You would think this was a battle for the soul of the party but this ain't 1968. Obama/Clinton is not Humphrey/McGovern. They agree on nearly all the issues! It's a good thing the republicans hate McCain or we would really be screwed. As it is, a long Dem primary will keep us in the news while McCain wanders the country trying in vain to get the base excited.

You can't use a dimmer, you can't put them in a ceiling fan. That accounts for 2/3 of my lights. On the other hand, all those crappy lights that are limited to 60 watt bulbs can produce a loit more light with a CFL.

I had similar experieces with the morning after. Peace, wellbeing, lessened anxiety about how the heck to spend my day. Later, I read some case studies of adults with attention deficit disorder and saw myself to a tee. After two months on Adderall, I can tell you that while I stil do benefit from the mental reboot a night spent with friends and booze provides, I'm feeling much better day by day. I can also tell you that it is possible to let off steam with your buddies without booze and get many of the same effects.

As long as black witnesses to black-on-black murders don't come forward (especially in cities where even the police force is increasingly black), nobody, black or white, rich or poor, is going to give a crap about the murder rates of young black men. They make the choice to live the lifestyle of the streets and that's it.

Every so often here in Philly, the news actually covers the murder of a young black man. It's usually when the victim wasn't a thug, when he was just a good kid doing the right thing, getting into college or working an honest job.

It's a shame though. You grow up in certain neighborhoods, you can't stay out of the game and you can't go out without a gun even if you hate guns.

I hope our new Mayor and Commish get sarted with their stop-and-frisk strategy. The civil rights types say its profiling, but if you can make it hard to be out on the street without a gun, you can make it easier for the kids who wish to hell they didn't have to carry a piece.

One more thing on a slightly more macro level: the stupid patchwork of state and municipal taxation in this country means that a city must pay for the upkeep of their infrastructure in high taxes that drive people to a suburb. Meanwhile, the suburb keeps using growth to finance new infrastructure. Eventually the suburb is built out and taxes rise, forcing residents to move to a new developing suburb. Stupid!

Meat on a stick, throughout Manhattan, as well as a Hebrew National that can somehow keep you going all day...

Sofie's cart at 17th and JFK in Philly, where dogs, keilbasa, and hot sausages are charred on a flat grill making every day taste like a July 4th BBQ...

Spiro's at 3rd and Market where you can get your cheese streak with provolone for only $3.50...

I'm shocked by all the postings here about how marriage is an outdated sham. It can get a bit chicken/egg but the fact is, particularly among the underclass, men are now considered useless and dangerous due decades of illegitimacy.

The illegitimacy epidemic started in the black community (although it certainly didn't end there), largely in part to a welfare system designed for widows that made husbands a liability for struggling families. 40 years later, 25% of all black men will spend time in jail. The cycle continues with each generation of fatherless boys, and makes it all the more unlikely for a woman to find a husband.

Having torn apart the social fabric among the urban poor, illegitimacy now threatens other elements of society, suggesting a future of angry fatherless men determined to follow in the footsteps of their fathers.

This isn't about feminism, it's about poverty, violence and nihilism, none of which are real great for people of both sexes.

That looks like 8 years to me, and by that I mean 8 years of war, recession, environmental destruction and natural disasters (and to think there are people who want that job)

There are exactly three real hybrids on the market right now, the Honda Civic, Toyota Prius, and the Ford Escape. There are an absurd number of mid-size SUV's out there, many of which are a lot better than the Explorer. It would probably make more sense to compare how many Escape Hybrids Ford is selling vs. Explorer.

Of course, todays NYtimes front page tells us that subcompacts now account for 1 in 5 new car sales, and that the Honda Fit, Ford Focus, and Toyata Yaris are all up around 50% in sales. That is encouraging.

What ain't encouraging is that my own subcompact Mazda3 has yet to break 21mpg in my daily city-driving commute, so not all subcompacts are created equal. Plus, assuming any other car would get the same 90% of the 2008 EPA city mpg estimate as I'm getting, the best I could possibly do, a Toyota Yaris, would probably only get about 25 mpg.

Bad news: Price of gas = value of (finite) refining capacity + global cost of oil. Taxes can't change the price at the pump, only the global cost of oil can.

Good news: Taxing oil co. profits won't change the price at the pump either. Exxon (or any other company) controls a static or declining ammount of oil and will probably sell whatever it pumps out of the ground each day at whatever price it fetches. Exxon also has a certain ammount of refining capacity it will utilize at 100% until the price of oil increases the cost of gas to the point that people stop buying as much gas.