There are two good reasons -- well, okay, three good reasons -- why Imus's firing is a good thing.

1) "I can save this one." That's the punch line to a story about a man walking down the beach, throwing stranded starfish back into the ocean. Another man sees him, and tells him smugly, "You can't save them all." As he throws another starfish back in, the man says: "I can save this one."

Moral: Don't expect to change the world. Just try to change what you touch, and the world will indeed be better for it.

2) "Broken windows." Imus was a broken window, as Wilson and Kelling might have it. Fixing one broken window won't change the world; but let that broken window go, and pretty soon vandals will be squatting in the building, crime will increase in the neighborhood, etc. We have a lot of broken windows in America in terms of public discourse; it's time to begin fixing them.

3) Imus is a horse's ass, and, if you'll excuse the mixed metaphor, such folks should always have their heads handed to them.

If that is indeed the young man's penis, then he will be making a whole lot of new friends in the near future.

"Nothing stamped with the Divine image and likeness was sent into the world to be trodden on, and degraded, and imbruted by its fellows."

I can agree with that. I wish Falwell and his godless followers, and Gingrich, could agree with that, rather than just quote it.

The hypocrisy in this speech is just breath-taking. To argue that religion is not divisive, and then to use it to divide. To argue that morality cannot be spoken of in the public square, and then to speak without morals. To argue for Christianity, but to deny the fundamental precepts on which Christianity is founded.

"With malice toward none, with charity for all, with firmness in the right as God gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the work we are in, to bind up the nation's wounds, to care for him who shall have borne the battle and for his widow and his orphan, to do all which may achieve and cherish a just and lasting peace among ourselves and with all nations."

The difference between Lincoln and the godless Christians who quote him is that Lincoln based his beliefs on his deep and profound religious nature, and sought as a consequence to free the downtrodden and bring justice to the oppressed. These contemporary atheists--atheists in the truest sense of the term--seek to make their religion into the only acceptable public belief and in the process to further oppression and injustice.

That few in public life will speak to this intolerance for fear of being labeled intolerant is one of the great, sad, and lasting ironies of American life.

"Sooner or later, everyone has to deal with the cancellation of a favorite show."

I don't know about you, but I'm still in mourning for "Beacon Hill." That was my loss of innocence regarding the cancellation of quality shows, and my realization that idiots ran the world.

Things haven't changed.

"Mr. Gore could have been elected in 2000..."

Just a reminder: he was. He won the popular vote. He probably won the Florida vote--we'll never know.

What Mr. Bush won in 2000 was not the election, but the appointment.

"Thayer Gate," "Cadet Gray," "R-Day"--from all these details, you'd think that Cheney was a West Point graduate himself, wouldn't you?

Instead, when called upon to serve his country, he had "other priorities." One of those was "to not get killed in a foolish war."

But boy, he sounds like a soldier, doesn't he? A man who has shot others only by mistake; a man who has born arms only against quail, pheasant, and duck.

You have to wonder what the graduates and the serving officers in the crowd think about this guy--a certified draft dodger, a man who has been the guiding force behind a lost war which has killed so many of their band of brothers. Do they take him seriously? Do they applaud spontaneously and enthusiastically? Do they nod their heads to the patriotic platitudes spoken by a man who would feed them into the meat grinder without a second thought?

Or is there something else going on behind their eyes?

"Jobs still puts his mark on products in ways no one else in the tech industry can match."

The joke here is that "his mark" is a dollar sign. Jobs produces a moderately better product, markets the hell out of it, and then makes the drooling audience pay heavily for the privilege.

The "new" iPhone, which will have an innovation of a "touchscreen," is going to cost the user six times what a comparable phone without "the mark" on it costs now. But yes, the suckers will be lined up around the block--for the cool factor.

Meanwhile, Jobs' failures--remember the Newton, folks, and have you seen the sales figures and reviews for iTV--are conveniently forgotten.

If Jobs gave me his product at a fair price point, I'd buy it. The reason why Apple has never matched MS for sales is the greed of the company, pure and simple.

The description of the interface is more than a little similar to what I see on the iPhone ads.

If you're tired of it on your computer, how long will it last on the iPhone?

So all these overdressed conservative twenty-somethings patriots....why aren't they in the armed forces fighting for their country?