I have to chuckle at Always a Bridesmaid, Kate, and others, complaining that women in America have such a difficult time meeting good men -- and then immediately going on to describe how, without much diffiulty, they met a good man.

Ladies, imagine if the good man you found (after so much "difficulty"), rather than being delighted that you might settle for him, instead reacted with horror at the mere idea that you could ever imagine yourself being good enough for him. Picture it happening to you about fifty times in a row -- being rejected, again and again, by an endless series of "geeks" (your word), none of whom you yourself would be proud to bring home to mom.

If you can imagine that, then you'll know what life is like for many men in America. No, not the tall guy you checked out on the elevator this morning -- the other guy, the shorter one standing next to the hot guy you checked out. What, you don't remember seeing another guy on the elevator this morning? My point exactly.

I also have to chuckle at the "anonymous" who suspects that the men who seek wives in other countries do so not ONLY because they are invisible in the U.S., but because they might be able to meet and marry someone "out of their league". Gee, ya think?

The calculus for a growing number of American men goes like this: waiting around while ordinary American women give their best years to corporations that don't care -- and a long series of men who wouldn't dream of marrying them but who are perfectly willing to sleep with them a few times -- in the hope that one such woman might condescend, as middle age approaches, to settle for us -- at least long enough to have a kid or two and get us firmly on the hook for child support. OR we can cross an international border and meet and marry a young exotic beauty who doesn't equate sharing household chores with slavery and who just might stay with us forever (even after she gets U.S. citizenship) -- provided we love her always, and devote ourselves to her happiness.

I know which choice I made, many years ago.

Especially the shoutout to the CFL

Rumsfeld now claims that the Berlin Wall might fall in the very near future.

When the so-called republicans refer to Time Warner (or GE or Disney or Viacom, etc.) as the "liberal media", I think what they mean is that in the run-up to the neocon-led invasion of Iraq -- for example -- if Fox News had as on-air guests 100 pro-war cheerleaders for every one person who expressed skepticism toward the Bush-Cheney claims, while CNN and MSNBC presented only 50 pro-war cheerleaders per each skeptic, well then CNN and MSNBC must be twice as "liberal" as Fox. On the spectrum of cable news channels available in the U.S., CNN and MSNBC really are the "mirror images" of Fox -- and never mind that, by any objective standard, none of these traditional media outlets has sought to hold Bush-Cheney to anything resembling the same high standards of honesty and integrity to which they all so zealously held President Clinton and Vice President Gore.

The so-called republicans lied to start a war that didn't need to be fought. They led a coalition of the gullible into the wrong war at the wrong time; and it turned out to be a fiasco, an utter disaster. As a result, the republicans are vulnerable, which is why they and their media cheerleaders are fast becoming unglued over the prospect of an opposition party standing firmly with the American people against their failed war.

Iraq might be only one of the many crimes and follies of the Bush-Cheney regime; but as far as professional Democrats are concerned, it should be THE issue. Political ads this year should simply show footage of the Bush-Cheney claims about WMD and being greeted as liberators, etc. -- juxtaposed with actual scenes from Iraq today.

Any time a republican/cheerleader such as the odious Cokie Roberts asks, "Well, Mr. or Ms. Democrat, that's all water under the bridge, what would YOU do now?", respond by saying: a) America's national security demands that we get the hell out of Iraq a.s.a.p.; and, b) from now on, let's not let the neo-cons start any more wars based on lies.

Better yet, perhaps Democratic ads could just point out that, more than five years after 9/11, the Bush-Cheney people are no longer even looking for Osama bin-Forgotten, who (by the way) was never caught (juxtapose more b.s. about getting him "dead or alive", etc.) and whose al-Qaeda (remember the real terrorists?) continues to threaten the West.

Beltway Guys, do you think you could do something like that this time around? As opposed to the usual true and important but uninspiring stuff about farm subsidies or medicare deductibles, blah blah blah. You KNOW you're going to get swiftboated regardless what you do; so why not, just for once, try to really stand for something?

Finally, just for the record, "left-wing" Democratic opposition to the war in Vietnam (and Laos, and Cambodia) did not put Richard Nixon in the White House. Sirhan Sirhan put Richard Nixon in the White House. It might help to keep that in mind.

I read all your prior posts to Salon, all six pages of them. Right on. man. As Johnny Carson would have said, "Good stuff."