The best liberal neck-rub of the day is Peter Beinart‘s Daily Beast article predicting that Sarah Palin, Christine O’Donnell, Rand Paul and the purist Teabag contingent are going to push the conservative agenda to such a rightist extreme that the 2012 election will be a disaster for Republicans in the same way the candidacy of the ultra-liberal George McGovern (beautiful man! should have been elected!) destroyed mainstream Democratic hopes in 1972.

“It may seem odd to talk of a blowout Republican defeat in 2012, when the GOP is headed for a blowout victory in 2010. But it is precisely the over-interpretation of the latter that could produce the former. When the dust from this massive recession settles, it will be clear that America is not moving right; it is moving left because America’s fastest-growing demographic groups reside on the center-left. Hold on, Republican moderates — you may be poised for a big comeback in 2016.”