One thing-

If the DA drops the charges, then the record is expunged. The men don't have to answer "YES" that they have been arrested for a felony. Besides, I don't think the question is "ARRESTED" I think the term is "convicted." At any rate, that is something they don't have to worry about. It can be treated as if it never happened, at least that is way it is in Ohio.

However, as a word of caution: when you get your record expunged, you better follow up that the clerk actually does the paperwork by running your own background check through the sheriff's department six months later.

Good Lord, get over yourself. Who gives a shit what consenting adults do? And furthermore, who really gives a crap what your sexophobic opinion is concerning "respect?" God, your thinking is at best suspect, and at worst, backward. Respect...and the woman was going to have these guys PUT IN PRISON for something they didn't do. And YOU are saying that the men don't have respect for this fucking piece of shit slut? God, how fucking ass-backwards are you? Do you call yourself a feminist or something, for, if so, you're giving all of them a bad name.

And Amy, could you delete this crap you wrote? It's pure shit and drivel.

Joan? Do you exercise ANY editorial control or are you too busy booking TV appearances? The quality of Salon is tanking. Good god, high school journalist students write better than this.

Whew, dude! Where have you have been? Your post is so assinine it's difficult to know where to start.

OK, let's take this one step at a time. First of all, any "health" insurance plan likely to pass Congress will actually result in a windfall profit for the insurance companies in the form of a mandate (everyone will be forced to buy a private plan or pay a penalty). How in the world can that be "personal choice?" Some Americans might want a public OPTION (see, there is that word you supposedly love, OPTION, which is having a choice.) Secondly, even the HR676 bill is called a SINGLE PAYER plan, which means that there would be one insurer, not several. This isn't "taking over healthcare" or "nationalization" as the PROVIDERS remain private. Americans would have a far bigger choice among providers than any private insurance plan (again, something I would think you would like since you adore the concept of CHOICE).

Are your panties in a wad that members of Congress get to have free healthcare (we pay) at any armed services hospital or clinic? This IS nationalized healthcare because the federal government owns the hospitals and pays the salaries of all the providers. Are you aware that your adoring Mitch McConnell, senator from Kentucky, had a heart bypass at Walter Reed in 2003? That's SOCIALIZED medicine, dude! Shouldn't you call him up and demand that he reimburse the American people? If you righties had any principles at all you'd be demonstrating at his doorstep demanding that he quite stealing from the American people.

You right-wingers are so fucked up I actually feel sorry for you. It's so easy to poke holes in your arguments and ridicule them that I should go elsewhere and pick on someone my own size.

is either profoundly naive (most Democrats) or just shockingly stupid.

The Democratic Party essentially needs to be destroyed. It is a corporate party through and through. EVERY progressive movement or tendency DIES in the Democratic Party. EVERY SINGLE ONE. And it has been that way for a very long time. The Democrats do not carry on or champion progressive causes; they wither away, stagnate, or die. Progress is fought from without the party.

Brooks should be labeled "The Queen of the Sissies."

It may be OK for younger children, but as they mature and want to take physiology, chemistry, physics, and calculus, I doubt that home-schooling from a group of artists, writers, and actors will cut it.

I am a chemistry teacher and I have yet to meet a home-schooler at the high school level who has tackled chemistry. Every email I get from a parent who is home-schooling her (and they are all women) children is way out of her league.

I've met several teenagers who were completely home-schooled. From my experience, this much home-schooling is detrimental. Every kid was pretty much fucked-up, socially speaking. They think the world revolves around them; they don't understand or know social boundaries; they have a difficult time entering a structured environment and they all went through a really tough time adapting from a sheltered home life to the world of work, and the demands of a university. I'm talking about teenagers who did NOT attend high school. I think teenagers need to get out of the house and take challenging academic classes from highly trained teachers in some sort of school.

Oh, I tend to agree with you. I hear things like "We need an educated society to compete in the 21st century" all the time from organizations like the American Chemical Society. Really, I ask myself. And where will all these educated people work, and who is going to pay them?

Most employers do NOT want their employees to think across the board, just in certain, constrained areas. The ruling class in this country PROFITS from poor schools, conformity, the drug trade, and the general impoverishment of the lower classes. This is what capitalism breeds.

How to fix the schools entails a general social revolution taking place. You are spot-on about how the schools developed, and why.