The editors at Forbes are probably moving Glenn up from “the 18th most influential liberal” at this very moment.

Whether or not Glenn had any influence, I appreciate him informing me about Daschle and his conflicts of interest.

No, he is not, nor is he Bush. My feeling of disillusionment is because he seemed capable of being so much better than just ≠ Bush.

I understand that he has a lot on his plate, and I am grateful for the good things he has done. That does not excuse the things he does that are wrong, and he needs to be held accountable for those.

One bright spot is that he doesn’t continue to insist that he is right regardless of contrary facts or public outcry. That is all the more reason for people of good will to let him know when he is going down the wrong path.

The Republicans realized long ago that they had no common ground with Democrats and that there was no point in compromising. It is about time the Democrats wake up and realize the same thing. There is nothing gained by gutting a stimulus bill to get three Republican votes.

Force the Republicans to filibuster, if they want to go that route and let the country see them for what they are.

We could send the whole Bush team there for the next year and waterboard them. Since they claim that the prisoners there are being treated well and that waterboarding is not torture, they really shouldn’t have any problem with it.

Please don’t stop raising the issue. I felt a lot of shame for my country while Bush was President, but I thought that at least things would change after he left office.

My disappointment in the Obama administrations stance on this so far is immense.

I cannot address what Rove meant, but from my viewpoint, the Republicans so far have played their hand pretty well. On the hope of getting Republican support in the House, and to actually get the support of three Republican senators, major cuts and changes were made to the stimulus bill.

That’s a much better result than the Democrats ever got against Bush with a much larger minority.

I think I would like to see Senator Whitehouse become President someday. I would even be willing to deal with the careful parsing that news reports would then need to distinguish between “Whitehouse said today...” and “The White House said today...”.

There were so many crimes committed within and by the Bush administration. There were poorly investigated terrorist acts, and a Congress and press that for the most part acted as Presidential lap dogs.

Today, the Obama administration carries on some of the worst abuses of Presidential power initiated by Bush. On top of that, we’ve got two seemingly unwinnable wars and the worst economic climate since the Great Depression.

I’m guessing, Glenn, that you don’t lie awake at night wondering where your next column is coming from.

Dr. Manhattan is clearly Superman but so is Ozymandias in his own way as well.

I assume you are referring to general power level, because otherwise, I don’t think you could have two more dissimilar characters than Dr. Manhattan and Superman.

Dr. Manhattan is a human who has become something non-human; he has trouble even caring about the human race. Superman, though an alien, identifies with his adoptive planet and is the person that most humans would strive to be like, even without the superpowers.

It is interesting (at least to me) to speculate what “Watchman” might have been had DC allowed Moore to use existing characters as he originally wanted. Much of “Watchman” is explaining enough about the characters so that the reader can understand their motivations. Presumably that would have been unnecessary had well-known characters been used.

I can kind of see Batman in the Rorschach role, unwilling to give up his cause simply because it is against the law, but I can’t imagine Superman in the Dr. Manhattan role. I have to think that a “Watchman” using established DC characters would have been much different.

As a direct result of the two articles I wrote about superstar singer Daniela Mercury in Salon in June and August of last year, I was invited by the publisher Editora Abril to observe the 2009 carnival in Salvador da Bahia and write about it from an American perspective for the Brazilian magazine Bravo.

Now that you’ve sucked up to Rush, maybe he will invite you to observe his show! What good is it having a national platform if you cannot use it to get some well-deserved perks? Nice subtle touch, pointing out what other suckees have done for you right after sucking up.

Here's the inside scoop on Cramer.

He is in the business of dispensing opinions on a network [CNBC] that sells commercial time to the very corporations the opinions are about.

And, said network (CNBC) is owned by one of the largest corporations of all, General Electric.

The devouring of news organizations by large corporations may not be the major problem with the media, but it certainly hasn’t helped.

What are the chances of NBC News vigorously investigating General Electric’s pollution of the Hudson River? If there was a major problem with one of the Disney parks, would you expect to hear it first from ABC News? The glory days of CBS News were when the news department only had to convince one man, William Paley, to let them do a story.

Once news organizations have to consider their corporate masters, they inevitably become compromised. A smaller and more independent a news organization has the freedom to speak the truth (although not all do).