You rock, my man. Did you know you said something as nearly perfect as we imperfect beings can? For some time I have been wondering about the appeal of Scientology, but I never got as close to understanding as you have now enabled me to. It was a real pleasure to read your letter.

A quote I think fits you:

My cares and my inquiries are for decency and truth, and in this I am wholly occupied. -Horace

Maybe, but it brought tears to my eyes.

Because even those of use with no money, who are sometimes crushed by the daily battle to earn our bread and hold on to our increasingly precarious jobs, can use the power of the pen to fight back against the overwhelming forces of property and power.

Those people who have a stranglehold on our government are terrified of us, the Great Unwashed, and will never stop until we all lie down in despair.

Because ultimately, that is what they want: a docile, unresponsive, non-voting mass of people, stupefied by entertainment and shiny consumer goods.

Fear and despair are their greatest weapons against us. And so we have to take these small victories to heart. All of the victories will be small, but sometimes things will reach a critical mass. The struggle, however, will never end.

I think bebop-o is truly Tom Bombadil, no? Bombadil is attached to nature, filled with joy, and sings all day long!

And it looks like I am stuck being Shelob, the giant spider. Pffft.

Hey Bop! merry Bop! ring a Bebop dil-o!

Ring a dong! hop along! fal lal the fellow!

Our Bop, jolly Bop, old Bebop-adil-o!

Hey! Come merry dol! derry dol! Our darling!

Light goes the weather-wind and the feathered starling.

Down along under Hill, shining in the sunlight,

Watching from the doorstep for the cold starlight,

There our darling Bebop is, laptop keys a-ringing,

Hailing Greenwald’s readers and happily a-singing!

In the bright morning, it’s blueberries he finding,

But when the blue sky blackens, it’s politics he’s minding.

Pedinska, thanks for the Bombadil article--that was fascinating!

Anon., you forgot to ask Santa for the gift of reading comprehension this year.

Maybe next year...

Why did the chicken cross the road?

TIM RUSSERT

I can't tell you whether the chicken crossed the road or not. My own policy, when talking to chickens, is to keep the conversation confidential. If I want to use any of the chicken's cluckings, I ask permission.

CHRIS MATTHEWS

I saw the chicken swagger across the road. Does it have sex appeal? Can you smell the English Setter's lather on this chicken, the sort of mature dog's lather, you know, from after he picked up the chicken? Do you smell that sort of, little bit of lingering biscuit breath? The manly after-aroma that lends such masculinity to the chicken's swagger...?

HOWARD FINEMAN

That chicken? There is, dare I say it, an old-feather quality to that chicken that some voters, indeed a lot of voters, find reassuring. And I speak for the chicken-watching common man, you know.

SHAILAGH MURRAY

YAAWWN. That's my view of the chicken flap.

PEGGY NOONAN

That chicken poofed his feathers for a full two minutes--I saw it on YouTube. His masculinity is suspect. We simply CANNOT have such chickens traversing our roads in these dangerous times. Be afraid. Be very afraid. I am serious.

GG: Col. Boylan, why did the chicken cross the road?

COL. BOYLAN: Interesting question. Why do you ask? That chicken might have had my name, my distinctive nose, my weight, fingerprints, and jaunty step, but it was NOT me. If you do a search on the web, you will see that I have been the victim of poultry identity theft of late in Vermont, where there are many bellicose blog-reading chickens.

GG: Aren't you concerned that a chicken crossed the road as you?

COL. BOYLAN: What I am doing about it does not concern you, you filthy, unserious hippy. You'd better watch what you say, DO YOU HEAR ME, GREENWALD?? %#$@!! $@#**!!#$% #!!@@***&^%%!!! [head explodes]

As Keith Olbermann has angrily pointed out, the wingnuts have taken to imitating our moronic leader by truncating the name of the "opposition" to "Democrat," as in "Democrat Party" or "Democrat Senator." So I think that as a general practice, we can all follow suit with "Republic President" or "Independ Candidate Michael Bloomberg."

If the trend continues, all of those bastards will simply disappear by the end of the year.

Bebop-o, I have aspired to be an academonic, one of those people that Peggy Noonan says ruin everything!