John Kerry walks into a bar and the bartender says “Why the long face?” 

Excellent points, Paul.  I was thinking along the same lines the other day when I was trying to understand how it is we become so beholden to a specific party or set of ideals.  For me and probably no surprise to most here, it’s the abortion issue.  I’ll never move beyond it nor am I wanting to.  As long as the Democratic Party continues to support it, I see no way that I can vote with them.  Even before I knew what abortion was though, I’ve always identified with the Republican Party.  It wasn’t my father who was influencing me because I never understood his politics from election to election.  The last vote he cast before he died was for Clinton although I know he voted Republican occasionally.

I do think we become jaded by our support for our team and at times we don’t allow ourselves to honestly access what’s before us.  We all do it.

I love your analogy about getting your dog to take a pill by wrapping it in cheese, bacon or whatever…personally; I find that peanut butter works great.

One puzzle I'd really like to solve in this lifetime is how to get all my remote controlls to work off one unit.  I just put a surround sound in my family room with hopes that the new remote which came with the system would work all the components.  I'm sure it can but damned if I can figure it out.  6 remotes is at least 4 too many!

Kevin g