ABC disgusted the Obama-ogling bloggers by dwelling on Obama's developing vulnerabilities. Gibson questioned Obama's remarks about the bitterness of poorer voters to cling to their guns and their religion, and their antipathy to immigrants (instead of voting for liberals). They asked several questions about Obama's longtime minister, the inflammatory Reverend Jeremiah Wright. And they asked if it wasn't a "major vulnerability" that he won't wear a flag pin.

(This last issue is a bit comical, coming from ABC News, whose president, David Westin, banned all ABC News employees from wearing a flag pin on the air so they could remain "independent and objective." Westin also resembled Obama's mysterious sense of patriotism in suggesting he didn't think it was his role to decide whether the Pentagon was a legitimate target for terrorists. The candidate could have proclaimed that he has demonstrated all the patriotism of your average ABC News reporter.)

But the biggest surprise was Stephanopoulos raising the case of "a gentleman named William Ayers," the unrepentant Weather Underground terrorist, who in a poetic lightning strike of bad timing for the left, was quoted on the front page of the New York Times on Sept. 11, 2001, expressing regret, sort of: "I don't regret setting bombs; I feel we didn't do enough." Obama had held an early organizing meeting for his state Senate campaign at the Ayers house, and the Obama campaign had described their relationship as friendly.

Heresy! Olbermann took to the MSNBC airwaves and denounced Stephanopoulos, the closet Republican, for asking this vile question suggested by conservatives. This would have never happened on Olbermann's cockeyed "Countdown" show, since he avoids conservatives as if they'd infect him with scurvy, rickets and dengue fever.

Leftists seem to have a medical approach to public debates. "Republican talking points" are treated like a fatal bacteria and the media are supposed to sterilize all public forums to avoid infection. But as much as the bloggers might intimidate the TV-news stars from uncomfortable anti-Obama stories, they will still be distributed far and wide through the Internet, talk radio and political ads. Ultimately, their horror at any hostile questions to Obama doesn't project much confidence in Obama's ability to withstand the heated kitchens of the presidency.