No offense, Greg, but you tend to overlook problems with Linux because to you it's no big deal to dig in and fix it. :-)

Flash... what about Shockwave? You can't run it on Linux unless you want to mess around with WINE. Ditto Authorware. Linux has made great strides, but it's still not all the way there. And again, if you're doing video editing, nothing approaches a Mac. There's also nothing resembling the WAV and MIDI applications on Linux either. You can run some stuff in VMWare, but the performance suffers drastically for that class of application -- I know, because I used to do it.

Looking at T61s on NewEgg... I don't see any with 17" screens, like my MBP -- so I don't consider them to be similar machines. Comparing similar models (newegg's prices) I see that the T61 is a few hundred dollars more than the equivalent MacBook, with a slightly larger screen. I don't think the difference in cost is nearly what people seem to think it is.

I am refuting the insinuation that Linux has problems with WiFi

What insinuation? Another Scott thought Macs might have problems in that area. I haven't had any. Where was Linux mentioned?

Like I said, Linux is great for developers and sysadmins. If you just want a family machine, my experience says Mac is better.