Which is something I must have done at least once to be able to make the analogy.

I like peat. I contain multitudes.

A not, I think.

And, doesn't anybody think

Laphroig might be a little too "peaty"?

That's why I was drinking wine.

You 'n Walt

Greenwald, I hope you are wrong. I have never voted for a Democrat for president in 56 years that I have been able to vote. I may well vote for Obama, based entirely on his faith in reason. Also, McCain fails to represent a change of attitude towards our foreign policy and our quagmire in Iraq.

Pedinkska?

In the V.A?

I listened.

I'm afraid to read the comments.

I heard some gruesome war stories .

In the orthopedic clinic, vets talk to me?

I need a break from the damn war stories.

It's howdy salad time, and I'm so hungry!

I'm curious about your dexperience with Sufism.

How did it come about? Did you study with a Sufi teacher, and if so, what order? Do you meet with other Sufis where you are? Or are you just a Cyber sufi?

Salad sounds wonderful to me.

It's almost lettuce planting time here. And snowpeas too. I love salads straight out of the garden.

How's the ol' stalk doing? Better I hope.

Stick that in your pipe, Mr. Greenwald!

He sees things that harry and hector him. Why is that, GC?

A remembrance: One time your signature exhorted me to "Be a Mage."

I tried to comply, but had taken in too fair an amount of The Glenlivet, not too peaty - but not that great a malt? No offense. (The worst Scots Whisky I ever had was pretty dam good!). I digress. The whisky induced a hallucination in which I saw God. He told me not to be a mage.

Freedom is to be found where?

Is it in the stillness of the mind?

If so, I am not a free man.

Is it to be found in attachment to material possessions?

If so, I am not a free man.

I do not think Bucky has a clue as to what freedom really means.

Few of us do. I certainly don't.

I think Art James does.

1% doctrine is white anti-liberation theology. It is a bizarre cult of data crunch machine worship and proselytization at gunpoint, advocated by Republican high priests. Perhaps John McCain should do a major speech about it so we can have a national dialogue.

John McCain should be heckled and and trolls should be sent forth until he tells us whether he is a dangerous white man and what the parameter values and probability levels are for their software that will trigger an executive order for enhanced interrogation to the CIA. I assume the pizza delivery guy will get detention without charge under Mr. McCain's rewrite of habeas corpus. Anchovies or extra cheese could be grounds for sensory deprivation alternated with extreme cold.

The only question John McCain needs to answer from now until November is whether a president who orders illegal surveillance of Americans, and systematic torture in violation of international and national law should be prosecuted. The rest of the presumptive Republican candidate's record, party platform, and views are irrelevant.

I hope yer stalk is better.

When you aren't around. I notice.

hehe.

by the company he keeps.

It appears that many people want to determine a candidate’s beliefs by looking at the beliefs of those around him or her. The implication is that the more one person listens to another’s point of view, the more likely they are to adopt that point of view. However, you don’t usually see this explicitly stated as such. More often it is expressed something like:

[sixfathom, courtesy of Ganpat Ram] ”I judge a man by the company he keeps. Through many years I have found it a good guide to a man's character.”

I think this form of the statement actually has an element of truth behind it.

If you look at a leader who surrounds himself or herself with people who share a single common ideology, they are likely the type of leader who values loyalty above discourse. Moreover, it is very likely that this leader shares many specific beliefs with any one of those advisors because all of the advisors agree among themselves.

On the other hand, if you look at a leader who picks advisors with many different points of view, they are likely to be a leader who makes decisions based on as much information and discourse as possible. Moreover, it is nearly impossible to determine the beliefs of the leader based on the beliefs of the advisors because the advisors don’t even agree among themselves.

This latter type of leadership is well illustrated in the book Team of Rivals, which describes the way that Abraham Lincoln surrounded himself with his political enemies when picking his cabinet.

Personally, I would prefer a leader who can listen to all sides of an issue and make decisions based on that input.

I think it is ludicrous to use association alone as proof of any of the following assertions:

1) John McCain believes that the Catholic Church is “The Great Whore”, just because he is proud of the endorsement by John Hagee.

2) Hillary Clinton believes that Obama would not be where he is if he was a white man, just because Geraldine Ferraro believes this.

3) Barack Obama believes that our government had a role in spreading the AIDS virus through the black community, just because Jeremiah Wright said so in a sermon.

It is as if people assume that either these candidates are so weak-willed that they are at the mercy of the beliefs of the people they associate with, or else that they display poor judgment by associating with anybody who doesn’t think the way the candidate is “supposed” to think.

This attitude on the part of the electorate might go along way toward explaining the political leaders we end up with.

Which came first, war or the state? -- L.W.M.

Anti-war always comes first; since 1968. My uncle invited scores of his fellow amputees in Valley Forge Hospital (sp?) to visit Florida the cheap way by staying at his sister's house free. (my mother's house)

I met man after man (all amputees) that told me the real truth about Vietnam. Since my family consists of a very high percentage of people who were/are military (even women folk) they figured I might be tempted to join. I was threatened by hardened vets that they would just kill me first. (a friendly threat I like to think)

A kind word for LBJ would get a boy punched out, if he had ever made that mistake. One of my three brothers did, but he was only in 4th grade and so got a pass.

I did not serve, but American wars have been my special interest ever since. There is no war without the warrior is one truth I learned. Another is that there are no winners. Ever.

But, I also learned that the state == war.