Quoting Donna Darko:

The organizing and mobilization scholar in me is totally impressed. But the conflict theorist and skeptic of authority in me is totally horrified.

It’s a two-fer, isn’t it?

You thought you were just voting for a candidate, but instead you were voting for permanently institutionalized Obama Movement, “a Google-like center of immense political and administrative power,” that bypasses the Democratic Party whenever the fuck it wants.

Well, if this Google-like center is that powerful, why isn’t it talking about universal health care?

Answer: Because it doesn’t want to. It has other things on its mind.

Earlier this week, the Ninth Circuit issued a ruling in United States v. Arnold that the Fourth Amendment’s “reasonable suspicion” requirement does not apply to the search of a laptop during an international border crossing. The court rejected Arnold’s argument that a laptop should be treated similarly to a home or office for privacy purposes, holding instead that a laptop was akin to a traveler’s luggage. George Washington University Law School Professor Orin Kerr discusses the holding in more detail at the Volokh Conspiracy blog.

Yeah, my laptop bag has a handle, so it’s luggage and so is what’s in it.

Then again, it doesn’t have wheels on the bottom. So maybe it’s not luggage?

I’d call this decision stupid, except that the effect of the stupidity is to contract, once again, the zone where government lets me alone. So it’s stupid in the way that the Village wants to be stupid.

Of course, I’m sure this precedent will never be applied domestically.

To understand how Obama’s war chest has grown so rapidly, it helps to think of his Web site as an extension of the social-networking boom that has consumed Silicon Valley over the past few years. The purpose of social networking is to connect friends and share information, its animating idea being that people will do this more readily and comfortably when the information comes to them from a friend rather than from a newspaper or expert or similarly distant authority they don’t know and trust. The success of social-networking sites like Facebook and MySpace and, later, professional networking sites like LinkedIn all but ensured that someday the concept would find its way into campaigning. A precursor, Meetup.com, helped supporters of Howard Dean organize gatherings during the last Democratic primary season, but compared with today’s sites, it was a blunt instrument.

The true killer app on My.BarackObama.com is the suite of fund-raising tools. You can, of course, click on a button and make a donation, or you can sign up for the subscription model, as thousands already have, and donate a little every month. You can set up your own page, establish your target number, pound your friends into submission with e-mails to pony up, and watch your personal fund-raising “thermometer” rise. “The idea,” Rospars says, “is to give them the tools and have them go out and do all this on their own.” The organizing principle behind Obama’s Web site, in other words, is the approach Mark Gorenberg used with such success—only scaled to such a degree that it has created an army of more than a million donors and raisers.

The social-networking model provided Obama with something that insurgents before him, from Gary Hart to McCain, always lacked: a means of capturing excitement and translating it into money. In the 2004 primary, Howard Dean raised $27 million online. Obama is fast approaching $200 million.

So there you go.

My social network was the blogosphere—not especially driven by money, and certainly not by “excitement”—which, once it became an extension of My.BarackObama.com, became a remarkably less pleasant, and effective, place all round.

No doubt, with the institutionalization of the Obama Movement, we’ll be seeing more friends “pound[ed] into submission.” Rather like a permanent campaign. What could go wrong?

To the victors…

UPDATE Of course, if I were smart, I would have joined up. But there you go.

UPDATE One forgets that there are people who simply can’t join this social network, by definition. One might almost think of them as disenfranchised. And, as housing prices rise in the cities, likely to remain so.

I like the camera angle, too. Cf. Matthew 6:5.

Surprise! Putting the word “Public” in front of anything is like hanging a “Loot Me” sign out for our klepotocracy…..

AP:

Edwards was to appear with Obama in Grand Rapids, Mich., as Obama campaigns in a critical general election battleground state.

The endorsement comes the day after Clinton defeated Obama by more than 2-to-1 in West Virginia.

Both Obama and Clinton immediately asked Edwards for his endorsement, but he stayed mum for more than four months. A person close to Edwards, speaking on condition of anonymity, said he wanted to get involved now to begin unifying the party. Obama also signed on to Edwards’ poverty initiative, which was a major cause for Edwards in his campaign and since he left.

When he made his decision, Edwards didn’t even tell many of his former top advisers because he wanted to make sure that he personally talked to Clinton to give her the news, said the person close to him. Edwards’ wife, Elizabeth, who has spoken favorably about Clinton’s health care plan, did not travel with him to Michigan and is not part of the endorsement.

AP:

Edwards was to appear with Obama in Grand Rapids, Mich., as Obama campaigns in a critical general election battleground state.

The endorsement comes the day after Clinton defeated Obama by more than 2-to-1 in West Virginia.

Both Obama and Clinton immediately asked Edwards for his endorsement, but he stayed mum for more than four months. A person close to Edwards, speaking on condition of anonymity, said he wanted to get involved now to begin unifying the party. Obama also signed on to Edwards’ poverty initiative, which was a major cause for Edwards in his campaign and since he left.

When he made his decision, Edwards didn’t even tell many of his former top advisers because he wanted to make sure that he personally talked to Clinton to give her the news, said the person close to him. Edwards’ wife, Elizabeth, who has spoken favorably about Clinton’s health care plan, did not travel with him to Michigan and is not part of the endorsement.

Readers?

UPDATE ABC:

Former Sen. John Edwards is endorsing Sen. Barack Obama’s presidential candidacy Wednesday evening, in a dramatic attempt by the Obama campaign to answer concerns regarding Obama’s appeal to working-class voters, several senior Democratic sources tell ABC News.

Alrighty then. Why not just give me truly universal health care? Would that be so hard?

UPDATE WaPo, The Trail:

So how exactly did former Sen. John Edwards decide to endorse Sen. Barack Obama for the Democratic nomination?

In an interview last week, Edwards strongly hinted that he was leaning that way — in part because of his embodiment of Edwards’s signature issue of poverty.

Edwards praised both Clinton and Obama for caring about poverty. “I think they’re both very strong on the issue … and Sen. Clinton has been working on this for decades, and particularly focused on children,” Edwards said. But poverty, he added, has been “central to Senator Obama’s life.”

Alrighty then.

UPDATE NYT, Rutenberg/Bosnan:

The campaign has timed the announcement to coincide with the start of the major evening newscasts, which would have otherwise focused on Senator Hillary Clinton’s landslide victory in West Virginia, which raised new questions about Mr. Obama’s strength with white working class voters.

Mr. Obama’s campaign is hoping it will be a big step toward the party’s coalescing around Mr. Obama as the Democratic nominee.

The Edwards endorsement, though, is singular. Elizabeth Edwards is not scheduled to add her voice to the growing Democratic chorus rallying behind Mr. Obama’s campaign.

Alrighty then.

Readers?

Alrighty then.

Axelrod client.

It’s clingy and the very opposite of self-aligning to a straight edge. It reminds me of border tape back in the days of manual paste-up.

Anyone got a cooler and more efficient and less time-consuming alternative? Or am I simply not familiar enough with this set of materials?

Careless detention

Oh? What’s “careless” about injecting people with dangerous psychotropic drugs? MK-ULTRA, anyone?

Every degradation of the human spirit that can be imagined is down to this administration — and its enablers in Congress, on both sides of the aisle.

NOTE Via Atrios.

Maybe an old-timer can explain who MWO was, and why we lamen them; I’m got to go do some trim and maybe lay down the first coat on the floor.

NOTE I don’t know why Hillary can’t run against the press. Maybe it’s not needed, because people can just see the bias and tune it out. After… everything over the last eight years — fuck, since the coup the right organized against Clinton — why wouldn’t they?

Obama did not appear in public after the voting ended in West Virginia, but a campaign spokeswoman said he left Clinton a congratulatory message on her mobile phone.

Didn’t appear? What’s he doing? Sulking?

At least we can be thankful he didn’t give her the finger. Maybe tomorrow?

Stay classy…

NOTE For once, I was cynical enough.

Our pet OFB is already trying to start a new wankfest! So cute.

11:28 PM 67% - O 26% = 41% margin, 82% reporting. The word the press needs to be using is “repudiation.” And not just of Obama, but also, perhaps even especially, of itself. After all, if anyone believed these guys, why would they even vote? At the most, it looks like the press depressed the turnout.

11:10 PM 66% - O 27% = 39% margin, 76% reporting.

11:08 66% - O 27% = 39% margin, 71% reporting.

11:01 PM H 66% - O 27% = 38% margin, 69% reporting. Bellwether Mason: H 72% - O 19% = 53% margin. Now that seems a little high. Let’s not run up the score.

10:36 PM H 65% - O 28% = 37% margin, 61% reporting. Over at Cheetopia, they’re reverse engineering the bar to 68%. How long do you think it will take that one to propagate. A whole news cycle? Half a news cycle?

10:36 PM H 65% - O 28% = 37% margin, 58% reporting. And so much for that high/low information shit. AP:

Overall, Clinton was running unusually strong across virtually all types of voters. She even led among many groups that Obama typically wins, including men, whites under age 30, college graduates, independents and the very liberal.

So, even though the percentage of college graduates is lower than other states, those there are voted for Clinton too.

10:18 PM H 65% - O 28% = 37% margin, 54% reporting. A beating.

So, Obama didn’t campaign. Does that mean he gets half the delegates, like MI and FL? (Of course, the “did not campaign” is a terminological inexactitude, since he spent a bundle on the teebee, and our famously free press is campaigning for him anyhow.) Looks to me like Barack “No Mas” Obama outsmarted himself, just like in MI, by trying to delegitimize a Hillary win by not contesting it. Hardly Presidential. And this looking ahead to McCain schtick makes it look like the pair of ’em is is measuring the drapes and the basketball court for the White House before they’ve really won the victory. And what does it matter of Obama’s looking ahead, if he’s going to lose?

10:00 PM H 65% O 28%, 42% reporting.

9:43 PM H 64%, O 29%, %30 reporting. Nothing from Mason.

9:37 PM H 61% O 32%, 10% reporting. That’s the kind of margin I like to see. But I don’t know enough to know if it will hold up. Bellwether Mason County still at 1%.

9:04 PM Waiting for speech…

9:05 PM Here we go (NOTE: “Until the last dog dies” sign):

[CLINTON] I am more determined than ever to carry on this campaign until everyone has had a chance to make their voices heard.

Go to hillaryclinton.com…

There are many who wanted to declare a nominee before the ballots were counted or even cast. Some said campaign over in IA and then we won NH… And then we came from behind to win in IN. So this race isn’t over. Neither of us has the total delegates to win. And both Senator Obama and I believe that FL and MI should be seated. Under the rules of our party, when you include all 60 states, the number needed 2209. Neither of us have that.

I am in this race because I believe I am the strongest candidate. To lead our party and to lead our nation.

I believe our case is stronger. We’ve won them in states we must be prepared to win in November … MI, FL, and now WV. It is a fact that no Democrat has won the White House since 1916 without winning WV…

The bottom line is this: The White House is won in the swing states and I am winning the swing states. Vision for America that rewards hard work, values middle class. Ready to go head to head with McCain and the vision he shares with President Bush.

I am strong enough. You know I never give up. I will stand with you as long as you stand with me.

So ask you Democrats to choose who you believe will make the strongest candidate in the fall, and is ready to … the office of the President of the US.

Why am I in the race? People who need someone who fights for them. The people who drive 4 miles, who come with the homemade signs, who raise money by skipping a night out… The trucker, the nurse. You will never quit and I won’t either.

In the face of the pundits they know what is at stake… They know, they know, they know … For an economy that lifts everyone up… For all that you can do to own a home and keep.

This election is about whether or not the American dream remains alive and well. This is the core of my life and belief. We do not want to see that dream recede. We know you work hard and we expect that. But at the least you should have a President that’s on your side.

[Of course we shouldn’t stop!!] An excitement about politics that is the lifeblood of our democracy.

Our nominee will be stronger for having campaigned long and hard.

As we look at the stakes, unprecedented. It is still so close, and it really does depend on those will vote in next contests, and the delegates. I’m asking people to think hard. This is not an abstract exercise. This is for a solemn purpose, to elect a President to turn out country around.

Election is an instant in time compared to the consequences [of the election].

[Shout out to Byrd, the governor, the WV veterans…]

So let’s finish the job we started

[Crowd goes bonkers, really, sound completely fails!]

Carville was right; it was a good speech. I don’t know if it was Teh Greatest Speech EVAH, but that speech was forgotten in two weeks anyhow, not least by Obama, who gave it, so who cares? She sure left me determined, which I’m sure was at least one of the goals (besides hammering home the “win in the swing states” point to the SDs). Oh, and Fuck the press sideways. Oh, and 2209, with FL and MI, so fuck Obama’s self-coronation on May 20. Readers?

(More LOL) Hat tip, Paul for content. 8:28 PM H 56% O 36%, 1% reporting.

Press: Can we go home now? I’m b-o-o-o-o-o-r-e-d. I don’t like that lady. Make her go away!

8:36PM Bellwether Mason County is on the CNN county maps, just to the west of Charleston. I want to know the margin!

8:43PM Hillary’s victory speech here (live from Clinton HQ). I wonder if Obama will even give a concession speech, even if he is out in MO? It would be a classy gesture…. [UPDATE Haw. I called my shot.

8:56PM Hey, where are the Abercrombie & Fitch boiz?

9:00PM If the crowd were thin — apparently, she beat Obama 2 to 1 — I imagine CNN would pull back to show that…..