The sitcom Newsradio parodied this kind of overreaction to naughty words in rap over ten years ago, when Phil Hartman's character goes on an on-air crusade against rap lyrics (and the joke then was that he was ten years behind the times in his outrage.)

It's on youtube in three parts: here's a link to the first part, see at about six minutes in.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2i0nxcRw850

I best remember an episode mentioned in one of the other letters, the woman with the gloves.

As I recall, she was a playboy-type model who would show everything, just not her hands (which she was saving for marriage). The guy who was dating her quickly became obsessed with her hands of course, but she held firm. I think it was after he proposed that she finally took off one of her gloves, and by that time I was thinking, oh, god, she's showing her bare HAND!

So, the show had some brains; that one was a great riff on how our sexual fixations can be pretty arbitrary. Gave me that bit of self-awareness at an early age.

Gotta love it when former First Lady, straight to the Senate as first elected office, regular attendee of the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland (great skiing!) Hillary Clinton can throw out the word "elitist" to deride all of those pointy-headed economists who probably have degrees from some elitist Ivy league school like Yale.

Guess you didn't learn anything from reading those 1,500 letters. Just can't resist the poor Clinton as victim spin, can you? Oh, poor, poor pitiful HRC (and Joan Walsh).

I went to a tenth reunion and had a fine time, mostly because it wasn't my own. My wife and I were part of a small group of people staying with a guy whose reunion it was. He was one of the organizers, but also a bit of a prankster, and encouraged us all to go with him. All of us were provided with identities of likely no-shows, a bit of biography and talking points, and a couple of warm up drinks. Some of us were plausible; I was a relatively unknown guy, supposedly part-time dealer (back in the day), my Hungarian wife passed as the Finnish exchange student well enough. The blonde, blue-eyed guy from Ohio was less successful with his Vietnamese name and character. Aside from the inherent fun in being a bit naughty, I actually enjoyed the company. Wouldn't go near any of my own reunions, of course, but glad I caught this one.

McCain

Palin

Actuarial Life Table

Woke up this morning 4 AM (in Europe) to watch the results on CNN International, and found myself actually wishing I could watch the fine folks at Fox swallow this pill. As the kid on the Simpson's says, "Ha, Ha!"

"the unprincipled thuggishness of his (Obama's) supporters"?

Oh, that's funny. Always a laugh when the bullies turn into crybabies.

Re Mike Sulzer's comment about the bias in the polls. I think the guys at fivethirtyeight discussed the problem that pollsters have accounting for the fact that many people no longer have landline phones and are being missed by traditional polling. A lot of cell phone-only people are young, more likely pro-Obama.

Why is this even a question? He campaigned against fellow Democrats. He participated in Republican slime attacks against Obama. Form the square and drum him out. Let him run to the welcoming arms of his new "friends" on the other side. Let him quit and have a republican appointed from Connecticut (who'll be toasted in the next election anyway). He knew what he was doing when he followed his "principles" during the campaign. Now it's time for consequences.

If Reid is too much of a wuss to toss that shitheel out, he's not the leader that the Dems need in the senate. Give it to Hillary. She's earned it.

Good to see some justice in the world of the senate, especially after Leiberman managed to piss all over the Democrats and still hold on to his chairmanship. We'll just have to wait a few more years for Conn. to elect a Democrat in his place.