Speaking of labyrinths, sometimes the self-canceling nature of blogging prevents me from being able to write.

For example, I don't like ad hominem rhetoric and personal attacks. When I saw one yesterday, I was immediately irritated. But the self canceling "rules" got in my way. This was especially complicated by the fact that it was a conservative-on-conservative attack. Now, I have never especially liked the subject of the ad hominem attack, but when I saw him attacked simply because he went to an expensive prep school and wore a bow tie, I found myself wanting to defend the bow tie wearing preppy. The left, of course, is fond of attacking the same man for the same things, and there is nothing logical about it. In fact, it is profoundly illogical, intellectually thuggish, and I got very, very tired of that approach to politics during the past eight years of Bush bashing.

Here's where the self-canceling came in: I didn't want to name the blogger involved, and not just because I don't like being disagreeable or because I think right-of-center people should stick together. There's the additional factor of his being very prominent. If you pick a fight with someone bigger, you're seen as a sort of trollish provocateur doing it for the hits and the traffic, and it just looks like a cheap shot. OTOH, if you pick on someone smaller, then you're seen as picking on a little guy. [Also a cheap shot.]

See what I mean about self canceling? Seriously, I don't want to write this post, and the only reason I am is to get it the hell out of the way. (In that respect, hitting "Publish" is like flushing the toilet. Or should I cancel that flush?)

One of the reasons I liked George W. Bush was not so much because I liked him, but because vicious leftists -- people like Ted Rall, for example -- were always relentlessly and viciously attacking him.

I miss the good old days.