This really was a huge foretelling of what was to come with the American political climate.
The disproportionate freak-out that their comments elicited was puzzling and weird at the time. But now it seems like nothing.
The Dixie Chicks situation, the freedom fries fiasco, all the French wine purchased and then poured down a drain in anger, and the myriad of other little meltdowns during W's era look quaint today.