Been insulted recently? Been the victim of a vicious ad hominem attack? Well, you ain’t seen nuthin’ yet. Wait’ll you get a load of these doozies.

Quick background: The Competitive Enterprise Institute (CEI) has, in its words, “produced two 60-second television spots focusing on the alleged global warming crisis and the calls by some environmental groups and politicians for reduced energy use.” You can see the ads here.

As you can imagine, not everyone, well, agrees with the ads. Here are samples of some of the “fan” mail the CEI received:

“You sick lying soulless ignorant son’s of bitch’s! Selling out that kid in your commercials future for a few more dollars. Nothing in the Science supports the misleading claims in your adds. … You can expect an especially large amount of warming in your future…IN HELL! Anyway have a good day…Jackasses! Ignorance and greed mixed together…what a shitty combination.”

“This ad is so stupid as to be humorous. Had I not seen it on your website I would ahve thought it was produced by The Onion or the cast of Saturday Night Live. Will you next run ads saying the earth is flat? Please, keep running it!” [from an assistant District Attorney in Wisconsin]

“Just saw this. It is embarrassing. CEI’s credibility is taking a big hit here. What’s next: Your Friend Nicotine? Please remove me from your press lists.” [from a reporter working for a major California newspaper]

“… I wonder how much “life” you would be feeling if you were locked in your garage with your car spewing out all of late life-giving gas into your lungs…hmmm…. It is sad , but true that many Americans will believe your ruse, much like the Germans believed Nazi propaganda films. Say it with me, P-R-O-P-A-G-A-N-D-A.”

“someone should put each and every one of you in an enclosed garage with the car running and see how much you love the air.” [from a staffer working for a major national political party]

“You are conscious and wilful liars. The rest of the world sees what you are doing and will not forgive your greed. I invoke the law of three on you, as individuals and as an entity.” [from an official in a foreign government]

“At one time people could be burned at the stake for knowingly misleading the pubic. There are people who are ready to revive that tradition for those who have mislead the public and caused correcting the serious problem of global warming to be postponed.”

“You guys are getting some horrible coverage on comedy news shows that appear on networks such as MTV, Comedy Central, and E! entertainment. … Nice job, retards. Maybe you should take your lips off the muffler of your car and let yourself get a little more oxygen to your brains.”

Forget about warming around the globe — let’s worry about these folks getting hot under the collar!

Washington Post business columnist Jerry Knight wrote his farewell piece in Sunday’s paper.  He offered thoughts on local stocks, saying “I’m getting ready to buy my first stock in a local company.”  Since we’ve been looking for tea leaves indicating whether he would pump or dump his employer, we eagerly read the column.  And the verdict?  Take a look:

For me the issue is not whether to buy media stocks but whether to sell the Post stock that’s accumulated in my 401(k) account. By any objective standard, I own too much of my employer’s stock, which is the most common investing mistake most of us make. Post stock is outperforming its local peers primarily because of the company’s Kaplan education division, which now generates more revenue — and growth — than the newspaper. Analysts rate most of the local media stocks “hold,” and in the case of the Post stock, I think they’re right.

Can’t split the difference any better than that.

ABC’s “Good Morning  America” seems to have settled on whom the 2008 Democratic presidential primary will feature: Al Gore and Hillary Clinton.  Last week Claire Shipman reported on Gore’s new global warming film “An Inconvenient Truth” in the context of his future plans.  This morning Jake Tapper explored Clinton’s Senate re-election campaign, with a healthy dose of 2008 speculation added in.  Question: will the major media profile a potential Democratic candidate other than these two?

Before joining New Media Strategies, I worked for the U.S. Broadcasting Board of Governors, where I was involved in helping spread democracy, freedom, and intellectual debate throughout the world through international broadcasting (Voice of America, Radio Free Europe, Radio/TV Marti, Radio Sawa, Alhurra, Radio Free Asia).

To help struggling democracies and overcome closed societies, America is moving away from ancient shortwave radio into cutting edge satellite television news and public affairs broadcasts — and embracing the Internet. So I was thrilled to read an Associated Press story this morning about an Egyptian named Alaa Abdel-Fattah who is blogging pro-democracy messages from his Egyptian prison. The story says the blog has become one of the most popular pro-democracy voices in Egypt.

The story quotes Instapundit’s Glenn Reynolds, who has written frequently about Abdel-Fattah: “He’s certainly the most famous blogger in Egypt and arguably the best known reformer there now. When you suppress dissent, even minor voices become incredibly powerful.”

The story also mentions another Egyptian blogger, Sam Adam.

On this Memorial Day, it’s thrilling and heartening to see the battle for democracy being fought on the Internet, not on bloody battlefields. Cheers to all blogging on the front lines.

Former Connecticut Democratic Rep. Robert Giaimo recently passed away.  He may not be a household name these days, but anyone who rides the Metro should be indebted to him.  George Mason Univeristy Prof. Zachary Schrag’s wonderful new book The Great Society Subway recounts how in 1971 Gaimo defeated powerful House power brokers to get the House to approve Metro funding.  Giaimo called himself “the father of Metro.”

Members of Congress are angry that the FBI raided the office of Rep. William Jefferson and seized records and a computer.  Could’ve been worse.  The FBI could have raided the  medicine cabinet of Rep. Pat Kennedy.

Kudos to Media Bistro’s FishbowlDC for hunting down the below video of my old boss Chris Matthews. Watching it brings back fond memories of staff meetings where we debated neocons and the Iraq War. As it turns out, Fishbowl was more succcessful finding this video than America was finding weapons of mass destruction.

Now, the answer to last week’s Extreme Trivia question. One of the hosts of a Sunday public affairs television talk show once made a cameo apperance on a prime time TV program as the cousin of a detective. Name the host and name the show.

DT Nelson expertly answered correctly this way: “Tim Russert appeared on ‘Homicide: Life on the Street’ as Captain Megan Russert’s cousin.  (Captain Russert?  Maybe she was a Lieutenant.  Anyway, she was boss of one shift.  Played by Isabella Hofmann.)  It was just a brief bit in the segment before the opening credits, and moderately funny, as I recall.”  Aaron Dickey also got it right.

Now, the next Extreme Trivia question.  In honor of the Memorial Day weekend rush to the beach: Richard Nixon famously wore a suit and wingtips at the beach.  Where was the below photo taken?

The U.S. Treasury Department today announced it is conceding the legal dispute over the federal excise tax on long-distance telephone service.  The Department of Justice will no longer pursue litigation and the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) will issue refunds of tax on long-distance service for the past three years.

What does this mean in practical terms?  It means the Spanish-American War of 1898 is finally over.  The tax was levied to help pay for the war.

And how is the victory being celebrated?

The Treasury Department went the low-key route in its press release headline:

Treasury Announces End to Long-Distance Telephone Excise Tax

House Majority Whip Roy Blunt, however, couldn’t contain his euphoria:

“The telephone excise tax has outlasted two world wars, the Great Depression, and the start of two new centuries, but the federal government continued to needlessly tax basic telephone services.  The war lasted only 220 days, yet this tax on talking has finally expired after over 39,000 days.”

Now if we could only blame the excise tax on the sinking of the battleship Maine.

Sometimes when legislative bodies pass laws, you are suprised to learn that common-sense rights you just assumed you had, well, you actually never did.

Such was the case with protecting your home, your castle, in Arizona. Last month, Governor Janet Napolitano (D) signed Arizona’s SB 1145, the “Castle Doctrine” legislation. Excerpts:

a person is justified in using physical force or deadly physical force against another person if the person reasonably believes himself or another person to be in imminent peril of death or serious bodily injury and the person against whom the physical force or deadly physical force is used was in the process of unlawfully and forcefully entering, or had unlawfully and forcefully entered, a dwelling, residence or occupied motor vehicle, or had removed or was attempting to remove another person against the other person’s will from the dwelling, residence or occupied motor vehicle. … A person has no duty to retreat before threatening or using physical force or deadly physical force.

In other words, it’s OK now to have doorbells in Arizona that, instead of going ding-dong, say, “Go ahead, make my day.”