sweetheart-mine

oh yah, that one leaps to mind immediately. i believe to this day that people who fell for that scenario and its timing would probably fall for anything that supported what they already had bought. it's a magnificent example of political manipulation and gain at its "best." ugh.

thank you, this is right on. why don't more people say it? palin is not poor, not defenseless, not a "delicate flower." and even if she were, she would have to prove her intelligence and capability in the real world just like anyone else. opportunity is one thing, and no doubt still to be fought for on some (even many) fronts; but to use the feminism challenges of 50 (or less) years ago as some kind of fallback-finger-pointing position whenever a public woman either is or acts stupid or naive, yes, it sets back the causes of feminism and of the larger human condition.

there is a lot of truth to that, and it's one reason why, no matter how the polls move and the debates go, i will basically be a nervous wreck right up to the election.

and and

i'm getting confused. is this the election thread or the red sox i mean baseball playoffs thread?

tbs just said that pedroia is sometimes called (no doubt by papi) cavajito? cavallito? meaning "little pony." that's damned cute. white socks should not exist, never mind be worn. in my opinion.

hollow controversy. all they have to do is sit back, let others stick their necks out, and then poke with sticks. sort of like so-called "debate" that takes place on some message boards.

yes, very frightening, though the number of americans thinking she'd make a good v.p., for whatever reason, seems to be dwindling. this could be a reason to celebrate americans' ability to eventually choose even slightly longer-term evaluation over love at first sight, at least when it comes to basic leadership. we'll see.

cocky doesn't sound accurate, but there might be an element of greed after 86 YEARS and then two championships. i don't think they're going to win it all this year, mostly due to injuries in bad spots, but whatever happens, i'm still high from 04 and double high from last year. not that it wouldn't be nice to make it again this year. and lester just now got out of a very bad predicament, so who knows?!?!? for lester

yes, that can't have been easy.

obama is clearly more deeply interested in active diplomacy than either of them. he has his foreign-policy priorities straight. to me that means he does understand the world better, will listen to the rest of the world rather than merely talk at it, and is in a better position both to carry out effective diplomacy and to make subsequent decisions based on it. no contest.

in the last thread someone, i can't remember who, had received one of the terrorism!-vote-mccain propaganda discs and was going to listen and report on it. did that happen and i missed it? can't find it but am very interested.

i love your avatar today. i'm worried about the injuries. but most important, GO SOX!!!

at least since 1972, yes, this is the worst, by far. if she surprises positively, and with truly her own thinking on thursday, i will do something unheard of.

if only the wrong assumptions in that could be funny. they would call for:

absolutely nothing. i'm surprised by this article and find it heartening. who knows if anything will come of it in the long run, but at least someone is making the effort. p.s. didn't even see this thread yesterday.

upset republicans who voted no and who spoke to the press yesterday referred to their own alternate plans that according to them weren't even considered. i wonder what those plans are. they didn't say, and i find it hard to believe that they have main street's interests in mind any more than the other people who were working night and day on this thing. not that i think congress should be in the huge hurry bush and paulson were to basically loot the treasury, which is what their hurry sure looked like.

the "law and order" crime fighters are going to beat them to it. i've noticed those guys really have it in for poughkeepsie. especially jerry orbach. of course, he's dead.

well, that's even more interesting, thank you for the info. it was only since the current "war" began that i started to absorb the kind of money we spend on what is called defense.

these are great. i love kucinich. in some ways it's a miracle he keeps getting elected, when pretty much without fail he says what he thinks, decade after decade -- though at the moment i think he's speaking for a lot more people than usual, including people who at other times might not give him the time of day.

it usually disappoints me when obama talks about fighting the "war on terror." at the same time, i recognize that he has to do it -- he has to have a perspective on it and plans for possible actions he might consider taking IF he found them necessary as president. i completely disagree that obama "comes across every bit as militaristic as mccain" and that his saber-rattling is "every bit as bellicose" as mccain's. they're not even close. also, obama's military talk is only one aspect of his broader foreign-policy perspective. mccain appears to have little to no other perspective -- th

re: waste in defense spending brought up earlier, most of you probably know that the u.s. now spends more on our military (and military ventures) than all the rest of the countries in the world combined. strange? lopsided beyond belief? here the years vary only slightly and are all twenty-first-century figures: http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/world/spending.htm $623 billion -- u.s. military expenditures $500 billion -- the rest of the world, including $65 billion by china, $50 billion by russia, and it's downward from there. i'm no economist, but really, what does this tell

ah. great and real message . . .

daily show and colbert report reruns might help . . . . . . in hard retrospect, but also in the almost-wistful nostalgia about somewhat humorous nastiness you can remember yet hope never to fight through again, eh?