Robertson Davies’ “Deptford Trilogy” is fantastic reading, but MUST be read in order, beginning with “Fifth Business”, followed by “The Manticore” and finally “World of Wonders”. I”ve re-read these books over and over.

Also, Davies’ “What’s Bred in the Bone” is a wonderful book.

(How liberals should respond: Satire)

My own working theory has been that Frum is hiding some personal demon — perhaps he committed some hideous crime against a child or maybe he murdered someone and the burden of guilt prompted him to join a militaristic faction that has no regard for human decency or life. Or maybe he just wets his bed every night and his wife refuses to sleep with him. Whatever the case, he clearly is unable to think rationally beyond his slavish obedience to his Dick.

(Delurking momentarily)Yes he is, but it’s nothing that dramatic – as a couple of other people pointed out above, the only reason Frum has a writing career at all is that his mother Barbara was a very famous Canadian broadcast journalist and his father Murray is a very rich man, so it didn’t really matter whether he was any good or not – he was ‘a name’. Most Canadians found Frum’s neoconservative propagandizing unconvincing and tedious, so he went south where being a neocon is far more profitable and more importantly, where no one knew rich-boy affirmative action got him where he is. Deep down he knows he’s a total fraud, hence his inability to take criticism gracefully. The pompous git still shows up on Canadian news shows from time to time as a commentator and I have to leave the room, because he sends me into screaming fits of rage.

Ed Kunin @ 134

Hate to be the ant at the picnic, though that’s my usual role. The difference between Bush and Hitler is that Hitler killed or imprisoned his critics. Bush doesn’t care. Christy, you vented lots of spleen, but nothing’s changed. The Democrats facing the charge they were deserting the troops, folded when it is apparent the only way to support the troops is to get them out of there. The question as I see it is what can we do, rather than what can we write. Anybody for not paying taxes?

Good luck with that. I admire people who are willing to go to jail for their beliefs (don’t kid yourself about that — what you’re describing is evasion, which is a felony under Internal Revenue Code Section 7201, and there’s no “pure heart, empty head” defense). But I’m not. I’ve got a kid to raise.

Besides, do you really want to take an action that plays right into the hands of an idiot like Grover Norquist?

Ok felonies don’t work for you. I’m not sure they work for me. It’s a matter of numbers. If two people don’t pay taxes, it’s off to jail they go. If twenty million go that route, it’s a different story. Supposedly 70% of the American people don’t approve of what’s happening, yet here we are.

How about a general strike? Again if two people go out, their next stop is the unemployment line. If the entire shop goes out, it’s more meaningful.

With all due respect, I don’t see Moveon.org and the like as particularly effective. As for liberal blogs, I have one which, like many others, no one visits and I’m not technologically savy. Is there a way to link liberal blogs or create a central place where we can meet, discuss, and gain confidence that we won’t be standing alone? I’m not sure what we can do which is why I’d like to talk about it. Where can you go for that kind of conversation? Can we improve on this comment system which is, to say the least, unwieldy?

Writing about how bad George Bush is hasn’t worked in six years. No reason to think it will work in the next two. We can wait with crossed fingers for November 2008, but even that’s uncertain. We thought we won in 2006. I’m afraid, one way or another, we are going to have to figure out how to do it ourselves.

And Jane, thanks for caring for Gilly and Jen – and your nation…

and letting us all know.

I’ve decided that the key to the right-wing hive mind is to look closely at the ridiculous assertions they make (the ones most distant from reality) about their opponents. That’s where they project their own insecurities and demons. Why do Republicans obsess over voter fraud when it clearly isn’t a major problem? Because they engage in it themselves. Why does Corallo, et. al., claim that it’s okay to politicize the DOJ because everybody does it? Because they really assume Dems do it just like them. So just take this paragraph:

What if the netleft, that has created the impression that there is a rising plurality that would like to abandon Iraqis to Qaeda, Quds and the Ba’ath, are just a few thousand committed Marxists in their pajamas? What if the Dems have strategically miscalculated? What if their over-compensation is to appease a vocal 1 percent of the electorate that actually draws contempt from the rest of the country?

and turn it into this:

Deep down I know that the netright, that has created the impression that there is a rising plurality that would like to keeping on killing Iraqis for 50 years, are just a few thousand committed Fascists in their pajamas. The Repubs have strategically miscalculated! Their over-compensation to appease a vocal 1 percent of the electorate actually draws contempt from the rest of the country.

See, if you know how to read them, these idiots are veritable founts of wisdom.

[Demographic Info: White Male, nearly 47, married over 25 years to a lovely physician (GP), 5 kids, Deacon at my local church, son of a Baptist Minister (my Dad went to Bible College with Jerry Falwell!), work in Software Development]