The New York Times-20080127-Op-Extra- Selections from Opinion Online- -Editorial Desk-

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Op-Extra: Selections from Opinion Online; [Editorial Desk]

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DOMESTIC DISTURBANCES I love coffee. And though I have previously shown myself willing to forgo all kinds of food and drink in the quest to rid myself of migraines, coffee is one habit that I am firmly committed never to break.

It's not about the caffeine. I have largely renounced caffeine. I say largely because I know that the decaf I now drink all day isn't entirely caffeine-free. My attachment to coffee is about the taste, and the smell, and the gesture. ... the kind of gesture my mother's brother Mel used to make, waving toward the coffee pot, when you walked into his house in Brooklyn. ...

I wouldn't be so pretentious as to say that I have measured out my life in coffee spoons. But it wouldn't be so far from the truth. I began drinking coffee at 9 -- teaspoons of warm, milky coffee from my father's cup in restaurants after dinner. By age 11, I was drinking it chummily with my mom over breakfast. I spent my adolescence over never-empty cups in places like Joe Jr.'s and Lepanto's and the Viand. There was time for this then, in my New York.

I miss that world terribly.

-- Judith Warner, Memory Refill

Reader Comments:

This is beautifully written and a lovely little meditation on stepping outside the frantic worry of contemporary life. It brings me back, strangely, to that popular little Verlaine poem Le ciel est, par-dessus le toit... and the realization that the joy and peace of life is always there in the margins, in the background. -- Posted by James Hathaway

Lovely column. And thank you for the shout-out to Joe Jr.'s -- my favorite coffee shop in New York, because it's in the same building as my first New York apartment. I stop in every time I'm in the city, and its stubborn refusal to change warms my heart. It also transports me back to a time when drinking coffee -- along with getting a job in the big city and having your own apartment -- meant you were one of the grown-ups. Thanks for the memories.

-- Posted by Anne B.

OUTPOSTS For 50 days, Rudy Giuliani has had the Sunshine State nearly to himself. In advance of the presidential primary on Jan. 29, he's sucked up to the Cuban vote in Miami, pandered in Cape Canaveral about the space program, tried to scare retirees over early-bird specials in South Florida.

There he is riding in a fire truck in a Miami parade, trailed by angry firefighters who blame him for multiple failures when New York was attacked. There he is in the Panhandle, the consummate Yankees fan trying to look down-home on the Redneck Riviera. And every night, his campaign phone bank reaches out to the diaspora of 1.5 million transplanted New Yorkers. Start spreading the news -- quick!

Yet, the more they see of him in Florida, the more his poll numbers tank. Rudy's campaign is in a meltdown.

-- Timothy Egan,

Goodbye Rudy, Tuesday

THE WILD SIDE It has long been known that mutations that act on an embryo as it grows can have profound effects on the adult organism's appearance -- dogs with no fur, humans with the symmetry of the internal organs reversed so the heart is on the right instead of the left, blackbirds with all white feathers ... But it was generally assumed that such mutations don't play an important role in evolution -- that they're just a freak show.

Which is odd. A quick survey of nature shows a variety of traits likely to have evolved in one jump, rather than gradually. For instance, many species of vulture lack feathers on their head and neck. (This is thought to be an advantage, as it stops them getting their feathers dirty when they stick their heads into a rotting carcass.) Did the loss of feathers happen because in generation after generation individuals with the most receded feather line had more children? Or did it happen through a single jump?

I haven't been able to find out -- I'm not sure the answer is known -- but I'm betting on the jump. The reason is that chickens with a bare head and neck often appear spontaneously: a single mutation blocks feather production from shoulder to beak. My guess is that if it can happen in chickens, it can happen in vultures -- and that in vultures, it gave an advantage.

-- Olivia Judson,

The Monster Is Back, and It's Hopeful

Reader Comments:

Wonderful exercise in scientific writing for the general public of nonspecialists. Now if only some of these geneticists could direct their attention to the question of how a gene could acquire and transmit a behavior pattern -- such as how to build a web for a spider, or how to flap the wings for a bird. Is anyone looking at this? Or is it not possible to connect behavior with genetic evidence?

-- Posted by Nelson Jonnes

My advice is to quickly substantiate the real reason for these genetic shifts that produce profound changes in morphology before you hand the creationists a new ideological weapon. One thing for sure -- yes, that is possible, even in science -- the change at the genetic level is not random.

It is not induced by a supernatural force either. The cause of these changes is physics, but the mechanism is not yet known.

-- Posted by Jeffrey Werbock

CAMPAIGN STOPS History teaches us that even when primary opponents inflict hard shots, the victim of those attacks -- once he (or she) secures the nomination -- is little worse for the wear. Most infamously, George H.W. Bush assailed Ronald Reagan's economic plan as voodoo economics in 1980. Reagan went on to defeat Bush in the primaries, choose him for his running mate and win the general election in a landslide.

During the 1992 primaries, Bill Clinton withstood a withering assault from Paul Tsongas, who called Clinton the pander bear -- and worse. Tsongas's harsh attacks did not prevent Clinton from winning that election. Equally strong barbs were thrown at Al Gore by primary opponent Bill Bradley, and by John McCain at George W. Bush in the 2000 primaries. But these primary campaign attacks didn't prevent Gore from winning the popular vote, nor Bush from winning the electoral college.

For better or worse, the candidates would have to hurl much fiercer attacks than they did on Monday night before the Clinton-Obama-Edwards exchanges get anywhere near as hot as some other winning candidates have endured.

-- Ron Klain, Too Nasty?

THINK AGAIN What do independent voters do? Well, most of all, they talk about the virtue of being an independent voter. When they are asked to explain what that means, they say, I can't stand the partisan atmosphere that has infected our politics (forgetting that politics is partisan by definition); or We like to make up our own minds and don't want anyone telling us what to do (as if Democrats and Republicans were sheep eager to go over whatever cliff the leadership brings them to) or (and this was a favorite of those interviewed in Iowa and New Hampshire), We vote the person rather than the party.

Now, voting the person rather than the party is about the dumbest thing you can do ... The party affiliation of a candidate tells you what kind of appointments he or she is likely to make. ...

Voting the person, however attractive or impressive he or she may be, could very well get you four years of policies you detest.

-- Stanley Fish,

Against Independent Voters

Reader Comments:

Being an independent means that we can argue issues in good faith instead of vilifying opponents as agents of evil. It means scoring poorly on rating scales of ideological purity. It means accepting as axiomatic the idea that no political party or ideology has a monopoly on truth or an immunity to hogwash.

-- Posted by Steven Tiger

I agree with Mr. Fish when he says that parties matter. The trouble is, we've only got two of them. A proportional system of representation, rather than the winner-take-all model currently in place, would more accurately reflect the diversity of political opinion in this country.

Potential voters, independent or not, would be more likely to participate in a process which gives them more viable options. Who wants to go to the ice cream store when all they've got is chocolate or vanilla?

-- Posted by Nick Marritz

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