I hope BillGates continues to support the efforts just as he is at this point. As for Global Warming, perhaps Mr Gates doesn't think that malaria is caused by spreading conditions for mosquitos caused by global warming but rather ignorance and poverty, and that even if you could snap your fingers and stop climate change at some "ideal" temp,there will still be an the root cause of the problems that are far greater impediments to our survival than shifting ecosystems and our inability to manage them as well as we might. This is the same for practically every percieved and amplified problem predicted by those who see our climate as being on the brink of some catastrophic calamity...it might be, but the likelyhood of CO2 triggering a collapse seems miniscule compared to the threats of real chemical pollution, population growth, overharvesting of the oceans and even natural events like mega-volcanoes or cosmic bollides from space, almost none of which will be addressed by merely reducing the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere. I appreciate anyone's wanting to do the best thing as they see it, and I don't think Mr Gates is making a mistake by focusing on practical solutions for the very real problems of disenfranchisement for large numbers of people due to ignorance, poverty and lack of the basic needs.

All the talk about nationalizing banks, or other sectors of the business landsape generates great contorvery, largely over whether it consitutes socialism.

As much as fiscal conservatives dislike the idea of socialism, they ususally are fine with it when it comes to how the military is run, which anyone can see is an example of centralised, state provided "cradle to grave" system, so it can't simply be the idea of socialism, so can it not be seen that the problem with socialism isn't the use of the mechanism, but the scope and duration. If the Fed is going to nationalize an industry whose well being is so vital to our society's ability to survive and grow in a stable environment, I suggest there'd be a lot less resistance from ideological counterparts if that nationalization came with a set of conditions which could be realistically met in order to return the industry to private and market controll. Everyone likes a tool or technique to work and when it doesn't work or is done with its work we want to see the mechanism back where it was.

Based on the first couple of hundred comments to Camille's last column, I can see that Salon is doing something right...no pun intended, probably.

I frankly disagree with plenty Ms Paglia says but appreciate that she says it and that she says it here where lots of folks who would otherwise not even be aware of their couterparts perspective, might not see it, let alone consider it.

What do we know from beans how the administration's appointees are acting..there hasn't been enough history to frame it properly, but I have some sense of trepidation when the room is composed entirely of people who resonate with the title "smartest kid in the class". There's a lot to be said for the one that is not maybe the smartest but is the most blunt and direct, but they usually don't get a "most congenial" award and picture in the year book for being so, nor does it seem do they get selected to Obama's stable of advisors and assistants.

Now that Obama's gone first name to first name with Rush, he should find a way to smother him with love or run the risk of elevating Rush to a cause much bigger than he is already, which would be considerable in light (and shadow) of girth lately.

To me this signifies the end of an era, and has since this trend in public broadcasting began several years ago. When I heard how much money Barney the Dinosaur made for its developer and for WalMart and how deeply in debt PBS was, I rather felt that the time for it to either move ahead or collapes into irrelevancy had arrived. It evidently chose the latter of the two options. Too bad, I'll always remember some of my favorites that I used to watch on PBS, but since it's been stripped and sold, it's rarely on my list of things to watch and instead I focus on the internet. Oh, and the annoying culture of "fund driving" didn't help.

A number of comments seem to be from those whom regard the idea of a woman in her 40s pair bonded with a man half her age as if it were disgustingly un-natural and ask why would anyone want that? Good question, and one that we've had plenty of opportunity to ask throughout history since it's really only in our modern western phase, since about the introduction of public schooling I think, that this age cohort lockstep through life has been "the norm". I guess it has some advantages though nothing from a scientific point of view and indeed it would seem to be our natural legacy, if instinct has any bearing on our romantic pair bonding behavior that the most fertile young women would become paired to those who are most likely to provide for them, and no surprise, it wouldnt be the guy who is the same age from the bordering territory, but rather a powerful, experienced and capable male, probably known socially to the female's progenitors.

We can pretend for whatever reason that there's some natural symetry, or order, or grand design to age cohort pairing but for the vast majority of human existence, it's not been so...but then neither has monogamy.