I'm afraid I have to disagree a with John on the "phony" racial incident with Sen. George Allen.

Allen was clearly going after the kid because he was from the opposing campaign, but the way he went after him was a big mistake and showed a distinct lack of racial sensitivity. Whether he was using the French word for a type of monkey (and let's remember, his mother spoke French), pronouncing the kid's name as nonsense because he couldn't remember an Indian-sounding name or doing just about anything else, it was a recipe for disaster.

I'm not going to proclaim that Allen is a racist. But I didn't consider that New Republic piece a "hit" -- indeed, I found what Ryan Lizza reported extremely disturbing. Allen's strange fixation on all things Confederate and his utter ineptitude with all matters racial are going to be big hurdles in any 2008 campaign.

Now, I admit I'm biased. I think Allen is a profoundly unimpressive man and candidate. He's pretty much at the bottom of the '08 field, as far as my own personal preferences. But even his supporters, I think, would be hard-pressed to claim he doesn't have a race problem -- even if that problem is just the media's (unfair) perception of him as a good-ol-boy Southern racist.