The political dustup over the proposed mosque near Ground Zero in Lower Manhattan kept bubbling along on Wednesday, as both parties pointed the finger at each other over the election year battle.

On the campaign trail, President Obama told reporters he had "no regrets" about addressing the subject last Friday at the White House, comments which have triggered days of political recriminations.

Why the President felt the need to respond is unclear.  If you say nothing, the press can't keep writing updates about a story.

That quick comment by the President insured that the story would live on for another day, as did the release of a written statement from Speaker Nancy Pelosi, who went one step further in urging a public review of who is funding the proposed mosque.

"The freedom of religion is a Constitutional right," said the Speaker.  "Where a place of worship is located is a local decision."  

"I support the statement made by the Interfaith Alliance that 'We agree with the ADL (Anti-Defamation League) that there is a need for transparency about who is funding the effort to build this Islamic center.  At the same time, we should also ask who is funding the attacks against the construction of the center.'"

Just as Sen. Harry Reid's statement on the mosque was belittled by more liberal websites, Pelosi's was as well, mainly for being "clear as mud" as one site put it. .

The latest political action on the mosque came as a new poll was released in New York by Siena University, which found that 61% of state residents are opposed to the idea of a mosque in that part of Lower Manhattan.

Among Democrats, very few apart from Speaker Pelosi were making news about the mosque, though former Vermont Governor Howard Dean did tell WABC-AM in New York that it would be better to build it away from Ground Zero.

Too bad the Congress isn't in session right now, because you could probably count on some Republican lawmaker trying to force a vote on the mosque issue in the House and Senate.

That would be a fun bit of parliamentary gymnastics to watch.

Instead, we await the return of the House and Senate on September 13.

So for the sake of argument, here is the comment of one of my listeners from Facebook:

"The fascinating thing about this whole story is that Republicans are acting like Democrats and Dems like Republicans; which goes to show there isn't much difference between the two."