1 Un-effing-believable. Man, the republicans are busier than a long-tailed cat in a room full of rocking chairs these days. First, they created Katrina to wipe out N.O. and take the media focus off Sheehan. Since that has backfired on them and it, too, has been politicized, they had to off Rehnquist to distract us from N.O. Anyone care to divine the next step in their evil plan since they're onto the Rehnquist plot? And if actus shows up - actus, this is called sarcasm.

2 Just freaking stupid I'm surprised the old man held on this long. He was a tuffie he was still working last week. Admirable.

3 I read the posts; I would call their remarks "outraged glee", i.e., they're sure that Rove had him gacked, and they're glad because he was a conservative, but they're sure worse it to come. One commenter simply wrote "We are screwed". He's right, too, if things go as they should, but I'm afraid Bush will wimp out on us. I nominate Ann Coulter, but failing that, I'll settle for Fred Thompson.

4 Umm.. and which one of those metafilter posts, exactly, were you thinking is NOT joking? The sarcasm is pretty evident. Even though there's not, like, a smiley face, or a "J.K.", or anything.

5 Oh, I see. A double standard. [slaps self] They can be sarcastic and it should be blatantly evident, but we can't possibly be using sarcasm because it is far too sophisticated a concept for us to employ or recognize. Gotcha. Now you get this: What was quite evident is the hate behind the sarcasm. THAT'S what they're not joking about.

6 From what I've seen of their postings, I don't believe they're capable of such a subtle concept. They mostly seem like angry kids to me, semi-literate and feral.