Why, O pedants, are we required to call it a "snow machine?" Aren't snow blowers and snow-making machines also "snow machines?" Why not more descriptive--and already commonly-used--names? Thus, a snow blower blows snow. A snowmobile moves over snow. Duh.

Governors of petrostates who deny AGW, even as it melts permafrost, destroying their own infrastructure, who imagine that the ANWR, with 7 billion barrels, max, will reverse our decline in oil production after North Slope oil, at 13 bbls, didn't, and who reportedly think our ancestors were walking around with dinosaurs, don't exactly get to lecture me on pointless changes in terminology.

Oh, they're not? Never mind, then.

And that's a challenge for all the wingnuts that are going to show up here: please explain to us how the ~$800 billion we're going to spend on the stimulus is vast government interference in our hitherto virginal market, and the $600 billion we spend on "defense," every year, is not.

It is a mixed economy...just like all industrial economies, even the so-called Communist ones. Your Capitalists' Paradise has never existed, and never will, except as propaganda to cover massive corruption.

Now: how, then, do we properly mix this economy? You may favor market solutions, I may favor government intervention, and that's fine. But let's not pretend the economy is something it's not.

Absence of evidence does not equal evidence of absence

Ah, yes, nearly the exact words Rumsfeld used to defend his scaremongering Iraqi WMD BS. And how many died behind that lie?

No, I'm not equating you to Rumsfeld. But that sentence is too long: it can simply stop at, "Absence of evidence is not evidence." Which is, of course, a tautology. Absence of evidence means you got nothing. Nothing that'll save any kids, or solve any problems.

When you or anyone else come up with something, let us know.

What do we do with all those fertilized eggs sitting around IVF clinics? "Is it morally acceptable to leave those egg-people in a freezer for their whole lives, or should we compel some people to carry them to term?"

To the last question, absolutely! And it's easy to pick the candidates for this honor. They must fulfill two conditions. They must:

1) be a member of the North Dakota legislature, and

2) have voted for this bill.

Yes, I know, many of them are male, and have not been blessed by God with a proper vessel for easily carrying these precious little snowflakes to term. But science can find a way, just as surely as it'll prove evolution wrong any day now. I have faith!

"You've said you're against reinstating the Fairness Doctrine, but you've not made it clear where you stand on possible regulatory efforts to impose so-called local content, diversity-of-ownership, and public-interest rules that your FCC could issue."

You can practically hear the sneering: so-called local content. Public-interest rules. None of these points have anything to do with the specific Fairness Doctrine, but Limbaugh is merrily conflating them. They could stand, however, in the way of eternal monopoly control of media outlets and content.

I am completely in favor of any effort to break up the media monopolies. That is the more important game, and perhaps Limbaugh dimly realizes that. I don't really care so much for the Fairness Doctrine; I think it operated within a post-WWII/Cold-War-era political consensus that no longer exists. However, if the saying, "Fairness Doctrine!" lights up the wingnuts, I'm all in favor, just for distraction's sake.

One of the things that's not like the '90s is the fact that there's a been a genuine collapse in basic civil liberties and constitutional checks in the intervening years. Who here--well, besides shooter and the other trolls--is not concerned about Obama continuing some of the Bush policies re: habeus corpus, the imperial presidency, etc?

My point is there are a very few principled conservatives and libertarians who would support pro-constitution movements. This would have the benefits of strengthening and broadening the movement and undercutting the Obama-is-coming-for-you nutjobs.

Apparently, Beck keeps watching Colbert and saying, "Hey, that's a good idea."

His "WAR ROOM" graphic looks an awful lot like the one for Colbert's "THREATDOWN." (Without the screaming siren that raised my blood pressure considerably the first, oh, twenty times or so that I heard it.) And this is after Beck went on a rant about "trusting your gut" that was taken practically verbatim from Colbert. Thus Colbert had to one-up him by actually showing his gut, via proctoscope (!).

Once again, the 21st-century American right makes it difficult for satire to keep the lead in the Crazy Race.

Sophisticated, clever and effective, largely peaceful, right through the ballot box and to a new 'confederancy' of a kind.

Wow, sophisticated and clever! (But not to the point where one spells 'confederacy' correctly. Don't want to get too snooty, y'know.) Sounds promising, pooh bah! But then we read this:

In the meantime just to quiet a few passions it would be politic for President Obama to cool a few raw nerves by producing a genuine birth certificate - to prove to many doubters that he is, in fact, a lawful President under the US constitution.

Not so promising, after all.

Is that so difficult or demanding?

Apparently, yes. The Genuine Birth Certificate having been produced, it is now clear you and the rest of the wingnuts demand a negative be proved. Since that's not logically possible, whatever shall we do?

Not argue; that's a waste of time. Alerting our fellow citizens, using ridicule, and continuing to organize works for me.