Blogging is to writing what extreme sports are to athletics: more free-form, more accident-prone, less formal, more alive. It is, in many ways, writing out loud.

My own early crusade for same-sex marriage, for example, is now mainstream gay politics. It wasn't when I started.

The success of the stock connect program and the increased market volatility means investors are looking for more products to access China markets performance than exchange traded funds, and futures are feeding that rising demand.

The relationship of black Americans to Obama is sociologically riveting.

The one thing we know about torture is that it was never designed in the first place to get at the actual truth of anything; it was designed in the darkest days of human history to produce false confessions in order to annihilate political and religious dissidents. And that is how it always works: it gets confessions regardless of their accuracy.

I think essentially corrupting institutions in Washington are turning conservatism into something that is really very creepy, but also emotionally and psychically powerful for people.

I think sex is completely absurdly demonized in our culture. But in the end, however much sex you want to have, with however many people in how many ways, to be loved and to love is what human beings really want.