Editor, Daily Nexus,

Joey Tartakovsky has a point in his Jan. 21 column (“Blue Traffic Lights: Dean’s Political Fury Could Be a Liability,” Daily Nexus). Hate should remain outside of political discourse. This said, emotional reactions to politics are fine.

Political discourse is a reflection of opinion and on many issues, opinions are rooted in emotion.

Expressing anger with the president is fine and, indeed, a time-honored American tradition. Being very angry is not something new.

Federalists drew cartoons of President Jefferson burning the Constitution and accused him of trying to establish a dictatorship.

There were similar responses to both President Jackson and President Lincoln. Even George Washington was once burned in effigy. But these were expressions of anger with presidential policy, not hate.

Similarly, many Americans are unhappy or angry with President George W. Bush.

I strongly doubt they all hate him, and it is unfair to label liberals or other angry people as “Bush-haters” as Tartakovsky does.

Indeed it would be like me calling all conservatives “Clinton-haters” or “anti-Clinton” or calling the GOP “the party formerly known as un-American.”

Fact is, “ultra-partisanship,” as Tartakovsky calls it, is at the heart of political discourse. You can’t have a genuine political discourse if no one takes the other side. That said, I’d like to see Joey Tartakovsky abandon his hatred of liberals and Bill Clinton.

Maybe we can have a nice, reasoned discussion of political ideas and values over, say, a latt