Oh Good Grief. I hope not !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Phreedom: "When will the final ray of light penetrate your thoughts and make you realize big government is the problem, regardless of party."

Agile Cyborg: "[Liberals and conservatives] are both controlling assholes who'll stop at nothing to employ broad government power to usurp the rights of others to force them into a centralized and collectivized morality."

Spoken like a couple of Ayn Rand-worshiping nutballs.

You won't find a single liberal or conservative who will claim that "big government" is great. That's because you have no definition for the term "big government." It's a vague, amorphous term that can mean anything you want it to mean to serve your purposes.

How about specifics? Which aspects of "big government" are you against? Which parts are too big, and which parts are the right size? Would it kill you to say?

Break it down. Which parts of the government are too big:

-- Post office?

-- Education system?

-- Military?

-- Highway system / DMV?

-- Health-care system?

-- Welfare?

-- FCC?

-- SEC?

-- DEA?

-- EPA?

-- FDA?

-- FAA?

-- Police, FBI, CIA, NSA?

-- NASA?

-- Etc.

I won't say that all of the above are perfect; far from it. But at least some of the above are essential.

You won't find anybody who will argue against cutting the fat in government. You'll only find arguments over what constitutes "fat." Congressional earmarks could be fat, but some of them are very useful to communities.

Money that goes into infrastructure can substantially help keep the wheels of capitalism flowing. Maintaining roads lowers costs for businesses to transport goods and make money. Regulating air safety minimizes crashes and therefore keeps insurance costs (among other costs) low. The postal service ensures high-functioning communication and trade systems. The education system means a higher collective skill level, which increases global competitiveness and raises the average economic class level, which creates a healthy and flourishing market. Economic regulatory agencies can limit anti-trust violations and other corruption, including monopolies that are antithetical to innovation and capitalist principle.

If you don't explain what you really mean, you risk coming across as mere sloganeers. It's nice to think you're a libertarian purist, but at a certain point you have to say what you really mean. Often I've found that when such people are challenged, their slogans turn out to be meaningless. It might make you feel good to think you have the answers, but it's only because you've limited yourself to stupid questions.

You wrote that the Northeastern media establishment is in decline, and everyone knows it. This gives me hope. How and when do you think this will play out. Also, what permanent repercussions, if any, do you think the Washington Post will suffer as a result of Salongate?

"Only a week before, Shepard had expressed fears about being killed. Given that apprehension, it is still inexplicable -- if the case is examined only through a political lens -- why Shepard would leave a public place in the company of such blatant thugs."

Man, I hope his family members don't read that. What an evil thing to say.

Sarah Palin has distinct legal obfuscation issues eminating from a loophole in the Alaska Constitution which permits Democrat airheads to file daily challenges to her governance; such challenges are termed "ethical violations" and must be challenged; they are unlike what most governors must contend with. She must retain counsel or staff to respond to each one; this takes up a lot of time and money. All 15 initiated so far have been trashed. These challenges all originate from Democrat sources - none occurred prior to her candidacy as VP. The MSM does not fully report this, so Palin is giving the media and the opposition the big bird - it prevents work from getting done, and Democrat goons know this.

Faith based initiatives and farm subsidies.

I think those government programs are too big.

Let's cut them completely.

Obama listed several billion dollars of stuff he wanted to cut, and all of it stuff that I think needs to be cut.

Only a week before, Shepard had expressed fears about being killed. Given that apprehension, it is still inexplicable -- if the case is examined only through a political lens -- why Shepard would leave a public place in the company of such blatant thugs. A hate crimes law that claims to be able to penetrate the mind of the perpetrator should be equally open to questions about the victim.

Did Camille Paglia seriously just blame Matthew Shepard for his own murder? Seriously? And then justify it with some twaddle about hate crime laws? Unfuckingbelievable.

I thought we had worked so hard to get past the mentality of blaming the victim, and yet here we are again. There is no defense for her words or her attitude. She's no different than a man who says a woman was "asking or it" when she's raped because she dressed provocatively or didn't vet her date more carefully.

Is what you say true? If so, then what strange communication disorder prevented Palin from stating the peculiarities of the Alaskan political system and its alleged cynical exploitation by the opposition as clearly as you did in this brief paragraph? As it is, in both the speech AND the follow-up interviews she came across to most viewers as a feckless quitter and liar, which explains the vitriol evident in these letters. If she can't even clearly express her reasons for abandoning an elective office, she is most certainly not ready for prime time.

Paglia = Palin with a thesaurus.

Same incoherent word salad, only with BIG words not in common nor contemporary usage.

...for Paglia passes by.

But I love to cruise the letters. The right always shows up to stroke itself about how "liberal" and "tolerant" they are of other opinions -- unlike those meanies on the left.

The only time the right is more hilarious is when they are bragging about their "family values" and how *their* politicians -- unlike that naughty Bill Clinton -- are just paragons of monogamous, perfect, loving marriages. Big fun. Or maybe Sanford et al have finally shamed them into eternal silence on that subject?

No matter. They've got their infinitely superior tolerance of opposing opinions. Why just tune into Rush to hear it. There you will hear pro-choice women treated with the respect they deserve. You will hear the many problems and conflicts with laws criminalizing abortion addressed seriously before Rush comes out with his own opinion. There you will hear screams cut caller off -- the gut-busting funny "caller abortion."

The right has as much superior tolerance as it has superior families -- where young people thoughtfully wait until they make that unbreakable marriage commitment to have sex.

Everyone knows the right's masquerade as sexually morally superior beings is over. It is time to end the masquerade that the right espouses or lives some superior tolerance of other viewpoints.