Dear Mr. Alexander,

Thank you for your important and original editorial, "Why are liberals so condescending?" I had no idea that I been guilty of employing tired and contemptuous stereotypes of my conservative brethren. I realize now that my partisan arrogance has limited "our national conservation on critical policy issues" and that if I and my fellow liberals had just been a little more charitable towards conservative sensibilities, the Republicans would be working with us to move the nation forward in harmony instead of being forced to filibuster every bill, nomination, and procedural motion on the Senate floor. All I can say is that I'm sorry, and I will try to be better.

Since your essay explained the many ways in which liberals are condescending but didn't actually answer your own question, I'd like to help by explaining why we liberals are so arrogant.

We're not really bad people, but our feelings have been hurt too. I wish that all conservatives were reasonable people like you who offer helpful constructive criticism. But I've been hearing so much lately about how evil I am and how I hate the Constitution, it's hard not to take it personally. I know that you said Glenn Beck is just "a marginal figure and a media gadfly," and I keep reminding myself of that, but he's sold millions and millions of books, which is way more than any of the liberal writers that you cited. I don't think many people have heard of Thomas Frank, the Edsalls, or even (no offense) Alexander Gerard, but Glenn Beck is everywhere.

Still, I know that Beck doesn't speak for most conservatives. In your editorial, you mentioned a poll by Markos Moulitsas which shows that only 23% of Republicans believe that their states should secede from the Union. That doesn't seem like too many. But you know, I looked at the survey, and it also shows 63% of Republicans think that Obama is a socialist. They probably mean that in a good way, but it just seems like a lot. And it makes me wonder, with no disrespect, how well most Republicans understand socialism.

But I'll try to forget about Glenn Beck. He's just one guy. There are probably many other bestselling conservative books that are far more positive about liberalism. Like Michelle Malkin's Culture of Corruption: Obama and His Team of Tax Cheats, Crooks & Cronies and Dick Morris's Catastrophe: How Obama, Congress, and the Special Interests are Transforming. . .A Downturn into a Crash, a Recession into a Depression, and a Disaster into a CATASTROPHE . . and How to Stop Them and Ann Coulter's  Guilty: Liberal "Victims" and their Assault on America and Jonah Goldberg's Liberal Fascism: The Secret History of the American Left, From Mussolini to the Politics of Change.

I'm sure that you're familiar with all these books. You probably also read Coulter's: Slander: Liberal Lies About the American Right when it came out 8 years ago. She wrote that "the more Conservative the Republican, the more vicious and hysterical the attacks on his intelligence will be." That's sort of close to the point of your editorial, isn't it? She also wrote that "much of the left's hate speech bears greater similarity to a psychological disorder than to standard political discourse." I have to confess that these words sound a little condescending.

But I'm sure that hardly anyone reads Ann Coulter and those other people. And anyway, Republican politicians are much more reasonable and open to liberal ideas. For instance, George W. Bush always consulted Democrats about their concerns. But it did bother me a little when Dick Cheney suggested that Democrats "are more concerned about reading the rights to an Al Qaeda terrorist than they are with protecting the United States" and when Sen. James Inhofe (R-OK) said that Obama "is obsessed with turning terrorists loose in America."

I also thought that Tom DeLay was slightly disdainful when he wrote that "liberals have finally joined the ranks of scoundrels like Hitler." But most Republicans don't go that far. I believe Rep. Paul Brown (R-GA) when he said that he wasn't comparing Obama to Adolf Hitler, though it was weird when he added, "What I'm saying is there is the potential of going down that road." I wonder if he talked to Rep. Steve King (R-IA) because he suggested that we might "end up in a totalitarian dictatorship." Could that be why Rep. Trent Franks (R-AZ) called Obama "an enemy of humanity?"

Anyway, shame on Thomas Frank for writing that working-class Republican Kansans care more about abortion than their own economic interests. Who does that guy think he is? I was so disgusted by his condescension that I re-read part of his book. I'm sure that you remember the bit about conservatives' propensity to "take offense, conspicuously, vocally, even flamboyantly" and how they complain that "the virtuous are persecuted by the 'sanctimonious,' by the arrogant, by the falsely pious, by the corrupt" and the part where he writes, "Everything seems to piss conservatives off, and they react by documenting and cataloging their disgust."

Had Frank read your brilliant editorial, I'm sure that he would never have written such nonsense.

Sincerely,
Genghis