If you hadn't argued cogently, I wouldn't have conceded. I don't mind changing my mind.

I'm in my early fifties and it wasn't hard to foretell the latest sagging of the stock market. So, I'm mostly in bonds now, but when I was younger, I was aggressive. That arc is what I advise for most people. I urge people to invest in no-load funds that mimic the S & P 500. Vanguard is a good place to go. And I urge investors to invest and forget that the money is there. I also urge folks to also invest in property and to always keep some money in the market. Since most of my money is in pretty safe investments, I'm very aggressive with the rest.

I know two jobs is hard. Being old and poor will be harder.

...contact you by email whenever a chosen reader posted.

I'd sign up for James Levy.

Comfort Inn? Ramada? They're pricey. Do the Ma and Pa motels. They're often $30 a night.

Ms. Torres is likely juiced. As much as want to believe that time doesn't diminish us, we're not faster and stronger at 40 than we are at 20, unless we're Roger Clemens and Barry Bonds...and likely, Ms. Torres.

Now, I'm a feminist, but I'm also a storyteller and so am aware of narrative. As someone who's written for the major feminist mags, I'm also aware of the feminist narrative. I'm not being pejorative here: every ideology has its narrative. And every ideology seeks those snippets that justify one's narrative. However, Ms. Harding, this snippet seems a little naive. If you think Ms. Harding is faster at 40 than she was at 20, do you also believe Mr. Clemens and Mr. Bonds when they assert that they never ever juiced? It's just that Ms. Torres has the attractive angle of pregnancy to sell her smoke. It's:

Ladies, we can rebuild her. We have the bio-technology. We have the capability to build the world's first bio-bionic woman. Ms. Torres will be that woman. Better than she was before. Better, stronger, faster.

There's also the likely, coming irony of it being revealed that Ms. Torres lowered her times by injecting a male hormone, which will be ironic because Ms. Harding wants us to believe that female hormones lowered Ms. Harding's times.

I hope I'm wrong. However, as someone who also writes for sporting mags, I've heard athletes say that astonishing numbers of athletes are juiced: they just won't say so on the record.

Do women get women? What if some of those marketing people were women? I suspect that they were. My point is that you put ten women in a room and you'll have eleven wish lists for motel/hotel rooms. Same with men. There is no "getting women," given the diversity of women...and men. Even when a group collaborates and reaches a consensus, that's ONLY because some of the people in the room are feigning agreement to end the damn collaboration.

If all goes according to plan, I'll have mutiples.

Then I'll inject so much juice that I'll have a six-pack forehead.

When I run a two-minute mile, I'll say, "I owe it all to my quads. Both sets."

Seriously, this is a fairy tale and it takes root in our rock-hard minds because of our fear of death. Because we fear the Reaper, we make believe that all we have to do is procreate and PRESTO, we're twenty again!

Ms. Harding, snap out of it!

Say, where's the intern who awards red stars for those who echo? Some people in this thread agree with Ms. Harding. They need their red stars, damn it!

I see that someone already got a red star for agreeing.

Calling, Joan Walsh! Salon's proclivity for rewarding the compliant doesn't best serve Salon or its readership. To plagarize T.J, "Dissent is the highest expression of patronitism."

"...both of them men who are very lucky that their fathers were born before they were."

And I like many, many cocksuckers, both male and female.

The only cocksuckers I don't like are those who suck Limbaugh's cock. Elephantman is one. I imagine him smiling and licking his lips whenever he posts at Salon to clear them of that salty solution. You can see that Elephantman gets the protein for his position from Limbaugh in the phrases he employs, like Bush-hater.

Well, I agree with the poster who asserts that there's nothing wrong with being a Bush-hater.

I'm a patriot, therefore I hate Bush.

here's a story I shared once at Salon before and I heard it from people who were there:

Dick Cheney went hunting. They put him in a gorge on a pretty boardwalk. They had servants (okay, workers) toss pheasants that had been caged over his head. He shot them. They then took the pheasants and put them in a heap to bait a bear. He shot the bear.

Cheney is only inches away from shooting animals in cages while his sips champagne.

I thought you were a provocateur, like me, but now I'm thinking you just like to disagree. Well, that's fine, but I can't follow your logic. Cyclists smoked because they didn't know any better and runners aren't running a whole lot faster, so that means that a 40-something swimmer can be faster than when she was 15 because...she's special and cyclists smoked and runners poke along at the old paces?

Help me out here.

Nice post. Balanced and therefore persuasive.

Ms. Harding, take note.

Ah, power. I'd say that I want Cheney's gig, but first they'd have to replace my heart with a rusty pump manufactured by Lucifer, Inc., which, ironically, has already half-happened to Cheney.

...thought that it was a real knee slapper.

What's ironic is that McCain is up there insinuating that his mistress/second "wife" is fuckable, when, if elected, he'll be fucking those bikers to serve the rich.

Sure, return fire, but serve up something that one can decode.

I read what you wrote, and reacted, "Huh?"

So, I reread.

Still: "Huh?"