True dissent threatens the state, it doesn't prop up its institutions. Killing citizens of another state, for the machinations of your state is not patriotic. Refusing to kill for the state is.

Patriotism is nationalism. We don't need more nationalism. It implies that the "nation" acts on behalf of the people when moving the country to war. War is not and never is in the "national" interest or the in the collective interest of the people, unless in direct defense of the people.

If you do have an army, you definitely don't want to promote the idea that the individual soldiers should speak out with their opinions of the conflict. Unless of course you want an military in chaos... which as a goal could be considered very unpatriotic. There is a reason we separate the powers of the military and the civilian government. There is a reason the military has a chain of command. There is a reason you don't want soldiers deciding and articulating their opinion of the conflict. They have every right as citizens to come back after their service and voice dissent, but not while in uniform.

It is the responsibility of congress and the news gathering media to investigate conflict, not the soldier. The media has decided to be embedded. That is their poor choice.

Do you think the grunts hitting the beaches of Normandy or Okinawa would have had good things to say about our strategy at the time? From a soldier's perspective the civilian leadership and generals are always FUBAR.

Making sure the fake two party system thrives, and standing with your thumbs in your pockets as you loose freedoms to a government that doesn't represent you is actually a conservative position.

You don't get the blimp? I don't get the preemptive strike doctrine. I know a candidate that voted for the authorization of a war of aggression against a nation that did not attack ours. Does everybody "get" Hillery Clinton's candidacy? Her votes and her actions 20 years ago would have made her a fringe right wing candidate.

Dr. Ron Paul is a republican presidential candidate, not a libertarian candidate. At least know your facts if you are going to propagandize. Ron Paul is a kook with a blimp. Dennis Kucinich believes in aliens. Har har. You sheep have and you'll get the government you deserve.

If you create a national debt of trillions of dollars that will have to be paid with interest by a future generation, you are not only not "reducing or cutting taxes," you are in fact taxing, without representation, children and even the unborn. Headlines should read George Bush taxes fetuses.

My carrier has a bag full of junk mail. He gets to our building with four occupants he puts four versions of the junk mail in our boxes.

The solution is that the mailers of junk mail should simply be charged for the full cycle of the mail. They should pay up front the costs involved in recycling or "keeping" the mail in a landfill for 200 years. They should also pay for the environmental impact of the inks leaching into the water and land via the landfill. Instead, incredibly, we incur this cost as taxpayers and basically subsidize this industry in the form of a corporate welfare. This idea of requiring companies to pay full cycle of the environmental impact of their products can be applied to any product or service. The markets would truly reflect real costs, and capitalism could run as rampant as it wants because it would be, in the least, sustainable.

I wholeheartedly admire Farhad's ability to con a few corporate manufacturers out of some goods with his guarantee of some 'less than ad rate' advertising in his column. The extra effort to create a few extra Salon.com accounts which he uses to "discuss" the products in the article, is the master stroke of an ironic genius.

It is a small Archibald 'Harry' Tuttle-like effort on your part Farhad, but this is how revolutions start.

The report exposes the "sports" you religiously follow as the fraud they actually are. Your games are nothing more than a corporate money generating way to guarantee the voting public is passive and uninformed. Your heroes are cheats and frauds. On top of that, someone else gets the front page today on Salon.com with their article on the issue. Must hurt "King." All the while this real story was going on, where was your reporting? You missed the story? You were being paid to do what? Report scores and sit around engaging in bar talk? How pathetic you must feel today. For others that frequent this loser's articles, realize the "King" is wearing no clothes. He's not an expert on anything sports or otherwise. He refers to the key providers of the drugs, the key witnesses, the people at the top of the supply chain, as "a couple of small-time operators." BALCO...small time operators. Right.

The Mitchell report points out how useless it is to spend a whole lifetime following rigged games, and how your relationship to professional sports not unlike a crack whore and his/her precious rocks.

Obama answers the door in a silk robe...

"Motorin'..."