I really found this article fascinating, especially thinking about what Sam would say if he were given the chance to speak. It would be interesting to hear if he thought it possible to find a "middle way" between his two extremes, or if he was consciously playing a hide and seek game in which he could not develop a "will to love" in his daytime self's "will to power" (thank you, Frederich N.). Obviously, the writer of the article was quite willing to live and evolve with this 'ambien'(t) state of relationship, and I applaud her for that. What would be interesting to hear is why Sam backed out. If he thought he was making himself vulnerable by being a "cuddle muffin" then it might explain his actions in negating that part of his personality in the light of day.

Does anyone out there have her e-mail address?

I too like the idea of a movement in the political will toward a politics of responsiblity. To that end I think Americans need to wake up to the fact of income disparity. Recently, ABC evening news reported on one hedge-fund manager who made $1.7 billion last year. I ask you: is this not a travesty of our democratic principles?

It is not so only if that money is taxed in such a way that most of it is returned to the public coffers. Yes, we should applaud this enterprising individual. We might even give him a medal or erect a statue to him. But what we can no longer afford to do is to see the fruits of his success as his property alone. I know there must be a way to couch this argument so that voters across a wide spectrum realize that hiking taxes for the rich, for the corporations and for the stock-option billionaires, is a civic-minded call, and not a pandering to socialism or a resentment to success or a collapse into envy. We need to work at every level possible in order to determine who in this country will lead a long-awaited social revolution that redistributes the wealth of our republic. Will it be John Edwards? Or Hillary Clinton? Or Barack Obama? Or, is there a dark horse out there who will plug into the disaffection so many have felt over the past decade?

From 1900 to approximately 1920 the Progressive Era challenged, and then built upon, the great accumulation of wealth under the robber barons of the late nineteenth century. Perhaps America today, riding on a commercial and economic high from the growth of wealth in the 1990s, is ready for a progressive kind of correction to that growth--a correcting that will enhance those material gains by sharing them across the nation. Perhaps then we can return to a less anxiety-ridden public life and find justice, and our own pleasure, in a sense of moderation.

Sometime in the next five days we should get some serious discussion, from some venue, on where each of the candidates--Republican as well as Democrat--stand on their choices for cabinet positions. I know, I know--they can all hem and haw and blurt out that there is a time and place for THAT--but I really do think the time and place is now. Even if such a question is prefaced so as to elicit a 'best possible case' scenario in each candidate's answer, we, the voting public, would have an interesting handle with which to stir our thoughts on the leadership abilites of the candidates. Anyone who says he or she has not thought about the answer to such a question could be summarily roasted for being shallow--and disingenuous. I, for one, would like to see how different a McCain and a Clinton cabinet would be, or find out who Obama and Huckabee consider the best and the brightest to bring on board. Can someone with some chutzpah and a connection to CNN or some other media outlets see if we can get a discussion of this nature going? Does anyone have Anderson Cooper's email address?