Comments Policy

We have suddenly started getting hundreds of spam comments a day, where it used to be maybe a dozen, and it's driving me nuts.  So I have to do something.  The available choices seem to be 1) word verification 2) Users with Google account only 3) Registered users only (actually, I'm not quite sure what that means) or 4) only members of the blog, which would be self-defeating.  We welcome all legitimate comments, but we have to stop this *&^%$# spam.  I'm trying word verification first.  Sorry, I know it's annoying.  Let me know if you have any suggestions.  Email will still work.