One might wonder why the Republicans, who are not any more trusting or naive than the average American, would want to risk putting so much power in the hands of one elected official. What if they get the wrong guy? What if all this focused power falls into the hands of an apostate wingnut who suddenly wants to give away the store? Or worse, a Democrat?

Could it have to do with the fact that the hard-right Republicans are a minority? Their views are not shared by a sufficient number of Americans that they can hope to see their social and military agenda made flesh in any other way. That makes it worth the gamble to put a sock-puppet like Reagan or Bush on a throne, hope his scripted performances will resonate with the angry and the uneducated enough that social progress can be stymied and military adventurism can be foisted on the electorate and the treasury. It didn't work very well with Nixon, but it's worked just dandy with Reagan and Bush.

"It's good to have cancer. It keeps you focused and keeps your doctors on their toes."

I wonder how many of the media writers/talkers who cover her resignation are going to note how devalued her praise is through repeated and disgraceful usage.

If Henry thinks these guys are "above board," then I say we can safely turn our attention to more important matters.

Why should Zemeckis create a mythical universe around Beowulf? True, it's a legend and not history, but it is deemed to have taken place on our Earth, in real time under the laws of physics as we understand them, etc. Beowulf happened in our world, not some fanciful alternate universe.

CNN.com and MSNBC are both carrying it.

When you're not up to the job, it's even worse.

Check out C. Hitchens at Slate:

http://www.slate.com/id/2178568/

If I tried to pull outrageous shit like this, I'd be in jail quicker'n you could say spit. How do Bushies keep getting away with it?? I'm jealous!

War and war talk sell newspapers. Cautious, consequence-weighing voices do not. It really is that simple.

Or if not to be critical herself, to seek out crdible opposing points of view and publish them, too.

Nice piece. If George Orwell had written a prequel to "1984" it would have featured paranoiacs like these being elected to run things. Hopefully, that won't happen.

Why didn't Saddam simply show us that he had no WMD's? Why didn't I'madinnerjacket throw open his facilities to forestall an attack? It ain't that easy. They're like a little warty guy who gets accused by a big, handsome guy with a beautiful wife: "Hey, I hear you been doin' my wife!" The little guy is so flattered, his people look at him with wonder in their eyes and say, "You been doin' HER??" So what's he gonna do? Say no, she wouldn't touch me with a ten-foot pole? He waffles, he dissembles, he lets anyone who wants to think that yeah, he's got what it takes to get Mrs. Yowza! into the sack. It's kinda worth getting the shit beat out of him -- if he survives, that is.

Now, as for the motive of the big, handsome guy -- who KNOWS the little guy isn't schtupping his wife? Only one possible motive: he just wants someone to beat up.

It isn't an opinion, you understand. It's from gawd. It can't change.

This article doesn't even scratch the surface of Mormon weirdness. Of course, all religion is weird and fantastical and fairy-tale-ish. But at least some religions have been around a while, have sunk their roots into our culture. Mormonism is more like Scientology than Christianity. God is this dude who lives on another planet and when Mormons die they each get their own planet to rule over and the Garden of Eden is in Missouri and it goes on from there. It's like Mork from Ork wants to be our president. Sorry, no way.

I always thought Hewitt was such an open-minded guy...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3inspkrGVbw

The Article 6 prohibition of a religious “test” for United States office-holders is almost as anachronistic a part of the Constitution as the 2nd Amendments “guarantee” of gun rights. Yes, of course the Founding Fathers were comfortable proscribing a religious test; at the time they were surrounded by an unthreatening blend of mild variations on Protestantism. While undoubtedly the Calvinists and the Baptists found much to disagree about, they had far more in common that united them against papism, its clone, the Church of England and certainly the more exotic religions. Does anyone seriously believe that if there had been free, white Catholics or Jews in the colonies – much less Mormons, had they and their peculiar brand of beliefs existed in 1787 -- of sufficient substance to mount a political campaign, that the Constitution would not have featured either specific bars to their entry into the political arena, or at least that the prohibition of a religious test would have gone conspicuously missing?

"Age and experience will always beat youth and skill."

I disagree. Age by itself has no value. Experience can obviously have value, but there's a flip side to it: complacency. Young pilots, like young doctors, bring enthusiasm, state-of-the-art training, sharp senses and the knowledge that they must use their eyes and ears. An old professional who has in his guts the need to treat each flight or each diagnosis with the same meticulousness he did his very first, sure. An old professional who's going through the motions because he's done them so many times successfully that there's no reason to think he won't do so again, no thanks.

The pilots, scuba divers, skydivers, race drivers I have known who died in the saddle were extremely experienced and full of the certainty that their experience made them invulnerable.