Just 5 weeks ago…

And this helps explain, perhaps, my relationship with Reverend Wright. As imperfect as he may be, he has been like family to me. He strengthened my faith, officiated my wedding, and baptized my children. Not once in my conversations with him have I heard him talk about any ethnic group in derogatory terms, or treat whites with whom he interacted with anything but courtesy and respect. He contains within him the contradictions - the good and the bad - of the community that he has served diligently for so many years.  Read more 

Mighty Corrente Building Manager Lambert brought something up in the comments to this post by bringiton that I thought deserved its own, entirely new thread. Maybe; it’s part of the “What To Do With The OFB” issue that I think is a fairly important matter.

Anyway, Lambert quoth:

How about they go fuck themselves?  Read more 

Via TeddySanFran @ FDL, the question everyone should be asking right up to election day:

So, the question is: will the ad run on Monday?

…

Is John McCain powerless? Is he impotent?

Bwahaha. Yes, these are important questions. I hope that some of our more accessible talking heads *cough* Ezra *cough* will be able to raise them on the air. As in:

Really, what people are asking right now is, why hasn’t McCain been able to gain traction with Democrats? Are we looking at an impotent campaign here, you know, one that’s never going to get any stronger towards November?

or

Well, McCain’s been taking criticism lately, and he hasn’t shown that he’s really strong enough to deflect any of it… is this the emergence of an impotent candidate?

or

You get the picture. Simple yet devastating. Can we pull it off?

Today’s slew of “Democrats In Disarray” columns offer yet more proof of the time-honored axiom: there is nothing a Dem can do to avoid being attacked by the Right Wing and the Beltway punditocracy.

Even the candidate that has embraced the Unity Pony (the absolute fabrication that the problem with Washington is excessive partisanship) doesn’t get a pass:

Mr. Obama’s call for postpartisanship looks unconvincing, when he is unable to point to a single important instance in his Senate career when he demonstrated bipartisanship.

But also the candidate whose family has been attacked relentlessly for the past 15 years:

Clinton had seeded doubts about her own character long before this campaign began through her record as a polarizing figure, her secrecy and her obvious prevarications.

skdadl at pogge reminds us that certain parties regularly get away with spinning their regular wrongitude into a larger, more noble narrative of rightness.  And that those who were right never get the credit for it.

Look: the point is that Iggy and company may have been wrong in the observable, normal universe—-what you or I might call "reality"—-but they were wrong in a noble, beautiful way.  The kind of wrongness to which they fell victim is the kind of wrongness that allows one to cover ones eyes with the back of one’s hand, stretch out the other hand, and sigh, "Ah, me!"   Read more 

From the Naomi Klein article referenced by Lambert earlier today:

Many argue otherwise. They say that if we want to end the war, we should simply pick a candidate who is not John McCain and help them win: We’ll sort out the details after the Republicans are evicted from 1600 Pennsylvania Ave. Some of the most prominent anti-war voices—from MoveOn.org to the magazine we write for, The Nation—have gone this route, throwing their weight behind the Obama campaign.

This is a serious strategic mistake. It is during a hotly contested campaign that anti-war forces have the power to actually sway U. S. policy. As soon as we pick sides, we relegate ourselves to mere cheerleaders.

It’s not just a mistake in this election, it’s always a mistake for citizens that want policies that benefit them.

Politicians are experts at getting you to work your ass off to get what they want (win elected office) while they neglect to fight for what you want (single payer health care, ending the war, etc.).  Read more 

Jane nails it:

Rather, I think we’re seeing the evidence that the media has decided that Obama is now the presumptive nominee, and having built him up he must be taken down to make the way for St. John McCain

The strategy is pretty obvious if you look at the big picture over the last year rather than the daily details:  Read more 

You know Hillary is a bit…busy…at the moment
She can’t be bothered right now to reinvent
EVERY GODDAM WHEEL

It takes presence of mind to have devine inspiration
At least for us…mere mortals…it does.
She needs all her smarts out there on the stump.

I say Hillary could use some bigger better brighter slogans
and we’re all bright kids here
we can come up with…bumper stickers & lapel pins.

We can do that.
“So cough’em up for Hillary!”

(well, okay…THAT one is not so good…)

But I do like mine:

america:
“you need a mother VERY badly!”
—wendy to capatain hook

what’s yours?

(preferably one per post for full impact)

…

Matt Compton crystallizes something I have been thinking about for days:

These are all examples of how the Obama campaign is doing something new: leveraging technology and community organizing to reach people one on one. It is avoiding the traditional and even nontraditional filters — the conventional media, the leaders of the blogosphere, and the Party establishment — to speak directly to voters.

One thing that is missing from this analysis, however, is the virulence of the Obama meme. All candidates are using web-based social network technology as a vehicle for their message, but the Obama meme is showing superior potency.

From another key article on the subject by Matt Stoller (via Digby):  Read more 

Congressman Ron Paul is running on the wonderful ideal of “liberty.” And who among us would not like more liberty? – The freedom to choose any personal path, freedom to do whatever it is that sparks our fancy. We’d be free of governmental impediments; who needs all these laws anyway?

The problem is, that when I gain the liberty to do X you necessarily gain the liberty to do Y. And what if X and Y are philosophically or practically in conflict if not incongruous?  Read more 

From a recent article by Teh Krugman:

OK, before I get there, a word about terms—specifically, liberal vs. progressive. Everyone seems to have their own definitions; mine involves the distinction between values and action. If you think every American should be guaranteed health insurance, you’re a liberal; if you’re trying to make universal health care happen, you’re a progressive.

(h/t to J Fyrste)

This is similar to my own personal definition* of Liberal:  Read more 

January 3 is four days away. The biggest Democratic primary of the year is so close you can smell the desperation. Who should be standing up in the klieg lights at the end of the night, victorious? Who shouldn’t, and why?

Shorter CNN:

If you’re really lucky, Bush’s vanity will force him to not destroy what’s left of America.

++++

Shorter format via busybusybusy who got said format idea from somewhere else, though I cannot recall any names.

++++

I vote because I am a citizen of the United States of America.  Read more 

There once was a man named Petraeus
If we rhyme with his name, they will flay us

There once was a Bill full of Rights
It was lost, but the Dems made their flights

There once was a man named “God”
Well, there wasn’t, it was only a fraud

In Iraq, there’s a firm called “Blackwater”
There’s no law if they slaughter your daughter  Read more 

This is not the argument I’d make, but I find it interesting and want to know your thoughts:

The New Orleans Fetish: The Real Reason New Orleans got no help after Katrina

I like it when people list reasons to save New Orleans:

1.It’s morally the right thing to do
2.It’s the government’s obligation to protect it’s cities and citizens
3.Because New Orleans is so special

The third reason, perhaps the most compelling argument to some, is actually what is hurting the systemic relief effort the most.  Read more 

The TAP article Lambert mentioned earlier is very interesting.

One the one hand, I’m very suspicious of arguments that devolve responsibility to groups with a small amount of power (Bloggers and the ACLU) rather than groups with a large amount of power (Democratic members of Congress).

On the other hand, I think the main thrust of the article is correct: lefty activists, civil rights groups and bloggers did not bring enough leverage to bear on their Congresscritters at the right time.

This view of elected officials explodes the myth (propagated by politicians themselves) that they are people of principle, “friends” who share our concerns and want what is best for us. They are, rather, dumb sheep who will go in whatever direction is dictated by the scariest sheepdogs.  Read more 

Spiky:

“It’s going to be very tough,” said David Rivkin, a former White House lawyer under President George H.W. Bush, who is close to officials [Fred Fielding?] in the current White House. “What [Gonzales’s resignation] is going to do is frontload a lot of battles on a number of issues: the appointment of a special counsel, document production, FISA (the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act)—that otherwise would have been spaced out over the next year.”

See you in Sep-tem-ber… Assuming the Dems don’t capitulate again, of course:

Rivkin, who has publicly defended Gonzales, said that he believes that it would be “political blackmail” for the Democrats to hold up the appointment of a new attorney general…

Yeah. And?

… unless they get what they want on those issues. But the belief that they are likely to do so is sufficiently widespread that White House aides and GOP staffers were today floating the idea that Bush may seek a less divisive figure with greater stature on Capitol Hill to succeed Gonzales.

What in the name of sweet suffering Jeebus does a “less divisive” figure have to do with anything?  Read more 

Maybe I wrote this because I just finished reading A History of Warfare (h/t Bird), or maybe because I just like making diagrams.

The pincer movement or double envelopment is a basic element of military strategy which has been used, to some extent, in nearly every war. The flanks of the opponent are attacked simultaneously in a pinching motion after the opponent has advanced towards the center of an army which is responding by moving its outside forces to the enemy’s flanks, in order to surround it.

The Key Word is Simultaneously

Over the past years, I’ve heard the argument that Democratic electoral victory must happen first, and only after that can Progressives really push for better policy. Everything that has taken place since the 2006 elections proves that this strategy is wrong.  Read more 

From The Poorman:

Shut the fuck up about “the table”. Shut the fuck up about what is on “the table”, and especially shut the fuck up about what isn’t on “the table” which, seeing as there is no table for something obviously retarded not to be on, is like two or three completely independent kinds of stupid. When one takes nukes off “the table”, where do they go? Are they stored in “boxes” in “the basement”, far away from “the table”, or are just left on “the mantle” in “the gracious drawing room”, to be easily retrieved for instant re-tabling should one, in a fit of high spirits, snap one’s “fingers” for “Marie, the French maid (and nothing else!)” to fetch them?

Other, less obviously retarded rhetorical devices that routinely go unchallenged by the Corporate Media and that also drive me insane:  Read more 

A common theme in the string of Democratic Party failures over the last years is what I call “Blaming The Process”. Or at least that is the narrative Democratic Party officials use when justifying themselves to the activist base. Something outside of their control, something about the legal, political or media process is actually responsible for the outcomes.

The failure to block the Roberts and Alito nominations, the failure to do anything concrete to end the occupation of Iraq, and now the imminent approval of warrantless domestic surveillance, are somehow not the responsibility of the Democratic elected officials.

The fault is to be found in things like the intricate details of the Filibuster and the Nuclear Option, the military budgeting process, the process whereby the media will utterly destroy any politician they deem to be “soft on terror”.  Read more 

 Read more 

Triggers are wonderful things when they are used successfully by ethical people to bring the straying into line with acceptable conduct standards. Seems like our Congress, incidentally under Democratic leadership, has found China’s trigger.

Today, the Chinese government has announced that it will appoint a special envoy to handle Darfur’s genocide, a response to a gentle reminder that it cannot have a successful Olympic games without international support. The reluctance of China to get on the wrong side of its major oil supplier, Sudan, seems to have been diminished by a simple expedient; diplomatic pressure.  Read more 

[Welcome, Rockridge Institute readers.]

Definition and discussion of the concept is below. The main points I want to convey with this image:

- There is, or there should be, a constant tug-of-war on the edges of the Overton Window on any issue.

- There is a place for everyone and anyone along the Left side of the rope, as long as we’re all pulling in the same general direction.

- The current location of the Overton Window is so far to the right of any objective political spectrum, that what are now considered Extreme Left Positions are really not extreme at all.  Read more 

Part 1 is here; Part 2 is here.
________________________________
Several years ago, in the pages of my first blog, ddjangoWIrE, I wrote an essay with the same title. When Blogger “accidentally” deleted my account, relegated ddjangoWIrE to a stripped archive, and “lost” some of my posts, the piece converted to disconnected bits in cyberspace and the essay was gone.

I’m really not going to use that disappearance as the primary excuse to post another brief essay on the same subject. Given the state of our nation, our democracy, and the inattention, malaise, and downright selfishness of its people, there are quite enough reasons to revisit this territory.  Read more