Civility Watchdog: Obama Has No Conscience, Hates Israel?

Radio pundit Mark Levin has this to say about President Barack Obama's position on Israeli-Palestinian peace negotiations:

"Why does Barack Obama hate Israel? ... The Israelis have no chance of surviving if they listen to him. None. Obama has been President for just over two years. Never before have we installed someone who is so out of his depth, who is so alien to our morays and beliefs, into the highest office in our land. It was a monumental error in American judgment, and it is a disaster for anyone who believes in liberty and, ultimately, human compassion. ... The man is without a conscience. He is historically illiterate. And let me make it as clear as I can: He has a Jewish problem, in my view. He's asking the Israelis -- in particular the Jews there -- to surrender themselves to these regimes, to terrorist groups that have vowed, and vow every day, to unleash their genocidal evil against them. ... [He is] our Marxist President ... If you believe in liberty, then you cannot support Obama."

There's a lot of name-calling here: That Obama is un-American, has no conscience and no understanding of history, is a Marxist, and that he hates Israel and has some problem with Jewish people (perhaps being anti-Semitic?). Obviously, Levin disagrees with Obama's policies on Israel-Palestine, which is fine, in and of itself. It's reasonable for people to disagree about this issue.

But Levin is trying to say that the only possible explanation for Obama's policies -- on Israel and any number of other issues -- has to be ignorance and evil. In other words, Obama is stupid and doesn't care about doing what's right. It's not possible that there could be any good intentions or rationality behind Obama's positions.

If Levin was demonized and his positions caricatured this way -- which Democrats frequently do, caricaturing conservatives as being either stupid or evil -- he would complain, and rightly so. It wouldn't be fair to say he's anti-Palestinian and has no compassion. But Levin doesn't treat his opponents with the same respect that he demands they treat him.