I had decided that Salon's giving a forum to this inane columnist was a youthful indiscretion that it had outgrown. I was about to subscribe again until I saw that she was actually going to be writing again for Salon. Not only did I not subscribe, I can barely stand to even check in.

You diminish yourself, Salon, with sensationlist nonesense. Lumping Foucault with Derrida and Postmodernism all mushed together, this alone makes you want to crumple up the page and toss it. Unfortunately one can't do that to a computer monitor. Well no, fortunately, I suppose.

Now we find she's also a climate change denier. Imagine my surprise.

Just to add this to the mix: During World War One, the French lost 1,397,800 men in battle.

The population at the time being 39 million, that represented 2.8 percent of the population.

Can you imagine if our country lost that percentage of men as soldiers in a war? We've never come remotely close.

I'm not saying this was a good thing, it was an absurd slaughter on all sides. I'm just pointing out that that the right wing slur about French "surrender" is as absurd as it is childish.

Let me restate it: That would be the equivalent of the US of today losing more than 8 million soldiers defending their country.

How do you think we'd react, after that, to anyone claiming that we're "surrender prone'?

Do you think we'd be, at that point, considering reevaluating the value of war, perhaps develop a more mature view of it?

The article seemed to have little in it that addressed the topic suggested in the headline. As an American abroad I was intensely interested to hear how the author thinks the seemingly irretrievably trashed reputation of the US can be so easily redeemed. Nothing here, sadly, convinced me. It would take generations, at this point. This is permanent, or close enough to it for all intents and purposes.

To paraphrase Vonnegut who was quoting Kin Hubbard: It's no disgrace to be an American these days...but it might as well be.

We don't have to even look at radio hosts or bloggers, Dick Cheney says the most astonishing things about this on a regular basis. My jaw dropped when I read this:

**

"Vice President Dick Cheney criticized the notion of applying the Geneva Convention to individuals captured in the course of the war on terrorism in a Saturday commencement address...

"Capture one of these killers, and he'll be quick to demand the protections of the Geneva Convention and the Constitution of the United States," the Vice President said in the Saturday morning speech. "Yet when they wage attacks or take captives, their delicate sensibilities seem to fall away."

**

Right. Shocking, isn't it, that we can't use the same tactics as a terrorist group? The fact that he bemoans our being being bound by basic civilized rules while actually expressing something very close to jealousy of the terrorists not being obligated to do the same-- it's astonishing. Truly.

http://www.crooksandliars.com/2007/05/27/cheney-criticizes-geneva-convention-in-commencement-address/

I think you missed the point of my comment. Not sure. I was expressing shock at Cheney' acting shocked. Not the other way around.

Good grief. More conservative than what we have now? Than every Democratic candidate up there spouting about love of Jesus, because they'd be skewered if they didn't? More conservative than pro-death penalty candidates (Clinton, for one. Bill, I mean). More conservative than the pro-business, afraid-to-offend the Bible belt or really stand up to Bush right-of-center "moderates" we suffer through now in the Democratic party?

In Europe any of these people would be right-wing conservatives. Rather extreme ones at that, with all the talk of religion in what's supposed to be a political discourse.

Case in point: Nicolas Sarkozy of France is characterized as from "the Right". He's in favor of universal health care, unshakable women's right to choose, and absolute and total separation of church and state.

Plopped down into almost any other country, our Democratic leaders would stack up as not only right, but fairly far right. And no, I don't think this is representative of the country.

Ah Camille.

When right wingers or others call Salon sensationalist I want to disagree, until I remember that Salon publishes Paglia on a regular basis. Then, I have to agree.

It's hard to give credibility to anyone who complains about O'Reilly or Limbaugh, then gives this woman a serious forum (global-warming agnostic? are you serious?) It's all for the same reason: it sells.