C'mon, TB. Give us a break with the sermons, already. We already know how you feel about this, and the boundaries of our disagreement have already been mapped in excruciating detail. Nobody has yielded an inch of ground, in how many years now?

Its not so much what you're saying as how often you have to pound it down our throats. Give it a rest, for Chrissake. I'm sorry to have to phrase it this way, I don't want to insult you or belittle what you feel strongly about; I do enjoy your posts, and even occasionally enjoy debating politics with you.

But its gotten to the point where every time I log on I cringe, my stomach is tied up in knots, wondering what new ambush you've prepared for the statists, a fight we'll have to engage in, mostly for schoolyard reasons. I am not in the mood for combat all the time. Not even most of the time. But that male ego always demands the last word, doesn't it?
We've been taught to stand up to bullies, that we can't let them get away with it. Anything else would be cowardice, letting our team down.

I perfectly well know how important politics and economics are. But diet, exercise and getting plenty of sleep are important too, and nobody here feels the need to turn this forum into a health and wellness blog. To some people, being saved and accepting Jesus is all that matters, but not to everyone, not all the time, and not in the Habitable Zone. Like the Witnesses, or worse, the Hare Krishnas, you're always there with the same old song, and its annoying as hell.

Sure, everyone is entitled to their hobbies. I'm sure I've bored all of you to tears with my boat stories and my nostalgia rants about the Navy and my rock and roll hippie days. We all have topics we tend to obsess about, and I hope the day I start outwearing my welcome someone straightens me out before I embarass myself any further. As you get older, you do tend to dwell on certain things. And we don't notice about ourselves what is suddenly clear to everyone around us. Maybe that's what Bobby Burns was trying to tell us.

But politics (like religion and anomalism) is different, because it invites controversy, not just debate. We discuss religion and anomalistic subjects here occasionally, and its fun, but we don't meet every day to do battle about them. The political post demands retaliation, its partly a testosterone thing. And yeah, I know I'm responsible for starting my share of the fights, too, and for that I apologize. But I also plead pride, fatigue, anger, not to mention prior provocation.

Tempers flare, unfortunate things get said, and good people leave and never come back. Driving off your friends is too high a price to pay for showing them how mistaken they are.