On the point about the word marriage, I'm with you.

The name of a religious sacrament has no place in secular law and never did. For me the answer isn't to relegate gay folks to only having "civil unions," but to replace the word "marriage" in all laws with the term "civil union" and to recognize the sacred act of marriage as one way of getting civilly united under federal, state and local law.

That puts marriage and it's definition back in the hands of one's Creator and place of worship, while giving straight folks and gay folks the same access to the secular rights and responsibilities attendant to those united according to US law.

(I fully understand that this is never going to happen, btw, and that the confusion and struggle between "sacred marriage" and "secular marriage" will continue... but just because it won't change doesn't mean it shouldn't...)

Sincere appreciation for your position. Sad, the way Ms. Geller divides everyone, apparently including even some of your fellow members at the Great Neck Synagogue. The accusations of naziism and not being sufficiently jewish, by both her supporters and by Ms. Geller herself, make me ever more sure that she is hateful and dangerous.

Thank you for standing tall, even as so many attack. Stay strong; you're in the right, in spite of the bile and vitriol these sad creatures are throwing at you.

If this stands, that intersession vs intrasession bit will call all of judge Pryor's rulings into question, as well. (In fact, I read there have been hundreds of these intrasession appointments...and that if they (and their fruits) remain illegal based on this ruling, there will be a whole lotta people claiming they were wrongly judged or ruled against by someone without standing to judge, which'll get awful messy.)

I suspect that overreach alone will mean this ruling won't survive en banc / Supreme review.

An army of 1, defending an ever-shrinking island of "I got mine." Good luck with that.

I can't speak to Pfeiffer. I think it more likely that he was as uninformed as most people seemed to've been about there being two Churchill busts and, believing there was only the one, which he's seen with his own eyes outside the Treaty Room in the residence, said the story about it being sent back was a falsehood. But maybe he did know the truth, and intentionally lie.

I'm less sold on the rest. The Bush administration received the bust that they had, as a loan for the length of his first term, and then that was extended through the length of his second. Doesn't that make the Bush administration responsible for returning it (along with other items they had been loaned for the length of his time in office--and I'm given to understand there were other items) at the conclusion of his Presidency? I'm not saying Bush was in the office rolling things up in old newspaper--anymore than you folks are saying Obama licked the stamps on the package that sent Churchill #2 back--but wouldn't it be his outgoing transition team making sure all the items loaned to them during Bush's administration were returned?

But ok, let's say the incoming Obama transition team or the permanent White House staff agreed to take care of that for the Bush folks, and that Obama was in office and therefore "responsible" for refusing the Brit's offer to extend the loan thru his term(s) in office, and actually sending the item back. So what?

Why does it show disdain for Churchill, England, Israel, or any other person or country for him not to continue the loan whose time was up? Apparently, he already had a bust of Churchill--which makes one wonder where the one we received as a gift was all during the Bush administration. Did Bush have both on display, or did the Obama administration go to the trouble of getting the original Churchill bust out of storage and displaying it, showing their admiration for the man and his country? And for that matter, where was the Churchill bust during the rest of the presidencies since we received it, and does it also show disdain if they did not have it in the Oval?

And further still, why do some conservatives find it preferable for this Democratic President to have the bust of an Englishman in the Oval Office, rather than a bust of one of the great U.S. Presidents--and a Republican, no less--from whom the man says he draws inspiration?

The whole nontrovercy seems awful silly to me... ...but just the same, maybe we need a congressional inquiry to get to the bottom of the whole mess. I'm most interested in finding out where that Churchill bust gifted to the White House during the Johnson administration has been all this time, and why Dubya had to get a loaner... The truth is out there...

True or false, one has to be a real douchebag to intentionally release offline (and seemingly, unverified) information about another blogger as vengeance for some online difference of opinion. Given the sickos out there, it's an invitation for trouble.

Bad enough, if the info's correct.

Far worse, if the info's unreliable, and they're targeting the wrong guy.

Ideas that are not born in one’s own head (or that harmonize and synchronize with the ones that are, at least) scare some folks silly.

Pointing and yelling “Anti-Seeeeemite!!!” (or “Cooooomunist!!” or “niiiiihilist!!”) at the top of one’s internet lungs is no substitute for reasoned discourse.

A real right wing echo chamber...

psst... 99 WEEKS, not months.

Still a long time, but significantly shorter than 8 years.

The question for those defending Stacy is, would they feel the same if Assange had offered that "You buy the ticket..." line?

It's fine to say that women who dress a certain way, or drink too much, or walk home alone late at night, or agree to have sex with relative strangers are foolish. But none of those behaviors are the equivalent of buying a ticket on the rape ride. The factor that makes it rape is that one participant has bought no ticket. There IS no ticket to be raped... not even if you drink excessively, dress and behave provocatively, pay little attention to personal safety and security, or even consent to some degree of sexual activity you'd prolly be wiser not to.