Can we have an intervention to stop the GG vs. JNagarya argument? Because the fight is over. JNagarya has been trounced. Give up. It is now beyond painful, like the scene in "Cool Hand Luke" where Paul Newman just keeps getting up and just keeps getting whacked.

"Sometimes nothing is a real cool hand". Maybe in a fight, if the tougher guy isn't a psychopath and refuses to beat you to death. But 'nothing' is not a cool hand in an argument.

You have lost, JNagarya. Move on.

To switch gears, someone way early in this string said something like "Can we agree that Edwards and Obama are metrosexuals?"

I thought at the time it was a ludicrous suggestion but did not have the time to respond.

No: I do not agree that John Edwards and Barack Obama are metrosexuals. In fact, they are not even close to being metrosexuals. The person who made this dumb claim is just another dupe who has swallowed the line about how Democratic males are somehow effiminate, just not tough enough to stand up to - "them" - whoever "they" are at the moment.

First, what exactly IS a metrosexual? Wikipedia helpfully points right back to Salon.com in their article, citing this from Mark Simpson:

"The typical metrosexual is a young man with money to spend, living in or within easy reach of a metropolis – because that's where all the best shops, clubs, gyms and hairdressers are. He might be officially gay, straight or bisexual, but this is utterly immaterial because he has clearly taken himself as his own love object and pleasure as his sexual preference. Particular professions, such as modeling, waiting tables, media, pop music and, nowadays, sport, seem to attract them but, truth be told, like male vanity products and herpes, they're pretty much everywhere.

"For some time now, old-fashioned (re)productive, repressed, unmoisturized heterosexuality has been given the pink slip by consumer capitalism. The stoic, self-denying, modest straight male didn't shop enough (his role was to earn money for his wife to spend), and so he had to be replaced by a new kind of man, one less certain of his identity and much more interested in his image – that's to say, one who was much more interested in being looked at (because that's the only way you can be certain you actually exist). A man, in other words, who is an advertiser's walking wet dream."

This is the article from which they are quoting: http://dir.salon.com/story/ent/feature/2002/07/22/metrosexual/index.html

While this does play into the silly stereotype of Edwards spending big money on a haircut, in fact, most politicians this side of the old Mayor Richard J. Daley want to look their best in public.

But other than that, Edwards and Obama are not within parsecs of fitting the description.

They are not young. They are not single. If they are spending alot of time shopping it is not at all obvious.

Both of these men are alpha males of the very highest order. They are self-made multi-millionaires. They are United States Senators, which means they automatically wield great power. They are obviously intense and hard-working control freaks who, if they did not occasionally verbally flame a subordinate for some mistake would be anomolies among such types.

Sissies? Metrosexuals? Not a bit of it.

If they are not warmongers or thugs, good for them. But weaklings? Don't make me laugh.

I have so far avoided posting any comments about comments, but since it is a topic at the moment I would like to ask - probaby futilely, true, but it might be worth a try - that those of you who:

a. Post way off-topic stuff that

b. Is often plain nonsensical or cutesy and is

c. Intended for only a small audience of a few people who

d. Post over and over and over, "letter" after letter so that

e. There are times when I have to wade through page after page of annoying, cloying drivel

- could you (and you must know who you are) find a way to communicate privately? Exchange emails or something?

The problem isn't the occasional jocular exchange that caps a substantive back and forth. The problem is those few people who (in my view) basically abuse the intent of a letter to the editor.

In short - will some of you please at least think twice before you click the "Publish my letter" button? Ask yourself if what you are writing has anything to do with the topic - anything at all? Ask yourself if you are just having a online chat as if this were a chat room?

Which is what I am doing now but I won't ask again.

Our political system is broken. The people who have broken it are the only ones who can fix it. The people who have allowed it to be broken are all of us.

Does anyone have a practical suggestion for a to reform this ugly mess? I confess I have nothing to suggest that does not involve a constitutional amendment, and that is a non-starter.

Getting rid of a few Blue Dogs is good in and of itself, but the system will remain in failure mode for the forseeable future.