Over at the excellent site The Art of Manliness, Brett McKay has an great article on how do debate politics in a civil manner. My personal favorite tidbit is this one:

Only bring to the table those facts which have been thoroughly vetted as true. Information culled from emails forwarded to you by Aunt Gertie, articles from the National Enquirer, and stories from a pirated radio broadcast you listened to at 4 in the morning do not count. How you and your friend interpret the facts will of course vary, but you must at least be debating accurate information as opposed to rumors and slander that no one can really prove or argue against.

Read the rest of it, though, which is excellent.

Most Friday nights, I spend my time at my local cigar shop, and there’s a group of regulars there that I routinely debate politics with. Most of us have a lot of varying opinions (they’re all McCain supporters, for one), but the debate is always civil. Which, frankly, just makes me look forward to Friday evenings. There’s nothing–nothing–like being able to have an intelligent argument with someone without people blowing their tops off. It’s always an invigorating thing.