...I find myself writing to Camille Paglia for advice on who to vote for in an important political race is the day I should have my citizenship revoked.

But when it's time to pick the hottest boy band, slickest night club, edgiest art fart, who's hot or not, or even student council president, I'll be sure send a query...

Should be titled "what fairly well educated, fairly comfortable, middle-brow semi-hip semi-intellectual white people like."

I know, too long. But none of the white people I know play kick-ball or Red Rover. We play hacky-sack, backgammon, and pool.

People write letters to Camille Paglia, and they aren't letters about pop stars, movie stars, or Camille Paglia?

Wow...

Was there ever written a headline (matched with a byline) better designed to illicit a big, fat, "so what"?

Obama needs to remind stupid Americans that he's their president too. Hope having Warren up there helps in that regard.

...at "burning man." Sounds like the three of 'em -- "brilliant" and "difficult," and "highly intelligent" in the most central casting way imaginable -- deserve each other. Why can't they just go on as three?

Some of the detractors would have been more impressed if the same events had taken place in more middle class environs, and the story had been rendered in standard grad-student English...

Sarcasm aside, Motherhoodrocks has it exactly right.

I wouldn't say the writer isn't "well spoken." I would say that the writer is either not well versed in or is healthily disinterested in standard white middle class English.

Pcv 2006 -- great letter!

The Cooler: 2003...

"He said he has never met one person who hated Rush who ever listened to him."

Well, then he never met me. I've listened enough to know how full of shit he is. Now I live overseas, and from time to time I listen to his broadcast via AFN (American Forces Radio I think it stands for). I have a rule: I listen to Limbaugh until he tells his first fib. I never make it past 5 minutes. If that equals "hating" poor misunderstood Rush Limbaugh, so be it.

BTW -- I would never treat the writer as obnoxiously as she has been treated in the incidents she describes, much less as obnoxiously as her cousin treats the "half of the country" that supposedly "hates" him...

It's ok to be disgusted with right wingo radio gasbags now? Thank you Camille Paglia, what would we do without your deep insight, your serious concern, and of course your impeccable taste!

My dinners at Ruth's Chris Steakhouse will be forever altered!

As a Texan, I have known my share of Hank and Peggy and Bobby Hills, more than my share of Luannes and Dales. To me they are dead-on accurate caricatures of real people I know and love. As a left-liberal, I gotta say, I have met a few folks that are maybe a little like those hippies and liberals skewered (hilariously) on the show, but those seem a little less than truely known to the writers of the show, they seem more to be sketches of some middle-of-the-roader's or right-winger's all-too-easily formulated strawmen...

I can remember from King of The Hill, Hank to Bobby: Son, I hoped I'd never have to tell you this, but soccer is a game invented by European women, so they could pass the time while their husbands cooked dinner.

Is this guy capable of "explaining" right-wingo thought in a way we haven't already heard a million times before?

As mentioned, hostesses are nothing new in Japan, nor is the work particularly "taboo."

Also -- giving a salary range for hostesses as anywhere from $100,000 to $300,00 is laughable. That bottom figure could be brought down considerably.

Sgt Crowley wrote a report to accompany this arrest stating that the 911 caller had identified to him "what appeared to be two black men" breaking into the house. The caller denies having identified the men as "black," and the transcript of her 911 call has her, after prompting from the dispatcher, only allowing that perhaps one of the men appeared "Hispanic."

I think Crowley's report places the caller in the proximity of "black men" for a reason. Read it once, quickly, and the caller identifies "black men." Read it carefully, and she does no such thing.

Crowley, in his report, also fudges his failure to properly identify himself. He states that again and again he "identifies" himself by saying that he is "Sergeant Crowley." Sergeant Crowley, highly experience officer that he is, knows, or should know, that he is required to provide his full name and badge number to citizens. Yet he fails to do so -- and his report is silly excuse making that would make a 13-year-old class-cutter blush: In essence, he says "Gates didn't ask for my identification, he only asked for my name! And my name is Sergeant Crowley!"

Crowley's report is plainly CYA bullshit from top to bottom. Gates's story is far more believable.

But the arrest itself is another issue altogether. Even if Crowley's crap report were to be believed 110%, the arrest was stupid, stupid, stupid. All Crowley needed to do, once it was determined that no break-in had occured, was get in his car, drive it to a Denny's or a Dunkin Donuts, and there would have been no "public disturbance." Voila -- effective policiing!<.i>