11.  Only in America can do for profit companies (public utilities) provide "free" services that purport to help you reduce your purchase of their product, and they do this with a smile!

Carson: Mohair

McMahon: Mohair

Carson: What's the last thing that goes down the drain when the Stooges take a shower?

Carson: Mohave

McMahon: Mohave

Carson: What does Ed keep asking Harvey the bartender after the show?

Carson: Molasses

McMahon: Molasses

Carson: What does that last frightened mole keep seeing as his friends dive into their holes?

There was something immediately recognizable in Johnny; he enjoyed everyone, good acts and bad.  He was courteous and playful, respectful and silly.  He was approachable, trustworthy, personable and likable and never, ever weird.  Weird defines Letterman and I think Conan trades in the strange, even if he isn't.  Leno is closest to sharing Carson's qualities, but he's not quite so likeable or approachable.  Fallon seems to lack any sort of depth and Kimmel can sometimes take snark to cruel levels, which has to scare potential guests.  Johnny put his guests at ease, encouraged them, and the results were often hilarious.  He joked that it was his show, that he was the boss, but with Johnny it was always for and about the guests, from Reagan to Rickles, from the dancing accordion lady to the parrot singing "I Left My Heart..."  He was the best.

Let me clarify - marriage license, blessed by whomever, but issued by the city, state or county, deemed legal by proclamation, publication or simply by virtue of a signature, a contract signed by the parties to be charged.  A civil union may in fact be evidenced bythe same document, except that those wishing to enter into a same sex civil union would check the civil union, not the marriage, box. 

Nah.  I like marriage.

I'm unaware of any data that supports the trend you suggest in your second point.  Certainly there were demographic issues in parts of the US at that time - immigrants were more likely to be men, for example or the fact that there were more men than women in the West.  And of course you have the huge Civil war effect when so many marriagable men were lost.  Statistical abherrations are likely a result of these things.

Risk is exactly the right word.  Why?  With marriage, that risk becomes possibility.  You've taken the first step - made a lifetime commitment - to prepare yourself for that possibility.  Pregnancy outside of marriage carries risk, that is changes for which you have not prepared, or changes that will significantly disrupt any preparations you have made. 

Rules of inheritance bear on legitimacy, this is whether a child was born into a marriage, but these rules are by no means clear.  I believe that an out of wedlock child can make a claim of inheritance if it can be proven that that child had a relationship, inclusive of financial support, with the father.  Countries other than the US may have quite different inheritance traditions and rules.  I think legitimacy is meaningful in most.  Just read Shakespeare and you can see that being a bastard was no fun.  And of course, trusts and wills supercede everything.

We do know them.  But they know that the power that comes with redistribution increases exponentially when there is a threat to take those benefits away.  Simply oppose any reductions in benefits and the votes are yours.  Yes, eventually the funds may not be there, but look, they aren't there now but the benefits continue - we borrow, we print, we use the massive authority of the bureaucracy to wrestle every penny from the economy - and power is retained.   Fiscal armageddon is predicted, but like the Mayan apocalypse, the day comes and goes.  The social security check arrives yet again and its Indian Casino time!

God Bless the Tea Party for pointing out how insane this all is.  Greeks demand more from a bankrupt state, French students and unions protest the loss of absolute job security, 32 hour work weeks and two month vacations.  I'm afraid that the time for easy solutions is over.  Brace for a hard transition to the right, with the left screaming bloody murder.

Also, keep in mind that this tax bill is not due nor even assured.  The theoretical taxes are payable when Saverin sells his founder stock - no easy task when you are an insider.  And it presumes that Facebook will be able to maintain this tremendous valuation - that is make gazillions of profits.  Today, GovMotors announced that they were going to leave the Facebook advertising platform as it was not "effective."   Let's face it, facebook isn't Google.  It isn't even Yahoo.  It remains to be seen whether or not it can live up to this IPO valuation hype.

I hope it does, but the odds are against it.  So Savarin may not have to pay that big tax bill, but something much smaller, if Schumer gets his way.  And one can always avoid taxes by giving money to charity.  Oh the horror!  Maybe Schumer can sponsor the "Charitable Deduction Limitation Act."  This has already been floated out there on an Obama policy trial balloon.  Why not make it so?

Natural born citizen has no clear definition.  It seems to differentiate between a citizen born in what would become the US during the drafting of the Constitution from a citizen born elsewhere.  Keep in mind there were many so called citizens in the US during revolutionary times who still had allegiances to the England (or whereever.)  It was presumed that one born here was less likely to have such an allegiance.  As the country matured, this distinction became irrelevant.  Natural born has come to mean, citizen by virtue of birth, including all but naturalized citizens. The US has customarily considered anyone born in the US, born on a US base, born to citizen parents working abroad, born on a US charter vessel or even in a US owned airplane, to be citizens of the US. Children born to a one US citizen parent abroad must select a country of origin at majority (age 18.) Since we've never had a presidential candidate born to a single expatriot citizen, the idea of a "dual" citizenship (where the US is the defacto choice at majority) has never been considered against the "natural born" interpretation. 

I think we should continue to point out that collectivism, a word I prefer over all the others as it is the most descriptive, has failed in all its forms.  It has never been "progressive" at all.  It is regressive.  It has failed and brought misery and despotism in its wake.  We must make the obvious case that whether its Obama's incremental collectivism, or it is the Bolchevik revolution, the result is the same: loss of liberty, decline, despotism.  Obama is Che, but he uses the bureaucracy not bloodthirsty revolutionaries to do his bidding.  Our country is proof that mankind is not on an inevitable path toward collectivism.  In fact, this is not a path at all, but detour to decline. 

These are not opposed concepts, KP.  One can have liberty and authority at the same time, so long as that authority is vested in an enforcement of the rule of law.  Our founders designed a system of authority that they believed to be innoculated from despotism - power was diluted amoung many and separated into three branches, each accountable to the others and periodically, to the people.  They did not see the rise of the political class (career politicians), the detrimental effects of stare decisis when applied in constitutional interpretation nor the resultant rise in the power of the now fourth branch of government, the bureaucratic leviathan.  So our duty is clear - enact term limits, insist on originalist constitutionalism and deconstruct the bureaucratic state.  Simple stuff.  Glad I could help.

The major elements of the New Deal-Great Society, Social Security and Medicare, are crumbling as do all Ponzi constructs.  Without them, Social Democracy has no chance for survival.  The question remains, will the country crumble when these pillars of socialism come down?  It does conservatives little good if the country is swept away with the flood no matter how many once screamed "the dam is breaking" for however long.  The real trick is to extricate ourselves from these economically false promises while supporting the country from collapse because of them.  The reality of national insolvency is waking many citizens from their nanny state induced coma, and conservatism is on the rise.  Collectivism, on the other hand, is once again proving to be politically powerful, but economically and practically impossible.  It always collapses of its own weight.   So the answer to your question is, no.  At the playground, children are drawn to the one who promises ice cream.  They never ask if the ice cream supply will run out.  They are sorely disappointed when it does and immediately return to play with old friends.  Funny thing, tomorrow's new friend promises candy and it starts all over again.

Can anyone answer my question regarding that stuff in Hot and Sour Soup?

No, Fred.  I simply signed up for to become certified to bid federal contracts.  This certificate gives my business access to contracts "set aside" for Hubzone" certified businesses by federal agencies.  A "Hubzone" certificate evidences that my business is located in a disadvantaged area (in my case a reservation) and that at least 35% of my employees reside in a specifically designated disadvantaged area (a census tract with 2X the national uneployment rate, I think.)   I met this criteria vicariously, so I figure, why not?  If it's used as an advantage and not a crutch, it's valuable.