In the last coupla days, Mary Scott O'Connor and mcjoan have written diaries/front-page posts that received alotta response. Alotta that response has been in direct opposition, including response-diaries that have also been rec-listed. That opposition that has been well-described and comes from numerous directions and expresses a variety of perspectives. And by-in-large, most of the comments have been more-or-less civil.
And actually, this sorta thing happens fairly frequently here at dKos.
When front-page or rec-list figures are taken to task for their comments, when alotta folks step-up and clarify issues...well, to me, this seems like dKos is "working" in a fairly effective fashion. At least for dialog and awareness.
...I suppose I could have posted this in one of those threads or the response-threads, but I'd like to acknowledge it in a broader sense, ya know?...