It's rare that you see this level of emotion on a weekend news show. But it's righteous, completely justified anger, amplified if you had watched the one and a half hours that preceded it.

One of Melissa Harris-Perry's guests for the entire duration of the show was Monica Mehta, described as a "business and finance expert" and author of an upcoming book entitled The Entrepreneurial Instinct. I've not seen her on any other shows, probably because I avoid business channels like the plague. For all of Mehta's supposed expertise, her knowledge seems fairly limited to conservative talking points. When discussing women's reproductive rights earlier in the show, Mehta dismissed it as less important to women's voters than the economy and jobs. She shrugged off commentator Nancy Giles' point that not having control over one's own reproductive system directly affects women's ability to participate in the economy, though the point is indisputable. Mehta also interrupted Wake Forest University professor David Coates as he pointed out that economic mobility has dropped radically as income inequality has risen.

Because Mehta still lives in the rarified world of privilege and the myth of meritocracy, she cannot or will not expand her world view to see that there are vast swaths of the American population who--through no fault of their own--don't get to go to Wharton Business School, work in private equity and carve out a media pundit career. Not because they're lazy or undeserving, but because those avenues are closed off to them economically. In my opinion, Mehta also suffers from the delusion of value by virtue of the size of one's portfolio, a common ailment of conservative thinkers. Her story is proof that the system works. Her success is all from the risks she took, not from the luck of her birth, nor the doors opened by attending a prestigious business school. But the truth is, where was Mehta's risk? It wasn't her money she invested. If she gives erroneous business advice in an appearance on television, or if her book isn't worth the paper it's printed on (scroll down for review), who has suffered? Not Mehta.

So perhaps Melissa Harris-Perry had had enough of the conservative delusions by this point in the program. But after calling out the barely veiled dog whistles of the attacks on welfare by the RNC last week and how here, in the wealthiest country in the world, conservatives can call a ridiculously meager subsistence for the most vulnerable among us an "entitlement" but think tax breaks for the very, very wealthy are great, Harris-Perry did not want to hear about how we must reward 'risk-takers' (starts at 8:14)

“What is riskier than living poor in America? Seriously! What in the world is riskier than being a poor person in America? I live in a neighborhood where people are shot on my street corner. I live in a neighborhood where people have to figure out how to get their kid into school because maybe it will be a good school and maybe it won’t. I am sick of the idea that being wealthy is risky. No. There is a huge safety net that whenever you fail will catch you and catch you and catch you. Being poor is what is risky. We have to create a safety net for poor people. And when we won’t, because they happen to look different from us, it is the pervasive ugliness.”

Sam Seder's Majority Report, June 7, 2012

We've heard it from every Republican in front of a microphone: "We must cut Social Security benefits to save it for future generations." The implication is clear: the "greedy geezers" (as Alan Simpson refers to them) didn't plan well enough for surviving into their senior years and are sucking on the teat of the federal government cash cow, draining it for future generations.

In a word, bullsh*t.

Sam Seder aptly takes down Simpson's fallacies above, so I won't bother to go through it again. This is a cynical ploy to pit one generation against another to distract them from those who are really threatening our collective welfare: Wall Street and banking industry, who stole and destroyed pension programs and whose wages have risen exponentially higher than the average American.

Still, I worry about the constant reinforcement of this message to the younger generations. Are they absorbing this nasty meme and viewing the older generations with the same sneering attitude that Alan Simpson portrays? Turns out, not so much:

There's good news from the front in one of our internecine economic and political battles: the war between the generations.

The news is that the younger generation is beginning to see through the propaganda.

For years now, efforts to set young against old have been linchpins in campaigns to cut Social Security and Medicare benefits and turn those programs over to the private sector. The basic tactic is to portray those programs as giveaways to undeserving seniors that rip off the young; the goal is to turn the ostensibly dispossessed young into an effective political counterweight to reform-resistant elderly.

Again, the most cynical of ploys, and one that that been in use for more than twenty years.

The purest articulation of intergenerational warfare as a wedge to break up Social Security's political coalition is a 1983 paper published by the libertarian Cato Journal. It was titled "Achieving a 'Leninist' Strategy," an allusion to the Bolshevik leader's supposed ideas about dividing and weakening his political adversaries.

The paper advocated making a commitment to honor Social Security's commitment to the retired and near-retired as a tool to "detach, or at least neutralize" them as opponents of privatization or other changes. Meanwhile, doubts among the young about the survival of the program should be exploited so they could be "organized behind the private alternative."

So when you hear a politician promising to exempt the retired and near retired from changes to Social Security, while offering to make it more "secure" for future generations, you now know the game plan.

And thankfully, the millennials are beginning to see through it. In discussing this as marketing ploy with some progressive advocates who are fighting to make more sensible reforms (bringing back the Gore-mocked "lock box", obliterating the cap, lowering the age), I was reminded of this National Geographic special from a couple of months ago. In it, Richard Leakey was discussing an amazing finding about the "Bones of Turkana", the most intact 1.5 million year old skeleton found:

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If you're like most people, you have a couple of wingnuts, some independents, and some rather conservative Democrats in your family. (In addition to the real Democrats, I mean.)

Here are some of the more common topics that will come up at the family's July 4th celebration, and some amusing suggestions for responding:

The Affordable Care Act. Try not to focus too strongly on the actual facts, like whether it will cut Medicare spending by $500 billion (it doesn't) or death panels. The thing is, true believers are more interested in how they feel, not whether they're accurate. Fox News Facts are just the scaffolding that holds up what they already believe.

So keep the conversation in that ballpark. When Bobby goes off on a rant about freedom, look at him, snap your fingers and say cheerily, "That reminds me! Personally, I think the freedom for people to have health insurance that isn't connected to their jobs is going to set off a wave of national entrepreneurship and small businesses, which are going to be great for the economy and bring real innovation back. It's going to be great, don't you think? Plus, we'll be able to compete with other countries that already provide universal healthcare, so our jobs won't be going overseas! I thought you'd be happy!"

The Kenyan. This one's so silly, it's absurd to try to "prove" it's wrong. Just change the subject again: "You know, I've been wondering about those stories that Mitt Romney was born to a polygamous family in Mexico. Sometimes I'm convinced, and other times I think it can't be true. What do you think?

Voter fraud. As we already know, this is a solution in search of a problem. So what do you say when Aunt Mary has had a few beers too many and starts talking about ACORN, voter fraud and the unelected Kenyan? Just smile and say, "Yes, it took me a while to get over the Bush family and the Supreme Court stealing the 2000 election, but look at me now!"

If all else fails, place your hands on the top of Cousin Louie's head and start praying in tongues. It's a real conversation stopper!

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It's a well-known truism in public relations, advertising and most importantly, politics: He who controls the framing wins the argument.

So perhaps it's not a surprise that the DLC is closing its doors under Harold Ford's chairmanship. Because, honestly, is there a bigger Republican in the Democratic Party than Harold Ford?

As a favorite and repeated member of David Gregory's Meet the Press round table, Ford is the GOP Party's best advocate, routinely undermining Democratic principles and platforms by not only accepting GOP framing, but actively pushing it. How sick is it that the purported spokesperson for the Democratic Leadership Council does nothing more than echo the pandering Lindsay Graham?

Once again, the very young, well-compensated Ford has no problem with extending the age of full benefits for Social Security to 70. Well, when the most arduous thing you do at work is pucker up to Republican memes, I'm sure you can imagine another 30 years of working. But tell me, Harold, what about the vast majority of people who rely on Social Security as the primary source of income in their retirement? Should we make truck drivers stay on the road to the age of 70? What do we say to those with back-breaking blue collar jobs? Suck it up until you're 70? Should my grandmother have been doing the surprisingly physical work of nursing terminal patients in her 70s? My mother is not yet 70. By Ford's calculation, she should still be working, the freeloader, instead of caring for my grandmother, allowing her the dignity of remaining at home despite her age-related dementia. Harold, you selfish prick, do you consider anyone's situation beyond your own cushy existence when speaking out AGAINST the Democratic platform?

As George Lakoff says:

Democrats help radical conservatives by accepting the deficit frame and arguing about what to cut. Even arguing against specific "cuts" is working within the conservative frame. What is the alternative? Pointing out what conservatives really want. Point out that there is plenty of money in America, and in Wisconsin. It is at the top. The disparity in financial assets is un-American - the top one percent has more financial assets than the bottom 95 percent. Middle-class wages have been flat for 30 years, while the wealth has floated to the top. This fits the conservative way of life, but not the American way of life.

Democrats help conservatives by not shouting out loud, over and over, that it was conservative values that caused the global economic collapse: lack of regulation and a greed-is-good ethic.

Democrats also help conservatives by what a friend has called "Democratic Communication Disorder." Republican conservatives have constructed a vast and effective communication system, with think tanks, framing experts, training institutes, a system of trained speakers, vast holdings of media and booking agents. Eighty percent of the talking heads on TV are conservatives. Talk matters, because language heard over and over changes brains. Democrats have not built the communication system they need, and many are relatively clueless about how to frame their deepest values and complex truths.

And Democrats help conservatives when they function as policy wonks — talking policy without communicating the moral values behind the policies. They help conservatives when they neglect to remind us that pensions are deferred payments for work done. "Benefits" are pay for work, not a handout. Pensions and benefits are arranged by contract. If there is not enough money for them, it is because the contracted funds have been taken by conservative officials and given to wealthy people and corporations instead of to the people who have earned them.

Democrats help conservatives when they use conservative words like "entitlements" instead of "earnings" and speak of government as providing "services" instead of "necessities."

I've been really angry by the lack of progressive voices on these shows. And Harold Ford--the ultimate in entitlement figures--is emblematic of the dangers inherent in a system that gives Ann Coulter a platform but still blackballs progressives like Markos Moulitsas.

Please Democrats, for the love and continuation of this democracy, STOP USING REPUBLICAN MEMES!

There was so much garbage being spewed on our airwaves and in print as well as online in 2010 that there are literally a million things I could have picked, but this phrase coming from Republicans about deficit reduction and entitlement programs, which is code for cutting or privatizing Social Security and Medicare.

Digby:

Chris Matthews: Let me talk down the road the big stuff because we all know, gentlemen that the country has a 13 trillion dollar debt and we can talk about economic growth and we can all talk about economic growth the economy, we all know that sometimes it just doesn't grow, some years it just doesn't grow. There's always going to be a business cycle, there's always going to be downturns. So my question to you is, Todd, here's the question. We saw what came out of that bipartisan commission just a few weeks ago. We saw the immediate knee jerk reaction of Nancy Pelosi, we saw the immediate reaction of some of the Republican members of the House. The president did get 14 of the 18 members, of that commission.

Is there a potential that he could cut deals with Coburn who is much respected on issues like fiscal policy and bringing in other leading Democrats as well, recognizing that that the appropriators won't like it, that Pelosi won't like it, that the unions won't like it, that he has to get past those people or he will get nothing done on the fiscal area? If the president waits for the unions, if he waits for the usual interest groups to say yes, it will never get done. He has to form a coalition around them.

Todd Harris (GOP strategist): You're absolutely right and I think the best way to do that will be to include some significant entitlement reform as part of that package

Matthews: Yeah

Todd Harris: .. because there's no way to talk about deficit reduction without doing it. Until people in Washington are ready to have an adult conversation about entitlement all this talk about spending and the deficit is all a bunch of noise, because as we all know that's where the money's going.

Yes, let's have an adult conversation. Go f*&k yourself. Adult conversations are something Republican hacks do not want to have. Anytime you hear Republicans say it, you know what they really mean is "us rich folks are sick and tired of all you poor people that should only be concerned with bowing down to your Masters and knowing your place in our world."

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Grandpa McCrankypants got his chance at the Health Care Summit to voice his "concerns" about health care reform. Funnily enough, his "concerns" sounded an awful lot like Republican talking points with a splash of electoral sour grapes thrown in.

Thank you, Mr. President and I understand the four categories. But there is a big category that the people in my state and across this country are deeply concerned about. And that’s not just the product that we are examining today, the 2,400 pages, but the process we’ve gone through to reach that. Now, both of us during the campaign, promised change in Washington. In fact, eight times you said that negotiations on health care reform would be conducted with the C-Span cameras. I’m glad, more than a year later, that they are here. Unfortunately, this product was not produced in that fashion. It was produced behind closed doors. It was produced with unsavory—and I say that with respect—deal-making. The “Louisiana Purchase”, the funding of $300 million for one state, the “Cornhusker Kickback,” which is, I understand now, been done away with. One of the things as provisions of this legislation that was particularly offensive was the carve out for 800,000 for Florida seniors exempt from cuts in Medicare Advantage Program. There’s 330,000 seniors under Medicare Advantage in my home state of Arizona. They’re deeply concerned about that. They’re deeply concerned about the carve-outs for Vermont, Massachusetts, Hawaii, Michigan, Connecticut, $100 million for a hospital in Connecticut. Why? Why should that happen? They don’t understand it. And at the townhall meetings I conduct all over my state, people are angry. We promised them change in Washington. And what we got was a process that you and I both said we would change in Washington.

Oh, sweet Jeebus on a popsicle stick. Can you believe the concern trolling here? Hey John, want to know why there was a carve-out for Connecticut? Why don't you ask your bestest buddy, Lieberman, who hemmed and hawed his support in order to get on TV as much as possible. Are you seriously blaming Obama for the lack of change in the way the Senate must do business? Why don't you look in the mirror and ask yourself how much your party has contributed to that change.

Frankly, responding to McCain's concern trolling is laughable. Which is why Obama's response is the only way to do so.

OBAMA: Let me just make this point, John, because we are not campaigning anymore.

McCAIN: I'm reminded of that every day.

OBAMA: So we can spend the remainder of the time with our respective talking points going back and forth, we were supposed to be talking about insurance reform. Obviously I'm sure that Harry Reid and Chris Dodd and others who went through an exhaustive process through both the House and the Senate with the most hearings, the most debates on the floor, the longest markup in 22 years on each of these bills, will have a response for you. My concern is, if we do that, we are essentially back on Fox News and MSNBC on the split screen. My hope would be is that we can just focus on the issues about how we get a bill done.

Suh-nap! Poor Grampy could only sputter at that point.

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When news came that Obama had been awarded the Nobel Peace Prize, I looked at my husband and said, "just watch, the wingnuts will lose it over this." And sure enough, I was right. But what threw me for a loop was how nakedly partisan CBS's Chip Reid was in attacking Obama for having the audacity to win the Nobel Prize, something even the great St. Ronnie didn't do:

REID: I mean, most Democrats have praised it, and most Republicans have said, you have got to be kidding me -- Ronald Reagan didn't get one, but Barack Obama, nominated 12 days after he was sworn in, gets a Nobel Peace Prize. And the fear among some, even some Democrats, is that this is going to widen the partisan divide and make things even more difficult to accomplish on every front.

Really? Even more difficult than reflexively fighting *every* *single* Obama agenda item now? How is that possible?

It's touching, isn't it, to hear Chip Reid's concern that this will widen the partisan divide? After all, past winners have included Al Gore and Jimmy Carter...obviously the Nobel committee loves them some Democrats.

But here's the thing that all these insulated Beltway Villagers continually forget: Outside of DC, life is more than Republican vs. Democrat, something that Gibbs gently tries to suggest to Reid:

GIBBS: I'll leave the pundicizing to the pundits. The notion that somehow this is going to more greatly divide America, you know, I think it should be mandatory that pundits spend a certain amount of their days each year outside of the friendly confines of the viewership of the Washington, D.C., media market.

Of course, that goes right over Reid's head. For Reid, this is all about dismissing the Nobel committee -- in Norway, mind you, and not subject to the mind-numbing partisan reduction that Reid seems to breathe as oxygen -- as some liberal organization. He just can't get his head wrapped around the fact the Ronald Reagan -- the man who ended the Cold War! -- was never awarded the Peace Prize. As my friend, Steve Benen says:

A few thoughts here. First, when White House correspondents from major news outlets start sounding like members of Grover Norquist's "We Love Reagan" fan club, it's not a positive development.

Second, the notion that Reagan "helped bring the Cold War to an end" is, at best, a dubious proposition.

Actually, I think Chip Reid is unintentionally letting us into his psyche more than he realizes. He's continually been a go-to guy for Republican talking points for years. He routinely criticizes Democrats for things he lets pass by Republicans and uncritically passes on Republican attacks without context or fact-checking. And here again, he mouths the GOP mentality.

But think about it: if the Nobel Peace Prize only supports liberal causes, isn't Chip Reid admitting that peace is liberal? Then we need never look to conservatives again, because they will never bring peace. Right, Chip?

Transcript below the fold

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I feel like I'm turning into Jerry Seinfeld: Have you ever noticed how only Democratic deficits are a problem? Republicans are sticking to their Frank Luntz-authored talking points on health care (as Chris Dodd points out about Lindsey Graham on This Week this morning) and pulling their beards, speaking ponderously of the horrors of spending money to save money:

STEPHANOPOULOS: Republicans seem to be digging in, Senator Graham, on a couple of big issues. On the issues of taxes to pay for health care, on the issue of a public health insurance plan. But let me show you this New York Times poll that's just out this morning showing 72 percent, 72 percent of the public supports a government health insurance plan and 57 percent of the public is willing to pay more taxes for universal health care. They seem to be ready for the kind of change that Republicans are fighting.

GRAHAM: Well, it's just not Republicans, George. The reason you're not going to have a government run health care pass the Senate is because it would be devastating for this country. The last thing in the world I think Democrats and Republicans are going to do at the end of the day is create a government run health care system where you've got a bureaucrat standing in between the patient and the doctor. We've tried this model -- people have tried this model in other countries. The first thing that happens -- you have to wait for your care. And in socialized health care models, people have to wait longer to get care and the government begins to cut back on what's available because of the cost explosion.

Lindsey, you silly thing! I know you're only saying what Frank told you to say, but since you've apparently had government-run health care most of your adult life (in the military and in public office), you probably don't know: We already have bureaucrats standing between us and our doctor. We already wait for care, and it's already rationed. That's why these talking points from Frank aren't working - they're not our reality.

The CBO estimates were a death blow to a government run health care plan. The finance committee has abandoned that. We do need to deal with inflation in health care, private and public inflation, but we're not going to go down to the government owning health care road in America and I think that's the story of this week. There's been a bipartisan rejection of that.

STEPHANOPOULOS: Well, you call it a death blow. Let me just press that point. Are you saying now that Republicans just as we saw in the stimulus where I think only three Republicans voted for the president's stimulus package -- if there's a government run health insurance plan, are Republicans going to vote on that against this package?

GRAHAM: I don't think it's just going to be Republicans. You've got Senator Conrad talking about a co-op. You've got other Democrats running away from the government-run health care where the bureaucrat stands between the doctor and the patient. I think this idea is unnerving to the members of the Senate and will be to the public when they understand what it means, that you'll wait longer to get treated and you'll get health care the government decides for you, not that of your doctor. So yes, I think this idea needs to go away and replace it with something maybe like Kent Conrad's proposal.

STEPHANOPOULOS: Now Senator Dodd, I think that Senator Graham talked about the public there. We just saw that hole. But his read of the Senate seems pretty accurate right now. You have not only Republicans but several of your Democratic colleagues, including the chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, Senator Baucus saying the public option isn't going to fly in their committee. They want something bipartisan and that can't include this public health insurance option.

DODD: Well, again, I'm delighted to hear Lindsey talk about the possibility of having something like a co-op and non-profits. I happen to support a public option, I don't think you can bring down costs without it. If there isn't some competition out there to drive down the overall cost -- costs have gone up 86 percent since '96, 1996. Forty-five percent might stay the loan, increase in health care cost. The American average working family can't afford this. A family of four now. it's $12,000. We're being told in 20 years, it could be half the gross income of a family spent on health care premiums. That is just unacceptable.

Now how we get those costs down -- you use a lot of these buzz words. No one I know is for socialized medicine. We're going to develop a U.S. plan, not a Canadian or a U.K. plan, one that meets our needs in our country. It's designed for Americans, by Americans, that isn't socialized medicine. But you've got to drive down these costs. We need quality, accessible health care in bringing down those costs are absolutely critical, or we're going to bankrupt the country. It's unsustainable. That's why we're at the table.

Now, let me make that even clearer: Dodd's right when he says the present situation is unsustainable. Borrowing money to fix this is rational, the same way borrowing to fix a major structural problem with your house is. As economist Brad DeLong pointed out this week:

America's long-run fiscal problems are caused by health care, and will not be appreciably made worse by this half-decade's federal fiscal stimulus. If restructuring the health care system can bend the curve on the rise in overall (and hence public as well as private) health care costs, then America has ample debt capacity to borrow whatever we wish in this crisis--and to borrow it at extraordinarily favorable rates as well.

If the curve of rising health-care costs is not bent, then the government's long-term finances are in trouble and so is the growth of private-sector non-health living standards: health care costs that rise as fast as CBO is projecting in the baseline cause lots of long-run economic problems, of which government fiscal bankruptcy is not the worst. Health care reform to bend the long-run curve of costs is now just what it was back in 1993: the most important issue for the American political system to deal with.

Knowing the kind of shape the country is in, knowing how much worse it will get, actually makes it physically painful for me to listen to the political kabuki of ideologues like Bobby Jindal and his ilk. Do Republicans ever put the country before their party? The New York Times published this editorial today:

Imagine yourself jobless and struggling to feed your family while the governor of your state threatens to reject tens of millions of dollars in federal aid earmarked for the unemployed. That is precisely what is happening in poverty-ridden states like Louisiana and Mississippi where Republican governors are threatening to turn away federal aid rather than expand access to unemployment insurance programs in ways that many other states did a long time ago.

What makes these bad decisions worse is that they are little more than political posturing by rising Republican stars, like Gov. Bobby Jindal of Louisiana and Gov. Mark Sanford of South Carolina. This behavior reinforces the disturbing conclusion that the Republican Party seems more interested in ideological warfare than in working on policies that get the country back on track.

Fortunately, as President Obama prepares for his first address to Congress on Tuesday evening, voters of both parties have noticed. About three-quarters of those polled in a recent New York Times/CBS News survey — including more than 60 percent of Republicans — said Mr. Obama has been trying to work with Republicans. And 63 percent said Republicans in Congress opposed the stimulus package primarily for political reasons, not because they thought it would be bad for the economy. It should be sobering news for Republicans that about 8 in 10 said the party should be working in a bipartisan way.

The Republican Party’s attacks on the unemployment insurance portion of the stimulus package are a perfect example. States that accept the stimulus money aimed at the unemployed are required to abide by new federal rules that extend unemployment protections to low-income workers and others who were often shorted or shut out of compensation. This law did not just materialize out of nowhere. It codified positive changes that have already taken place in at least half the states.

To qualify for the first one-third of federal aid, the states need to fix arcane eligibility requirements that exclude far too many low-income workers. To qualify for the rest of the aid, states have to choose from a menu of options that include extending benefits to part-time workers or those who leave their jobs for urgent family reasons, like domestic violence or gravely ill children.

Data from the National Employment Law Project, a nonprofit group, show that 19 states qualify for some of the federal financing and that a dozen others would become eligible by making one or two policy changes. Unemployed workers are worst off in the Deep South, where relatively few people are eligible to receive payments. Louisiana, Mississippi and Texas stand out.

The governors are blowing smoke when they suggest that the federal unemployment aid would lead directly to new state taxes. No one knows what the economic climate will be when the federal aid has been used up several years from now. But by dumping billions of dollars into shrinking state unemployment funds, which puts money into the hands of people who spend it immediately on food and shelter, the stimulus could help the states through the recession and into a time when unemployment trust funds can be replenished. In other words, the stimulus could make a tax increase less likely.

The latest Pew Survey on News Consumption, which is conducted every other year, was released yesterday, and is chock full of interesting tidbits and results. Most notably, there was a great section of the report on news-consumer knowledge and sophistication.

About half of Americans (53%) can correctly identify the Democrats as the party that has a majority in the U.S. House of Representatives. In February 2007, shortly after the Democrats gained control of the House after a dozen years of GOP rule, many more people (76%) knew the Democrats held the majority.

The public is less familiar with the secretary of state (Condoleezza Rice) and the prime minister of Great Britain (Gordon Brown). About four-in-ten (42%) can name Rice as the current secretary of state. The public’s ability to identify Rice has not changed much over recent years: In April 2006 and December 2004, shortly before she was sworn in, 43% could correctly identify her.

The prime minister of Great Britain is not well known among the public. Just more than a quarter (28%) can correctly identify Gordon Brown as the leader of Great Britain.

Overall, 18% of the public is able to correctly answer all three political knowledge questions, while a third (33%) do not know the answer to any of the questions.

I’ll admit, I’m torn about how humiliating this is to the nation overall. For the typical American not to know Gordon Brown strikes me as only mildly distressing — Brown has only been Prime Minister for about a year, and most of the public was probably more familiar with Tony Blair.

But one-in-three Americans got all of the questions wrong. For all the talk about the Democratic Congress, barely half the country knows there’s a Democratic majority.

Maybe my perspective is skewed because I just finished reading Rick Shenkman’s “Just How Stupid Are We?” but at a certain point, the political world is going to have to come to grips with the fact that a striking percentage of the electorate has no idea what’s going on.

As for the other results from the Pew survey, it was also interesting to note which news consumers did better than others.

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