Can't speak for liberals because I guess I must not be one, so I'll speak for progressives like me:
I thought the attack of Quayle was as stupid as the attack on Obama here. I have known for a long time that people hate themselves and exemplify this by their feeling. There isn't a child alive who can hear or communicate with other people who hasn't been called stupid a million times and not a single one, either, this hasn't been scarred by it. It is our own feeling that we are stupid, all the pain we felt being called that, that comes out as anger or defensiveness when being called that, or doing it to somebody you dislike, or protecting somebody you do.
So forgive me if I think I can laugh it off not only as easily as you can, but better, because I can actually see beneath the BS to know what's really going on. And naturally, I'm telling you this so you can know it too. I want everybody to be smart like me, everybody to be as profoundly brilliant, because in fact it's really easy. Brilliant is really just stupid minus the stupid. All you stupid bastards should be able to manage that. The hard part has been done. You already have the very thing you need to let go of.