More on Mass Delusion

John Nichols' column in The Nation has to be read to be believed:

...media coverage of this campaign, at least in its final days, is going according to Karl Rove's script -- thanks in no small measure to the inability of most political reporters to chart their own course on the eve of an election.

Rove needs the focus to be on Kerry.

Kerry was a absolute non-issue before he opened his yap, displayed his superior intelligence, and followed up by blaming everyone but himself. But somehow, Nichols has convinced himself that it is all part of a Rovian manipulation the likes of which we have never seen. John Kerry was just standing at a podium minding his own business when the Karl Rove script went into affect.

The outrage felt by Nichols and the rest of the mouthpieces is that the Republicans are now using Kerry's display of superior intelligence to highlight the Democrats' tacky theme of distaste for the military. "It's not fair." "It's dirty politics." "It's..It's...Rovian!"

Boo-hoo.

For the last month I have watched Democrats use the Mark Foley sex-with-no-sex scandal used to paint Republicans on the ballot as complicit in the cover-up and protection of gay child predators. I watched them make two weeks of headlines out of the use of the word "macaca."

Somehow, Nichols is able to block all of that out, and more, long enough to let us know how dirty the GOP plays the game, because it is apparently taking political advantage of Kerry's display of superior intelligence to highlight what is actually true.

Don't take my word for it. Let Sy Hersh, liberal extroardinaire, explain how many on the left feel about the military:

There has never been an American army as violent and murderous as the one in Iraq.

Nichols, like Olbermann, is living in denial. They should both seek professional help.