No, I haven't suddenly lost my wits.

But there's an elephant in the room.

The elephant is Harvard. It's on the letter-writer's back, certainly: he's hating himself because he's unable to function right now BUT...

It's on the backs of the really angry crowd around here and explains a lot of the self-gratulatory nastiness they're helping on someone who's thinking of suicide. They can't attack Harvard, but they can attack a member of the pride that can't keep up. That's a LOT of fun. That's a sign of incredible character.

Frankly, I think it takes more courage to have that crimson letter on and admit that thinks are screwed up than your talk about work ethics, parasites, the usual obscene babble from the over-the-borderline types...

Harvard. DEAL with it.

Marine bootcamp. With dreadful sherry.

You can protest that that's not so, it doesn't mean anything, but the elephant is still in the room.

At least, the LW isn't fooling himself that it's part of the problem.

So that's what you're going to teach your child: Spite and baiting?

I hope you make a lot of money to pay for the child's "issues."

See today's Cary Tennis column.

I caught what you were saying. I simply threw it away.

It's a nice trick: take activists, deflect them to something YOU want, get what YOU want because the activists are pretty effective -- but in working for you, they don't get what THEY want.

No thanks. Frankly, I think healthcare insurance has to change for men as well as women.

By the way, when you buy a suit, do they charge alterations for the trousers and the cuffs? They charge me. And they charge me more at the hairdresser and the drycleaner too.

Crybaby.

So lobby for yourself and quit whining.

She lived through this situation and, from how she is quoted, it sounds as if she has grown tremendously.

Hope that her growth means that she'll be able to leave the sucker to rot. Or that he gets his in prison. Seven years?

GMAFB.

Pity, used as a weapon, isn't pity but weaponized smugness.

That's not a gift I can accept; you didn't mean it as a benefit; so I see no need to thank you.

But I'm certain you felt very, very good about yourself.

I think they're cranky from parenting too intensively. They need to go to their rooms and take their naps or have a nice QUIET timeout in a corner.

They're helicoptering their kids; they're helicoptering themselves, and they're making the pharmaceuticals industry rich.

Dayenu!

(Swine Flu and Steele, if you want to be anti-Semitic, I'm a two- or even three-fer: Jewish, feminist, and Ivy educated.) You're not original, clever, funny, or even intelligent when you pull this crap.

If you gentlemen want car-insurance parity, let's see: what can you do?

Accept cars simply as transportation, not compensation

Teach your sons to drive responsibly (and I believe that teen males who do drive responsibly and meet other qualifications are eligible for discounts)

Get off your duffs and lobby for them yourselves, instead of expecting women to do the legislative equivalent of fetching you a cold beer when you yell for one.

I wouldn't expect the cold beer either. You have hands, you have feet, and you have mouths. USE them to do more than complain.

The smells of Schadenfreude, reverse snobbery, and jealousy in the morning, the afternoon, or the evening.

So I shall turn on the ceiling fans and make a suggestion. If it were me, I think I'd be curious about film school in California. Aren't there a couple of superb ones -- USC and UCLA?

If you could get in, you could have them. Set yourself the goal of earning them. Put yourself through. It will take you years to get enough to get cross-country and start the application process. Maneuvering the labyrinth of financial aid will teach you complex organizations like no one's business.

But graduate school shouldn't be occupational therapy or more of the same. Go only if you can't -not- go.

Use the creeps here to work up a head of steam. You won't be the first to be condemned for the crimson: there are worse things to be condemned for.

Or a temper tantrum, which this is.

Can we please give them a time out?