People may fulminate about Chavez calling Bush the devil, but compared to the Democrats on Capitol Hill, at lease he has courage to take on the administration that is one of the largest threats to peace, prosperity and the environment in history.

I don't stand by this President at all. He has profoundly failed to represent even one bit of what I believe in-- from torture, to war, to environmental destruction. If Bush isn't one of the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse, who is?

Hi Folks,

This is the same Barbara Cubin that examines other Congressional members' "packages", and bakes cookies of same to hand out to them.

One thing that the American public needs to understand is that these people act crazy because they ARE crazy.

That's what is so scary. It's not just the notion that they make up and fuel the chattering class-- it's that anyone rational could take them seriously at all.

I just got back from Brazil, in the countryside, after days of walking around the Pantanal and eating hearty, healthy Brazilian organic-by-necessity, grass-fed-by-necessity fruits, vegetables and beef. Not much was fried. A lot was stewed, or cooked in sauce.

I felt great. I was surrounded by beautiful women who also seemed to eat normal portions of food, yet were pretty skinny by American standards. None of it was hard, nobody was suffering, and everyone was drinking a caipirinha or three every night.

There were almost no morbidly obese people. Some with a middle-aged spread, but even the middle-aged folks mostly had a small tummy of fat-- not the sign of super-athleticisim. But most looked pretty good, and pretty fit.

It was pretty easy from a diet-and-exercise perspective to see why they were that way. They eat fruit at every meal. Their kids eat fruit, and vegetables, and learn to make healthy choices right off the bat. Soft drinks come in 12 oz. cans, or smaller. Meat is stewed, not fried. Though there is some fried food ( fried plantains come to mind!) there's not a lot of it. They eat dessert. But plates are smaller, and portion sizes as well. They don't drink 32 oz. of soda pop with lunch.

And they walk, alot. THey walk because they have to. So they get some exercise. From where I stood, it didn't look like anyone was denying anyone anything. They just lived right. And it wasn't that hard, and it was pretty tasty.

Immersion back into the US at the airport made obvious our problems. Though there may be one healthy choice at an airport, you were almost always surrounded by fried food. You were surrounded by Big Gulps. Any healthy eating had to occur with a focus, because you were surrounded by alternatives promising an endorphin boost-- and who in any sterile airport doesn't want to feel just a little better?

Healthy choices were easy in Brazil, because that's mostly what they had. Exercise was easy in Brazil, because you had to walk to get where you wanted to go.

All this dieting crapola is the result of a toxic society, fed on Archer Daniels Midland high fructose corn syrup, and accessibility of the automobile to anything. If we're serious about changing our health, we'll kick cars and ag. subsidies. Anything less won't cut it.

Why would Bush condemn, or even cast a hint of aspersion on the killing of Saddam? Bush himself signed the death warrant for some 150+ individuals in Texas. He openly mocked Karla Faye Tucker, one of his executionees.

And Texas only did away with state-sanctioned hanging in 1923. While 1923 may seem a long time ago, it is only 1-2 generations back from GW Bush himself.

Liberals need to stop believing that certain conservative behavior is incomprehensible because it seems irrational to them. It is very rational to the people engaging in it, however reprehensible it may appear to us. What we can learn from Hussein's hanging is more a notion of what the various parties' worldviews actually are-- so that we can understand-- and plan strategies to deal with it. Because convincing people who think hanging is a good idea that it is actually not ain't gonna cut it.

The writer, Michael Scherer, ends his descriptive piece,

"But for the first 100 hours, partisanship is what she has offered, and partisanship is what she will get."

Such nonsense-- written as if there are no real stakes in things like the minimum wage, ethics rules, the war in Iraq. The purpose of politics and government is to make a real difference in people's lives-- whether it means aiding the unfortunate, or leaving alone the well-to-do.

This is not some game. As we continue to run out of oil, and watch the carbon in the atmosphere rise, as well as watch major parts of the US wiped off the map through a combination of hurricanes and poverty, it would behoove the media to not play the role of the cynical court observer.

There are stakes-- real stakes of survival. And if you cannot see that, nor appreciate that. then get out of the business.