As bad as Nixon was, he was not actually impeached. That seems such a simple fact that one should get right if one is to cast stones at the current (bad) president.

Does truth only matter when it speaks to our particular interests?

That Richard Nixon was not impeached is far from pedantic. You made a rather serious factual error, and your response is to attack me for being 'pedantic.'

Interesting view of the meaning of facts, especially coming from a person who claims to be a professor at Georgetown University Law Center.

You wrote something false. When it was pointed out that it was false you attacked the messenger.

What callous indifference to truth must reside within you.

It pisses me off when the people who I want to agree with have such a casual connection with truth.

Or as that just being pedantic? Is truth among liberals truly relative as the conservatives charge?

>I'm not talking about cases of reasonable doubt. >That's why a criminal conviction is supposed to be >beyond a reasonable doubt in the first place. People >can lie face-to-face, too; I don't see how this >could even relate to a false-accusation issue.

All cases that end up in court involve the question of reasonable doubt. If there was not the potential for doubt the case would have been plea-bargained earlier in the process.

Yes, people can lie face-to-face. But 1) if you do it in court it is a crime-perjury. If you do it on a 9-11 call, or do an officer, it is not a crime (or not nearly as severe a crime). and 2) The Constitution demands this right.

Please read the Sixth Amendment, it is an important part of our Democracy:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sixth_Amendment_to_the_United_States_Constitution

Especially this:

'...to be confronted with the witnesses against him;'

This says nothing about the victim. This says that the defendent has the right to confront witnesses.

Sure, the victim _is_ a witness, but it is in the role of witness that the defendent has the right of confrontation.

This right is not optional. It is not a technicality. It is basic to our system of Justice. And frankly, I find arguments against it to be as offensive as I find arguments that we establish an official religion.

Andrew wrote "What I find odd is seeing a culture war break out in the middle of an energy crisis."

But the current peak oil phenomena has little to do with energy and much more to do with culture. The phrase 'death of suburbia' is more goal than prediction, and Kunstler more Jim Jones then anything rational.

Thanks James, but I'll skip your kool-aid.

I'm not sure what is shameful about the ad. I think this is truly how they see the stakes to this election.

Note, I don't see the stakes that way, but it is not shameful or irrational to believe the people who say they want to kill Americans, and who don't appear to be bound by some of the same constraints that our previous enemies were bound by.

I also think the Republicans are making the problem worse, not better. And the execution of the ad pushed most of my 'oh fuck, the Republicans are going to get us all killed' buttons.

The production values are also pretty weak. Maybe it works on a larger screen.

The genius of the Daisy ad was that it focused on what we all want, peace, children, flowers, etc, and then the mood shifted, got darker with the count down, and boom...

I am confused as all hell about this article, and the ensuing pack of self justifying dribble presented as serious commentary.

An artist has come up with a way to take one completely and utterly fake representation of reality (ie. modern digital photographs), and transform it into a complete and utterly fake representation.

The artist, and likely the artist's patrons (er customers) likes this representation, perhaps even thinks that this representation more closely matches the 'real' version of their child, or of their aspirations for this child. Bright eyes as a mark of intelligence, rosy cheeks indicating health, tidy hair representing a child who is groomed and cared for by their clan.

Catherine Price goes on about 'perfectly natural' this and that without recognizing that there is absolutely nothing natural about a photograph.

Representations of reality are not reality. And the beauty or dare I say even greatness in a representation does not come from how closely it matches our absurdly limited ability to perceive reality.

Catherine's post, and most of the comments which follow, sound exactly, and I mean _exactly_, like the commentary which the 'educated' have always used to dismiss new forms of expression which offended their tiny little world views.

See for example the reaction of the 'critics' to the impressionist salons.

For some values of 'most,' I assume that most of the commentators would find nothing odd about an article praising tattoos and piercings. They are just a form of expression, and etc, and yet someone using Photoshop to change how kids look is damned all over?

"I'm going to use this as an example of what not to do in my next Photoshop class, "The one that will haunt my dreams."

I find sheep, yes I say sheep, and little but sheep for just as far as the router can route.

Sexuality is a part of humans from birth. I think most of us find abhorent the conscious thought of sexualizing our children, or of allowing (or encouraging) them to become the target of the sexual interest of others.

Lucky Achiever said "Most of us find the conscious thought of sexuality in children abhorent. Most of us would never do this to our children."

If that is a true reflection of 'us' than most of 'us' have never had children, or didn't notice, as they touched themselves, or let running water touch them, etc.