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A little bit of the fun from today's Rally to Restore Sanity and/or Fear with peace trains, crazy trains and love trains. Apparently the appearance by Yusuf Islam formerly known as Cat Stevens didn't sit too well with some conservatives.

TPM has more -- Cat Stevens Appearance At Sanity Rally Rankles Right Winger. The "right winger" they're talking about that got his panties in a bunch over Islam's appearance is our old buddy Michael Goldfarb who David posted about here and here.

From TPM as well, here are some pictures their readers submitted of the rally.

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After being asked by Jake Tapper why President Obama is bringing up the issue of immigration reform now even though it doesn't appear there's any chance that something is going to get passed in the Senate, Al Hunt takes John McCain to task for his fear mongering interview earlier in the show where he lied about the crime rate in Arizona.

HUNT: I must say, John McCain, in his interview with you, Jake, that was extraordinary to say that crime is up there. He's talking about Mexico. Crime is down in Arizona. Every single academic study that's been done shows that immigrants commit fewer crimes.

RAMOS: That's right.

HUNT: We have a system where there are now three-and-a-half-fold more illegal immigrants than there were 20 years ago. It's a system that's broke. And for John McCain to say that there's been a dramatic change just simply is not the case.

It's too bad Al Hunt is the one bringing this up instead of Jake Tapper calling out McCain while he had him on the air.

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Haley Barbour backtracked from his previous statement that the $20 billion escrow account would make it less likely that BP will pay for everything in regards to the damages from the Deepwater Horizon disaster. Now that he's found out the money will only go out in payments of $5 billion a year, he's much less worried his campaign donor will go out of business any time soon.

GREGORY: Governor, you--Governor Barbour, you've been concerned about the idea of this escrow fund, this $20 billion fund. Why?

BARBOUR: Right. Well, I thought that they were talking about taking $20 billion from BP all at once, and my fear was if you took $20 billion from them all at once, put it in an escrow account, then they wouldn't have the working capital to generate the revenue to pay us. I think the president was smart, and I congratulate him and BP that they reached an agreement. Instead of $20 billion taken out of that working capital all at once, it's actually going to be $5 billion this year, $5 billion the next year, $5 billion the following year and $5 billion the fourth year. That makes sure--as Mary Landrieu says, we want to make sure that BP stays in business, generates the revenues that will pay what they owe the states and our citizens. And I think the--I don't know if it's a compromise or not--the agreement they worked out not to do all the $20 billion, put it in an escrow account all at once, means that we're much more likely to get everything paid by BP, who, by the way, is supposed to pay everything.

I'm still wondering when Barbour will admit that there is a need for the fund in his state and that the oil has washed up on the shores of Mississippi as well.

From The Onion:

Assassination plot thwarted due to suspect's fear it would seem racist.

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The Republican National Committee is trying to manipulate their donors by playing on "fear" of President Barack Obama and the top Republican in the Senate doesn't like it. Politico revealed a GOP PowerPoint presentation last week that recommended using fear and extreme negative feelings about Democrats to raise money.

"That sort of thing is certainly not helpful. I can't imagine why anybody thought that would be helpful," Sen. Mitch McConnell told ABC's Matt Dowd Sunday.

"I don't like it. I don't know anybody that does," he said.

When asked if someone should be fired for the presentation the Senate Minority Leader tried to distance himself from the RNC. "Look, I don't run the RNC. That's up to them," he said.

From Countdown Feb. 15, 2010 Special Comment: Tea Parties And Race:

I happen to be filling the few spare hours of this past week by re-watching my friend Ken Burns' Jazz documentary and was literally pulling my shoes on to head over to the hospital yesterday when it came to the story of the great Billie Holiday and the still-startling anti-lynching song "Strange Fruit."

Not long ago, my father, who abandoned baseball because his team traded his favorite players (Yankees; Steve Souchock, George Stirnweiss; 1948, 1950; yes, we carry grudges), mentioned to me that he'd seen Satchel Paige pitch at Yankee Stadium, for the New York Black Yankees. "It never occurred to me, it never occurred to anybody I knew, that he couldn't play for the other Yankees. We just assumed he didn't want to. That none of them wanted to."

Fatal racism, passive racism, self-rationalized racism. It all blended together for me yesterday, and it led me to think about the Tea Party group, who they are, who they aren't, and what they're afraid of. Read on...

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Fox News pundits said President Barack Obama was arrogant and unwilling to apologize for his handling of the arrest of Henry Louis "Skip" Gates Jr. Sunday.

"The president could have said that was a stupid thing for me to say, but he can't say that for some reason. That would be too self-deprecating and he is an arrogant man and he is entitled to pass judgment on cambridge cops," said Bill Kristol.

Brit Hume seems to think that the Gates arrest will be an issue that will concern the next president. "I fear we will have to await the arrival of the next president who can apologize for Barack Obama on this as he so repeatedly does about previous presidents," said Hume.

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July 21, 2009 C-SPAN