What a weird Labor Day weekend. I'd like to say that I spent the entire three-day holiday splashing in the sun, or communing with nature, or drinking myself to oblivion. (From the aftermath of the afternoon scene at Starline Grill, where I ate dinner Monday night, it seemed as if a fair number of folks took the drinking route.) But I actually frittered a lot of the long weekend away glued to my computer screen following national news developments: the aftermath of the Dems convention, the McCain VP pick, the path of Hurricane Gustav, the bizarre Sarah Palin fake-pregnancy rumors and the announcement that her 17-year-old daughter is pregnant.

Such issues have been thoroughly covered elsewhere online, of course, and it isn't my intention to get into a partisan back-and-forth about Palin, for example, here on this thread. (You have plenty of opportunities elsewhere: for the conservative side, try Redstate.com and nationalreview.com; for the liberal side, some of the big players have been Dailykos.com and andrewsullivan.com. And there's always the Bee's Opinion Blog.) However, there are several bigger-picture things that struck me about the whole scenario:

1) We are in a different age in terms of how quickly rumors/news/developments travel. I've realized that for a while, but it really hit home this weekend. I didn't even turn on the TV to track Hurricane Gustav. Updates were much faster online. As far as the Palin story goes, the major developments actually seemed to move of their own accord online. One site would pick up a rumor, then another, and all the while hundreds of commenters issued forth a steady stream of opinions, conspiracy theories, personal memories and outright vitriol. Occasionally someone would contribute an actual tidbit of news. The bloggers themselves just fought to keep up. And the more mainstream outlets were playing continual chase-up, with even the august New York Times relying more on its Caucus blog comment string to advance the story than anything its reporters could provide.

2) Broad generalizations are always dangerous. But the anonymity factor of the Internet makes them even more so. I can't count the number of times over the weekend that isolated vitriolic comments from individuals were used as an excuse to bash the other party. Every name was called: Republicans are hypocrites. Democrats are scum. And vice versa. (And a lot, lot worse.) For months, liberals have bashed conservatives for encouraging various unfounded rumors about Barack Obama. But now, conservatives are bashing liberals for advancing rumors about Palin. I think we all have to remember: There are always going to be over-the-top naysayers and generally nasty people on all sides of a political argument. Instead of making generalizations about everyone of a particular political persuasion, we'd be much better served directing our rebuttals to individuals.

3) The much vaunted anonymity of the Internet makes it possible for nameless individuals to influence the public debate. But is it truly possible to be anonymous? Take the case of blogger ArcXIX, the Dailykos.com diarist who helped advance some of the odder Palin pregnancy rumors. Who is this guy? Some folks are already trying to find out. In the meantime, it stuns me to think about how unskeptical a lot of people are. "Evidence" presented on a computer screen is easily manipulated. (Consider the photos of Palin at various stages of her pregnancy: Who is to say that those photos were chronologically accurate?) The best motto is: It's fake until it's been scrupulously verified.

4) It doesn't do much good to rail against the speed of the Internet and the way that nearly instantaneous gossip has the potential to change our lives. It's already here, and it isn't going away. What this last weekend showed me was how powerful the process can be. I'm not one who's much for video games, but I found myself sometimes slipping into a video-game mode: that blank-stared, losing-track-of-time state of fixed concentration in which I just keep clicking away. Who knows what the next game will be?