Okay, let's review: we have fascists calling socialists fascists and socialists denying they're socialists and fascists denying they're Nazis and Nazis claiming the socialists are Nazis.

And some whack-tard dude showing up with a loaded gun at a town hall meeting hosted by the president.

Good thing we're on summer recess. Can't wait for everyone to get back to work in Washington.

I think I'm going to be sick. But I can't afford a doctor because I can't afford health insurance.

And, by golly, whatever you do keep the government's hands off my Medicare!

Meanwhile, ol' radio bloviater Douche Limpbranch is playing catch up to rival radio bloviater Gin BecksBeer by yelling, "Nazi," louder than Gin BecksBeer.

"The Obama health care logo is damn close to a Nazi swastika logo," proclaimed Limpbranch, repeatedly.

This is helpful to debate because it so clarifies the issues and makes perfect sense. He then goes on to explain why he is right: the Nazis were socialists.

Yep, makes perfect sense.

Meanwhile, not unrelated, we have the phrase, "death panel," entering the political lexicon. This, too, is helpful because, gee, it adds so much clarity to the civic discourse.

A death panel is, of course, what former Alaska governor and former GOP Veep candidate, Sarah Palin, said President Obama would install as part of our new health care system, specifically to kill old people and her own baby.

She explained this on her Facebook page last weekend, right after she told us how far she'd gotten in Mafia Wars and what, according to the little test, would be her hillbilly name. Oh, by the way, it was Sarah.

Maybe we should think about revamping mental health care because it looks like there's a whole bunch of folks goin' bat-s—t crazy out there.

But, hey, there is good news out there. Did you catch the U.S. Secretary of State absolutely snapping off a college student in the Congo? Yea, that was good. The student asked a question of Secretary Clinton. Only the question came out, through an errant interrupter, "what does your husband think about Chinese contracts in the Congo?"

The secretary, visibly perturbed, answered directly: "Oh no you di'int!"

No, actually, she explained – tersely – SHE is the Secretary of State, not her husband. (He was only president.) And she will be glad to give her opinion but not channel her husband's opinion.

It was that look on her face, though, that froze me in my tracks. Bill, too, watching back at home. He's seen that look before – the one with lightning bolts coming out her eyes.

"Uh-oh," he thought. "Maybe I shouldn't have brought home those two Asian chicks last week."

"Ah, yes, welcome Earthlings to the planet Moranus via that hideously outdated technology you refer to as inter-galactic television – cute."

"We particularly want to welcome to this seminar those Earthlings who refer to themselves as, um, I have my notes right here…oh, yes, 'Real Americans'…whatever that is."

"We understand you seek our superior wisdom here on the planet Moranus to help you sort out some sort of debate among yourselves about how to best care for your sick and dying. We hope our wisdom will be useful to you."

"As we understand your problem, Real Americans, you have a leader who wants each of you to receive adequate and effective care when you get ill and even prevent illness through a system of primitive exercise and healthy nutrition intake. What a silly leader."

"We here on the planet Moranus have for many eons lived quite well on starch and fat and when we're dead, well, that's it: we're dead. While at the same time, we've grown very wealthy charging our fellow Moranians vast amounts of currency for what we call, 'health insurance' while returning to them very little at all, if anything. It's a system that works quite nicely and tends to thin our herd of the unwanted and undesirable. "

"But you say this leader wants to change things; wants to ensure everyone a healthy life while at the same time limiting the wealth of those who exploit others through a scheme similar to our health insurance?"

"Very good. Here's how you combat such a silly change – as we did many, many calendars ago: you simply don't let it happen."

"First of all, rally all you Real Americans and tell them this leader isn't legitimate. I don't know, tell them he isn't even a Real American like you. Tell them he was born on some other planet. If Real Americans are anything like Real Moranuses, they'll believe any ol' thing you say if you repeat it loud enough and often enough."

"If your leader and his minions insist on taking the debate to the rest of your society, make sure you send Real Americans out among the masses to disrupt the arguments in any way possible. Never let your leader make his points. It could make sense. Stop the discussion in any way you can."

"What's that you say? You've already sent legions out to the public square to yell and shout slogans which make no sense but sound shrill and loud and scare away others? Ah, yes, very good. Perhaps you are a more advance civilization than we supposed."

"But what again? You still have a majority of your fellow citizens who agree with this silly proposed change in your system? I understand. Well, then, you simply need to accelerate your disruptions. I understand you to be only a very small part of your population but that doesn't matter. You simply need to be louder than everyone else."

"Hit them over their heads with banners and signs, if you must. Call them names. I've see your planetary history and calling them 'Nazis' always seems to put them in their place, make them more subservient."

"Tell them this leader's proposed change will kill all your relatives, put your elderly to death in camps. Your planet hates what you call, 'evil.' Tell them your leader is evil."

"I am quite sure if you employ these methods you will find those other than Real Americans will, eventually, cower in fear, shut their non-Real American pie holes and stop all this silly talk and you Real Americans can go back to your doughnuts, fat and happy and getting poorer by the day – just the way you want it."

"We, here on the planet Moranus, have lived for many calendars happily being the stooges of our wealthy exploiters and we like it that way."

"We will end this primitive inter-galactic transmission now. It is time to check my cholesterol. I have lived 30 calendars and my time is short. I wish you a happy disruption."

It began with a Facebook post, via Twitter; the story of a town hall meeting held by Texas Congressman Gene Green, a Democrat.

The town hall was disrupted, as have been others, by people organized to oppose any kind of health care reform.

The post, originally reported by the local Texas Fox News team and related by Alternet, included this: "During the town hall meeting, one conservative activist turns to his fellow attendees and asks them to raise their hands if they "oppose any form of socialized or government-run health care." Almost all the hands shot up. Rep Green quickly turned the question on the audience and asked, "How many of you have Medicare?" Nearly half the attendees raised their hands, failing to note the irony."

This prompted a lively debate on the Facebook:

Friend #1: Please can we all stop the "teabagging" references. We all know what it means and why it's being used as a reference to a certain class of protester. It's crude and does nothing to foster understanding or upholding every Americans right to dissent.

Friend #2: It's meant to provoke you into thinking and make people get passionate about their government. There are some ideologies and people that don't want to "foster understanding". And no, we all can't just get along. Sorry.

Friend #1: Call those that disagree with you "teabaggers" is going to provoke people into thinking like you!?! In addition calling people "teabaggers" has certainly inspired passion maybe just not the kind you want. We have a representative republic which insures people who cannot get along will still be able to have their voices heard.

Friend #2: Obviously, you love your freedom of speech but want to edit (others').

Friend #1: Not at all. I do not always agree with (him) but I read and enjoy all his posts. However calling the recent wave of "Tea Bag" protesters, "Teabaggers" with a wink and a nod towards a crude sexual act does not foster civil discourse.

Friend #3 (okay, me): I never thought of protesting as a crude sexual act. But I will look into it.

Friend #1: Oh come on, you know what I mean!

Friend #4: Main Entry: so•cial•ism Pronunciation: sδ–shuh–li–zem Function: noun Date: 1837; 1: any of various economic and political theories advocating collective or governmental ownership and administration of the means of production and distribution of goods.

We must end the VA, stop building roads and wasting money on schools..Free market will take care of all ..need help just ask a banker…

Friend #3 (okay, me again): Preach it, Brother! Too many people don't understand socialism; don't understand socialism is NOT the government providing or helping provide services to ensure the HEALTH, safety and welfare of its citizens. The provision of such services, the regulation of certain other services fits well in a capitalist economic system and a democratic republic. Not a conflict.

Friend #1: Then..."As an economic system, fascism is socialism with a capitalist veneer. The word derives from fasces, the Roman symbol of collectivism and power: a tied bundle of rods with a protruding ax. In its day (the 1920s and 1930s), fascism was seen as the happy medium between boom-and-bust-prone liberal capitalism, with its alleged class conflict, wasteful competition, and profit-oriented egoism, and revolutionary Marxism, with its violent and socially divisive persecution of the bourgeoisie. Fascism substituted the particularity of nationalism and racialism—"blood and soil"—for the internationalism of both classical liberalism and Marxism." – Online Edition of the Library of Economics & Liberty.

Friend #4: Unless we put medical freedom into the Constitution, the time will come when medicine will organize into an undercover dictatorship to restrict the art of healing to one class of Men and deny equal privileges to others; the Constitution of the Republic should make Special privilege for medical freedoms as well as religious freedom." -- Benjamin Rush, MD., a signer of the Declaration of Independence.

Two young – female – journalists are taken captive by the North Korean government.

Who ya gonna call?

Why, Bill Clinton, of course!!

"I have a penchant for helping young women," Clinton said, as he departed for North Korea.

No, just kidding. But had to do it. Seriously, President Clinton is to be congratulated for his mission and its success in freeing journalists Laura Ling and Euna Lee.

But, don't worry, back in the States there will no doubt be harsh criticism of Clinton and his successful efforts from the new nattering nabobs of negativism that have become the core of the vast right-wing conspiracy.

Sure, nearly 75 percent of Americans want serious reform in the health care and health insurance industries. And, sure, the overwhelming majority of Americans want a system in which everyone gets adequate and effective health care.

But, oh, heck no, we have maybe 15 to 20 percent of Americans who are bound and determined to make sure reform never happens and insurance companies continue to make us turn our heads and cough while holding us firmly by the…um…er…billfolds.

And rather than discuss the issue like mature adults capable of grasping our own…um…er…billfolds, we'd rather organize loud and cacophonous mini-riots in town hall meetings. Thanks, insurance companies and vested interests for organizing and funding these spontaneous, grass-roots temper tantrums.

Nearly 47 million Americans without health care? Oh, what the heck? Let 'em eat cake…and get fatter…and unhealthier.

The Faux News Channel, a full participant in the tyranny of the minority, featured one dude who said he didn't want a Washington bureaucrat picking out the next battery for his pacemaker. Seriously, a dude said that.

And, naturally, one might expect the same crowd to see only misery and a chance to invoke fear in the hugely successful "cash for clunkers" program, stimulating the auto industry while at the same time getting polluted, high-mileage vehicles off the road.

So, here's the strategy: take a wildly successful win-win government initiative and turn it into something dreadful.

"I just think this is a great example of the stupidity that's coming out of Washington right now," said South Carolina Sen. Jim DeMint of the program. "Our children and grandchildren can't afford to make these car dealers well right now." The federal government went broke in one week in the used car business and now they want to run our health-care system. "

Brilliant.

Um, actually Senator, children and grandchildren aren't the buying the cars. But you're right our children and grandchildren may not be able to afford cars. They'll still be paying for the invasion of Iraq.

Ah, yes, what the teabaggers want, apparently, is to go back to those good ol' days of wild government spending on immoral and illegal wars coupled with a completed disregard for civic rights coupled with manipulative elections coupled with intense and rapid accumulation of vast wealth on the backs of the increasingly impoverished and destitute all of which added up to the greatest national debt in history.

Good idea.

Finally, Happy Alleged Birthday to President Obama. He no doubt blew out his candles and wished the vocal minority would start using their own brains.

"Hi and welcome to another installment of the world's most popular TV game show: 'Are You REALLY THAT Gullible?' …

"The game show where we take ordinary, well-meaning if perhaps a little dim-witted Americans in Red States, throw them together with Blue Dogs and make them the bitch of our corporate masters, especially the health insurance companies."

"Today we tackle so-called health care reform where sinister forces allied with socialist-Hare Krishna-granola-eating-rabid-wombats are trying take away our sponsors' enormous profits and give you adequate and useful health care!"

"Today's episode is sponsored by BlueDog/BlueScreed because we never have enough profit! And you can tell that because we have money to pay for this TV show and spend $1.4 million each month to lobby the Congress!"

"Okay, let's get right into the game. Today we're playing with Homer from Opelika, Alabama."

"Homer, your first question: Do you believe health care reform will end up providing free medical to thousands of undocumented Mexicans who want to move in with your wife?"

Homer: "Well, no I don't think that's true."

BUZZER…"Oh, Homer, I'm afraid you've provided the correct answer but what we're looking for here in this game is the BIG LIE! Had you answered, yes, you would have been awarded 100 points for being so gullible. There's absolutely nothing in any health care reform bill that will allow for free medical coverage for anyone. But that's the truth and we're looking for lies!"

"Okay, let's move on. Homer, do you believe a faceless, nameless bureaucrat in Washington will decide what doctor you can see and how sick you really are?"

Homer: "Well, no, I think I will still have plenty of choice and if I like my current health care plan and my doctor I will be able to keep them."

BUZZER… "Oh, dear, Homer. I'm afraid you've once again given the correct answer but, remember, we're looking for the BIG LIE, which is: some ashen-faced, pimply government worker will decide to cut off your right arm just for fun if health care reform is adopted!"

"You need to try harder, Homer, you're just not being gullible enough."

"Let's move on: Homer, do you believe health care will be rationed, just like government cheese?"

Homer: "Well, no. None of the bills in Congress call for rationing. Rather, they require companies and the public-option plan to provide a wide range of care, limit out-of-pocket expenses and prohibit pre-existing conditions as a reason for denying health care coverage."

BUZZER… "Oh, Homer, once again you've given the correct answer but, remember, we're looking for the BIG LIE and that is, 'yes, you'll be rationed health care and given no choice and some Mexican will take your doctor."

Homer: "But none of that is true."

"Oh, Homer, you're just not playing the game correctly. I'm afraid we're going to have send you home a loser. If only you'd believe these lies we could stop this health care reform in its tracks and keep our sponsor, BlueDog/BlueScreed, in huge profits and sponsoring our TV game show!!"

"Well, that's all the time we have today. Tune in next time to, 'Are You REALLY THAT Gullible,' when we try to persuade you that President Obama is not a U.S. citizen and is, in fact, some alien from another planet!"