Second

I've been thinking that part of the reason America may be ready to elect an African-American man as President is that they've been prepared. Barack Obama won't be the first black President. He may not even be the second, if you count Bill Clinton (as a black friend of mine affirmed on Friday).

The actual antecedent to Sen. Obama as Head of State is President David Palmer.

If Obama takes this across the finish line, he'll owe a debt of gratitude to Dennis Haysbert, who convincingly portrayed a black politician you actually believe had won, and who's smarts and steadfastness have stood in stark contrast to our current Republican President.

In fact, he'll really owe the debt to the men who created 24, and in particular to first-listed creator Joel Surnow, a self-described "right-wing nut job" who's buddies with Rush Limbaugh and a GOP supporter. Tick-tick-irony-tick-tick...

Will Surnow come out in support of Obama? There's already one old-style Conservative, Andrew Sullivan, who made up his mind for Obama early and quite correctly makes the connection between Obama's rhetorical style with not MLK, JFK or RFK so much as with Republican godhead Ronald Reagan. Writes Sullivan:

The analogy that worries Republicans the most is a more recent one. Could Obama be a potential liberal version of Ronald Reagan? Could he do for the Democrats what Reagan did for the Republicans a quarter century ago?

It’s increasingly possible. Reagan was the cutting edge of the last realignment in American politics. With a good-natured, civil appeal to Democrats who felt abandoned by their own party under Jimmy Carter, Reagan revolutionised the reach of his own party.

He didn’t aim for a mere plurality, as Bill Clinton did. Nor did he try for a polarising 51% strategy, as George W Bush has done. He ran as a national candidate, in search of a national mandate, a proud Republican who nonetheless wanted Democrats to vote for him.

He came out of a period in which Americans had become sickened by the incompetence of their own government. Reagan shocked America’s elites by pivoting that discontent into a victory in 1980. And by his second term, he won 49 out of 50 states.

From Reagan Democrats to Obama Republicans?

Republicans are Insane

What kind of sane jurist, let alone U.S. Supreme Court jurist, argues out their side of the case by basing their arguments entirely upon fictional TV show characters?

That would be Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia:

Senior judges from North America and Europe were in the midst of a panel discussion about torture and terrorism law, when a Canadian judge's passing remark - "Thankfully, security agencies in all our countries do not subscribe to the mantra 'What would Jack Bauer do?' " - got the legal bulldog in Judge Scalia barking.

The conservative jurist stuck up for Agent Bauer, arguing that fictional or not, federal agents require latitude in times of great crisis. "Jack Bauer saved Los Angeles. ... He saved hundreds of thousands of lives," Judge Scalia said. Then, recalling Season 2, where the agent's rough interrogation tactics saved California from a terrorist nuke, the Supreme Court judge etched a line in the sand.

"Are you going to convict Jack Bauer?" Judge Scalia challenged his fellow judges. "Say that criminal law is against him? 'You have the right to a jury trial?' Is any jury going to convict Jack Bauer? I don't think so.

I know Republicans love 24, but are they all this fucking crazy?

Are they all so charming about due process?

"I don't care about holding people. I really don't," Judge Scalia said.

Even if a real terrorist who suffered mistreatment is released because of complaints of abuse, Judge Scalia said, the interruption to the terrorist's plot would have ensured "in Los Angeles everyone is safe." During a break from the panel, Judge Scalia specifically mentioned the segment in Season 2 when Jack Bauer finally figures out how to break the die-hard terrorist intent on nuking L.A. The real genius, the judge said, is that this is primarily done with mental leverage. "There's a great scene where he told a guy that he was going to have his family killed," Judge Scalia said. "They had it on closed circuit television - and it was all staged. ... They really didn't kill the family."

Hey, I've loved Alice in Wonderland ever since I was a kid. But I also know I'm not going to pass into my shaving mirror.

Okay, maybe that's just one guy. Now we're back in the real world. The one where Rudy Giuliani pretends to be an actual expert on terrorism:

Rudolph Giuliani's membership on an elite Iraq study panel came to an abrupt end last spring after he failed to show up for a single official meeting of the group, causing the panel's top Republican to give him a stark choice: either attend the meetings or quit, several sources said.

Giuliani left the Iraq Study Group last May after just two months, walking away from a chance to make up for his lack of foreign policy credentials on the top issue in the 2008 race, the Iraq war.

He cited "previous time commitments" in a letter explaining his decision to quit, and a look at his schedule suggests why - the sessions at times conflicted with Giuliani's lucrative speaking tour that garnered him $11.4 million in 14 months.

Look, I don't begrudge the guy for hitting the bank while the hitting is good. Just don't do something like this and then pretend that you're a viable Presidential candidate, ever.

You really are going to put the peoples' needs before your own? You expect me to believe that?

You must be crazy!

Oh, there is one Republican who I know is not insane.

Was.