So Much For Civility

This whole Birther episode has been infuriating enough on its own, but Fallows' guarded optimism at the end of his follow-up to his initial angry post--"Perhaps the media types who have been paying attention to Trump and his braying will stop to think about what they've actually been doing. Conceivably there will be a moment of recoil about the unworthy, irrational indignity of this stage of national life."--recalls a similar silver lining moment from only a few months ago:

And if, as has been discussed in recent days, their death helps usher in more civility in our public discourse, let us remember it is not because a simple lack of civility caused this tragedy -- it did not -- but rather because only a more civil and honest public discourse can help us face up to the challenges of our nation in a way that would make them proud.

We should be civil because we want to live up to the example of public servants like John Roll and Gabby Giffords, who knew first and foremost that we are all Americans, and that we can question each other's ideas without questioning each other's love of country, and that our task, working together, is to constantly widen the circle of our concern so that we bequeath the American dream to future generations.

They believe -- they believe and I believe that we can be better. Those who died here, those who saved lives here, they help me believe. We may not be able to stop all evil in the world, but I know that how we treat one another, that's entirely up to us.

Not six months after asking the nation for more civility in our politics, the President of the United States submitted to the indignity of proving his citizenship to a blow-dried hairpiece and his legion of wild-eyed spittle-flecked followers. Words really do fail to capture one's outrage and disgust at this sordid episode: