I never thought I’d say it, but Maureen Dowd is exactly right with her important column on Sunday, “Boy Oh Boy,” in which she argues that racism permeates the fervent anti-Obama mentality exhibited by Joe Wilson and Company.

The congressman, we learned, belonged to the Sons of Confederate Veterans, led a 2000 campaign to keep the Confederate flag waving above South Carolina’s state Capitol and denounced as a “smear” the true claim of a black woman that she was the daughter of Strom Thurmond, the ’48 segregationist candidate for president. Wilson clearly did not like being lectured and even rebuked by the brainy black president presiding over the majestic chamber.

…Wilson’s shocking disrespect for the office of the president — no Democrat ever shouted “liar” at W. when he was hawking a fake case for war in Iraq — convinced me: Some people just can’t believe a black man is president and will never accept it.

This feels accurate to me, and you see this denial of the black president manifested in the bizarre anti-”fascism” protests, the crazies toting guns around presidential speeches, even the anti-ACORN fervor.

(Granted, ACORN deserves criticism—the pimp and hooker story is hilarious and depressing at the same time—but since when is a community group worthy of a national obsession?)

It’s no coincidence that Joe Wilson’s unprecedented act of disrespect was directed towards a black man.

I don’t like even thinking about it, but Wilson et al are going to incite someone who’s just marginally more nuts than they are to take a shot at Obama. And when that happens, will they feel guilty—or glad?