Lies are the enemy of well-made laws

For decades now, the media and a vocal minority have stood in the way of numerous things a solid majority of Americans support.

Take gun control, for example. For 40 years now, polls have shown that somewhere between 70 and 80 percent of Americans would support registration and licensing for gun owners.

But the gun lobby -- the powerful National Rifle Association -- and a solid bloc of people who will vote just on that one issue have kept anything from getting accomplished.

The same is true in the present health-care debate. Many polls have shown that 65-70 percent of Americans would favor a single-payer, government-run health care system. Even folks who have insurance don't trust that insurance to be there for them if they need it in a major way.

But a small but solid majority -- along with a right-wing media more concerned with preserving unfettered capitalism than health care -- has kept the idea of single payer from even being on the table.

It'll be something of a miracle if the bill that comes out of Congress even has a public option, although competition from the government is the only thing that could keep the big insurance companies honest.

Part of the problem is that people who are in the majority don't even know they are. If you listen to any of the right-wing whack jobs on talk radio, you'd get the impression that their views are widespread. But even the audience of 15 million or so claimed by the biggest show, Rush LimbaughRush Limbaugh, is about 5 percent of the country.

One of the few controversial issues on which there really is no consensus is abortion. The country is pretty well split on this one; an awful lot of people who don't like the idea of abortion still don't want the government telling women what to do with their bodies.

You want to tell how small a vocal minority really is?

I'll give you a good way to measure it. The louder they are, and the more outrageous their claims are, the less likely that they have either the truth or a majority on their side.

Death panels? Not so much.

Confiscating all the guns? Not so much.

It would be amazing what we could accomplish in this country if people bothered to be a little better educated before they vote. Who knows? They might even demand that their candidates tell the truth.

Weapons of mass destruction in Iraq? Not so much.

Reality, what a concept.