And not for nothing, but pretend it's not abortion, okay? Not gay marriage or the War. Pretend it's...I don't know. School systems. It's a lot easier to get crazy about when it's something like that, but that doesn't help anybody who's ambitious, because crazy gets you numbers: just ask President Laura Koresh. You ask why I brought up "temporary religious values"? Why the religious lobby is a problem? Why faith-based charities are an issue? You advance an emotional issue, sell it as vastly more important than things like the disappearing middle class, illegal strategies for wealth accumulation, tax havens for the rich, health care -- boring shit like that -- and you'll blind some people. Most people. Me. I didn't get the fight here until just now, because they played the Right to Choose card. Thought it was weird that they'd randomly drop it in there -- hearing somebody say "abortion" on TV is like seeing somebody smoke cigarettes in a movie. This isn't about Geminon or Rya Kibby, it's about Doc Cottle (Fed) getting to decide what's best for a girl from another planet, and it's about Sarah Porter (A-Fed) wanting to take women's rights out of the fucking Constitution, and it's what the Civil War and the Independence War were about, and what the Browncoats were slaughtered over, and I'm sorry if you feel I'm being partisan, but so's the show, and it's also about me, being used as a political football, losing the election for a guy I kind of liked. (Like I would even want to get married. Fuck that noise. And if you're really angry right now? Keep reading; engage with the show. I'm using a real-world example to help explain the action of the story, and the parallels at play, and I would do the same and use many of the same examples if I were on your side of the argument -- and you're not getting an answer if you email to convince me otherwise. I expect, and respect, that you've got the ability to look at things from both sides, and come to your own conclusions.) Point being, I was so sidetracked by the emotional stuff here -- by my revulsion -- that I wasn't watching the bottom line. And now Gaius Baltar is going to end up President. Guilt.

Tory leaves, and Adama pulls a shocking line of dialogue out of his hat: "She's not Billy." Roslin agrees. He sits, and won't look at her. Roslin finally sits across from him, and smiles. They consider each other for a long time, and she finally comes out with it: a hilarious, very affectionate, very adrenalized "What the fuck now, old man?" kind of "What?!" He pauses, and sighs, "I hate to say this. Because I know that this is a political issue. The fact is that that number doesn't go up very often." He points at the Whiteboard of Extinction. Roslin thinks a second, looks away, troubled, then sits way forward. "I fought for a woman's right to control her body my entire career. No," she says sweetly, still thinking, then harder: "No." Adama doesn't want to be saying this either: "I'm just remembering what you said. Right after the Cylon attack. That if we really want to save the human race, we'd better start having babies." He smiles a tiny smile, and Gods only know what he's thinking about right then, but I hope it's little Adama-Roslins. Roslin looks away, and thinks some more, sadly. I will take this moment to point out that, although I have used it several times, this is the first time the word "Cylon" has been uttered in the episode. That's where we're at with this. We haven't even seen one.