I really don't get how you can defend his post and turn around and state that mine is uncalled for. I am well aware that my posts are not "polite" and there is no good way to rebut the remarks that were made -- that stating "that's a personal attack" almost always ends up being a personal attack. It's a damned if you do, damned if you don't situation.
Many people on HN come across as socially awkward, full of themselves and so on. Hackers are not exactly known for their suaveness as a group. (Personally, I have no fondness for suave people, but I imagine commenting on that would really strike people as "uncalled for", personal attacks, sweeping generalizations, and so on.) I don't see how sounding to someone else (not me) like he was full of himself invalidates the point or makes it uninteresting. I also don't see how even if it were guilty of such things that merits the characterizations in onan_barbarians remarks of "fatuous self praise" and so on. For me, it is good food for thought. I tend to be too talkative. I've had to work on such issues. I rarely find good insights into the type of problems that causes.
Anyway, it would probably be best to drop this. I'm quite tired, which is not a good place from which to try to politely disagree or parse out such things. And I strongly suspect that we are both merely putting out the fire with gasoline (since I really don't think you intend to be ugly and I certainly don't either), which really adds nothing of value any way you slice it.
Peace.