Personally, I don't see what the big deal is. If you can justify eating meat, do so; if you can't justify it, well...

As a veggie I have to justify myself at almost any group meal I attend. "Why don't you eat meat?" etc. Then after cajoling me into talking about it, they get defensive ("I don't eat that much meat, really.") and angry. It's a pattern that is repeated at every public and family function I go to. All of my veggie friends go through it. Yet any veggie who does the same to a meat eater is considered to be abusive or harassing. It seems unfair to me.

Wow. What a bunch of sanctimonious busybodies. Seriously. Is this crossing guard/hall monitor attitude really as prevelant as it seems in this letter thread? Yikes!

I dunno, it doesn't look good if your lawyer proclaims your intention to follow the law rather than asserting that you did. I smell a plea bargain.

Seems a shame Milbank couldn't call Shays' office and ask who he was referring to and then call that person for a reaction. I thought that was what reporters do.

needs to remember people don't have "faith" in science. You can perform a test and check the outcome against the results of similar tests. Other people can read about these results and make up their minds. Secondly, I have never heard Hedges and Harris argue that humanity is steadily "progressing" towards a godless utopia, or a utopia of any sort. They seem to argue that as man gains more knowledge about how the world and the universe function, large scale fill-in-the-blanks style memes, like religion, become harder to sustain and attempts to sustain them lead to the conflicts we have today. To compare "the new atheists" (only two people as far as I can tell) to the entire fundamentalist network and its enormous coercive power is absurd.

Enough! I want a candidate to stand up and say there is too much of this patronizing talk about faith. This government is being stampeded into accepting religion, and the pandering of the Democrats is going to make it that much harder to disable bullshit like abstinence programs.

despite what Cary seems to think. 3 beers in the evening, loaded once a week? A nine year old who throws temper tantrums? You're kidding! Get over it and get over yourself. These are not real problems. Your kid throws temper tantrums because they get him more attention from you. The cat is 15 years old, a good run and it shouldn't be a problem to see him/her off with the dignity a boon companion deserves. Hell, have a couple of beers in the evening with your wife after the kids go to bed and forget about bullshit like "self actualization". Relax, stop looking for problems and enjoy yourself.

The past few months have seen a few, but the biggest was the blackout on the story about cabinet level meetings (including the VP) on how to torture individual detainees. The President himself confirmed this and then...crickets.

I would also include the lack of curiosity about McCain's tax returns, while harping on Obama and Clinton's.

It is also important to note that for a long time the media blamed their lack of interest in these kinds of stories on the Democrats, saying they should have been more aggressive. In both the propaganda and torture stories leading Democrats have been screaming about them, but still no interest. Shameful.

We have no inherent right to not be annoyed by our neighbors. We live on the planet with other humans and they all make annoying noises. Even the LW, I'm sure. Just like you tune out car traffic and lawnmower noise you can tune this out. I live with stick in the butt neighbors like this. Wait til this kid starts a band.

and they are all amplified in Kit Seeyle's bog post in the Times seen here:

http://thecaucus.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/05/24/on-the-road-clintons-very-bad-day/

The tone is so passive, they are nothing but onlookers, when they are not fed information by those in authority they are lost. Didn't Hunter Thompson skewer this in Fear and Loathing on the Campaign Trail? Is this attitude still around?

2 key passages:

"On the other end were editors who had seen a Drudge Report link to a New York Post item online. The Post was not with the traveling press — and apparently had a decent Internet connection."

"At the back of the plane, some in the media were playing a raucous game of roll-the-dice. In the middle, a clutch of reporters dissected the day’s events."

Nothing better to do, I'm sure. Drudge still rules their world. I fear they are too stupid to handle anything heavier.

It makes them think they are doing a good job. They are also plainly too stupid to understand the concept of self reflection. Perhaps that's what makes a good anchor these days.

It was amazing that even as they replayed what was an obvious foul, the announcers kept pretending it was a legitimate steal. Michelle Tafoya even asked Kobe about as if it were a legit defensive play. At another point, the color guys (Mark Jackson and whoever) had to remind the play by play guy that his narrative of The Laker Comeback(tm) was inoperative, making many of the same points you made in your column. He wouldn't let it go, so they teased him about it a bit. Kinda funny.

Obama is more popular with Jews than Lieberman. Not THAT shocking really...

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/07/22/obama-far-more-popular-am_n_114182.html