. H/t Patrick Appel.

“Under capitalism, man exploits man. Under communism, it’s just the opposite.” — John Kenneth Galbraith

TMV’s Kathy Kattenburg chimed in earlier on the recently released CAP study re: just how progressive the Millennial Generation seems to be. Sitting in for Andrew Sullivan, Patrick Appel added to the reax with the headline, “We are All Socialists Now,” then pointed to Derek Thompson’s take that “Millennials are stoked about the goals of liberal government … but pretty ambivalent about the means.” My dueling thoughts on the subject were ably articulated by...

As regular readers know, I’m among the Republican defectors recently highlighted by Gallup. But while there’s no love lost between the Grand Old Party and me, Speaker Pelosi entirely deserves this one, courtesy of the House Republican Conference. Granted, House Republicans didn’t have to work very hard. Pelosi handed the noose to them and then jumped up on the hangman’s platform. Given which, it may be time for the Democrats backing her to rethink their support.

…. whether you’re Nancy Pelosi in the U.S. or Michael Martin in the U.K. H/t Ben Smith.