I think the proof of how self-indulgent this piece is is in the emails. They're not very interesting, could easily be described in a few sentences, and constitute blatant padding of a non-story. Including the Yahoo ads at the end is even weirder. Are we supposed to find it funny that Reagan uses Yahoo? Many people who value their privacy do. Are we supposed to compare the silly ads to his real plight? The silly ads allow him to have free email, and since the piece doesn't care about his plight the juxtaposition doesn't work there anyway. If Wadhams went to Ethiopia and couldn't find a story that's okay. If he wants to write a piece analyzing why he couldn't find the story, that's fine too. But this was clearly just thrown together.

P.S. The headlining on this piece is atrocious. We never find out whether Reagan is really a rebel, and even if he is we have no clue why he would make the author see guerrilla rebels differently. There are plenty of very serious very dangerous rebels out there. It's pretty clear that the Salon.com editor knew that nobody wanted to read the actual story (Some African Screwup- A funny thing happened on my way to civil war in Ethiopia -- I didn't trust my contact and chickened out) and so felt compelled to trick the readers with an inaccurate headline. If you bought a turkey of a story that's fine, but don't try to trick your subscribers.

Regardless of my personal opinion on Hillary Clinton, I think this was a really good interview. Shapiro offered a good mix of personal (How do you feel about being called Hillary?) policy (How many troops will be left in Iraq?) and follow up (What have you learned in the senate specifically?) questions. Clinton's responses were substantive. I learned about the candidate, including how she communicates and how she thinks about the office of the president. These things are, in many ways, as important as particular policy decisions.

If most political writing were like this we would have a healthier democracy. I salute Shapiro for his interview and Clinton for her eloquence.

Havrilesky is dead on in her commentary, but ignores one crucial point. Who do you think is paying for our TV shows? Advertisers, mostly. Of course they'd prefer shows that promote crass materialism, and the "you can never have enough" mindset. Do you think Visa or Mastercard sheds a tear when someone runs up their credit card trying to keep up with the TV Joneses? Plus as the luxury goods sector accounts for more and more of the economy, lucrative product placement contracts require rich characters. What company wants to see their product surrounded by squalor, or even normality?

The premium channels may avoid the advertising trap, but they cater to a wealthier crowd anyway, and they follow general trends.

One show not mentioned, that perhaps bears some discussion, is Heroes, where superhero characters are drawn from all strata of society, something that I think gives the show some of its charm

Bayard's responses to Shenkman's arguments skirt the issues at hand rather than confronting them. For example, his flip comment about the Simpsons completely ignores the point, which is that ignorance about the constitution is a problem, not that it's bad to know the names of cartoon characters. He's right that the lists are not comparable, but the point is that most Americans don't know their rights (or the rights of others) as enumerated in the constitution. That's a big big problem, especially since judicial interpretation of those rights depends in part on public perception of them.

Likewise the comments about not knowing a party's platform to the word are accurate, but irrelevant. Few would argue that one needs to know every detail of a candidate's positions to vote for them. The points are that people A) don't know the BASICS of many party platforms, and B) Don't understand what they do know. Picking policy based on how it makes you feel is foolish, since all policies are aimed at making people feel good. Corporate welfare is pitched as job retention. Draconian drug laws are pitched as fighting crime in general, and reducing the scourge of addiction, even if study after study proves that they do neither. People accept extremely simplistic claims about how policies will affect their lives and do little analysis or digging about what the actual likely outcome is. The fact that judging a candidate's trustworthiness (often an emotional process) may also be a valid element of voting doesn't change the need for more intellectual rigor in the booth.

As for Bayard's claims that we can't reverse democracy's advance, and that the good old days were seriously flawed, he's exactly right. White men aren't more intelligent or rational than black women. Legislators and electors can be just as ignorant and short sighted as general voters (Ted Stevens LEAPS to mind) But we can push for better education and a culture that doesn't look down on intellectualism. We can demand better from our media than Britney Spears and Ashton Kutcher. There's where the fight is.

The American people cannot impeach. That power belongs to the legislative branch. As impeachment is, essentially, a legal procedure, it makes sense that it isn't done through popular vote, since at the time of the founding of the country there was no media capable of bringing people "into the courtroom," and even today it would be impossible for the country to stop all activities to pay attention to what was going on.

The worst Americans can be accused of in terms of impeachment is failing to elect congresspeople who would impeach Bush. In defense of the American people, the Democrats stated and implied they would take a serious look at the Bush Whitehouse and file appropriate charges. Instead the Democrats have allowed the Whitehouse to stonewall and, in some cases, openly lie to them. The Democrats' spinelessness was not entirely predictable.