i live in a part of the country where gas prices are already high. while my addictive / ocd personality has latched on to market progress as a sign of stability, the higher it goes, the more it seems to bump oil (hence, gas) prices further and further up. it's a double-edged sword. i can't help but wonder if we're headed for more rampant inflation, which will start this cycle all over again.

meanwhile, i was just home visiting folks in michigan. every single person i know there is living with an under-water mortgage. these people are not bums, they don't live in bad parts of town, and they all have good jobs (for the time being). i'd wager a good portion of the foreclosures we're still seeing are the result of folks like these simply walking away from bad deals.

my "for dummies" take on this is that we need unemployment to begin reversing itself, so the housing market can stabilize, so we can get these mortgages back to a decent level and people will stop abandoning them.

troll alert. these guys clearly got their marching orders from rush or MM this morning and are out in force. one of them also posted on the thread for ask the pilot. they are not capable of real thought, so please do not engage them. repeat: do not engage...

This is the second story on salon this morning that reminded me of rilke -- the other was the letter to cary tennis from the adventurer-wannabe-writer, and his advice to "spend a week at a museum." i think we all need a little bit more of that spirit in these dark and troubling times. a bit of art cropping up unexpectedly in the otherwise dreary grain of life to throw open a window on other lives, possibilities, lights... not unlike the leonard cohen concert we went to recently that's still buzzing around in our heads.

Far more troubling to some of us than the economic struggles of this country is its near-absolute cultural poverty. When's the last time anyone's been to a party where someone stood up and recited a great poem, unveiled an amazing work of art, or...? Right, though; i can already see from some of the previous letters on this thread that this is all decadent bullshit. carry on...

where people will hate the otherness of the other rather than respect it.

i have to think the above is a mistake in transcription. we already have enough hatred of the other...

and stinky and saggy -- get a life.

negative remark about sarah palin = ranterranter getting his panties in a wad and firing off a zinger.

don't worry, dude -- it'll take a lot of obama date nights to begin to approach one bush "vacation" down on his ranch...

...otherwise known as gov. palin's unofficial press secretary, salon.com branch.

This debate -- the debate about what constitutes free speech and what is pure and simple hate speech prone to incite violence -- is one that we absolutely must have in this country. Unfortunately, the extreme right has managed to frame the issue in advance by screaming about such things as the Fairness Doctrine when it's not even on the table, precisely because even to put it on the table -- to point out that the airwaves are rancid with one-sided, venomous bile -- is what they most fear, since it would mean people were thinking about the fairness of public discourse.

I fear that we will not have the debate until something horrible happens, because no one seems to have the will for it now.

Also, to all those who would equate left-wing vitriol against GWB to right-wing screeds against Obama: I remember a time when people were losing their jobs for saying anything remotely negative about the president. I remember boycotts, threats, and lots and lots of flag-waving. What I don't recall is a gigantic surge in gun sales. What I don't recall are actual terrorist attacks being carried out -- and please spare me the fallacious equating of muslim extremists to left-wingers.

It's some scary shit.

What on earth does a "partial recount" mean? The fact that they're willing to do it at all reeks of impropriety, yet the "partial" raises serious red flags that this is nothing more than an attempt to defuse the protests and appease the world media.

On the other hand, it's not at all clear that the U.S. should go in, guns blazing, and start making demands and accusations. After all -- and once again, Nate Silver has done nice work on this -- there's really no evidence of a stolen election. Also, no matter what sorts of funny business took place, there's a very good chance we will still wind up dealing with the same person at the end of it all.

And it hardly needs repeating that our actual ability to create leverage in the area has not been strengthened, but severely weakened, by our ongoing presence in Iraq.