Looking at that lot above it seems that a way around the spam filter has been discovered.

They are manually entered by the spammer and manually deleted a few minutes later by us.

I don't know anyone who worships Democratic leaders. They are just politicos. Somewhere out there, between lawyers and salespersons.

Golly, Mencken has a low opinion of the common man.

I take it you haven't seen the Republican convention.

I take it you haven't seen any of this years Republican convention.

Mencken was wrong. The ordinary American Joe and Jane were not jackasses then and are not now. They are busy people who optimize the amount of time and effort they devote to following politics and their decision-making powers are endorsed by the evidence -- the very wealthy, mostly free, and immensely powerful country which the USA was and has become since Mencken's day-- as a result of their decisions, political and otherwise.

Mencken was a clever writer, and a wiser and better man than much of his more acidic writing would lead you to believe. But his elitism wasn't based on much, and he proposed no realistic alternatives to democracy. He was a debunker only. Not much of a hero figure.

Give me Cobden and Bright any day, for example, men of action who were engaged in politics, did not disdain the majority of men and women of their day, who proposed specific, concrete programs to improve society and increase liberty. Men of substance, not men who could merely come up with a cute turn of phrase.