All s, like all human beings, get many things wrong. Ronald Reagan's extraordinary achievement as of the U.S. was to succeed in getting the two biggest challenges of his time right: defeating the Soviet Union and reviving the American economy and spirit. Neither of those achievements was inevitable. Both were fiercely opposed at the time. But he persisted; his visionary focus matched only by a gentleness of character and a brilliance of rhetoric.

I'm not going to sit around an pretend I'm not thinking things on my blog when I am thinking them and when I'm open to rebuttal.

Obama is looking good because he kept his nerve and retained his restraint. That's a tough combo: nerve and restraint. It takes a cold-bloodedness to pull this off, and there are times when ice seems to run through the man's veins.

Any president can start a war, and use the chaos of disorder that such a war creates as an indefinite argument for prolonging it. It's a war that keeps on giving. Failure means it's even more necessary to keep failing.

The important things are not worth knowing because they are useful. They are worth knowing because they are true.

Homophobia whether internalized or externalized is really fear; it's not hatred, it's fear. It's fear of the truth about ourselves.

Some of this is unavailable to the male-female union: there is more likely to be greater understanding of the need for extramarital outlets between two men than between a man and a woman; and again, the lack of children gives gay couples greater freedom. Their failures entail fewer consequences for others. But something of the gay's relationship's necessary honesty, its flexibility, and its equality could undoubtedly help strengthen and inform many heterosexual bonds.