isn't that technically what the "congregation for the doctrine of the faith" (not sure I'm getting the name right) is in the Catholic Church? only now to the extent that they are "meanies" they are more into stamping out the "red menace" of liberation theology and that sort of thing. So to the extent that political liberals have a legitimate interest in enforcing "doctrines" of liberal political thought, like the idea it's bad to be a corporate sell-out, I don't think it's totally unreasonable to associate that with the idea of "inquisition."

But this supposes that it's possible to separate "inquisition" as doctrinal enforcement from "burn the heretic." Which it probably isn't really; whether we liberal opponents of Lieberman's re-election are protecting reasonable interests or if we are meanies partly depends on one's point of view. But, honestly political speech is pretty mean sometimes and does have a "burn the heretic" tone. It's not like all the blogs have a high commitment to "speaking truth in love." Personally I think it might help sometimes.