Because Joan Walsh is the editor of Salon, I always interpret her pieces as "editorials", and not unbiased journalism. The reason you may be confused about this is that her editorials are closer to real journalism than most of the pieces at sites like Politico.

The lazy journalism that has blurred the lines between editorials and reporting seems to be the root of the problem here. How can this problem be solved when a generation of journalists haved been trained under such skewed values?

They want a packed house. I thought everyone knew this.

If you observe the little obnoxious children after the flight, they are usually obnoxious snots off the plane as well (if the in-flight obnoxiousness didn't tire them out). The culprit is bad parenting, and until we establish some laws requiring good parenting in this country (which would improve society tremendously), the problem isn't going to go away.

By the way, a good way to deal with a troublesome child on a plane is to talk to him or her directly (assuming it isn't an infant). Such children generally aren't used to adults talking to them in a serious manner, so at the very worst you'll have a few minutes of silence while the kid puzzles it out. Be polite but serious, say please and thank you, and don't try to explain to them why they should stop -- just tell them to stop. If it pisses off the parents, who cares? They'll just fret and fume in silence. However, you'll be surprised how often the parents will come down on your side.

If you are a sexually active heterosexual guy, you need to get one of these Magic Wands. If your significant other wants some action and you just aren't in the mood, pull out the wand, maybe put on an attachment, and do the 110V deed. It is surprisingly time-efficient too.

I think I read this in Hot Rod magazine many years ago. If you want to steal a car with an alarm, go past the car every morning at some awful hour, whap it with a rolled up newspaper (or do whatever is necessary) to trigger the alarm, and keep moving. Maybe do it more than once a night sometimes. Eventually the owner will turn the alarm off, either from personal annoyance or pressure from neighbors.

The next time you whap it with a newspaper and the alarm doesn't go off, you break in and steal it. And if any neighbors happen to be watching you do it, they probably won't call the cops.

As a teenager we lived in a little town of maybe 200 people which was generally very quiet except for one young man on a dirt bike who would tear up and down our gravel road in the middle of the night. One moonless night, my father pulled a long piece of wood from the woodpile and placed it just beyond a small rise in the road. The bike races were truncated that evening, and did not return again afterwards.

(By the way, the biker was smart enough to wear leathers and a helmet, and on both sides of the road was lush farmland with soft soil. It was the kind of town where everyone knows each other or knows about each other, and it was the general consensus that the guy got what he deserved.)

Also, don't buy guinea fowl if you live in the country. We bought some once and let them roam around, but luckily someone shot them soon afterward. I hope they tasted good.

Reading it for the first time I interpreted it as Republicans deciding not to commit fraud against the voters, but I guess that's really the same thing.

And "Bud Cummins" is an obviously fake name.

candidates will ignore them in the future. Hopefully. Sitting on the sidelines will only hasten their self-destruction. Again, hopefully.

Every one should be able to own as many guns as they like -- provided that they utilize no technology that was not around in 1787 when the US Constitution was adopted. Now people can arm their militias while not harming innocents -- because by the time the gun owner has taken the time to load the thing, you can run out of the gun's range and be safe.

There, I've settled the problem. I expect my Nobel peace prize in the mail.

I'm so used to conservatives making crap up that the statement regarding evolution "Just 13 percent say that God was not involved" went into my cerebral trashcan as soon as I read it. But if you think about it, it's probably true, although it doesn't have the importance that the Conserv-O-pedia people think it has.

If you believe in God -- which the vast majority of people do -- and you accept that evolution is valid, then logically you have to believe that God was involved with evolution, because God has to necessarily be involved with everything. Frankly, that 13 percent figure seems a little large to me given this.

Now I don't believe in intelligent design or any of that nonscientific hooey, so don't label me as such. The looneybin right argues that God and evolution are incompatible, so don't you all spout the same baloney.

I know that referring to "temples" technically covers Buddhism, but he needs to be more open about it.

seems to apply here to Bush: "At least they're waving with all five fingers now."

she's going to be looking like Keith Richards in twenty years.