Surely your son deserves to set a better table. For what is missing isn't the proper fork but the discourse of the myriad interesting, no! brilliant! women who've graced this earth. I think I would sit Lucrecia Borgia next to Henry VIII for sparks, and invite Sarah the Priestess, along with Cleopatra, the Lady Murasaki, Virginia Woolf, George Sand, Mary Magdalene, Saint Teresa of Avila, Manuelita Saenz, Sapho, Catherine the Great, Isabelle Burton, Queen Elizabeth I, Orianna Falaci, Madame Curie, Sor Juana Ines de la Cruz, Abigail Adams, Emily Dickinson to name a few...

I agree wholeheartedly with Glenn Greenwald's perception of journalism's role in our society and his comparison with the ethical guidelines of doctors and lawyers is very good. We all stand to lose our eyes and ears if journalists start to get weak-kneed when they should confront the lies that our politicians have concocted. Those interested may also want to read the various postings apropos of this entire bias vs. duty argument in Paul Levinson's blog about MSNBC's removal of Chris Matthews and Keith Olbermann as anchors for the campaign. One or two of those postings point out a troublesome trend: journalists are being strong-armed by the McCain campaign by denying their news organizations interviews with the candidate. What this implies is that "the fear of losing my job" self-interest is more important for the journalists,and for the organizations they work for, than informing and analyzing as accurately and truthfully as possible. I would imagine that in reality McCain cannot afford not to grant interviews to such major news organizations as MSNBC or CNN and that this is just the kind of bullying about which reporters could, should and must keep the public informed. It is their duty and obligation.

Can it really be true, as the letter from bnc states, that some people are veiling their racism behind statements about Obama's inexperience and obstreperous statements like the one from Richard Beard about Obama's birth certificate being fake? I suppose these people presume that they represent the United States of America and they think of themselves as moral stalwarts in their social environment. I imagine them believing that their stances should make the USA admired abroad. For what reason? for their brazen hypocrisy and preference for spreading lies? for their obvious ignorance? For their lack of human and moral strength? Or is it for their shameful injustice in dismissing or devaluing a person solely on the basis of the color of his or her skin? Wake up, America! It is the 21st century. Our planet is suffering from the damage done by the immorality of racism, apartheid, greed, envy and the arrogance of those who think themselves better than others because they are paler than someone else. We all came from Africa: Scientific studies of all human DNA have shown clearly that our roots, our primal mother -- Eve -- was black. Now, let's grow up, move on, get on with fixing the damage done by those ignoramuses and bring on the change that our world so desperately needs.

Who knew? The US is just another "third world country" when it comes to democratic practices and principles, it appears. Documentaries have been made, and ignored, about the voter disenfranchisement in Florida during the 200O and Ohio in 2004. No one has been sent to court or prison for the kind of cheating that "challenged " the votes of a large number of Democrat-voting people or sent the state troopers to "pre-view" voters as they came to the polls, mostly black Americans in Florida. In our collective naivete, we Americans have thought that the commendable efforts of former President Jimmy Carter and other elections observers in nations like Venezuela or Peru were, of course, unnecessary in this bastion of democracy where we grew up. In my country of birth, Colombia, where in the past dead people were known to vote, Election Day is a holiday. In small Costa Rica Election Day is also a holiday, a celebration of democracy. But not in the US. In the US voter suppression is reaching astounding proportions. So, I invite Jimmy Carter and other NGOs like the National Democratic Institute, which send elections observers all over the globe, to post their observers in the US and tell us what kind of democracy we live in.

You know what? To recommend such a show as you have described here is almost tantamount to dropping down to that same level of "disgusting" and 'puerile" that the show has. I would think that we want to progress and to raise somehow the level of our human element and our humor. We count on reviewers with mature, intelligent taste to tell it like it is. You do tell it like it is. But must you recommend such crass ill use of the airwaves? Are we not going to then wonder why our movies and TV shows are considered so lacking in wit and value abroad? Yes, I laughed at All about Mary, and the silliness there, but was it the best humor the US can produce? giant farts? men and their butts? men and their zippers? Awful! Oh, where is Archie Bunker when we need him? Or I love Lucy or Laugh-in or Woody Allen or....