Dare not speak its name...

I have been following with interest the spate of stories about the sudden emergence of the "N-word" in connection with President Obama. A sticker reading "Don't Re-Nig: 2012" has appeared on car bumpers and on the web. A nationally read blogger posts a cartoon of the president as a chicken-eating spook. And on and on.

So, finally, it is all beginning to break, isn't it? The fog lifts. The concrete appears behind the vast abstraction. The reality: the virulence of the Right, of its hatred of Obama, has nothing to do with economics, nothing to do with being a "socialist," or a liberal, nothing to do with foreign policy or the support of Israel or energy…

It is about Race. It has always been about Race. It always will be about Race.

But, then, we knew that already, didn't we?

We just didn't dare say it.