But the rumor — which has come up at Congressional town-hall-style meetings this week in spite of an avalanche of reports laying out why it was false — was not born of anonymous e-mailers, partisan bloggers or stealthy cyberconspiracy theorists.

[…] and suggests a crowd of problems quite beyond the reach of solution, leading, indeed, into plummetless mystery.

But if all rhetoric is a mode of pyrotechny, and all pyrotechnics are by necessity fugacious, yet even in these frail pomps there are many degrees of frailty.

Thought I'd just crash here for the evening. Grab some z's.