The Difficulty of Race Talk on the Left

There are helpful ways to talk about and disagree about race and there are less helpful ways.  The latest poster child for one of the least helpful ways has to be this column published in Salon by Gene Lyons.  Mr. Lyons' column is purportedly a response to Professor Harris-Perry's piece on President Obama and white liberal racism.  I talked about the piece here.

Unfortunately, Mr. Lyons could not restrict himself to reasoned argument, but stooped to name-calling (he called her a fool) and a racial fundamentalist.  Needless to say, there are ways of disagreeing with an argument without resorting to ad hominem attacks.  Might it be possible that in the Obama era the left might have a harder time talking about race than the right?