Steve Benen found a good one. Looks like the wingnuts are so eager to find "proof" for their theories about Obama, they don't even bother to check the source. Can't say I'm surprised!

Right-wing pundit Michael Ledeen published an item this week on Barack Obama's "college thesis," which Obama allegedly wrote as a student at Columbia 25 years ago. Leeden cited some website, which ran a piece in August.

The paper was called "Aristocracy Reborn," and in the first ten pages (which were all that reporter Joe Klein -- who wrote about it for Time -- was permitted to see), the young Obama wrote:

"... the Constitution allows for many things, but what it does not allow is the most revealing. The so-called Founders did not allow for economic freedom. While political freedom is supposedly a cornerstone of the document, the distribution of wealth is not even mentioned. While many believed that the new Constitution gave them liberty, it instead fitted them with the shackles of hypocrisy."

That's quite an indictment, even for an Ivy League undergraduate.... Maybe instead of fuming about words that Rush Limbaugh never uttered, the paladins of the free press might ask the president about words that he did write.

Yesterday, Rush Limbaugh picked up on Leeden's report, blasting Obama for the alleged paper.

The first sign of trouble was when Joe Klein noted that he's never seen or written about Obama's college thesis, and has "no idea where this report comes from."

The second sign of trouble was when one stopped to notice that Obama didn't write a senior thesis (though he did write a thesis-length paper on Soviet nuclear disarmament).

The third sign of trouble was when one clicked on the link that Leeden provided as support and found the word "satire."

Yes, Leeden and Limbaugh got all worked up, trashing the president for a paper he didn't write in college 25 years ago, relying on a satirical blog post. And for real entertainment value, notice what Leeden and Limbaugh did when they realized they'd fallen for a dumb joke -- they blamed Obama anyway.

Leeden conceded he was wrong and apologized, but added, "It worked because it's plausible." Limbaugh said the text he touted was fake, but it didn't matter because, "I know Obama thinks it." Yep, even when they're wrong, it's only because the president makes it easy for them to be confused.

One of my friends raised her kids in the Lower Merion School District, in a Philadelphia Main Line community. (Kobe Bryant went there.) She used to tell me horror stories about the "helicopter parents," like the ones who insisted on getting their kids into the other kindergarten class - because more of that teacher's students ended up going to Harvard. (Really.)

But this takes it to a whole new level:

BEIJING - The book spawned a genre, selling more than 2 million copies in China on the premise that any child, with the proper upbringing, could be Ivy League material.

Now, eight years after the publication of "Harvard Girl," bookstore shelves here are laden with copycat titles like "How We Got Our Child Into Yale," "Harvard Family Instruction," and "The Door of the Elite."

Their increasing popularity points to the preoccupation - some might say a single-minded national obsession - of a growing number of middle-class Chinese parents: getting their children into America's premier universities.

Because government policy allows families only one child, many parents in this rapidly developing country feel immense pressure to groom their sons and daughters for success and, in the process, prepare a comfortable retirement for themselves. They fervently mine the expanding volumes of child-rearing manuals - "Stanford's Silver Bullet," "Yale Girl," and "Creed of Harvard" - for tips on producing what the Chinese term "high quality" children.

"Harvard Girl," written by the parents of one of the first Chinese undergraduates to enter the university on a full scholarship, chronicled Liu Yiting's methodical upbringing that instilled the discipline and diligence necessary for academic success. The tome has a place in many urban households with high school-age children, and new parents receive the book as a present from family and friends.

"Going to Harvard means that the way they raised their child was successful," said Yang Kui, publisher of the bestseller. "People are willing to copy and learn how they did it."

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C&Ler Jim sent this response to Kudlow after he blamed " Liberal guilt consciences" for the mortgage meltdown.

Cudlow, Cudlow, Cudlow [sic]... you are not stupid. You are, however, a conservative, republican hack. You know good and g*damn well that this crisis was precipitated by the Commodity Futures Modernization Act of 2000, pounded through by Senator Phil Gramm, that was tucked into an omnibus spending bill at the end of Clinton's last term that included, amongst other things, a treasury authorization and Medicare/Medicaid bill that could not be vetoed. This Act excluded any swap transaction from the reach of the CEA and also amended the Securities Act to exclude swap agreements as being defined as securities.

Therefore, these instruments were left unregulated. Hence, we are now reaping the whirlwind. You have put yourself on record as blaming liberal guilt and poor people for this crisis. This is not just intellectually dishonest, it is a factual lie. As a member of the f*&king intellectual elite (I have a law degree, a guitar, and a car) I challenge YOU to bring McCain and Palin on your show and have them explain their version of these events. I bet you won't... Love, Jim.

P.S. I might also add that the notion that the sub-prime crisis was caused by liberals wanting to put poor, first-time buyers into homes is disproved by the fact that most of these loans (over 60%) were not first time home buyers, but refinances. This is because investment firms and banks were selling the idea that people should treat their primary residence as an investment like a stock: borrow on the equity (leverage) like any other asset and bet on the value to rise. This is contrary to traditional conservative thought that the homestead is not to be put at risk. But you guys never thought about that because you were too single-mindedly interested in the up-side. It never occurred to you that the downside was families without homes. Therefore you put unsophisticated folks with children in the same boat with Ivy league 20 something geniuses who walked away with millions, while the families walked away with a trailer. It truly is sickening.

Once again, Love, Jim

(Just a reminder. I will print emails from C&L's massive inbox)

There is bone-snapping pressure of conservative not even to pursue PhDs! I simply don't believe that the "chilling effect" on conservatives can get much worse. Meanwhile, the warm, nurturing, environment for champions of Jackassery couldn't be much more encouraging. Hang Churchill (metaphorically of course). Send a signal...

Studying Churchill like he was a lab rat isn't a good idea precisely because he is exactly that -- a lab rat. Typical in every way; the baseline. No one studies lab rats qua lab rats anymore. You only study them after you've done something to them. The only thing that would make Ward Churchill interesting for study is if you cut him loose. See how the other lab rats react. I'm sorry if I sound to Machiavellian...