Yes, it was satire, and guess what? Satire is meant to hurt, in the interest of serving a larger point.

If the Church's position on birth control is so popular with Catholics, how come the great majority of American Catholics, in poll after poll, ignore it? Why is artificial birth control disallowed? Because, uh, well, I really have no idea. Because it gives freedom to women? Because it would be a much better idea for the world, with the population explosion being what it is, to limit the growth of populations before we hit 10 billion, and not by any 1984-like government decrees, but just through the normal exercise of a woman's will? Because, if you don't have to be worried about conception every single time you have sex, you might enjoy sex as an expression of love a little more?

I grew up Catholic, and am not anymore, in large part because of attitudes like yours. It's not "bigotry against Catholics" you can't stand, you just hate being contradicted, and even made fun of.

There's a sizable portion of Catholics that want to join with the fundamentalist right and allow religion to dominate politics. Thunder condemnation all you want, but there's more Catholics who don't want anything to do with Falwell or the right-wing Christians in general. You're in the minority, even among Catholics.

If you don't like Catholcs ever being made fun of, go back to Franco's Spain.

I might take your nasty little insults a little more seriously if you had the nerve to reply in the persona of a real person, and not like a smutty little high school jerk.

It most likely had to do with some poll results Labour saw about the upcoming election's results if he doesn't start to draw down.

As usual, you found the salient details, Sidney.

One thought: go back in your life to an occasion when you were supremely angry with someone. Don't you remember exactly who you were talking to? What the conversation was about?

Just two things: the initial referral was by the CIA. If Ms. Plame wasn't a NOC, they wouldn't have made the referral. But indeed, this trial was not about that, because, as Fitzgerald charged, all this lying was an attempt at obstruction of the inquiry. But that's the only reason the matter of Valerie Plame's status and so on was kept out of evidence: it wasn't relevant to this trial. However, Fitzgerald was quite within his rights to bring it up, obliquely, in his summation. As I understand from FireDogLake, there was almost no objection, as Wells was still doing his James Brown impression, too moved to speak, hiding his face in his hands. Eventually, his cocounsel spoke up, at least saving the matter for appeal; but all he really did, in essence, was point to the fact that the underlying investigation, which was obstructed, was pointing in the Vice President's direction. Nothing wrong about that.

And there certainly is a cloud over Cheney. In fact, it's a thunderhead.

I don't want a monstrosity that looks like the "open source DRM" that the Norwegian idiots -- and the RIAA -- want. It may be all pose on Jobs' part, but what's the impact on the consumer? There's only one good outcome, and Doctorow has been loudly proclaiming it for years: no DRM. Do you support that idea, Cory? I don't care about your Inside Politics tilt here. I know that, if DRM breaks, slowly at first, like a dam, it will be a very good thing. THEN, if Apple doesn't go along with that "in a heartbeat," then we can pants Jobs, okay?

Of course we're being encouraged to be a bunch of trivial pigs. Of course the main subject of this big story, and many of the big stories that are peddled to us, are of women who commit the crime of being desirable. (Number one search term on Google for a number of years.) Now Britney is finding out what it's like inside the Iron Maiden of the glamor queen mask.

But the really sad story is the media that brings it to us. The other day, on the Huffington Post, they linked to a story by some horrible organization that runs a bunch of press whores. They have footage of Brit in a car while a woman buys gas. The cameras approach. She yells something, wanting them to go away. Of course she does. Wouldn't you?

Then later, they follow her to her former husband's house. She wants her kids. There's yelling and screaming, and then the object of the gaze of a million eyes sees the photographers. She tells them to get away. Wouldn't you? They don't. They yell questions, the answers of which belong to a psychiatrist, a marriage counselor, a priest, a loving parent. She grabs something and attacks the photographer's car. Then she leaves. They shoot the damage, giggling.

And the Huffington Post links to this, and even Salon might do the same, and the big boys all repeat the stories. It's a major news story, they say. Right up there with the disaster in Baghdad and the one in D.C.

In the old days, the more idealistic days, they launched a magazine called Life that now is a tiny insert in the Sunday paper. Then the had Look, which was more direct, but a little cheesier. A major picture newsmagazine today would be, "Rub your nose in it."