A week ago tonight, I asked Teresa Heinz Kerry a simple question here: "What did you mean?" And a wicked firestorm was sparked. Incredibly, most of it was directed against me.

Moments earlier, Mrs. Heinz Kerry had talked of "un-Pennsylvanian and sometimes un-American traits" that supposedly have crept into our political discourse. Her talk before the Pennsylvania delegation was, in part, a plea for a return to civility. She was not specific. As any journalist would, or should, I sought an example. Instead, I got a finger in the face and was told to "shove it." I have been told worse things by more important people.

By week's end, I and/or the exchange had been immortalized in some hilarious editorial page cartoons and become a part of David Letterman's "Top 10." But liberals also did their best to demonize not only me but the Trib. "Right-wing rag" became the pejorative du jour, vomited repeatedly by liberal media elitists. Heinz Kerry said I attempted to "trap" her. To defend her intemperance, she publicly impugned my personal and professional integrity. On national television the woman who herself raised the specter of McCarthyism with her unexplained remarks insinuated I was engaging in the same tactic. Democrat presidential nominee John Kerry called his wife's actions appropriate.