I get the part about vanity awards being available for a small price.

What I don't get is this -- how are they different from the mainstream awards?

True, the quantity of published material has exploded, but the quality of the mainstream stuff has long been in the pits. I can't tell you how much crap with a National Book Award I've tossed in the trash ... while continuing to find true jewels lacking that suppposedly prestigious endorsement.

The Cheney Republican party knows that the farther away one is from a likely target, and the less informed one is about the enemy, the more irrational the fear is.

They know how to exploit fear like that to justify inventing needless wars, and, just coincidentally, rebuild the military industrial complex in the process.

It never stops surprising me how the tv news cabal put a collective spin on a story and then resolutely refuse to examine their own objectivity.

For me this story was not about terrorism, but about the mindblowing power of religion to legitimate mad-dog acts of destruction.

Needless to say, faux newsfolk like Chris Matthews are obliged to genuflect before the altar.

The average American has no idea of what the Constitution does, or why constitutional law trumps acts of legislatures.

He sees no conflict at all between his personal right to his religion, and his desire to deny that right to others.

Until something rekindles awareness and respect for the idea that the purpose of law is to ensure equal rights for all people, our society will continue to be dominated by people who think the only law is the law of might.

Is it possible for climate change spokespersons to write anything without a tone and cadence of hysterical breathlessness?

It does not enhance their credibility, and it probably blinds them to the need to include dull old empirical data to back up their points.

Each time a commercial airs showing a 'drowning' polar bear, they lose more support.

I notice a small, but distinct group of anti-Obama types who deeply believe the USA is in total collapse.

They hold Obama responsible for the economic crisis, and for the dire state of two wars. They hold him responsible for the poor image of the US military as a result of Don't-Ask-Don't_Tell, and they hold him responsible for illegal aliens taking their jobs. They appear to view him as a symbol of The End of Everything -- so it is no wonder he is often called The Antichrist. With this 'End Times' world view, and the loudest rhetoric around, it is not surprising that the Republican Party cannot find any leaders who are willing to solve long-term problems.

The curious thing is that this group is indeed beginning to realize that the world is not coming to an end, and that life is going on. They're getting confused, as it is hard to replace that obsession with more mundane ideas. They're probably going to produce a few desperate crazies as their world-view crashes to earth.

Sorry, but Whitewater was a legitimate legal issue. The absence of a conviction hardly exonerated anyone.

So was lying to a grand jury.

Why does it matter if the teabag crowd was only concerned with the idea of a president having illicit sex? That does nothing to diminish the illegal acts of a very flawed president.

Ann Kornblut is the nation's leading practitioner of fake journalism.

That is why she appears so frequently on the Chris Matthews Show. Matthews asks her a question, while giving her the answer, and then she gives the answer back to him.

Fox isn't the only media outlet that invents stories, and then reports on them as if they were news. The print media have become willing participants in the fraud.

Since Episode 1, this thing has been inaccurate and unrealistic.

Mad Men is Desperate Housewives with less botox.

The History Channel has become a bog of fake history and end-days horror shows. One can explore these frauds all day without ever hearing a rational word.

Beck has made a great success of venting his inner hysteria.

It is truly frightening that his followers don't realize that he says whatever will be most outrageous to his audience of the moment, and that none of it is based on facts or knowledge.

He seems to be propelled by a need to transfer his panic to his audience.

The only comparable march that I can recall down Penn. Ave. was back in the 20's.

Everyone was wearing sheets.

It never ceases to amaze me that the far right continuously protests that the government is taking away all their rights ... yet they leap at the any opportunity to give government tyrannical powers.

It is sad that Ashcroft can't be imprisoned for his role in this Hitlerian abuse of government power.

Matthews declined to tell Tom Delay that rejecting the President's birth certificate and all evidence is just plain crazy -- because he is still courting Mr. Delay.

He ennobles the birther lie by repeating it as if it has not already been found to be totally irrational.

The right's strategy of telling a lie, and of counting on their ability to get 25% of the public to believe it in spite of all evidence to the contrary, has been working for years, and is only getting stronger.

How big does the lie have to get before a pusillanimous news media just starts calling it a 'lie'.

I see nothing in the article that suggests the offensive speech was anything other than insults, easily identifiable as of dubious accuracy, which are protected by the right of parody.

If Google starts having to identify website creators or other posters of material in the manner of this case, we may find that the biggest industry in the country is that of libel suits.