On the February 2 edition of MSNBC News Live, during a conversation with host Joe Scarborough about congressional opposition to an Iraq troop increase, Time.com Washington editor Ana Marie Cox asserted that it is “strange” that "[i]t's Democrats that are really representing the mainstream American values right now, which is a strong disapproval for the surge." Cox also observed that “Americans largely disapprove of this surge.”

In a recent post, Cox referred to Media Matters for America as humorless. Needless to say, we were not amused.

From the February 2 edition of MSNBC News Live:

SCARBOROUGH: Ana, it seems like the world has turned -- the political world has turned 180 degrees. From 2002 through 2006, it was the Republicans that always stood shoulder-to-shoulder, and it was the Democrats who were always fighting each other.

Now, things have switched. Democrats are shoulder-to-shoulder, and Republicans are fighting each other in a way that I never saw Democrats fight each other, accusing each other of being traitors or being extreme. Let's talk about that.

COX: Democrats can be awfully tough on each other, but, yes, I think that there is nothing like a war to get people to sort of look at the very bare facts that they have in front of them and to really draw lines between themselves.

I think it's really amazing that on the Hill right now, you have -- what? -- I think six or seven different kinds of resolutions about this troop surge. They range from -- sort of, on the surface -- they range from the, perhaps, the best-case scenario for Bush but unlikely to happen, a vote in favor of it -- a resolution proposing support for the troops -- and then you have people voting to pull out.

It turns out that if you look at the middle ground between those two poles, the middle ground is not something like what [Sen. John] Warner [R-VA] offers. The middle ground, if you look at what Americans want -- Americans largely disapprove of this surge.

And, so actually, again, like this is something strange, I think, too. It's Democrats that are really representing the mainstream American values right now, which is a strong disapproval for the surge.