The Economist has a piece decrying "Krugman's Toxic Rhetoric." The "climate of hate" accusations are not persuading anybody. Sarah Palin didn't tell anybody to shoot Democrats and this kid Loughner wasn't paying any attention to Palin, the Tea Party or anybody but Representative Giffords, and then she was just a prop for his insane melodrama, but absence of proof hasn't stopped the fever swamp left from spewing its own overblown, hate filled rhetoric.

This crisis is artificial. Contention has always been with us, but those decrying a "climate of hate" are guilty of stoking that climate and are becoming shriller now that they're losing the argument. It's a dishonest and cowardly way to change the subject.