Yeah - it was really nice, that Christmas night toward the close of WW I when the German and the "Allied" troops sang carols to each other from their trenches and then gingerly crept out to shake hands with the fellas they'd be busy butchering on the morrow.

But BotF ain't the Western Front, no one here writes as well as Erich Maria Remarque, and July ain't Christmas.

All by way of saying that right now, at this point in the history of the US, posters like

JackHumdrum, DribbleQuill, Irkwad, Skeptical, Kazillions, Sgt_Rock, b-a, and yes, even fpl (sorry old friend) ...

are the enemy.

Multiply them by six or seven million and you've got the Republican base - i.e. the folks so mired in their own fears and ignorance that they're more than happy to bring us all down with them.

So next time you decide to post some considered rebuttal to any of them, remember that by arguing with them, you are only serving to legitimize them, a bunch of folks whose only interest is to trivialize and narrow US political discourse until it is as small and petty as they are.

The only thing you should do with them is what Franken and Olbermann are trying, albeit very badly, to do with O'Reilly and Hannity.

Laughter is the only way they can be stripped of a legitimacy they never would have had if the corporate owners of this country had not started whining about media bias.

Maybe if you didn't try to seem so above the fray, while making obvious the fact that the fray is your crack cocaine......

Maybe I'm wrong.

As one of their prime enablers, Michael, it's only fitting that you have the right of first reply.

Even if it is, as usual, entirely besides the point.

No, it is the point David.

You're an addict.

Perhaps someday, like the German soldiers in the story, we can round our little wooden box outhouses together to share our hand-written letters from the little girls that love us, while we crap for an hour and a half in them, grateful to be with comrades whatever the circumstances, while not being shelled.

It's hard for me to say that a life with laughter in it isn't better, so feel free, but beware of the blowback you so often spouted.

For that post, K, you have my respect (the kind of respect that Karla and Smiley had for one another, according to Le Carre.)

At least you chose to engage on the issue, as opposed to raising dust a la Schmutzie.

Some questions, Schmutzie -

Are you familiar with Citrix?

Are you familiar with Citrix as a front-end to a complex IDE with a complex editor?

Are you familiar with an underpowered Citrix system as a front-end to a complex IDE with a complex editor?

If yes, yes, and yes - then you will understand what I mean when I say that what appears to be you to be an addiction is merely the way I occupy the intervals during which I'm waiting for the cursor simply to come back.

I understand that may be hard for you to believe, but that's actually the reason my posts are so frequent during the day.

But damn - I'm a multi-tasking machine - I'm still six weeks ahead of schedule on two major tasks and can afford to spend some prep time on some really serious tasks coming up after them.

I have known ole skep for many years now and remember giving him and the loc dog a rough time on todays papers.I came over to botf to give Se~Nor Jack_Dallas a rough time.

When soldier 2000 died I threw in the towel.I could no longer hate the yellow ribbons on cars etc.It has been 7 years since 91101.I must admit I'm ready to assume the hunt for obl in pakistan/afganistan..

kill that idiot..

You can run but you can't hide, fpl.

As they used to say in Harlan County, which side are you on?

I'm on the side of broadband.I have had a darn dialup since 93 and the pentium one.I'm still at pentium 3 and a spare gigahertz with no operating system since the xp quit working.

It has a decent harddrive and I bought a new modem.Have you ever tried linux?

any suggestions until I get broadband or satellite?

is kentucky an obama state?

Truth is, fpl, I think you answer that way because you yourself don't know which side you're on.

Which is a good thing, actually.

Wish "wb" was still around. Remember him? He had come to conclusions one would not expect someone of his background to have come to ...

Yes,he is from Columbus,Ga as I remember.Well shoot,you must like julie_k too..haaa...(julieboomer)

Nope - South Carolina - nearish Clemson cause I remember telling him that the next time I visit this math professor I know there, I'd look him up.

I have no idea who this julie is - I don't read any of her posts because her nic is so obnoxious ....

Hold on now!!!She is a fellow traveler.Ole skep calls her the answerette,allied with the communist party.She has also stated'Once with a black you can never go back."She also supports balack obama..or as skep says white obama?

well I'll keep a weathereye out for her posts.

like someone once said, you don't need to be a weatherman to know which way the wind is blowin ...