... when you tell people there's no flying spaghetti monster?

Every day that goes by, and nearly every letter response I've read to this articles, convinces me that the United States of America is not someplace normal people should live. The forcefulness with which so-called "Christians" state there (baseless) case ("We think there's a God no matter what you say and you're just a big fat stupidhead if you don't believe it, too") makes me see that living here is like living under a Christian Taliban.

When do the beheadings start? It might be a lovely way to pass the time while I finish my education and can move to a country where education and intellect are valued over witchcraft and Godly sorcery. After the Rapture, when all the Christians have been evicted, I can come home and move into a nice little suburb where the neighbors know better than to talk about religion.

~AS~

My mother was a gourmet cook, but I, alas, was born without the "sauteeing" gene. I can't separate egg whites, I can't make a souffle, I can't whip up a trifle.

But in a bind and without a recipe, I can take a chicken, some terragon, some white wine and a boil-in-bag of Uncle Ben's rice and throw together an edible, credible meal in a relatively short time. Nothing fancy -- just regular old food that taste good and isn't sweetened with high fructose corn syrup somewhere along the line.

I think people who waste time "hating" her have way too much time on their hands in the first place. Rachael Ray's style of cooking is right up my alley -- no hanging by the kitchen pot rack, no culinary gymnastics. Just some tasty, quick, easy cooking using fairly fresh food and basic utensils. I can stomach a dose of Rachael along with some fabulous roast meat and a salad. And judging from the success of her shows and her cookbooks, I'm not the only one.

~AS~

... that should there be a consensus about how to end the Iraqi war by the next presidential election, "then the Iraq war would largely be off the table as a defining issue of the 2008 race -- a potentially huge advantage for Republicans."

Really? Think so? Because here's what I'm thinking. While the war itself might be "off the table", the (at-present) $335 million dollars it cost, not to even mention the cost of several thousand American lives, and HUNDREDS of thousands of Iraqi lives, will be "off the table." I think it will be very much on the table, and it will hurt both Democrats and Republicans in Congress who initially voted to sustain the war.

However, since Republicans were much later in coming to the "Let's End the War Before We Look Like Complete Idiots" table, I think the war and its after-effects will haunt Republican presidential and congressional candidates for years.

Mr. Dreyfuss, this isn't wheat subsidies we're talking here. Its war. People remember stuff like that a little bit longer than you may realize.

~AS~

That, here in America, there are no shortage of homophobic, racist, small- and evil-minded people with a few bucks to contribute trying to elect someone just like them.

This is what makes our country great. (And I don't mean that in the least facetiously.)

~AS~

I find it particularly abhorrent when those same individuals are elected officials, or work in high-level positions for elected officials dedicated to denying people their most basic rights as Americans, simply because of their sexual orientation.

Cowards, indeed.

~AS~

Since you clearly lack the imagination or personal experience to extrapolate on the term "other repercussions", allow me to be of some assistance. "Other repercussions" could mean she'd get thrown out of her home. "Other repercussions" could mean that, though he doesn't lay a hand on her, her father calls her a whore and it changes the nature of their relationship forever. Or "other repercussions" might simply mean that, rather than allowing her to have an abortion and get on with her life, her parents force her to have and raise a child she's in no way prepared to care for.

Is any one of these scenarios so outlandish as to be beyond the scope of your understanding? Or is it simply that you just don't think any of that would be really so bad, compared to the horror that is modern medical abortion. And while we're on the subject, please let me remind you that tens of thousands of women in the country -- many of the quite successful and accomplished -- have, in fact, endured this procedure without being pushed to the brink of madness, in spite of what you might have seen on Lifetime TV.

Personally, I think I'm going to do everything I can to keep abortion safe, legal and accessible to any female in the state of childbearing years. So, thankfully, my vote will cancel yours out and we can pretend like this whole ugly little affair never happened.

~AS~

"This has nothing to do with parental notification and everything to do with chipping away at Roe V. Wade."

Well and simply stated, Herself. It's absolutely what this is all about. Conservative Orange County Christian neocons couldn't persuade Californians to restrict abortion across the board, so they decided to start small and move in baby steps. And exploiting our relationships with our daughters seemed like an ideal place to begin.

No on 85. Period.

~AS~