The problem with the "torturing the right guy" to stop 9/11 or the nuke in the cargo container or whatever Awful Thing is the macguffin in question is that in practice, outside of bad fiction, one doesn't know who the "right guy" is. This generally leads to torturing an awful lot of wrong guys...really, there is no limit to the number that could be tortured before you stumble on the right one, or even the one that leads you to the right one. If you follow the argument to its logical conclusion, the torture of every Muslim, or every brown person, or every liberal on earth could be justified if it prevented the death of White American Conservative "Christians" of any quantity. Even one.

Which is really the point. People who support torture, no matter what disclaimer they attach, really do so because at some level they like the idea of being in charge and reminding everyone who isn't in charge that any appearance of being a threat, or even competition, will be met with violence and pain. They LIKE the idea of torturing people, regardless of any efficacy it might have (and most experts agree it's dubious at best as a source of info). It keeps the uppity in their place.

Except of course when it has exactly the opposite effect.

What torture by the US unquestionably does is put us on the same exact moral level as every other state willing to torture to get what they want. If you're happy in that company, I have nothing to say to you, now or ever.

I agree with several others here (and in the discussion at Amazon) that the pricing structure is not in the long-term interest of anyone as it stands. $400 is too much for the platform and $10 is too much for a digital copy of a book. I hope they're trying to snare enough bleeding-edge technophiles to allow them to go broader and cheaper. I fear that the publishers really still Just Don't Get It and won't go along with Amazon. Or perhaps they DO get it--once a market model that allows electronic distribution of book content actually starts working, they're obsolete...so they try to sabotage any promising technology by overpricing.

Mr. Sondhiem personally approved the casting for the leads. Evidently his idea of what voices are sufficient for the parts, and perhaps of the balance to be struck between musical and acting ability in his work, differs from that of some of his fans. ;)

...the current generations of readers aren't painfully bright, are quite legible, and have a "page turn" time roughly that of a middle-aged cartoonist. The business model still sucks though. Then again, so does publishing, so what exactly are we being nostalgic about again?

When they get the money end of the e-book right I'm looking forward to ditching many, many shelves of paperbacks, which don't exactly add gravitas to a room, and just keeping some artistically bound hardbacks for show. And I will have control of my space again.

Rowyna--

I believe the opposite was true. The numbers were so large, and the process open enough on the Democratic side that it slowed down the whole process, whereas the streamlined process the GOP uses means the faithful could get in, have their precinct captains or the equivalent tell them who they were voting for, and leave.

There were nearly twice as many participants on the Dem side as the GOP side last night. Which is a good thing in and of itself. :)

Aycharaych--

If abortion had been legal in 1961, I probably wouldn't be here.

That doesn't make me anti-choice. It means I have some perspective that keeps me from being reflexively pro-choice.

Doing stupid shit when you're a kid doesn't mean you have to support stupid shit the rest of your life. It only means you have an understanding of it that the squeaky-clean among us don't.

None of this means the drug war as currently conceived and "enforced" isn't a bad idea. It is. But it's only a symptom of larger societal and political issues, ones I think Obama might just have a chance of doing something about.

And I'll say it to Clintonites tonight:

Watch what you say to people whose votes any Democratic candidate will depend on to win in November. The childish, Rove-like vilification of the "other candidate" I've been seeing from some partisans here and elsewhere towards FELLOW DEMOCRATS is the ONE thing that could lead to a loss to the GOP this year. We cannot afford to embitter our own base, and that's just what I'm afraid is going to happen if you people don't stop sniping at each other.

Insulting and belittling those who are supporting another Democrat than your person is a really great way to ensure that if your person DOES win, they'll get right out there and work for a victory this fall.

How many letters columns are you going to cut and paste that diatribe in, anyway?