That'll preach

This is where we are right now. It’s a racial stalemate we’ve been stuck in for years. Contrary to the claims of some of my critics, black and white, I have never been so naïve as to believe that we can get beyond our racial divisions in a single election cycle, or with a single candidacy – particularly a candidacy as imperfect as my own.

But I have asserted a firm conviction – a conviction rooted in my faith in God and my faith in the American people – that working together we can move beyond some of our old racial wounds, and that in fact we have no choice is we are to continue on the path of a more perfect union. ...

It requires all Americans to realize that your dreams do not have to come at the expense of my dreams; that investing in the health, welfare, and education of black and brown and white children will ultimately help all of America prosper.

In the end, then, what is called for is nothing more, and nothing less, than what all the world’s great religions demand – that we do unto others as we would have them do unto us. Let us be our brother’s keeper, Scripture tells us. Let us be our sister’s keeper. Let us find that common stake we all have in one another, and let our politics reflect that spirit as well.

For we have a choice in this country. We can accept a politics that breeds division, and conflict, and cynicism. We can tackle race only as spectacle – as we did in the OJ trial – or in the wake of tragedy, as we did in the aftermath of Katrina - or as fodder for the nightly news. We can play Reverend Wright’s sermons on every channel, every day and talk about them from now until the election, and make the only question in this campaign whether or not the American people think that I somehow believe or sympathize with his most offensive words. We can pounce on some gaffe by a Hillary supporter as evidence that she’s playing the race card, or we can speculate on whether white men will all flock to John McCain in the general election regardless of his policies.

We can do that.

But if we do, I can tell you that in the next election, we’ll be talking about some other distraction. And then another one. And then another one. And nothing will change.

That is one option. Or, at this moment, in this election, we can come together and say, “Not this time.” This time we want to talk about the crumbling schools that are stealing the future of black children and white children and Asian children and Hispanic children and Native American children. This time we want to reject the cynicism that tells us that these kids can’t learn; that those kids who don’t look like us are somebody else’s problem. The children of America are not those kids, they are our kids, and we will not let them fall behind in a 21st century economy. Not this time.

This time we want to talk about how the lines in the Emergency Room are filled with whites and blacks and Hispanics who do not have health care; who don’t have the power on their own to overcome the special interests in Washington, but who can take them on if we do it together.

This time we want to talk about the shuttered mills that once provided a decent life for men and women of every race, and the homes for sale that once belonged to Americans from every religion, every region, every walk of life. This time we want to talk about the fact that the real problem is not that someone who doesn’t look like you might take your job; it’s that the corporation you work for will ship it overseas for nothing more than a profit.

This time we want to talk about the men and women of every color and creed who serve together, and fight together, and bleed together under the same proud flag. We want to talk about how to bring them home from a war that never should’ve been authorized and never should’ve been waged, and we want to talk about how we’ll show our patriotism by caring for them, and their families, and giving them the benefits they have earned.

I would not be running for President if I didn’t believe with all my heart that this is what the vast majority of Americans want for this country. This union may never be perfect, but generation after generation has shown that it can always be perfected.

Comments

[practicallyevil]

r : J hn nd c ns rsh p

This doesn't so much have to do with John, as it does with are dear departed scott. Scott got away with years of trolling, and being generally abusive because Fred was such a nice guy, but it became clear that scott got out of control and something had to be done about him. So Fred's hand was forced and he had to ban him, now Fred wants to stop another potential scott from brewing. To this end he has put John in the proverbial pillory to show that their will be consequences for acting like a jerk in thread. So please, don't acknowledge trolls and don't be a troll, or else it's the stockades with you, which Fred has every right to do seeing how this particular swath of the internet is his demesne.

[Bugmaster]

It's called disemvowelling. It's a favored tactic of certain internet moderators. I tend to like trying to re-parse them.

Oooh, that sounds like a challenge (Homestar-style, as in "Are you looking for a chaleeeeeeeeeenge !!!"). Dang it... If I had more free time, I'd write a re-emvoweller that puts the vowels back in. I think a straight-up HMM might do it, actually. Maybe one weekend when I'm free...

Anyway, to get back on topic: one misgiving I have about Obama is that he says all the right things, but he never says how he will actually accomplish anything. He seems to have a lot of "big-picture" ideas, but I don't get the same sense of a focused, detailed plan from him, as I get from Hillary. Maybe it's for the best, actually -- at this point, a President who will do as little as possible (other than ending the Iraq war, of course) could be just what the country needs. We had a proactive President for the past 8 years, and that didn't turn out so well.

[Ursula L]

Oooh, that sounds like a challenge (Homestar-style, as in "Are you looking for a chaleeeeeeeeeenge !!!"). Dang it... If I had more free time, I'd write a re-emvoweller that puts the vowels back in. I think a straight-up HMM might do it, actually. Maybe one weekend when I'm free...

Putting vowels in is easy. Putting the right vowels in the right spots, particularly if the disemvoweler hasn't left spaces to say where the vowels go, that's going to be the tricky part.

I'd be curious to see if it can be done...

[Bugmaster]

Putting vowels in is easy. Putting the right vowels in the right spots, particularly if the disemvoweler hasn't left spaces to say where the vowels go, that's going to be the tricky part.

Unfortunately, I don't know when I could get to it, if ever, but my naive approach would be as follows:

• Create an HMM, where the states are letters of the English alphabet, with two special states for "start word" and "end word". The outputs are the same letters.
• Train the HMM on regular, em-vowelled text
• Apply it to disemvowelled text, where the states are hidden, treating the consonants as evidence.

I can foresee tons of problems with this approach; in fact, a simple dictionary search might actually perform better, but it's a good place to start... Feel free to try it, let me know if you get it working before I do :-)

[Jon]

Anyway, to get back on topic: one misgiving I have about Obama is that he says all the right things, but he never says how he will actually accomplish anything.

Also, when he pulls off the mask and reveals that he really is a secret Muslim antichrist replicant lizard person/whatever else the conspiracies are claiming he is, it will be that much more disappointing.
Which leads me to wonder why, if he really wanted to say something stirring and inspiring, he didn't simply list off the states in alphabetical order and cite the year in which they officially became states. Being honest and forthright with skillful rhetoric and eloquent expressions of faith in the potential of this country to be perfected? Pshaw! Us non-RTC types need some meaningless trivia in order to really be won over.

[Robb]

We had a proactive President for the past 8 years, and that didn't turn out so well.

I slightly disagree - We've had a proactive President who was not a very smart or considerate man, guided by less than scrupulous & less than wise men. All of them had a penchant for the priviledge & secrecy that comes with power.

Having a proactive president who's actively interested in using the power of his office to truly change the moral direction of America is vastly different.

*****

"Are you looking for a chaleeeeeeeeeenge !!!"

Funny, I was thinking about that particular cartoon and realized what an excellent parallel it is between Bush ("I'm training for fighting, or maybe a challenge") & Obama ("Yessir, Yessir I am"). Of course, Bush isn't likely to be happily entertained by anything Obama does once he's in office; and Obama is far more 20X6, while Bush is more 1936.

Ok, so it's not a good parallel, but whatever.

[Jeff]

I really couldn't read them

It's really not that hard to at least get a sense of what's being said.

I created a post of John's comments, if anyone feels the need to read them.

[Jesurgislac]

The clue will be when McCain announces that he wants to rebuild the White House in Babylon.

.
.
.

Oh, this was about how Obama is the anti-christ! Sorry, I got confused.

[not someone else]

Ah; so the problem is that it's not Thursday yet. That makes perfect sense.

Jesu:

Where do you live again? I've never heard of someplace that has actual laws against discrimination based on gender identity and/or presentation, rather than handwaving.

[Nicole J. LeBoeuf-Little]

What trollery is tolerated, will be perceived as tolerated, i.e. appropriate to the forum. Good moderation is the fine art of removing inappropriate behavior before it can multiply.

On one of the blogs that was addressing the issue of the "men's rights movement" backlash against feminism (I can't remember which one; I got there by a link from maybe Pandagon or Feministing, I dunno), one wide-eyed clueless person repeatedly issued statements to the effect of "we can't discuss this here effectively because [host] keeps censoring opposing viewpoints; come discuss this on my blog; it's totally unmoderated because I don't believe in censorship."

One person who had been very kind to his opposing point of view (which oddly enough hadn't been censored, since he expressed it politely and without insult, funny that) took him at his word. She came back saying that she had never been made to feel so humiliated, so insulted, so viciously attacked as she had been on that person's blog. The moment it was revealed she was a woman and a feminist, the blog's residents initiated what can only be described as an online mental and emotional gang-rape. And this sort of viciousness was allowed to flourish, because the blogger "didn't believe in censorship."

Where obnoxious behavior is tolerated, it will thrive and multiply. It will not be balanced by polite and compassionate behavior, because those people exhibiting politeness and compassion will not stay to be abused by the obnoxious ones. The well meaning forum maintainer will eventually have to choose: moderation, or cesspool?

I appreciated Fred's decision where this choice is concerned.

It's not 100% true to say "it's not about opposing viewpoints." When discussing Barack Obama on this thread, one could argue that "Brck bm s rcst nggr nd s r s spprtrs" is an opposing viewpoint. It still has no place being expressed in a forum where name-calling and race-baiting are not welcome.

Sebastian posted a link to it, but for those who haven't followed it, I think TNH will forgive the text of her certificate being replicated here, wherein she...

grands this moderator official permission to advise, curb, admonish, sort out, look askance at, chide, restrain, sit on, disapprove of, reprimand, discipline, call to account, rebuke, censure, upbraid, shoot down, chew out, tell off, give notice to, disemvowel, delete, suspend, proscribe, or permanently ban trolls, kooks, sockpuppets, monomaniacs, bullies, and other ill-natured or vexatious persons.

Moderation, after all, isn't rocket science.

Now. I eagerly await the arrival of opposing viewpoints that aren't full of lies, insults, and race-baiting. Would anyone like to politely take up the position that Barack Obama's speech was not all that and a bag of chips? Heck, any number of letters the the editor of local papers this morning have done that: "It's too little, too late," or "His speech is nothing but playing the race card, no one's brought race up but him, he's being a divider," for instance. I don't agree with them, but had they posted here, I doubt they'd have gotten disemvoweled.

[Jesurgislac]

I've never heard of someplace that has actual laws against discrimination based on gender identity and/or presentation, rather than handwaving.

It's a legal requirement for countries in the European Union, though countries interpret the legislative requirement differently. I live in the UK. The regulations against discrimination on grounds of gender identity/gender presentation will become law at the beginning of April. The regulations against discrimination on grounds of sexual orientation became law last year.

[Lila]

Thank you, Fred. I haven't felt this hopeful about a presidential election since I became old enough to vote (and I'm 46).

[Jesurgislac]

Nicole: On one of the blogs that was addressing the issue of the "men's rights movement" backlash against feminism

It was Jeff Fecke's post on Shakesville - Explainer: What's an MRA? For a couple of weeks the "last word" on the comments thread was bib0cierced, Drak Pope's new word from last year.

[Nicole J. LeBoeuf-Little]

Anyway, to get back on topic: one misgiving I have about Obama is that he says all the right things, but he never says how he will actually accomplish anything. He seems to have a lot of "big-picture" ideas, but I don't get the same sense of a focused, detailed plan from him, as I get from Hillary.

If Senator Obama did as you say Senator Clinton did, outlined the details of some plan, the national debate would get bogged down in discussing those details: would they work, wouldn't they, etc. That's would be useful if all the candidates were working towards the same picture and we had the luxury of voting on the candidate with the best plan to get there. We don't. Obama's big picture is not Clinton's is not McCain's. At this point, I'll vote for the candidate with the intentions I like best. The time to yodel at my representatives about what plan will most effectively put those intentions into motion is after the candidate with those intentions gets the presidency.

[Nicole J. LeBoeuf-Little]

Jesurgislac - I think that was the one, actually. You were there too, weren't you?

[Jon]

The Onion's take on Obama: Black Guy Asks Nation For Change

[Robb]

Would anyone like to politely take up the position that Barack Obama's speech was not all that and a bag of chips?

Not me, but I expect someone would - I can readily imagine something along the lines of "Obama's lack of experience prevents him from recognizing that there are deep divisions between the average American couch ridden potato chip eater and Anglophile-influenced Americans who will imagine a greasy bag of thick fried potato slices slathered in vinegar & salt. My health care plan will work to mandate. . . [blah blah blah]."

Of course, that's assuming she's actually heard it yet.

[Robb]

Ah - my bad - that article was from yesterday afternoon.

[Raka]

Nicole J. LeBoef-Little: ...the blog's residents initiated what can only be described as an online mental and emotional gang-rape

I'd argue that it can be described in other ways. I'd go so far as to argue that perhaps it should be. My personal beliefs about the appropriateness of the word "rape" in civil discourse: always when referring to the actual act, sparingly and with qualifiers when used as a simile, extremely rarely as a metaphor (and preferably applied only to inanimate or abstract objects), and never as a joke. I feel that using it as a metaphor generally detracts from the attempted emphasis (a la Godwin). Add that to triggering effect is has on many people and the inevitable watering-down of any word that's widely used as an emphatic, and it merits serious consideration before deployment.

That completely uninvited and preachy tangent aside, I agree with your analysis of the merits of activist moderation. I'd like to see more of it even here. I'll freely admit that some of the crankier exchanges I've had with Jesurgislac could've benefited from some admonishment by way of disemvoweling; even well-intentioned people can occasionally use a reminder to settle down and play nice.

[Lauren]

The Onion's take on Obama: Black Guy Asks Nation For Change

Funny thing is, it's working. $55 million raised in February, was it? That's a lot of change!

[Raka]

Nicole J. LeBoeuf-Little: the national debate would get bogged down in discussing those details... At this point, I'll vote for the candidate with the intentions I like best

I'll agree with that sentiment with the caveats that a history of successfully turning stated intentions into accomplished fact is very helpful, and any many intentions do need at least a general sense of direction. I like it when candidates talk about reducing poverty, but it makes a difference to me if they intend to do so through public assistance, the power of prayer, or by deporting the poor.

[Raka]

Jon: The Onion's take on Obama: Black Guy Asks Nation For Change

Lauren: Funny thing is, it's working. $55 million raised in February, was it? That's a lot of change!

Wait... he told me his car was out of gas and he just needed a few bucks to make it to his job! Dammit, I knew he was just going to go spend it on political ads!

[Jesurgislac]

Raka: I'd argue that it can be described in other ways. I'd go so far as to argue that perhaps it should be.

A woman who had been raped, who entered an online discussion where the host had said she would be treated politely and respectfully, was aggressively attacked by a group of men, friends of the host, because she said that a man who had had sex with her without her consent raped her: is a rapist. She was accused of lying about him, of lying about herself, of traducing an innocent man, of violating his right to be presumed innocent until proven guilty, nad of doing this because she was a vicious feminist who wanted to humiliate and destroy men. The male commentators who took part in this attack egged each other on, praised each other's attacks on her, and commented to each other on how unattractive and unpleasant she was.

So, yeah, actually, I think describing that as "an online mental and emotional gang-rape" is a very cogent description. Don't be a Cheuvront.

[Jeff]

is a rapist

Did anyone on the forum put a penis inside her? If not, the laws you like to flaunt says that she was not raped.

Only being half-snarky. You've been very clear about what the UK considers rape, and that, by and large, you approve. A little acknowledgement of that approval might not be unseemly.

For what it's worth, I do think that the woman was "gang-raped", but my definition is different from yours. (I also believe that there's a time and place to use "lynching" is a metaphor -- Clarence Thomas' Supreme Court hearings were not one of them.)

[Cowboy Diva]

Jesurgislac: Don't be a Cheuvront.

?? Need the cite, as I do not think this will help me reach level 50 on freerice. Are you referring to a judge's ruling on some case?

[kay.c.]

@ Ursula: Putting vowels in is easy. Putting the right vowels in the right spots, particularly if the disemvoweler hasn't left spaces to say where the vowels go, that's going to be the tricky part.

Actually, I don't find it terribly difficult to read at all. As a dyslexic, I've learned to read very quickly, almost just scanning along, picking up nearly as much from context as from actual words, as the letters scramble and rearrange themselves. When my eyes are most tired, and so the scrambling effect most pronounced, there is not a whole lot of difference between what I see and this disemvowelment stuff!

Huh. First time I've ever considered dyslexia useful for anything.

[damnedyankee]

Did anyone on the forum put a penis inside her?

Jeff, that is the absolutely most assholish question I've seen posted in a comment section since I stopped bothering reading the comments in Will Bunch's Attytood blog.

A bunch of strange men attacked and belittled a woman over what I think I can presume is one of the most traumatic events of her life. No doubt it caused her to flash back to that very event, effectively making her going through it again. It's one of the reasons why so many rape cases go unprosecuted, because the victim is unwilling to revisit the event in court.

And this -

Did anyone on the forum put a penis inside her?

- is your answer. Because Jesu said it, and whatever pathological need you have to disagree with Jesu overrides any and all considerations.

[Jesurgislac]

Cowboy Diva: ?? Need the cite, as I do not think this will help me reach level 50 on freerice. Are you referring to a judge's ruling on some case?

I can't reach level 50 on freerice, why should anyone else be able to?

Jeffre Cheuvront is the judge who decided that the word rape couldn't be used in his courtroom, because if a woman described a man having sex with her against her will and without her consent as "rape", this might "inflame the jurors" into finding him guilty of raping her.

Rava's and Jeff's insistence that a group of men who acted as described shouldn't have their behavior referred to as "an online mental and emotional gang-rape" are, well... being assholic. With Raka, it may be Cheuvront-ish: with Jeff, it's probably more dislike of me. *waves at Jeff* It's okay, Jeff, even though I think I figured out why, I won't publicly embarrass you by explaining it.

[practicallyevil]

Jeff, Jesu, let's take it down a notch. Jesu, rape while possibly applicable was too strong in the context of the thread in that it was going to provoke these kinds of responses. Jeff you're trivializing rape, although I think you just phrased the question inappropriately.

[Jesurgislac]

Jesu, rape while possibly applicable was too strong in the context of the thread in that it was going to provoke these kinds of responses

Nicole used the description first as 'The moment it was revealed she was a woman and a feminist, the blog's residents initiated what can only be described as an online mental and emotional gang-rape. And this sort of viciousness was allowed to flourish, because the blogger "didn't believe in censorship."'

Raka objected to using the word "rape", so presumably Raka would rather have had 'The moment it was revealed she was a woman and a feminist, the blog's residents initiated what can only be described as an online mental and emotional group sex.'

Sorry, just doesn't work for me. I agreed with Nicole's description of the attack as "online mental and emotional gang-rape": and I found Raka's reluctance to admit this is an appropriate metaphor when a group of men get together to share male bonding by humiliating and attacking a lone woman rather Cheuvront-ish. I'm sure Raka'll be back and we might even manage to have a civilised discussion about this and other examples of not-Godwinning a thread, providing Jeff can be convinced not to escalate the situation.

[Lauren]

And it was such a nice thread. Can we just talk about how great Obama is a little more?

[Froborr]

As presented in Nicole's original comment, the woman in question was insulted and treated poorly for being a woman and a feminist. While a terrible way to behave, comparing such treatment to rape does indeed trivialize rape, and my initial response to Nicole's use of the term was outrage.*

However, I read further. It appears that the issue is not that Nicole is trivializing rape or exaggerating the emotional impact of being insulted by assholes, but that the treatment the woman received was much worse than what Nicole initially described. Insulting and blaming the victim of an unimagineably traumatic experience for her trauma is beyond "a terrible way to behave"; it is compounding that trauma, maliciously forcing the victim to relive it. In that sense, it is very like rape.

*I feel much the same way about American Jews who call any criticism of current Israeli policy "anti-Semitism" and call me a "self-hating Jew" for espousing views that among Israelis themselves are fully accepted as reasonable positions, albeit not the majority. There's an old story about a boy who cried wolf...

[Sniffnoy]

I think you're making the wrong distinction here, Jesu. To "online mental and emotional gang-rape" you oppose "online mental and emotional group sex", which obviously favors the former; but I think the proper thing to put in opposition to it is "online mental and emotional attack".

Now in this particular context, "gang-rape" works very well, but that's another point...

[Cowboy Diva]

to quote from The Fantaskticks:
"You may prefer the word 'abduction,' but the proper term is 'rape.'"

by the way, I'm with Lauren.

[pat greene]

You know, Jesu, I was right there with you on your response to Raku up until you got snarky.

In Nicole's original comment that spawned Raku's response, there was not enough detail about what happened. The woman could have been attacked about her discussion of rape, it could have been about experiences of workplace harassment, about any number of things. And I'm with Raku about being wary of the overuse of the word rape as a metaphor.

Your response clarified the situation, so that I found myself thinking "Okay, then, in that case I can understand the use of the word rape."

But, and not that you give a damn what I or anyone else thinks, your insistence on attaching a snippy little put-down to what was a pretty straightforward explanation was obnoxious.

[Bugmaster]

I dislike the tendency of true believers -- be they conservatives, libertarians, Christians, atheists, liberals, feminists, or whatever -- to elevate every discussion to the most emotionally-charged level possible, until everyone just goes critical. Any attempt to provide better healthcare is Communism. Any taxation is slavery. All religions other than a particular branch of Christianity are Satanic. All theists are morons. All Republicans are fascists. Any insult of a female is rape. And so on, and so forth.

I think this kind of rhetoric devalues the very real evils of rape, fascism, slavery, etc., and turns every discussion into meaningless white noise, with opponents shouting keywords at each other... Turns it into modern American politics, in other words. I like to avoid such rhetoric when I can.

[Jesurgislac]

And it was such a nice thread. Can we just talk about how great Obama is a little more?

Let's.

[Froborr]

Did we ever stop?

For we have a choice in this country. We can accept a politics that breeds division, and conflict, and cynicism.... But if we do, I can tell you that in the next election, we’ll be talking about some other distraction. And then another one. And then another one. And nothing will change.

That is one option. Or, at this moment, in this election, we can come together and say, “Not this time.”

[practicallyevil]

And it was such a nice thread. Can we just talk about how great Obama is a little more?

*desperate attempt to put bad feelings behind us*

I voted for him, and I think I'm the only one who didn't check the "vote for group" box for election ward council. It was basically four families, both husband and wife were from each family, who where the current candidates for election wardens. I said to myself, "I got to break this monopoly up," so I only voted for the wife of each family, my mental image being, "You'll have to wait in the other room Thomas, this is election ward business. Don't forget dinners at five." That and I vote against every ballet issue, that isn't raises for school teachers or something that is clearly for the common good, because my default assumption is that the person sponsoring the bill has ulterior motives.

Democracy can be fun.

[Cowboy Diva]

practicallyevil,
In Missouri you can vote for judges once they have served one appointed term. My grandmother would vote against all but one in a completely random fashion, knowing nothing at all about any of them, thinking if nothing else they needed a wakeup call.

[Lauren]

I think it was Matthew Yglesias who was disappointed that an aquaintance of his, who was running in the Democratic primary for a seat in the state House in Texas, probably lost because his name was second, alphabetically, and most of the people who came to vote in the presidential primary just checked the first box for all the other races.

I really think it ought to be made clear in US elections that you won't invalidate your ballot if you don't vote in every race on there. When you've been taking multiple choice tests your entire life, it can feel really uncomfortable to leave some of the options blank.

Has Clinton responded to Obama's speech besides saying it was nice for him to talk about that stuff?

[mike timonin]

practicallyevil: "That and I vote against every ballet issue"

What, you have an issue with dancers?

[Jesurgislac]

Ballet dancers always have ulterior motives.

...or do I mean posterior motives?

[Danseur Montoya]

Hello, my name is Danseur Montoya, you enTombed my father, prepare to frappe!

[Lauren]

Maybe practicallyevil just has an ultra-pro-modern-dance agenda?

I do despise this kind of meta-analysis:

If he has to confront racial division in October in a major way, he will lose the election. By October, he needs to have the media and voters say, "We've already finished with this subject. What about Iraq? What about the economy?"

But, I kind of wonder about Obama's timing. Obviously, to some extent his hand was forced by the reaction to Rev. Wright's sermons, but giving this amazing speech the day before the 5-year aniversary of the start of the War in Iraq and another big speech seems fishy. I wonder if his campaign wanted to slip it in under the radar so they could quickly move onto another topic if the response was poor. But I wish he would have done it on some other day when people would have more time to talk about it. It was a great speech and they should have fully owned it.

[Cowboy Diva]

Ah, but Lauren, they are ALL great speeches; no ulterior motives at all, right?

[Jeff]

Actually, I don't find it terribly difficult to read at all.

Could you help me with the few words I missed? (See here. I'm not sure anyone cares anymore, but it would be a fun exercise, and gets around all the "censorship" questions.

================

Obviously, I need to repeat: For what it's worth, I do think that the woman was "gang-raped", but my definition is different from yours. (I also believe that there's a time and place to use "lynching" is a metaphor -- Clarence Thomas' Supreme Court hearings were not one of them.)

I understand my first sentence was more than a little overboard, and I should have refered to the "what is rape" thread more obliquely.

My apologies.

providing Jeff can be convinced not to escalate the situation

Does this work?

[Lauren]

Jeff: I'm going to guess "Hagee's TAPES" are what McCain has been listening to for decades.
I have no blogger account to post non-anonymously with.

[mike timonin]

"Ballet dancers always have ulterior motives.

...or do I mean posterior motives?"

Jesu, I think you're dancing around the point. You should take a position - possibly the first position - and stick to it. All this jumping around makes it hard to follow your argument.

(Hmmm. I could extend my rambling metaphor more easily if I actually knew anything about ballet.)

[practicallyevil]

What, you have an issue with dancers?

I should say so, Ballet dancers have committed terrible injustices on my person. I can still remember their what they said to me as I lay in a pool of my own blood:

"Hello, my name is Ballerina Montoya, I've killed your father, prepare to make my voter sponsored initiative die."