Bookmark this post, and recall it every single time a progressive blogger accuses us of “distractions” and irrelevancies when it comes to criticizing Barack Obama. Today, Markos gives his readers a substantive reason to vote against John McCain — his yellowed teeth:

Hunter already mocked John McCain’s website today, and I’m still shaking my head at the blatant rip offs from the Obama website. But I’m also shocked that his team didn’t … well, take a look ….

It’s pretty bad when your hair is whiter than your teeth. Take a closer look … I mean, they have teeth whitening products today.

Gee, where have we seen this attack before? Oh, right — from the Sorosphere. The local MinnMon ran an equally classy attack on McCain’s teeth without doing any research on McCain’s dental history:

In 1968 he was offered early release, and when he refused, because others had been there longer, his captors went at him again; he suffered cracked ribs, teeth broken off at the gum line, and torture with ropes that lashed his arms behind his back and that were progressively tightened all through the night.” Source Vanity Fair, February 2007

“He spent two years in solitary confinement, suffered from dysentery and even tried to commit suicide by hanging himself with his own shirt.

In 1968, the Vietnamese broke off many of his teeth at the gum and tortured him for hours on end. They offered him early release, knowing his value as an admirals son, but he refused, saying others had been held captive longer.” Source Daily Mail, February 1, 2008

You know, I fail to see how this heals the oceans, helps Michelle Obama’s kids, or has anything to do with why people should vote for or against John McCain. Then again, I’m not the blogosphere’s cheerleader-in-chief for a candidate with no executive experience, no foreign-policy experience, no military experience, and a grand total of three years in national office with no legislative track record. If I was, I’d be tempted to find distractions like the tooth color of a man whose mouth and the rest of his body got tortured and beaten for five and a half years in service to this country.

Just in case this gets “disappeared”, I have the post cached here with comments through 1 pm CT today. A significant number of Kos’ commenters sound refreshingly disgusted with this post.