Alas, Poor Comma - I knew it, Samuelson

Robert Samuelson of Newsweek wrote an amusing piece about the slow decline of the comma. He seems to focus on some of the more obvious uses, such as setting off the introductory prepositional phrase. Personally, I would mourn the so-called Harvard comma - the last comma in a list of items that you use right before the word "and" - if I did not insist on including one at every occasion. I'm sure it drives copy editors made, but someone has to offer the literary world some tough love, determination, and an appreciation for clarity that I think the final comma provides.