Tens of thousands attended conservative commentator Glenn Becks "Restoring Honor" rally on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial Saturday. Why were they there? What was the point?

If my experience is any guide, the people who are least surprised to hear of the appalling conditions that led to the egg recall that began on August 13 were my fellow small and mid-sized farmers. Many of us have watched with alarm the changes in the poultry industry over the past several decades and warned of its likely consequences.

As a nation, we have overcome many racial barriers, but in too many of our cities and towns, the ugly legacy of a "separate and unequal" doctrine haunts environmental policies that negatively impact low-income communities of color. This became painfully obvious five years ago, when the hurricane season ripped through the Gulf Coast and unveiled the racial, social, and economic inequities that lay hidden beneath good times in "The Big Easy."

It’s no surprise that so many Americans think that Obama is a Muslim. The Pew Research Center poll found a big increase in the number of Republicans that believe he is. Certainly that was no surprise. And only slight less surprisingly the poll found that lots of Democrats and Independents also think that the president is a Muslim. No president has ever had more pejorative labels slapped on him. He’s been branded a Bolshevik, socialist, Nazi (go figure that one), an anarchist, leftist, an alien, and of course, un-American.