I saw this film at a festival earlier in the year and found it a fuzzy, loopy mess. Enjoyable, but flat. There's no there there. The director skates over any kind of dramatic conflict and highlights Bettie's sunniness and innocence while she's posing. This after showing us Bettie was molested and gang-raped. Are we really to believe that Bettie didn't understand why men wanted these pictures, or that she didn't feel some satisfaction in finally being sexy without being violated? That said, Gretchen Mol does a good job portraying Bettie in a film that doesn't allow her to go very far below the surface of this character.

Doesn't work? I saw it at the Portland International Film Festival and enjoyed it from start to finish. It's true it's a bit of a hybrid, but the darkness is there from the beginning, even in the jokey parts, so I bought the offbeat suspense story. I wouldn't say any of Zwigoff's stuff fits into a genre, so the idea that it can't be pigeon-holed didn't disturb me. It's farcical, bleak, misanthropic, and at times very, very funny.

What was the point in printing a response to Kennedy's article at all? Those of us who read Salon knew Manjoo's opinion on this matter. Why, apart from ego, should Manjoo have picked Kennedy apart in this forum?

Many people in the U.S. know very little of the Ohio election irregularities, and it was good that these things were being brought to light in Rolling Stone. Everyone should be concerned about what happened, whether or not it would have changed the outcome. That there were people attempting to steal the election is frightening enough; to argue over the results is pointless infighting.

No one I know who has had an abortion (maybe 25% of my closest female friends?) would say that abortion is a bad thing. As I recall from witnessing them go through the experience, or have heard from those I didn't know at the time, they were relieved to have the option and were glad when it was over. I personally don't know anyone who suffered emotionally from the experience, or saw it as a personal tragedy, or who has even expressed regrets for having it done. Not all of these people could be sociopaths; some are now even very happy stay-at-home moms.

As a culture, we like to think that having an abortion is a personal tragedy, an emotionally wrenching experience as depicted in fiction and Lifetime movies, but for some it's just not. That it is safe and legal is a good thing. To join the "abortion is bad" chorus is to make it that much easier to demonize a surgical procedure that has helped--yeah, helped--millions of women.

This morning I heard NPR breathlessly covering this "debate" over the terror resolution...treating the Republicans as if they were clever instead of a bunch of grandstanding baloney artists manipulating fools. Newspaper and television reporters seem willing to praise whoever can use Iraq to their best advantage, as if the problems of the world were just the football in a big game between the Republicans and Democrats.

To those who have said the Democrats should have walked out, I saw Amen. These Republicans need to be deprived of their political oxygen, and more people (thank you, Michael Scherer) need to call what they are doing what it is: worthless bullshit.

Once again, the Dems bicker with each other and look like fools. Who cares if they come up with a phantom policy statement, one that in all likelihood will never be implemented? Until November, Democrats should be saying--in unison: We are the party that believes the U.S. should get out of Iraq, while President Bush and the Republicans will have us there until 2009 and beyond. (Bush has said this.) If voters want costly, unending war, they should pick Republicans in November.

Debating the issue among themselves simply backs up the Repubs' claims that the Dems aren't unified.

Given all the greatest generation verbiage that's been written, you'd think people (or even Ann Coulter) would not sling around such incorrect statements about WWII. One thing that's commonly said (especially on television) is that America leapt to the defense of France and England. We didn't. It took us two years to step into the fight, which we finally did because Japan attacked us, and then Germany declared war on US. Some people in the US wanted to join the war in Europe earlier--most were Democrats, led by that famous bugbear liberal, FDR. The isolationists in those days were generally Republicans.

If you call the offices of the Democratic Leadership Council and ask them who they'll be supporting in November in the CT Senate race, their position this morning is that they don't know. The DEMOCRATIC Leadership Council doesn't know if they'll be supporting the Democrat in the general election.

Is it any wonder that there has been no real opposition to this hopeless, disastrous administration?

Cary seems to have given you a half-assed answer, LW. Or at least he did not try to work up much empathy.

The overbearing family sounds like a bad situation to me. Worse still, it's not going to go away. You are right that you can't ask your girlfriend not to talk to her family (it sounds like you have already dropped hints...ie, the dinner conversations). You have to decide if this clan is something you can live with long-term.

I would worry that having a kid would send these people into warm-fuzzy overdrive.

Living with people before marriage is a way to test the waters of a relationship. You might have hit a rock here. Or maybe you will decide you can live with it. Just know that there are many who would agree that your situation is a difficult one. Good luck.