Your attitude toward poetry mirrors my own.  I figure it is my weakness but I also know that you can't make yourself like something so I've given up trying to become a poetry connoisseur.  As to prose however I love reading Joseph Conrad.  His use of the English language is amazing but to think that he didn't even speak it as a native but learned it almost is beyond belief.  I love virtually everything he has written.  One of the less known an funner reads of his is "Nostromo" which I just finished.  All of his works are in the public domain.

Loved your post.  It was extremely insightful into the Muslim paradigm.  Like many others however, I think the real affinity the left has for Islam is Islam's defiance of the West and all that represents.  Perhaps the thinking for some goes deeper than that and touches on the points you made but I suspect for most it is a knee jerk sympathy for the hatred Islamists show toward modernity.

When I was ready to buy a handgun I talked with a friend who had retired from the Secret Service.  He told me that they used the Sig Sauer P229 and suggested I try that.  I did and have loved it.  It's never misfired, is easy to disassemble and clean and is very accurate.  Mine fires the 357 Sig bullet but you can also get them with 40 cal.  It's not the best concealed weapon but sure has stopping power and not much recoil.

I understand your resentment. I'd probably feel the same way in your situation. I have seven children so I guess I've been on the receiving end.  The tax benefit of increased exemptions never crossed our minds when my wife and I decided on our family size. I'll tell you one thing though, they cost a lot more than any reduction in taxes I got from them.  Then again, it's been worth every penny.

One point that doesn't get enough discussion is how inflation or currency devaluation is very much like a regressive tax.  It hits those who live on what they make month to month the most.  Just think of the cost of filling your tank with gas and how that has changed in the last four years.  This is going to be a radical thought and probably misguided (I'll let the Ricocheters correct me) but I'm not terribly opposed to inflation for that very reason: it is a tax on everyone.  I just wish more of those who supported Obama understood this.

I like your approach much better than my suggestion.  Thanks for the post.

I don't think your first point is necessarily correct.  Unlike the credit card holder, the public (through their government representatives), can simply make the value of their debts decrease by increasing the money supply.  The Fed keeps buying Treasury bonds, essentially writing themselves a check.  There doesn't seem to me to be much connection between what the government takes in and what it spends which is what we really need.

Your's is the voice of reason, mine is a voice of disgust.  I admit it.

I think that's probably true if it happens slowly, sort of like bringing the pot with the frog in it slowly to a boil.  This so-called fiscal cliff is one way to make it happen fast.  All the Republican house has to do is nothing and every American will feel, at least a little, the cost of the government they voted for.

Exactly my point.  You said it better.

I actually agree completely with you which is why I suggest we should resist all spending increases.  I too don't believe raising taxes will solve our fiscal problems but, given the current disposition of the American Public, we might at least be able to pound into their brains that big government is expensive and will hurt their pocketbooks.  Making the usual arguments don't seem to work.

It's true that there are many differences but I would hope there might be some common values that would prove sufficient to bind us together.  

Our debt situation isn't sustainable, that is one inescapable truth.  The question remains how it all comes tumbling down which, given the last election,  seems inevitable.

There are two ways to determine who won the debate.  The first is by asking the question: "Who accomplished what they set out to do?"  Romney wanted to come across as reasonable, thoughtful, presidential and even-tempered.  He did.  Obama wanted to paint Romney as the gun totin' reckless wacko and he didn't.  What's more is that Obama appeared petty and small.  By the first measure Romney won hands down regardless of what the snap polls say.

The second way is to see how the debate moved the decisions of voters.  Even the snap polls indicate that either Romney persuaded more to vote for him or it was a wash.  By this measure he also wins.

I hope when Romney debates Obama Monday, and Obama parades out his having "ended the wars"  as some badge of honor that Romney says something like: "I don't think there is any virtue in a slow surrender,"  which is essentially what Obama accomplished.  Under his administration the US will have left two war arenas without having secured a lasting victory.  If you are going to give up you might as well do it quickly and save the expense instead of this ineffective winding down that costs more lives and treasure.  Of course, the best thing would have been to actually "win" the war, as Jay suggested.

I kind of wish I were a betting man because this site (not Intrade),  if I understand how it works,  takes bets on the election and has Obama favored quite a bit.