The travails of Dr. Laura Schlessinger, late of radio, bring to mind another talk radio personality. Morton Downey Jr. lost his own 1980s radio show in Sacramento, California when he derided a local politician for the man's Chinese ancestry. Downey would not apologize and KFBK-AM fired him. They brought in a quick replacement, an unknown named Rush Limbaugh, and racially provocative radio became a supercharged tradition. Downey went on to television syndication.

He was not the first shock talk host. Joe Pyne was a television pioneer. Most of what I recall, as a youth watching the show, was Pyne at a studio desk, sharing it with some liberal guest. Pyne would berate the guest to the cheers of his studio audience. They provided his leverage. His shows were not exactly a Bill Buckley Firing Line variety. He suggested that one guest gargle with razor blades, and his audience laughed and jeered. He hated homosexuals and had one fellow on who shamed him. The guest told Pyne that pretty much any member of the audience could walk down any street holding holds with a lover with no problem. "If I hold hands with the one I love, we could get arrested." Pyne ended the segment with "The only thing YOU need is a good woman." Two odd things happened. The audience was silent, and after a moment Joe Pyne apologized for the remark.

In the 1980s, Morton Downey, Jr played a little rougher. He would scream at what he called "slime" or "scumbuckets." His audience screamed along with him. Once, when he paused for breath, his guest calmly asked, "So anyone who disagrees is a 'pablum puking liberal'? Is that how it works?" Downey lamely explained the format. Another guest, a black civil rights activist, challenged him more directly. "I'll tell you something, you won't have the guts to say back to my face." Downey smiled at the challenge. It was HIS show, and he had the audience with him. The man looked him in the eye and said, "I love you."

Eventually the ratings died away. There was a scandal involving Nazis attacking him in a men's room, painting a swastika on his face, backward as if drawn by looking in a mirror. Downey eventually departed his show. He was diagnosed with cancer, and died a few years later. He described in an interview the cards and messages from liberals, including Senator Edward Kennedy. He was bitter about the lack of concern from conservatives. He apologized specifically for encouraging young people to smoke, and spent his last years campaigning against the habit. He said he regretted allowing his show to become so extreme, and often described himself as "a bastard."

As Christians, we are tempted to betray our faith by judging people as opposed to actions. Is the hurt Downey generated mitigated by his late repentance? I hope so. Are Lee Atwater's filthy tricks on behalf of Republicans mitigated by his deathbed apology? How about Robert Byrd's life of civil rights support after so many years of opposition, including a brief stint in the KKK? John Newton wrote "Amazing Grace" and became a voice against slavery after decades as a slave trader, decades during which he put hundreds of Africans into chains. The Apostle Paul is first mentioned in the Bible as Saul of Tarsus, devoted to killing and imprisoning early Christians.

We believe in redemption. In part, it implies hope for all who need to turn from the evils haunting humanity. Laura Schlessinger, most Christians, many of other faiths, some with no beliefs at all. You. Me. We all need that hope.

It got out of control because the producers ... wanted me to top myself every night. If I did something outlandish on Monday night, on Tuesday night, we'd have to think of something even more outlandish. And after awhile, you work yourself toward the edge of the trampoline and you fall off. I fell off a number of times and I found it very displeasing.

 - - Morton Downey, Jr., shock talk host, interviewed in early 1990s

• James Wigderson illustrates why the rest of us refer to him as Mister James Wigderson SIR with a brief analysis of a local race that includes insights on why local primaries are hard to predict, how Republican traditions are becoming displaced, and how over-the-top campaigns can backfire. Mister James Wigderson SIR is a remarkably gifted writer, but he is devoutly conservative. Tragically, this makes it difficult to swing him over to the dark side.

• Jack Jodell at THE SATURDAY AFTERNOON POST turns his razor sharp analytical scalpel on GOP luminary Congressman Paul Ryan. Ouch! Thank you, sir. May I have another? Ouch!

• The spiritual World of Doorman-Priest explains one hidden meaning behind a brief, important part of the Lord's Prayer.

• RANDOM THOUGHTS has eclectic views on about everything. I like his point on religion, in which he seems fairly tolerant of Bible thumpers like me.

• Ned Williams at WisdomIsVindicated has an interesting objection to the way Harry Reid formulates faith and politics. Ned is usually wrong, but often thoughtful. Worth the read.

• It's okay to read Slant Right's John Houk, but don't forget to wash your hands right after. He attacks Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf as a "fake moderate" (truth here and here) and includes a diatribe on the Terrorist Mosque (sic), Ground Zero Mosque (sic), and 911 Mosque (sic). Sick.

• The Lawyer at MadMike has the answer to NYC Mosque concerns.

• Chuck Thinks Right reacts to atheists offended by crosses honoring slain state troopers. Offended enough to bring suit.

• Manifesto Joe of Texas Blues talks about the difference between weather and climate, and about the difference between Senator James Inhofe (R-OK) and intellect.

• Tim McGaha at Tim's Thoughtful Spot notes, with video, the approaching finale of the space shuttle.

• Gwendolyn Barry with New Global Myth is still down on President Obama, and introduces a video narration of a recent brief incident at Wounded Knee involving Black Hawk helicopters.

• Nancy Hanks at The Hankster says a lot of independent voters really don't like wedge issues.

• David Everitt-Carlson of The Wild Wild East Dailies in Vietnam has thoughts, with graphs, about workplace motivation and euphemisms.

Dick Armey is a very smart man. He always has been. He and Newt Gingrich crafted the strategy that brought Republicans to power in the House in 1994, although he let Newt have the credit. He became House Majority Leader under Gingrich and stayed there during the second Clinton term and the first couple of years of the Bush Presidency. When the Bush administration made it clear military bases would have to close as a cost cutting measure, he figured out a way for Republicans to steer clear of the firestorm of angry residents. He created an independent nonpolitical commission to identify which military bases to target.

He also worked on a lot of projects that never quite fell into place. He worked out plans to replace the progressive tax with a flat tax that would shift taxes to poor and middle class people and away from the wealthy. He worked out how to end farm programs. Like most Republicans who want to privatize Social Security, he hated the program. He could not understand why Americans supported it. But, unlike his colleagues, he worked out specific ways to abolish it. He just couldn't generate popular support.

He has been out of office for 8 years. But now he is planning how to take control of the Republican Party. He is backed by Richard Mellon Scaife, the extreme right wing gazillionaire who previously financed the "vast rightwing conspiracy" behind some of the accusations against President Clinton. His organization is called FreedomWorks and it finances a part of the Tea Party section of the Republican Party.

He is quite open about taking over the GOP. He co-wrote a piece in the Wall Street Journal about the strength of the movement. It is the inchoate rage, the directionless nature of a movement without clear agenda that presents the opportunity.

The tea party movement is not seeking a junior partnership with the Republican Party, but a hostile takeover of it.

The problem with his plan is the nature of the movement he wants to use. It is not a creature of strategy. Rather it is a sociological movement within a shrinking political party. As the GOP becomes more extreme, moderates leave. This moves it to more extremism, so conservatives who are not rightwing enough are pushed away, and so it goes. Each cycle to the right loses more Republicans, which pushes the party more to the right.

The takeover, if Armey is right, will place him at the center of the maelstrom, a vortex where big money meets indiginous rage. It is the place of his dreams, if he can mount, and stay atop, the tiger.

We are here to assert the Islamic conviction of the moral equivalency of our Abrahamic faiths. If to be a Jew means to say with all one's heart, mind and soul Shma' Yisrael, Adonai Elohenu Adonai Ahad; hear O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is One, not only today I am a Jew, I have always been one, Mr. Pearl.

If to be a Christian is to love the Lord our God with all of my heart, mind and soul, and to love for my fellow human being what I love for myself, then not only am I a Christian, but I have always been one Mr. Pearl.

And I am here to inform you, with the full authority of the Quranic texts and the practice of the Prophet Muhammad, that to say La ilaha illallah Muhammadun rasulullah is no different.

It expresses the same theological and ethical principles and values.

We are here especially to seek your forgiveness and of your family for what has been done in the name of Islam.

 - - Imam Faisal Abdul Rauf, Muslim holy leader, February 23, 2003
     Expressing solidarity with the family of slain journalist Daniel Pearl, at a
     memorial service at B'nai Jeshurun synagogue in Manhattan. Imam Rauf
     was invited by the Pearl family to speak against the terrorists who had
     kidnapped and killed Pearl.