I would like to write for Broadsheet and you'll like me writing for Broadsheet 'cause I will write about high heels and underwear and masturbation and high heels. And underwear. Because these are things that matter to women! Duh!

And I'll even girl crush on a certain commedienne who mocks women who limit their caring to such things, oblivious to my being such a woman. I'd write more if I didn't have to self-observe, in a mentally mastubatory way, how I feel about my underwear right now.

And hire me soon, Joan! My future readers want to know whether I wear pantyhose or not!

First off, thanks for posting in this thread. And I'm glad that you tried to post five times and failed, for that speaks to your seriousness, which is loving and righteous.

You wrote, "...we are so spoiled, I say that with all the love, but really, how can any of us possibly comment on this topic...."

Yes, yes, yes. I love that you correctly assert that we're all spoiled and that you do so WITH ALL THE (due) LOVE and furthermore, that you do so with two missing teeth and no health insurance * and yet, you can still see that we are all spoiled. That sentence alone deserves not a red star, but all the stars in the Milky Way.

What I'm about to share might seem utterly germane, but I think it's applicable: Last week, I was in a home with an oddly high and wide front window, given that the home was old. Of course, such windows are common nowadays in plastic palaces, but I know just enough about architecture to ask the realtor if that window was original.

"It is," she said. "It was where the family would display the body. Neighbors could pass the home and view the deceased."

Now, this home was never a funeral home. It was always some family's home and once upon a relatively recent time, American families tended to their dead and girl children prepared for their dying by embroidering some verse about their impending deaths. So, Americans once kept the literal dead and the concept of death close, in their homes and on their walls, where samplers were hanged.

But nowadays, we wall off lost children, our waiting graves, the various deformities of birth, and everything that doesn't have the sweet, pink scent of Barbie's breath. We're unable to discuss our utter helplessness to avoid the grave and the vicissitude of life. Plus, we understand that our "spoiled" state is founded upon the misery of others. How can we evidence empathy without revealing that we're phonies? Holden Caulfield was right.

* I also have no health insurance and just recently managed to fix my teeth, but I remember what Van Gogh said, "I just the dog's life. I just to be poor. I choose to be human."

Yeah, I'm not urging anything new in arguing for a weightier Broadsheet. It's just that threads about underwear and high heels seem to undercut the alleged purpose of Broadsheet. Don't the Broadsheet writers want women to be taken seriously? If so, why aren't there more serious threads? Or do the Broadsheet writers want women to be taken seriously AS THEY WRITE ABOUT FRIVOLITIES? One can only say so much about high heels and wanking and underwear. Frankly, I don't give a shit about high heels. I don't wear them because they destroy your feet. Some women wear them for reasons already articulated. What else is there to say? There's that old axiom about being the change you want to see. If you want to be taken seriously, then be serious.

But maybe I'm just being a killjoy. Perhaps I should cyberhand with Mr. Greenwald. He's a serious cat.

Thus, he must assert that he's not just right in doing so, but righteous.

Even if one day you're bloated with bree, I hope you remember. Rich people can't comprehend poverty. Without comprehension, compassion will always be a nice notion. That day in the soup kitchen was a day when you were graced with witnessing and it will remain an important day if you don't forget.

Covet the memory.

"Hey."

Just, "Hey."

And, "I wish it weren't so hard, Hun."

Yes, there are those who will consider Ms. Ryan unpatriotic. If Limbaugh were to read her essay, he would mock her for procreation and a frivolous degree.

If you want to see how much America's sensibilities have changed, view one of those WPA murals, many of which depict war mongers and profiteers as unpatriotic and hardworking Americans as heroic. Nowadays, people like Limbaugh and Bush, the draft-dodging warmongers, are cast by the Right as patriots, whereas hardworking, sacrificing mothers like Ms. Ryan are cast as unamerican. Change is coming. There are so few Limbaughs and so many Americans who are suffering.

Did you ever see the movie, Seven? I wonder how the serial killer, John Doe, would have configured Limbaugh's demise? Limbaugh's sin and the sin of the Right is the deadliest sin, for it has disenfranchised millions of Americans and no one is more dangerous than someone with nothing to lose.

I was one of those happy to see America's bb team lose at the last couple Olympics and perhaps you're right that we were seeking to suffer for our national sins. If only a few Hail Marys and Our Fathers would have sufficed.