He's as green as the most maintained golf-courses in america, fertilized with money, treated for pests with empty legislation, and lavished with expensive and increasingly scarce water in the midst of a desert.

That said I do wish to state that it is possible to be green and still believe that the alarm over global warming is largely a sociological phenomenon. I loathe Inhoff and I do not assert that Gore is hoaxing us, but I do think he's mistaken, as he has been mistaken numerous times in the past, and often with the best intentions (need I remind everyone that Gore's well thought out plan to run with Lieberman had more to do with Gore's loss to Bush than did Nader).

I know in these divisive times we wish to lump all those who disagree with us into our enemies camps, but I will persevere in advocating calm and reason when it comes to interpreting the complexity that is our climate, while continuing to observe how the large cycles of our planetary systems continue to surprisea and defy the common senses and the experts' predictions.

I was watching some documentary on aeronautic aces and dogfighting in jets and one was quoted a well worn phrase that is supposedly used among fighter pilots, "if you aren't cheating, you aren't winning".

I see this as a personal mantra for McCain and being very compatible with her full-on christian soldier face and we would be remiss in not keeping that in mind.

I notice one commenter when comparing the diets of hunter gatherers to our modern diets said that game is low in fat. True, the muscle part of the game is typically low in fat, which is why hunter gatherers typically dry that for later use and focus on the fattest part of their game: the brains, internal organs and other delicacies. Low cholesterol intake for hunter gatherers goes by the name "starvation" and it's one with which they can be very familiar and to be avoided at all costs. Too bad that these days hunter gatherers have been relegated to the poorest, leanest, hungriest of landscapes. It was not always so and certainly not during that time in our evolution when our species' metabolisms were being forged in crucible of natural selection. We live as a result of our being able to capture and use natures most effective fuel animals.

That's an interesting way to word the question and it brings to mind that famous qoute from wayback. "No one ever went broke underestimating the intelligence of the american consumer". What is a voter if not a consumer by another name.

In a riff on the revolving door of government/military to private industry and back again, I would point out that as the now expereinced (and soon to be forme) administrators of the Iraqi Provisional Authority, mostly graduates from institutions such as Liberty and Oral Roberts, go lookin' for jobs they'll be welcome with open arms into the fat paychecks and eternal job security of this newly created government guided "finacial-emergency-fixin" beaurocracy, for which they are just as qualified as they were to bringing about a quick and peaceful resolution to the Iraqi situation. I wonder if they won't be needing a private army of blackwater guys before its all over.

So McCain is Goldwater, then Biden is LBJ and Obama is Kennedy and Palin is ..who was Goldwater's VP? Oh yeah, William Miller...that guy from the American Express ad.

McCain is no Goldwater as far as his politics is concerned..too bad. He was more like Ron Paul is today. And consider the irony that Lyndon "Bomb the hospitals in Hanoi over Xmas" Johnson was the peace candidate. Let's hope Obama doesn't have the kind of penis envy that Kennedy did when it came to defense.

Been reading your stuff for years, Nick and always appreciated how accurately your writing describe the scene. Glad to see the same consciencious attention to accuracy here in this description of Palin and the culture of the MatSu of which she is such an embodiment at its worst.

Having lived in a number of places in Alaska over the years in the past, and being aware of its diverse culture and the expansive range of issues, I have a feeling that much of her popularity in Alaska is the result of her handsome luck to be sitting in the governor's seat at a time when the rest of the country that doesn't receive royalties for extortionary prices on our economy's fuel (literally)is wondering what it would do with $1,200 bucks in the mail.

Thanks again for the perspective. Let's hope that with the recent revelations of just how fairly she plays ball becomes more common knowledge to the rest of Alaskans, her chances for re-election sink following a resounding defeat in the presidential race with McCain. And let's hope Don Young get's a real job to boot.

It bears noting that all the countries of Scandanavia, as well as England and Japan and almost every genuinely secular country in the world actually have "official" religions...and nobody squawks about 'em. In fact in countries like those the numbers of faithfull are diminishing at a steady rate. It's here and in Russia and China where secularism is the official stance that we see burgeoning numbers of the ingorand and dissillusioned flocking to superstitions and myths with the delusion of "end times" and "revelation". Perhaps we ought to adopt some form of monotheism too so that the true believers have some sort of security blanket to cling to while the realists in ever growing numbers express their confidence by ignoring them or at most humoring them, the poor fools that they are. When will the enlightened learn the most important lesson: you cannot shove truth down a closed hole.