A Stitch in Haste

More planets?

Hoping to end the agonizing over whether Pluto is really a planet, an international committee of astronomers has come up with a new definition that would save the tiny body's place in the sun's family.

Under the long-awaited proposal, Pluto would remain in the pantheon of planets by becoming the prototype of a new subcategory of small, outer solar system objects dubbed "plutons" -- planets, but distinct from the eight larger "classical" planets closer to the sun.

Damn activist astronomers legislating from the telescope!

Planets have always been defined as "those nine." Words have meaning -- "planet" has always meant "planet" -- are we to abandon the whole of astronomical history? We shouldn't be creating a "special status" for alternative celestial lifestyles. These "plutons" just want special rights -- they're free to acquire mass and become "traditional" planets just like every other macrocosmic entity.

Clearly the majority of Americans do not want to revise the definition of "planet" -- who are these unelected scientists to "read into" science books something that no one ever seemed to find in the texts before?

We need to defend traditional planets!

(Because it's all about the children...)