1) She writes of herself far more approvingly than anyone else bothers to.

2) She writes of herself period far more than anyone else bothers to.

As for the height of pretention, screaming from the sentence "I for one do not dance to dance music; disco for me is a lofty metaphysical mode that induces contemplation", one can only respond with a classic disco slogan:

Shut up and dance.

So the good things that have happened to women over the last few decades would have happened anyway, and are the product of a historic process, but the bad things are all the fault of the bad feminists? Um, yeah, sure...that computes.

"If boomers are so liberal, why did they, in combination with their elders, elect Richard Nixon, Gerald Ford, Ronald Reagan and the two Bushes?" writes Gary Kamiya. Only they didn't. Gerald Ford is famous for being the only POTUS never elected to the White House at all.

I'm usually a big fan of yours, Mr. Benn, but are you really calling the man who said "better to have Sharem al-Sheikh and no peace than peace and Sharem" the "wisest Israeli statesman"?

Now that you've told us that The Fix is gone, isn't a bit inane to keep running the "on hiatus" thingie in Sunday's articles' column?

of disengagement? Seriously. A guy on my blog correctly commented that like in flying, the two most dangerous phases of a war are takeoff and landing. Maybe, bleak as it sounds, we're better off coasting at damage-control for the next 18 months and then have a more competent administration come in and do it somewhat right.

I have a 2.5 year old brilliant, impish bolt of lightning. I will have a daughter in 4 months. I have already vowed that this is it. I love it all, but... well, you said it so well. Again? in your 50's? Respect, man. can't see myself doing it, but that's still 15-20 years in the future. who the hell knows. So anyway, you feel ok about yourself - now it's me who's asking if I'm just a bit too grouchy about it all. :-)

Let's get a few things straight, and then we can take a look-see how much we really disagree on.

1) The cartoon is rather lame

2) The cartoon's biggest joke is that Muslim women don't wear a bikini or any kind of (what we'd consider) normal bathing suit. It's a burqini, get it? No, no... Get It?

3) Oh yeah, the toon was also working in a ham-handed skewering of the Du[m]bya mentality.

In fact, it is this last character who gets skewered the most. By about a mile. Therefore, the only thing one could possibly get offended about is the very mixing of [true fact about observant hardcore muslims] and [mirth] - even when said mirth actually shows Muslim virtue to advantage over dumb yahoo-ism. Sorry, but you don't get to be that touchy in this society. Whether you make big tantrums about it or ignore it completely (like the Amish), if we find your ways amusing we're gonna express that.

All in all, nothing at all to be offended about, and not a terribly interesting comment on any of the issues involved.

Yea, verily, should he who Breathes of Berkeley make pilgrimage to the Apple of Great Size, and placate the great master Trudeau with cardigan sweaters, home-made pies and all that is good, and learn from him the sacred art of the deadpan.

Instead of clogging the man's email: Despite my serious disagreement about King's blowing off the weight of this deed, I agree forfeiture is too much - especially when I learn (from King himself, above) that this only happened once, 86 years ago or so. We (da Jets) will take their first draft pick next year in compensation, tho. Detroit can have the 2009 one.

As for putting a guy in row 12 - sure, you can. But they wanted unobstructed clarity and the ability to relate the data quickly. Or maybe they wanted just to get in Mangini's head. Still deserves punishment - you don't get to intimidate by breaking the rules.

As for stealing being a fine art - this ain't baseball. The incorporation of "cheating" in baseball (quote marks cause if it's not disallowed, it ain't cheating) is rather unique to it among sports. It's not the rule. In most sports there's do's and there's don'ts. Think you can aim a laser microphone at the opposing team's timeout in hoops?

and already spotted instances of blatant contradiction, stupid credulity and an utter non-sequitur posing as contemplation.

Can you find all three, kids? This game is more fun than believing six impossible things before breakfast!

I understand that Joan Walsh and Camille Paglia go way back, but surely that's no reason to inflict her ludicrously self-centered bloviating on the rest of us? We come to Salon (and pay for the privilege of viewing it uninterrupted, some of us) to read quality journalism, not unexamined tripe the likes of which can be found at any middling discussion boards. I suspect the real problem is that Paglia's status as Salon Old Guard Legend means that her texts don't get edited for content. Every publication has contributors who enjoy that privilege. It's the who of it that's sad.