Creepy

I'm in love with my basic cable. It costs about $12 bucks a month, but it's not the cost that is most impressive. Nope, the best part is not having to watch CNN and Fox tell me how to think. That has spared me from viewing the creepy cult meme in all its glory. Via Will Bunch:

Look, we all know there's a large media/consultant/insider permanent clique that's camped out inside the Beltway -- some people call them the Gang of 500, while Atrios refers to them as the Villagers. They were there for Bill Clinton, they've been there for Bush (literally for most of his presidency) and they'll be there regardless of whether the winner in November is Hillary or Ron Paul -- they've seen it all and they know that in the end it's all about hardball and horserace, that platforms and even passion on the campaign trail are always just a matter of that other P-word: Positioning.

Now, for the first time since the current generation of Villagers took up the roost, there's a candidate who's not playing their game, who's bringing new, young, previously non-political and enthusastic people into the system (inspiring them to not only open their hearts but their wallets, apparently).

Now, a lot of the Villagers and a lot of their counterparts in the provinces are going to spend this election working through the fact that the Senator from Illinois is black.

But what's creeping most of these folks out isn't really Barack Obama, it's that the great unwashed might actually participate in politics and, even more hair-raising, that they might do it with the kind of passion that's been drained out of the game by the existing superstructure. Horrors.