I absolutely agree with you that those picky, picky people should just do the work themselves. As long as the job gets done, that is what matters. It was my ex-husband who was the picky one. I finally caught on. Everytime he began bitching at me about how some particular job should be done, that became his job. Pretty soon, he was doing most of the housework. I really appreciated it and put my feet up and relaxed a bit. Of course I did eventually dump him because those hypercritical people are hell to live with.

Does your new girlfriend let you do the laundry.

A few observations:

First, my ex-wife was the queen of the world at this. She literally would not let me do the laundry or wash the dishes, claiming that I was incompetent. When she left on a three-day trip with our oldest, and I was to spend 72 hours with our two daughters, who were 3, she left me an eight-page single-spaced minute-by-minute instruction sheet. I know this whole sick game well.

It's a form of abuse, basically. Plain and simple. It's about power and control, and keeping the other person off balance. And when someone on Broadsheet points out that this may not be a good idea, everyone goes berserk. Over 180 responses. She's touched a nerve.

Also, it often flatly contradicts facts. My ex, while she would start a huge fight if I tried to do my own laundry, would let washed, unfolded laundry pile up in the garage for weeks. I remember crouching in that garage in my boxer shorts many times looking for a clean shirt, not because I was unwilling to do the laundry, but because she wouldn't let me. Similarly, she would not let me touch anything in the kitchen -- and I'd been living alone and cooking for years -- but she wasn't that good a cook. Just wasn't. She'd get on my ass about allegedly flirting with other women, but she was lousy in bed. And so on. This kind of game is the sign of really deep insecurities, basically.

It's also fascinating that this kind of woman typically shuns the REALLY dirty jobs. When it's time to, say, work outside when it's 100 degrees, or go up on the roof where there's a risk of falling off and getting really hurt, or trapping the rats that have moved into the garage, or whatever, suddenly, we're not so incompetent.

Michelle Obama is a particularly vile form of this. Her husband is a United States Senator and is running for President of the United States. He has a real shot at winning, and at literally making history. And she's so fucking immersed in this idiotic mindset that she thinks that bitching about how disgusting her husband is ("stinky and snorey") or that he's a slob and can't put his socks in the hamper, is "candor." I'm sure the military leaders of China are pleased to hear this. She's pretty much doomed his candidacy with this bullshit -- if he wins the primary, the Republicans will take him apart for this, but as with a lot of women like this, nothing is more important than being able to bash her husband. What a pathetic little child. Obama could have changed the fabric of this country, and instead he's going to be a footnote in history, like Geraldine Ferraro, at least partially because his wife, unlike Hilary Clinton, thinks man-bashing is perfectly acceptable.

And finally, because Nature always balances her books, these women reap what they sow. Either they end up divorced, or they have really miserable marriages, and they're usually too chickenshit to do the work in therapy necessary to change. My ex is now a single mother, and she has blown it, but good, and she's beginning to realize that. I'm too stupid to figure out how to run a dishwasher? Fine. I'm gone. Have fun.

I have a new girlfriend now, and that shit's over.

Why are you with a woman who is not special? Why don't you leave?

Oh yes, it makes the world go 'round.

"I'm fairly sure that the fact that I've earned 3 college degrees and have always worked my way UP the ladder, working as many hours as it takes to make the 6 figure salary I make doesn't fit the description you write about me above. And you dn't know me at all."

It always amuses me here at Salon how people establish their bona fides via their income. And it is always a "6 figure salary." Somebody pays this gal six figures and she doesn't know how to use quotation marks! Amazing. She also doesn't know that the smaller numbers, like six, are always spelled out. She has "3 college degrees" and she didn't learn this little bit when she wrote her dissertation? In the meantime, she has just insulted every SAHM in America as a useless parasite.

Let me tell you somethings Miss Rich B[r]itch[es]; many of us were brought up by women who were mostly SAHMs and they weren't parasites. I doubt my father ever would have made the income that he did if she was not there for him. She kept him organized, kept him off alcohol, and took good physical care of the four children that they had together and which he wanted. His house was clean, his children were fed, the meals were well-prepared and nutritious by the standards of the time. I and my siblings were chauffeured to dance lessons, cub scouts, girl scouts, little league, and when we went to church our clothes were clean, pressed, starched, and our shoes were polished. Sometimes our clothes were beautifully homemade. She cut down one of my Dad's suits and made two little suits with vests for my little brothers to wear to church. My dance costumes were the envy of the other girls. Who but a mother would hand sew hundreds individual feathers to the underside of a parasol so that her gangly daughter could perform her first solo performance in toe shoes?

My parents had many problems, but the fact that my mother was a SAHM for the first ten years of my life surely wasn't one of them. Parasite? She was one of the hardest working women I knew. My father had the good sense to appreciate her most of the time when she stayed at home, when she worked part time, and when she worked full time.

Parents who stay home with their children, corporate wives (and husbands) who further their spouses's careers by their personal and social efforts, and long time older housewives and househusbands, and those who become disabled during marriage all deserve and should get support -- or did you think the government should be doing EVERYTHING?

Money isn't everything. If you truly think so, then your three degrees have taught you nothing.