Portlander wrote: Excuse me, but what pathetic drivel. The instrument of consumption is irrelevant, it is the amount of consumption that matters. I have an SUV - hybrid that gets 28 mpg, but still an SUV. Try transporting 4 Siberian huskies, a dog sled and related equipment in anything else. But, I only drive 4500 miles per year. That's 161 gallons per year. Can you match that?-- Portlander"

Whoa! Touched a nerve there, did I, Portlander? I repeat: you are a selfish Neanderthal who doesn't give a rat's ass about how your "baby SUV" contributes to the overall loss of ozone, contributes to global warming or causes America to import even more oil that only lines the pockets of the Saudi trolls.

How would you transport your 4 dogs plus sled and related equipment if you didn't have that gas-slurper? Oh, I dunno...use the dog-sled as intended? I don't recall a V-8 on any of them I've seen in the Iditarod. You sound like the kind of person who would drive to a walk-a-thon.

So...you "get 28mpg" with your SUV"? Whoopie! Now, multiply that by all the other arrogant SUV owners and you can see the problem. Too many inefficient gas-guzzlers wasting too much fossil fuel. And, each owner thinks he doesn't count. Try the cumulative effect model.

Finally, spare me your masturbatory fantasy about how you are "only taking a little slice of fuel" to indulge yourself and your four Siberian Huskies, sled and assorted playtoy accoutrements; you are a prime contributor to the continued demise of our planet.

You could have saved all your bloviation and blather by summing up your disdain for gay people in three little words: "I'm a bigot".

I care more that our next President will be competent, compassionate, capable, honest and insightful and less that he might be a Muslim, smokes or chews his fingernails.

End the war in Iraq, repair America's infrastructure, feed the hungry, clothe the naked, house the homeless, create jobs, fix the break with America's traditional allies worldwide, engage our enemies in peaceful dialogue, help end our over-dependence on foreign oil, stop global warming, encourage green technology and return America to the fair and honorable place in the world where it was prior to the bastardocracy of George W. Bush.

THAT'S what I want in a President!

Could you please get over yourself? That Hillary-bashing you continue to shovel is old, tired, passe and boring. Those of us who are and have been Hillary supporters are being asked to support Barack for "unity and the good of the party". Obama trolls such as yourself are the primary reason why I haven't signed-on enthusiastically to that idea as of yet.

Keep it up; I still may not.

Poor Barack Obama; he seemingly just can't win. As a bi-racial person, he is pulled toward "acting white" and "talkin' black" by both camps...each forgetting the fact that he is both white and black.

Perhaps the man is simply a combo of both worlds: acting and talkin' white and black...simultaneously. His background and foreground would seem to make that possibility a probability.

Whether he "frightens whites" or "empowers blacks"...so what? Can the man lead a nation and be a world-leader? That's the real concern.

I tend to look at Senator Obama as neither black nor white first; I look at him as a potential president first. Everything else is secondary.

So. The Bush Administration...and its minions...played very fast and extremely loosely with the facts on torture, brutal interrogation techniques and other assorted relevant and material facts that have caused surprise and outrage when discovered? Plus, the cover-up was orchestrated by General Myers at the (supposed) behest of Mssrs. Rumsfeld, Bush, Cheney, et al, and is, therefore, somehow merits a "news bulletin" article by Mark Benjamin?

Bulletin back atcha, Mr. Benjamin: the US military is an adjunct of the current Republican administration and functions as one of the administration's hatchet-men. Any US military man or woman with a conscience and mission to do things correctly, with honor and by the book is routinely fired or re-assigned to some backwater base by this President and his henchmen.

As Mr. Bush is relegated to the dung-heap of history, I'd imagine that more and more military people will pop up with horror stories of how this administration bastardized proper military procedure.

Rats, meet sinking ship; sinking ship, meet rats.

How sad that Barack Obama, or anyone else, has to "prove" his patriotism to suit the NeoCon/Right Wing elements of the country and the Republican party. "Patriotism" to these fascists requires no analytical thinking, no comparative nor contextural analogies nor anything even approaching a true value judgement of what constitutes "patriotism".

Patriotism requires us to love and promote our country, but, the true patriot uses his brain and conscience, as well; blatant jingoism serves no one well, except the "my country, right or wrong" crowd. To his great credit, Senator Obama has correctly rejected that blind-fealty-is-patriotism argument.

Whenever I see a Republican waving the flag furiously with one hand, I always look to see what the other hand is doing. Usually, that other hand is doing something dishonest, illegal or underhanded. That's just the way Republicans are.