President . . . SHARPTON???

[vsp]

The wonderful thing about the Internet is that it acts as a gathering point for all types of people, allowing them to communicate and organize over vastly greater distances than would be possible in Real Life.

The terrible thing about the Internet is that it acts as a gathering point for all types of people, allowing them to communicate and organize over vastly greater distances than would be possible in Real Life.

Honestly, I don't even blink at the existence of web sites such as StormWatch. White supremacism is but one flavor of such organized discontent; name a race, creed, gender, ethnicity, religion or any other distinguishing characteristic, and you'll be able to dig up four or five hate sites with a minimum of effort.

The PEOPLE who buy into prejudicial, racist swill are out there in vast numbers; the Internet merely gives them a better communication medium than newsletters or local meetings, and provides a reasonable amount of anonymity for the participants. Squashing their websites is no more effective than attempting to squash any other underground -- one goes down, and four more pop up elsewhere to take its place. It's on a personal, hearts-and-minds level that the battle must be waged.

AS FOR the Democrats' prospects... it's far, far too early to tell. A lot depends on which yahoo emerges with the Democratic nomination; if it's a clown like Lieberman or Gephardt, I'd wager the college fund on Dubya in a heartbeat. A lot depends on what blows up (both in Iraq and in the US) this year and next; things that go boom have an unfortunate tendency to raise Presidential approval ratings. A lot depends on what kind of campaign the Democratic nominee wages -- will he go on the attack to distinguish himself from the far right, or run another "Republican-Lite" campaign to chase moderate votes? And a lot, as always, depends on what games are played with voting machines across the nation.

Very few have ever gone broke overestimating the stupidity of the American public.