<...a blatant, blinding hatred of America that precludes all attempts at reasonable discussion on the topic.

That pretty much hits the nail on the head. The hard left, which infests our universities and far too much of our government, has just such a hatred for not only America, but pretty much anything that smacks of Western values.

Long-time communists for the most part, the effort of dodging the knowledge of the oceans of blood that have poured out of every nation ascribing to the Marxist creed that they firmly support, has forced them to shut their minds to everything except the repetitive litanies of anti-Westernism that shoot out of them like crap from a hippo.

Should they ever reactivate the front ends of their brains, the part that perceives facts and makes new connections to form new abstract thoughts, then facing the eighty million people dead at the hands of their beloved Leftist philosophy would probably burn out their brains like a Christmas tree light connected to a 210-volt circuit.

If it weren't for the fact that so many of these yammerheads were in a position to teach our children (a fact which seems to bother surprisingly few people) or that their pronouncements are lapped up by a worshiping media, I would ignore them like any other bearded, smelly louse-farmer standing on a soap box in the park.

They are in full cry right now, after recovering from the painful (to them) rush of patriotism that hit this country in September and paralyzed them like deer in the headlights. For a while, the same America-bashing that got them smiles and nods in the coffeehouses got them the dirty looks and contempt that they never thought they would see. They're obviously getting past that now. I don't know whether it's because they've learned to ignore the criticism, or whether the criticism has died down as people get back to "normal" lives.

The Mideast crisis is an opportunity for the Left. Being able to dump their bile on Israel, which to them represents a reflection of America and Western values, has allowed them to get a lot off their chests as well without risking the disapproval that dumping on their real target might create.