New comments announcement

The words "shut up" are henceforth banned in conjunction. If I want someone to shut up, I will tell them so. If you want someone to shut up, then you should get your own blog where you can enforce that desire. The purpose of the comment threads is to encourage interesting discussion, not regression into toddlerhood.

Further reminder: this is a family blog. Specifically, my family. Comments using profanity, speculating about my sex life, insulting my relatives, trying to sell useless commercial products, calling people Nazis or Communists who do not self-identify as members of those movements, or otherwise degrading the level of discourse are unwelcome, and as soon as I see them they will be uncomments. If your conversational skills did not pass seventh grade when the rest of you did, find somewhere else to deploy them.

Update I should note that this is not about getting rid of people who disagree with me. I will crack down harder on readers who like me than the ones who disagree: you can think of this as sort of a libertarian game reserve for well-mannered statists. I have enough of a hard time fighting off the crazies who come here from other web sites to throw bombs; please don't add to it, no matter what the provocation. If you think a comment requires more than polite disagreement, email me and I will take care of it.