"Of course, there are mean girls who write negative reviews about you in the New Yorker and there are mean girls who sneer at the rape testimonials of young college women, which is what Roiphe did, and no doubt accounts for some of the treatment she received in kind."

You go, Becky!

Oh, and Anonymous, you are a total dickwad.

A lot of heat, zero light. Does either of you have a f***ing clue as to who actually killed Litvinenko ?

No? Didn't think so.

You are quite right; looking back at what I wrote, it was a little unfair. Your letter, at least, was straightforward and analytical in tone, even though I might disagree with some of the substance. I apologize for any offense given or taken.

When I wrote the letter you refer to I was mainly reacting to an entire series of letters (previous to yours) that were chockful of uninformed charges and outright errors (Like the one I discussed in my 2:30pm, Sat. letter, "Labcoat Pundits", on p6).

My remark about folks getting a "rush" from hammering Large might well have been ill-considered but was not intended as a cheap shot. The phenomenon of "piling on" is just a part of "human nature". Whenever I think I get a whiff of it, I feel like being the foil, the devil's advocate! Again, I apologize for any offense.

May I suggest that the principle of parsimony that you so eloquently recommend be employed with respect to the political aspect of this affair?

I believe there is a strong resistance, from a number of sources, to charging the Putin Regime with this crime. It would in fact be premature to do so; the facts aren't in yet. But it would make a difference whether or not Putin were just an autocrat with basically good intentions, on the one hand, or a megalo-maniac who murders his political opponents, on the other hand. How would G.W. Bush, for one, feel about facing this reality about the man whose eyes he had looked into and caught a glimpse of the soul of a man he could trust?

Alternatively, the possibility of a plot of the sort discussed by Patricia Schwarz in her posts must be considered. The psychology of terrorism involved in the employment of such a bizarre means of execution might well be common to both an autocratic regime and a cabal of dispossessed oligarchs with a point to make. The thundering silence of the Putin Regime thus far is also an interesting feature of this affair.

It is depressing to think that Putin might think that he could do something like this with impunity. But that might well prove to be the case.

At this very moment analyses are going forward. Sample masses will be determined to femto-gram precision. Relative proportions of isotopes will be determined. Then, both the relatively rare beta gamma emissions and the far more representative alpha emissions will be monitored over time. The "DNA" of the material will be precisely determined. Then, it will just be a matter of how much classified knowledge our intelligence agencies possess of the kinds of facilities that may have produced the material in such quantity (let's remember, the stuff seems to be scattered all over the place; there was evidently an incredible amount of it). (On a side-note, was the leakage accidental? If so, as seems likely-- think of a fluoride gas or very finely divided powder with compromised containment-- one wonders about the conditions of the agent or agents involved!)

Call me a cynic but, after all that anyalysis and investigation, we never find out who did it, then we'll know for sure who did it.

Get real. Your position is preposterous.

Title IX was intended to redress the imbalance in public educational institutions' relative emphasis on male and female athletic programs. It makes an implicit recognition of the fact that males and females athletic abilities are different: Males, on average are bigger, stronger, and faster. Girls are allowed to play on boys' teams occasionally, on a case-by-case, "merit" basis, when they are able to compete .

But, it is a fact that even a male of average athletic ability would be able to out-compete many, perhaps even most, female athletes in most sports, especially in the early years-- i.e., at the level of public school and university athletics.

The recognition of this difference is not a sexist or chauvinist observation, per se . Indeed, some of the roots of sexism and chauvinism in student athletics lie precisely in failing to recognize this difference .

The old system recognized the difference as well, but discriminated against females because of it. Title IX attempts to correct this by requiring institutions receiving Federal funds to expend the same amount of resources on male and female athletics.

This effort would be completely vitiated by allowing boys to compete in female athletics based on their ability to compete. Relatively quickly, there would not be such a thing as female sports.

I am aware that, at a cursory glance, this appears to be a version of the "separate but equal" philosophy that had such a perniciously discriminating impact on the education of African-American children in this country. But discriminating-- i.e., "making a difference"-- on the basis of a meaningless, completely superficial trait like skin-color is one thing, failing to recognize obvious physical differences in the ability of males and females to compete in athletics is quite another.

Please, folks, let's not throw out the baby when we throw out the bathwater.