Children were the hot topic for the week containing Mother's Day. Readers commented on nannies, Pregnancy for Dummies, and "Dad Again," with Adam Morgan asking a key question: "Do small children imitate extreme right-wing politicians? Is Michael Lewis's response, akin to a tired and wearied electorate willing to tolerate almost anything except more turmoil, how you parents have responded?"

Subject: Tyrants Against Terrorism
Re: "Readme: Answering Sharon"
From: Cantinflas Vive
Date: Thu May 9  10:54 p.m. PT

If we make ending terrorism the trumping condition over all other things, we are forced to collaborate with tyrants and undermine democracies. Terrorism is much more likely to flourish in a democracy since an effective tyrant can quash all subversive elements. The people in North Korea are probably too hungry to become terrorists. The overall "war on terrorism" needs a broader ethical basis than merely the (usual) evils of terrorism.

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Subject: We're All Rats at Work
Re: "Frame Game: Robot Rationalizations"
From: Vinzago
Date: Thu May 9  10:40 p.m. PT

We eat animals, for goodness sake. Are you telling me that it is more cruel to artificially stimulate a rat's pleasure center than it is to kill and eat it? I already get artificially manipulated, by the way. It's called a paycheck. "You mean I did all that work and all I get are these little slips of green paper?" …You don't need electrodes to motivate humans. We're smart enough to be manipulated directly through propaganda, financial gain, vanity, you name it.

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Subject: Popularity for Presidents
Re: "Assessment: President Ulysses S. Grant"
From: Edward Furey
Date: Fri May 10 10:16 a.m. PT

The "good man" stuff may be fashionable, but on a deeper level, the public isn't buying it. The most popular recent president remains Kennedy, and Johnson is disliked more for the disaster in Vietnam than for his ambition. … Grant and Adams are important figures despite, rather than because of, their presidencies. Both were important patriots, playing major roles in the creation and preservation of the United States. … If the only standard of "goodness" is absence of sexual scandal and great achievements, it will remain a tough sell. A few years there was an attempt to make Coolidge "cool" again. It came to nothing.

[Find this post here.]