we may also have different definitions of Satan and evil. As someone who could most easily be characterized as agnostic, I am not sympathetic to such characterizations generally. From my Baptist upbringing, I remember Satan as being the ultimate embodiment of evil. In human terms, I think of people like Hitler, Pol Pot, and Stalin.

Somehow McCain does not fill the bill for me. Understand that I am not defending him. I simply think that he has neither the charisma or the obsessed ideology to be that sort of despot.

I do not use words like Satan lightly, AKA Smith. I'm not just throwing it out there as an epithet. The man was a POW, was tortured, and not only won't he shut down the Cuban concentration camp, he says the Supreme Court decision to give the prisoners habeas corpus is one of the worst decisions ever.

I call that callous hypocrisy and, of course, it speaks to the banality of evil. Evil can happen from good intentions or by accident. I would characterize few people -- even those with Antisocial Personality Disorder as truly evil. I have known people who have molested children and beaten their spouses near to death. Believe me, they were more nuanced and complex than you might imagine.

He plans to continue the pointless mass murder that is the Iraq war.

Only he doesn't see this as evil. He sees it as a way to fight Islamofascism (a silly word if there ever was one!). He see himself as protecting our interests. Do I think the war is evil? Of course. Do I think everyone caught up in it, including our servicemen and women are evil? Of course not.

Even further, he took a, "stroll," in Iraq, wearing a flak-jacket, surrounded by Marines, with snipers at the ready, as a way to justify the war. He said that it was like walking in an open air market in Indiana. The next day, several people he spoke to at that open air market were murdered, in apparent retaliation.

So what did he do? He went back for another photo-op. What happened? People were murdered the next day in retaliation.

I would be interested in see a link on that. As you probably know, Barack Obama is planning to visit Iraq. How do you think he will avoid becoming complicit in that sort of thing?

So, if you disagree, that's fine, but don't tell me I'm spitting wild hyperbole, or that it has anything to do with my support of Obama.

No, I don't think you are spitting wild hyperbole. Just plain old hyperbole. I think it weakens your actual argument. The facts themselves are damning enough.

Again, I'm very, very familiar with McCain, and have been long before I knew anything about Obama. Don't paint me with your wide brush.

No, I am not saying you are an Obamabot. The use of that term does not have to include all Obama supporters.

I wonder, however, if you know as much about McCain as I do. He'd use the constitution to wipe his bottom if it would make him president. He doesn't have a single principle, that you can point to, that he has maintained over his career. He now says he wouldn't even support his own campaign finance reform bill, today. The man is a shameless opportunist. And, he's evil.

All politicians are shameless opportunists, aren't they? Would they get elected otherwise.

Do you have a quote of a link on his statements on his campaign finance bill? I would be interested in reading more about that.

As to McCain's principles, I don't think it is people's principles or even the lack thereof that make them evil. It is something inside of them that makes them "wired" differently than those of us who are "normal."

[Obama's vote] That's something you're right about. It is wrong. It is 100% wrong. However, the vote hasn't been taken yet, and already, most of the people hear are ready to tar and feather him. I'll be even more disappointed if he actually votes for the crap. I'm hoping against hope that he left himself an out, to vote against the bill on the basis of the immunity clause.

He actually promised to filibuster. I suggest he start filibustering. It would be great theater and he speaks so well. I am not sure if he caves it will be about being elected in the fall. I see things differently. I think it is about an exchange of chits and the chits he can call in in the future. If he supports this bill, I see him as pretty cynical.

I think reserving judgment until the vote is cast is the least we owe, don't you?

No, I don't. I think actually holding his feet to the fire now is more effective. In politics, trust is for weenies.

... just as you reserve the right to criticize Obama, I reserve the right to tell the truth about McCain, and try to talk some sense into the disgruntled faction of our party that are considering letting that sociopath win.

But of course you have that right, it is just that your arguments will mostly be wasted upon me. The only one you could have made that would have swayed me would have been in response to one of Joan's recent columns. But that is past.

Renegade, probably more intelligent, organized sociopaths seek careers in politics, sales, and the law than any fields other than dangerous sports and criminality. They lie with impunity. When one position doesn't benefit them, they assume another. However, one thing I have learned about sociopaths, we almost never spot them until it is too late. They charm us while they pick our pockets and destroy our lives.

That does not mean you have to completely forgo those avenues within the system you think make a point but it does mean that you cannot use them as your primary method of fighting.

OK--for me, including that statement made the ick factor go away. I sense that you're generally on a page I agree with. That LCM guy is just plain bizzare.

If I had to pick a fight, and this is the gentlest of one, I'd say your statement got my goat because reasonable political strategy involves a hard and constant interplay between working within the system of candidate x and y and building structures which challenge the system as we know it--which you can't do by yourself and involves a great deal of system maneuvering in itself.