PEGGY NOONAN, SHOCKED AND APPALLED, DISCOVERS DIVISIVENESS

Peggy Noonan just now noticed that there's divisiveness in American politics -- and it's not just harmful, in her opinion it's "wicked"! Guess where she finds this divisiveness, which is so appalling she needs an Old Testament adjective to describe it.

Aw, c'mon -- you didn't think it was her side, did you?

The Democrats have begun what Grover Norquist predicted a month ago. They saved their money for the end of the campaign and have begun running negative ads. They are not speaking in support of their own votes on health care and other issues. They are avoiding the subject of their own votes on health care and other issues. They are focusing instead on accusations of personal scandal. Both parties have done this in the past, to their mutual shame. But this year, with some exceptions and for obvious reasons, it appears to be largely a Democratic game. At this point in history, with America teetering on the brink of bankruptcy, negative advertising is even more destructive, more actually wicked, than it was in the past.

Negative advertising tears everything down. It contributes to the cynicism of the populace, especially the young. It undermines the faith in government Democrats are always asking us to have, by undermining respect for those who govern, or who seek to. It wears everyone down. And in the long term, though this can never be quantified, it keeps from electoral politics untold numbers of citizens who could bring their gifts and guts to helping solve our problems.

Yup -- that's what undermines faith in government. Not accusing the president of the United States of being Hitler or the Antichrist, or of deliberately trying to destroy the American economy, or, for that matter, America itself. That doesn't "undermine[e] respect for those govern." Running an ad accurately quoting Sharron Angle on Social Security ,or accurately recounting Christine O'Donnell's resume lies and positions on cultural issues, does.

Thanks for clearing that up, Peggy.