"Don't Stop Believing" was the theme of my Senior Ball back in '83, one of the happiest times of my life. "When the Lights Go Down In the City" is the best song ever written about San Francisco save the one and only "San Francisco Open Your Golden Gates!" (now "We Built This City" - that's pure cheese). I tear up every time I hear that song because I was living on Green Street and Laguna (lower Pacific Heights) on October 17th, 1989 at 5:04pm. Later on, a bunch of people were on our apartment roof, looking out at the eerily dark city when someone, somewhere started playing "When the Lights.." on a horn (trumpet? fugle?? I'm not sure). There were other people on the roofs of their buildings in our neighborhood, and, little by little, they and we all started singing along with the horn. It was incredible, a moment I'll remember until the day I die. So there's the nostalgia.

As for Perry's voice, well, what can I say? It could be by turns overpowering and as gentle as a windchime. He was one of the very few who were allowed a brief solo moment during "We Are the World", and the only performer who made a bigger (positive) impression was Ray Charles. The guy was one of the greats, whether anyone wants to believe it or not. And the reason he had to "beg" to get people to sing along to "When the Lights..." at Graham's memorial (I was there too) was because of the asshole poseurs who were booing him. Yeah, that turned my stomach too, but for entirely different reasons.

You have eloquently written about an issue that until recently could only be found in "alternative" magazines and journals such as The Progressive, Counterpunch and The Nation. Your central thesis - that those who support the concept of "the unitary executive" are basically tyrants who do not believe in our political system - was tragically smack-on. It's high time that those who fully and fiercely support that system recognize that these tyrants must be confronted and defeated. I hope such defeat is political, but it may not be so simple.

We are heading for civil war. What's terrifying about it this time is that the breech is within each of our individual minds and consciences. This time around there will be no uniforms and orderly muster for battle. No, I fear this time it will be simple, enraged mass-murder. I pray that it doesn't come to that, but I'm ever more convinced that we've come too far for it to be otherwise. My advice to non-tyrants? Start buying guns, and learning how to use them. The time for squeamishness is over.

And I think Mr. McCarthur was trying to hide his ever-swelling woody behind that podium.

I think we should dig up his corpse and fuck it. Least we could do.

...wasn't the first F4 movie a colossal flop? Since when do the studios make sequels of flops? Can HOWARD THE DUCK II be far behind??

And I am so sick and fucking tired of fanboys, young and old alike, heaping cultural significance on comic books with their endless prattling about subtext and such laughable semantic stunts as referring to comic books as graphic novels. I actually enjoyed "The Dark Knight Returns", as well as Neil Gaiman's "Sandman." But aesthetically (not to mention literarily) speaking comic books do not even rise to the level of mediocre genre fiction. To put it crudely, it's shit for shit-for-brains, and that's about it.

As a cineaste I do appreciate those who have taken the raw story elements and elevated them into cinematic art. The original SUPERMAN, Tim Burton's first BATMAN, the X-MEN trilogy and, of course, the SPIDERMAN films are all great stuff. But the comics upon which they are based are not much of anything but reflections of the sad state of educational affairs in this country. The fact that grown men can't read any better than high school burn-outs, and thus turn to these glorified picture books is a tragedy.

And while I don't always dig horror movies, Zombie's THE DEVIL'S REJECTS is one of the best ever, because it performed the amazing act, by the end, of having the audience identify and sympathize with the vicious, sadistic family of killers. Eli Roth's work is, I agree, pure shit.

They're assholes, and age has nothing to do with it. Anybody who refuses to call people back who have left them messages is, by definition, an asshole. Ditto those who don't respond to e-mail. And spare me the "I'm busy" shit. Nobody's that busy.

Please don't quit your day jobs. Seriously.

Knock it off. It's embarassing.

...but Christopher Hitchens has jumped on the "Pardon Libby" bandwagon. Here's the link:

http://www.slate.com/id/2168642/

I'm stunned at this. Didn't Libby lie, not once but repeatedly, while under oath?? Or is that just left-wing propaganda?

In point of fact she and her vaunted commission took single-payer, socialized medicine off the table from the get-go under pressure from the AMA and big pharma. The result - HMOs and PPOs - is what we're left with today.

Many years ago a Canadian doctor wrote an essay entitled "Why Are My American Colleagues Lying About Canadian Healthcare?" I believe if you Google that, you should find the essay. I remember it as being VERY revealing. Ms. Zacharek would do well to read it before she reviews another documentary on this topic.

"Pets or meat?"

In the words of Ed McMahon, "You are CORRECT, sir!"

Video Dog should be renamed "Video Ghetto." Or perhaps "Video Sewer" would be more apt.