It seems interesting to me that the anecdotal evidence supporting either position is often class based.

The anecdotes on one side always seem to read: [hugely successful woman] leaves [high powered, high paid] career to care for children. Therefore the gender gap is not real; it's women choosing lifestyle over career.

The anecdotes on the other side always seem to read: [box store employee] earns $6 an hour while her male counterparts earn $6.33 an hour. She keeps losing her job because when her children are sick her no-good dead-beat boyfriend won't help out. Gender inequality is therefore alive a ticking in our patriarchal society.

Is is possible we're all just talking past each other on this one?

A little off topic...

From the article: "Its case targeting the distribution of porn via SPAM was the first of its kind... "

In the last week I've seen junk mail delivered via email written as SPAM (as if it were an acronym) rather than spam or Spam (which Hormel hates, I'm sure, unless you are referring to the meat product).

Is spam (or SPAM) now an acronym and, more importantly, why didn't I get the memo?

It's unfortunate that the Imus frenzy so quickly focused on racism and sexism. One of the reasons I found it so offensive was that it was personal and the power differential seemed so great; rich, famous shock jock attacks without provocation hard-working college athletes.

So here's my advice to radio and TV: don't censor but pick on people your own size. Attacking the powerful makes you look brave. Picking on the powerless makes you look like a coward and a bully. I think the main reason Imus had so few defenders was simply that no one wants to be friends with a bully or a coward.

How about "no, no, a thousand times no!". Aren't teachers allowed to have private lives? Given that they already are paid less than their educational levels should dictate do want even more reasons for good people to wander over to get a business degree or a pre-law degree rather than being a teacher? Drinking in your free time does not preclude one from being a good teacher. In fact -- and I know this is going to be more controversial -- I'd even allow teachers to smoke in the privacy of their own homes. Can you imagine the outcry if she had a picture of herself with a Pal Mal?

If, as expected, the White House stalls on this request what are the next possible steps? I can think of two but I don't know if they are able to be implemented:

• Power of impeachment. Not of Bush, necessarily, but of Gonzales or Rove?

• Power of the purse. Can Congress punitively restrict funding of the apparatchiks in the White House? I'd love to see Rove and Mier's salary set to a Congressionally mandated $6.35 and hour.

I wish I had been there. It sounds classic.

However, in the city where I live - charming Baltimore - the people "block the box" all the time. It isn't a case of "some guy made a mistake"; it's a case of tailgating the car in front of you until it slows down without any regard to cross streets or traffic flow. It's the same attitude that makes the horn-blowers lay on the horn; complete disregard to one's surroundings and one's neighbors.

Yes, the proper response to horns is violence, but what's the proper response to the people that shut down traffic in the city through their selfishness?

We must disagree on this topic. The faithful must be willing to assume some responsibility for the actions that are taken in the name of their faith. Mitt should have said something about the Mormon church's stance against equal rights for African Americans and his failure to do so speaks negatively of him. Christians should speak out against fanatics that kill doctors at Planned Parenthood clinics. And, Muslims should take a vocal stance against honor killings and other terrorist acts that are justified in the name of their religion.

This is in response to Lynx's post about how, despite the dire warnings, we never seeming to hit the "peak" in anything. I disagree, though it's never discussed in these terms, I think we hit "peak biodiversity" a few thousand years ago and we are now on the steep slope down. It's clear that there are fewer species of plants and animals alive now than there have been in the entire history of humanity. And next year there will be even fewer.

I did a google search for "bikini font" and got links to this article, links to fonts, and links to bikinis. But, nothing showed up that explained what a bikini font is.

There is absolutely no way that this episode would have ended with a white girl in handcuffs. I'm sorry to bring race into it, but there is no question that incidents involving black kids get escalated far beyond what would happen in the same situation to a white kid.

Do you remember the first time you tried a microbrewed beer? It was probably a Pyramid Hefe Weizen with a little slice of lemon in it. You realized how good that was and started getting more and more adventuresome until you were buying X-treme beers with IBU ratings over 100.

Eventually, however, you realize that bitterness (in beer or coffee) is not an extreme sport. Sophistication can be found in mellower brews. That's not to say that all bitter brews are unsophisticated or that all mellow brews are, just that bitterness is not the only criteria for a good coffee.

I haven't had the Pike Place brew yet, but I'm willing to give them the benefit of the doubt until I've had a chance to try it.