I believe Barack Obama touched on a nerve, and now the "powers-that-be," both Republican and Democrat, are trying to stop the pain before it makes voters do something crazy, like vote for people who actually will listen to them. These bitter people live in urban, suburban, farming, and other communities besides "small towns" all over the United States of America. I am one of them, and I'm am praying that all of these people will vote for the person they believe is the most likely to listen to them. However, "we the people" need to remember that our vote is not enough. We vote for the person we believe will represent the real people of the USA, not the "corporate person," whatever that is. Then, we must stay on the backs of our officials, reminding them constantly and unabashedly of their promises to us. Write letters, make phone calls, get on the blogs, and take peacefully to the streets to keep our wants and needs on their minds. Please--all those who are bitter, vote and join me. Peace.

I mean no disrespect to any family anywhere who has suffered the tragedy of abortion, for whatever reason. However, why would some pundits make fun of American men who feel the emotional suffering of abortion and then feel compassion toward the Chinese men? I know that forced abortions are NOT the policy of the United States, but they might as well be, especially for those in total poverty, the working poor, the uninsured. For many women, abortion feels like the only choice they have, and so the more considerate of men who want to take responsibility for their actions join the women in their grief over this "choice." On the other hand, families, friends, bosses, professors or other authority figures of these couples often promote an atmosphere as coercive as the Chinese officials' enforcement of that country's laws. I know I'll hear it from the pro-choice people, but I believe all abortions to be coerced in one form or another, by law, by poverty, or by pressure to meet someone else's "standards" of living. Those Chinese men and women,"married" or not, should be given asylum. As for Americans, we need to address and remove the root causes of the so-called "choice" of abortion.

Yes, yes, yes!

I will take this message home to my family, and ask my students to debate it in their writing. Incidently, I've just finished reading Senator Obama's The Audacity of Hope. This man of reason, in an often unreasonable world with its slutty soundbites and stupid slogans, has shown me what is possible. I embrace him as the person I want to see take the oath of office in January 2009. I will try to persuade as many others as I can to see this same vision. Thank you, Mr. Kamiya.

As an Obama supporter, I have received astonished looks and nasty comments like "I ain't votin' for no jiggaboo!" in NEW JERSEY! There are dittoheads who really believe Obama's going to make this country into a fundamentalist Islamic state and these mentally challenged people live in NEW JERSEY! People who I thought were reasonable will not consider the possibility of an Obama presidential candidacy, and they definitely don't live in "the hills." When many people in southern New Jersey (especially) state their blatantly racist opposition to the Phillies' hiring of former player Gary "Sarge" Matthews as an announcer, for example, I know Obama might be in for more trouble than it seems up to now. It stinks! People in my own family won't even discuss an Obama candidacy, and I know my mother raised them right. The neo-cons have used this time well--they have succeeded in dividing many of us along class and race lines without our conscious knowledge and despite our better selves. We need to REJECT those hypocrites' polarizing influence and vote for the candidate who will actually listen to the people and attend to the people's needs, not the corporations and/or the warmongers. Start talking to your brothers and sisters, and all fair-minded people before the end of this campaign and let's let our better selves shine!

Regarding my previous post (if it got there), I fight battles for creativity, being a writing professor. There, whew!

Even though I take exception to you dismissal of Holly Hunter's incomparable performance as Grace Hannadarko in "Saving Grace" (not to mention Leon Rippy's Angel Earl), I totally agree with your assessments of "In Plain Sight" and "Burn Notice." In the former, I like that Mary is not gorgeous, nauseatingly slim giggle-face. In the latter, I'm enjoying the obvious parody of spy flicks and the main actor's good looks (hey, snow on the roof ...). It's nice to come home after hours of fighting for the rights of true creativity to prop my feet up and watch the reasonable to extraordinary creativity of these three shows. See, someone does get it! Enjoy!

Yes, most people will consider me to be an "anti-choicer," because I believe in choice (birth control) BEFORE conception. However, I also think the Democrat's abortion plank is much more realistic than before. Most women get abortions because they actually feel they do not have a choice. If we create a society where men learn to stop treating women like rubber dolls and punching bags and women learn to stop treating men like meal tickets, if we create a society where all women and men can find work they enjoy and are paid living wages for, if we create a society where all human beings are treated with respect and given encouragement and support throughout their lifetimes, abortion would virtually disappear. Although neither party is close to those ideals, I believe most Democrats at least have a clue (and most Republicans are a bunch of narrow-minded hypocrites). I'm an "anti-choicer" because I look forward to the day where abortion will become unthinkable.