I would be absolutely utterly delighted with a Newt-Sarah ticket in 2012. Can you say "Electoral Landslide For Obama"?

Considering the fact that Gingrich couldn't possibly win the Republican nomination, sadly that hope is in vain.

Oh, and you really are proving your cred when you look to Bible Spice for a place on the ticket. Clueless twits with extremist religious views always lend gravitas to a political discussion.

What is your native language? It obviously isn't English.

Are you an immigrant to the US? Or are you posting from your home country?

I am only asking in order to put your comments into perspective, to try and figure out what angle you are seeing things from. If you are an immigrant, that means there is one interpretation of your attitude. If you don't even live in the US, that will give a different interpretation of your attitude.

If you were a native English speaker, born in the US, your ranting would be peculiar. But since your faulty grasp of English makes it obvious it is a second language, I would like to know what your native language is, and where your perspective of the US comes from.

When Nate of "Six Feet Under" hit the floor with a brain ailment right after cheating on Brenda, we giggled in spite of ourselves.

Really? You giggled?

I certainly didn't. I thought, "Oh god, here we go again" as something bad happened again to one of the ever-more-unlikeable Fishers. But I definitely didn't giggle.

Did anybody else giggle? Anyone? Really, I would like to know.

What a messed up piece of sloppy writing. The author uses the actor's name when she is referring to the character: "Faced with insolvency, an unexpectedly pregnant wife and a teenage son with cerebral palsy, Cranston did what any man in his position might do: He teamed up with a no-account loser of a former student, Jesse Pinkman (Aaron Paul), and started cooking up high-grade crystal meth out of the kid's Winnebago." Cranston doesn't do this, his character Walt White does. Does Havrilesky know the difference?

Apparently not.

Using the actor's name instead of the character's name is a standard technique in movie and television reviews. It happens over and over and over again, in reviews written by hundreds of different reviewers. Have you ever read a TV or movie review before?

Apparently not.

My guess is that this relationship would have ended long ago if it weren't being kept alive by its long-distance nature. That if you had spent the last three years together full-time, you would have ended it by now.

At 28, you are, in the eyes of "your society," long past your shelf life. Yet you didn't get into your first serious relationship until you were 24? And now you want to rush into a marriage with a reluctant partner? You are in need of a reality check. You need to stop letting outside opinions run your life.

You were past your shelf life the whole time, so just forget that aspect. That was never a realistic criterion.

You had to brow-beat your lover into marriage, so he doesn't really want to marry you. Do you really want to marry someone who has even a shred of doubt?

He wants permission to sleep around, because he never got to before. Yikes. He had never slept around by the time he was 24, but he wants to start now, at 28, after he commits to marrying you? How could you even consider this?

I don't know how hard it will be to find someone new, considering the description you have given for the next few years of your life. I am sorry that your society is so backward that it is pressuring to get married at all costs. I am especially sorry that you are letting that societal pressure manipulate your life to your detriment. But you need to find someone new.

The only reason to marry this man is so that others can see that you are married. There is no happiness in this.

Performing a marriage should have this in common with getting married: If you have any doubts at all, don't do it.

I too have a mail-order internet ordination. I could perform marriages, although I haven't yet. But I am never going to perform a marriage that I have doubts about.

You say refusing would harm your friendship. Isn't doing it going to harm your friendship as well? Aren't they just using you?

At least if you refuse, the harm will come with a clean conscience for you.

There seems to be some confusion amongst the posters as to how much is covered by a "hijab." I am not the person to resolve this confusion, but I always thought hijab referred to the scarf that covers the hair and neck, and leaves the face uncovered.

In this particular case, was her face uncovered, or not. Can anyone clarify this?

(Yes, I know that even if it is authoritatively clarified, there will still be confusion among posters unwilling to have their preconceived notions challenged, but I want to know the actual facts.)

Your confusion stems from the idea that Republicans actually favor state's rights.

The "state's rights" mantra is trotted out only when there are federal statutes that the Republicans disagree with. If there are state statutes they disagree with, then the federal government is the final arbiter. Just look at the medical marijuana laws in California, and the just marriage laws in Massachusetts.

All they are talking about when they whine about "state's rights" is that one particular federal law they want to change that is under discussion. In general they don't give a damn about state's rights.