Well, I'm going to say what I have to say, whether it was said before or not. I think...
..."Political" (whatever that really means) discussion should be allowed. If somebody goes a little overboard, just deal with them. How does shutting the thread down solve anything? The longer we sit on these issues the harder it's going to be for us to not talk about them.
..That, at least with some topics, what's the point of arguing in the first place? It's like those religious debates I got into a while back; eventually, I thought, "why talk about this stuff, anyway? It's not like I'm going to say something to someone--here, on an internet Mario forum--and they'll respond with 'Oh... I guess you're right. I'm changing my beliefs on that one.'"