Lewis Black needs to get his panties out of a wad.

I have a pretty good sense of humor, but I thought that his remark about Dean tonight was not funny. He said he was on his knees at the 700 club, and he was NOT praying. Now I don't belong to the 700 club, but I know a lot of people who do. They are on the whole just regular people who are finding out their leaders have clay feet.

I think Howard is going to continue to talk to the religious community, and I hope he does. Here are a few things he said in a PBS interview last year. I am sure I am in the minority about Black's so-called joke, but it was in very poor taste. Dean made a good impression one person I talked to, someone who had never seen him before. That is how you communicate, the best you can...and you keep trying.

PBS Newshour, Dean and Ifill

HOWARD DEAN: Well, first of all we have to show up. The idea we're going to win by campaigning in 18 states is just not going to happen anymore. We need to be in Mississippi, in Utah, in Texas, and Oklahoma. I've been to all four of those states in the relatively brief time I've been chair.

Secondly, we need to speak about moral values. We really do. The Democratic Party I think has the kind of moral values that most people, particularly the religious community and particularly evangelicals like. I've had numbers of calls from evangelicals and discussions with evangelicals as well as high ranking members of the Catholic Church since I've been DNC chair.

We want to reach out to folks. You know, the Republicans talk about two issues: Abortion and gay rights. I don't think that most Democratic officeholders have been supportive of gay marriage, but I think we are supportive of rights for every single American. We may have some differences of opinion with the religious community on those two issues but the Democrats are much more in sync with the both evangelical Christians and others, Catholics and so forth, on helping the poor, on making sure that we have -- everybody has an opportunity. I am including everybody in the American dream.

Those are the real Christian values. And those are values that appear to be absent from the Republican platform. I jokingly say in my speeches that I have yet to see the biblical injunction that it's easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than it is for a rich man to enter the kingdom heaven. I have not seen that in the Republican Party platform.

So I don't think that the Republicans have any right to lecture Democrats about morals because our morals really are pretty biblical when you look at them. They really are about being good stewards of the earth that God gave us, they really are about helping children, helping the disenfranchised, making sure that everybody gets included. Those are pretty good values.

So keep it up, Howard Dean, in spite of the ugly remarks being directed toward you. I was recently part of that community, and I understand a lot about where they are coming from. We have no right to be insulting to our fellow travelers on this earth. Shame on you, Lewis Black, we usually look forward to your words.