Please don’t confuse the vocal output of Sarah, John, and Joe the Plumber with “speech”. They aren’t attempting to communicate through language but to evoke shared prejudice.

That “palling around with terrorists” has no basis in reality doesn’t matter. That calling the New York Times “liberal” is absurd doesn’t matter.

There are many utterances that evoke “communication” among the initiates, including much of “talk radio”. That it is incoherent in terms of its “faith-base”- vs. “reality-base”-ness is beside the point because they don’t even know what that means and they will endlessly argue about really ridiculous things like drilling for oil in the U.S. offshore shelves will have anything to do with reducing importing oil.

Love.

Sorry, I do have to ask. If you know someone interested in running a DKos like state community, I can put you in touch with all the right software and people…

That aside, I’d second what Scott said. People’s political beliefs are wrapped around vital organs, and sometimes operation is impossible. Intelligence only comes into play when the results of applying it don’t shatter someone’s vision of his or herself. With the smarter people you know that are still thinking McCain might work, respect that it’s not intelligence, that there’s a lot of accidents of personal history in there. Somehow smoking at one point seemed really integral to me being my rock and roll self, and I made progressively more absurd arguments to defend the habit, because it felt like if I let go of the smoking I’d cease to exist as myself. My flirtation with libertarianism was not dissimilar. And I’m sure there are some things currently with me that are motivated by similar concerns.

The best thing you can do with the people you respect is to let them know that it sucks they are not a Democrat, because we could really use good-hearted people like them, and because you believe that the party is much more core to what they believe.

Because that’s the truth — if you didn’t respect these people’s intellect or heart, there’d be no nausea, only anger. Arguing about issues is the wrong side of the stick to grab, and makes me nauseous as well.

I can say uncategorically “NO” that is not the “right” engagement. The easier one, sure, but not the “Right” one.

What can the tolerant not tolerate? (lots I believe, but you need to figure out what for your self.) How to act from love to those who don’t love you, indeed who seem to hate you?

“…consider your feelings about someone who completely repulses and sickens you” yes, consider. But consider being “unable to control my emotional reaction” too.

I am not trying to trivialize your feelings here. I think I really get this, and I live in a (slightly) less polarized country than your own; I imagine he challenge you face is even greater. But my experience is that, when I am in touch with my own feelings and able to encounter these others not in judgement but in “identification,” (I know you get the reference) most often what I end up seeing behind these positions is fear, confusion and powerlessness. And when I see them like this I feel much more able to empathize, and then educate and help. Trust me, I’m not saying I’m very good at this or can do it all the time; it’s way easier to turn on The Daily Show and laugh it away, or just avoid those with whom I differ. And at the end of the day, you can only do so much, people have to do this work for themselves, so do what you feel able to. No one’s asking for more.

I’ve felt much the same way recently and have used long walks to try to move past the dismay, the anger, the anxiousness. I am worried about what I might say to people to whom I am related, over the Thanksgiving table if the election goes badly.

But I feel even more strongly that one of the reasons we are in this mess in the first place is that we do not talk about politics or world affairs (or much of anything substantive beyond our immediate selves) openly in this country. The people of every other country I have lived in or spent more than a couple of months in seem to embrace open, active participation through heated, ongoing discussion about town, country, region, and world matters. We are polarized due, in some part, to willful ignorance. I refuse to withdraw. I say, let’s walk into those contact zones, repeatedly and try to empathize, not sympathize with other viewpoints. Let’s talk. And then work hard to change their minds. Even now. Especially now.

Of course, if McCain wins, I am out of this country altogether.

So yeah, I feel a bit strongly about this too.