Regarding the California system of higher education, Ellen, you claim that "to 90% of Californians whose kids couldn't get in, anyway -- at least not into Berkeley or UCLA -- those students were nothing but the pampered offspring of high income earners," but these were perceptions, not reality. I grew up hearing this denigration of the counter-culture youth as "pampered" and wealthy, so it's not a trivial point to determine whether this was true. For every Bill Ayres, was there also a working-class or poor kid who made it and still thought his country was heading into hell?

I am reading Nixonland now and am learning a great deal!

Posted at May 27, 2008 3:47 PM in response to Taking the Adversary Seriously: History and Condescension

Why use slang, Kanne? Why use words like "mamma," "gonna," "get all bad" and "be all scared" when Obama clearly does not speak that way? Why not try to match his eloquence and maturity instead of resorting to the linguistic equivalent of blackface?

Posted at May 20, 2008 3:39 PM in response to OBAMA: Michelle On The Stump For Her Man But Don't Ask Her Questions

I may be a bit late on this thread, but the line that caught me is at the bottom of p25: an analyst remarks that it doesn't really matter whether the Iraqi government is democratic as long as it doesn't pose a threat to the U.S. in the war on terror. Did I misread this? Rumsfeld responds, "yeah."

Isn't this a bigger deal than the slavish praise?

Posted at May 9, 2008 3:18 PM in response to Audio: Military Analysts Laud "The Leader" Rumsfeld