"People who think only of themselves and value their possessions more than other people. And they think that rules are irrational, don't even consider the possibility that there's a reason."

All that's happening here is that passengers are so accustomed to being lied to by airlines and subjected to nonsensical administrative rules that they have lost the ability to distinguish core safety regulations from, say, being gouged hundreds of dollars for correcting a misspelled name on a ticket.

There is plenty of money available for R & D in either place, but the American legal system discourages innovation while Japan, China and Korea lets it romp. If you have a tech idea, why risk years of fighting patent trolls and NIMBYs when you can just hire a crew in China and go build it?

...But shouldn't the Peace Prize have gone to someone with, you know, actual accomplishments?

When Al Gore got the Peace prize, it became the little plastic ring at the bottom of the Crackerjack box.

This would be the kind of recipient we of the dark side would expect after Yassir Arafat, Jimmy Carter and Al Gore.

Our criticism of the award on grounds that Obama has no Nobel-worthy accomplishments yet pales by contrast with the hard left, which is incensed that Obama did not immediately hand the country over to their sacred Taliban. Women and gays: you might want to rethink any enthusiasm you may have for today's left, for if the Taliban were to win, you would shortly find yourselves enslaved or shot respectively.

"If these people are my enemies, how are their enemies not my friend?"

Co-ops would form naturally for bulk ordering efficiency, just as lone investors coalesce to form mutual funds. Giving individuals the fundamental right to shop around would put healthcare on the same basis as such fields as electronics. It's time we replaced monopoly law with Moore's Law.

...You should have voted for libertarian candidates in the first place. I suppose you thought that all the anti-gay candidates were Republican - or white?

The Democrats were elected last year by those who hoped that the party would turn populist after all these years. On banks, on healthcare and even on airlines, Congress and Obama have had the opportunity to bust monopolies and force those getting bailouts to adopt more consumer-friendly policies in return for that taxpayer cash. After all, the Republicans lost largely because of their corporate toadying. Bot one year on, we still don't have so much as an airline passenger bill of rights - remember that no-brainer of the 2008 campaign? We're still paying the world's highest drug prices. Nothing has been done about copyright and patent reform.

It's time for a third party now, more than ever.

What we right-wingers have against hate crime legislation is inconsistent application. The intent is to make racist motivation an aggravating factor in sentencing a criminal, just like using a gun or torturing the victim. Fair enough as a basic idea, but we told you in the beginning that the hate-crime factor would be invoked only on behalf of those minorities favored by the criminal defense bar.

And sure enough: no hate crime aggravator for the obvious racial motivation in the Wichita and Knoxville massacres (look them up) makes a mockery of the entire concept.

"Why do most of the liberals posting here attack Camille personally rather than challenging her on the issues? "

Because ad hominem spew was all they had back in 1968, and it's all they have now. Pass the popcorn, please.

There are very few movies I can watch again and again. The sense of cultural satire in this one was spot on.

In saying that "I hope he fails" is not going to make the Republicans popular again, even if this failure comes to pass. The next election will go to whichever party proposes a set of initiatives that actually captures the public's enthusiasm. Let's have a real energy program, for just one instance, before the dollar turns into toilet paper. Let's introduce real consumer choice in medicine, not more bad regulations to sort-of-counterbalance the existing set of crappy regulations. And yes, let's fix the culture: instead of deporting people who come to this country to work, let's deport the Hollywood degenerates who sign petitions for child molesters. As another poster just pointed out, they have repeatedly promised to leave the country in the past, then have kept letting us down.

"So I'm over 50 which makes me too old to really appreciate the whole cougar experience, but I have many friends and former lovers who are cougar material and I get embarrassed for them watching this show."

It sounds as though what you found attractive about those women, unlike the Botoxicated objects depicted on the show, was that maturity made them more interesting. They just knew so much more about everything, sex included. This was in a time when, although Eros was everywhere, women my own age prided themselves on being inarticulate. A glance at any Paglia letters thread will show you they still do.

When you consider that the closing low for the Dow in 1932 was 41.22, any increase whatever on that figure was a much more impressive percentage gain than anything we see today. The Dow of 1932 was in this way like the house price of 2009.

NFL owners are known for bullying cities into bribing their teams with scarce taxpayer funds to stay in town. "Build me an opulent new stadium every ten years", they threaten, "or we're leaving!"