The Michael Richards incident was stupid and ugly, but at least it's over. Not in some political quarters, apparently. The Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel reports that Gov. Jim Doyle, who is such a huge Seinfeld fan he's seen every episode eight times, last year proudly displayed a Festivus pole — made by Milwaukee firm The Wagner Cos. — in the governor's mansion. However, because of Richards's racial outburst, he will no longer put it up but will donate it to the Wisconsin Historical Museum.

I despise the phrase, but it's impossible to call this anything but an outbreak of Political Correctness.

In the first place, it's ironic to be marketing Festivus poles, since the character of Frank Costanza "invented" the holiday in part to protest the commercialism of Christmas. But therein lies the point: Festivus is associated with the Costanzas, not with Michael Richards's increasingly tiresome Kramer character. I imagine the Doyle posse's thought process: Festivus=Seinfeld=Kramer=Michael Richards=racism.

Apparently, by the transitive property of racism, anything and everything associated with Seinfeld must now be shunned by us good liberals. So the next time someone drops a "not that there's anything wrong with that" or a "no soup for you" in your direction, you'll know he or she's a bigot.

This is the sort of thing that right-wingers love to club us over the head with. There are so many real things to be outraged by; the last thing we need to do is invent silly new ones.