Pure Awesome: “destroy America faster thereby bringing about The Inevitable Dawn of The Great Progressive Age of Progressive Enlightenment and Anti-Corporatist Veganism.”

If it didn’t happen after Shrub, it ain’t gonna happen now. You’re going to have do actual work, people. Step away from the keyboard and run for school committee or city council.

As Scott Lemieux reminded us yesterday, President Chomsky and House Speaker Avakian wouldn’t have been elected in 2004 if Nader hadn’t tipped the election in 2000. So history is clearly on the side of the front pagers.

Taunt away, you O-bot.

The worse things get for the worse the better, the better.

So I guess you’re an idealist, vegan, pure progressive? Who are you planning on voting for, and how will that serve to advance your dream world?

I think you’re missing the snark/sarcasm in his comment.

Read the second line again.

A horse is a horse, of course, of course.

Yes, DavisXMachina does snark at a whole different level – show-offy bastid!*

*{sotto voce} I think he teaches Latin, and you know how those people are; he knows way more than is good for a person. {/sotto voce}

They never mention how Gary Johnson is doing in the polls. THE WHOLE SYSTEM IS RIGGED.

OOOPS!!! I guess I’ve spent too much time butting heads with the true believers.

Sorry, DavisXMachina. Put it down to an old broad’s short temper? Please?

Perhaps the impending Obama re-election is actually the Rapture- all those Republikkkanz heads asplodin’, all those tru-beeleeverz shuffling off their mortal coil, to live forever in Wingnut Heaven (no Negroes or queers allowed).

It could happen!

Maybe I’m in the minority, but I’m much more perplexed by Obama voters who are defecting to the Rmoney side, than by the much smaller, statistically insignificant protest-vote heighten-the-contradictions group.

This was the big mistake of the Democrats during the Cheney regime years — they became so obsessed over the few thousand Florida Democrats that defected to Big Bad Ralph, cried about it for years on end, yet had nothing at all to say to the twelve times as many Democrats who voted for good ol’ GeeDub.

And they learned nothing from it. Instead of taking to heart Harry Truman’s old warning about people voting for the real Republican rather than the fake one, they interpreted it all as a need to tack further right, to genuflect more to people who were never going to vote for them in the first place.

I know we’re talking about degrees of sanctimonious douchebaggery at this point, but still. Some perspective might be in order. More people are defecting for Vulture/Voucher, insisting on their own Precious Sparkle Rainbow Unicorn. They’re infinitely bigger assholes, deserving just as much of a reaming.

Ah yes, a breath of fresh air here. Some places just have too much vegan juice for me.

if they are actually in the voting booth, the jll steinites will pull the lever for the hated kenyan, I am sure. The real worry is if they stay away.

In any event, it is too small a cohort to actually affect anything, so who cares? The Jill Steinites are all in CA and OR – not exactly toss up states…

The real worry is if they stay away.

Fortunately here in OR we can mail it in, our votes that is…

May I ask for your source of so many former Obama voters switching?

Yes, many Florida Democrats voted for Bush in 2000. They’re conservative, Southern Democrats, mostly in N. Florida and the Panhandle. Oh, and a few thousand perhaps voted for Buchanan by mistake. Remember the butterfly ballot, and the elderly Jewish woman who exclaimed, “Oy, i think I just voted for Hitler!”?

TBogg, did you see any of Digby’s posts this week where she exposed how Clinton, Biden and even Obama himself are fairly clear that they embrace the Bowles-Simpson proposals that will cut Social Security benefits and Medicare, and especially Medicaid, all in these corporate Democrats’ desire for a post-election Grand Bargain?

A TBogg who had any integrity would have said: “You know, I, the great TBogg, was wrong to say that anyone who thinks Obama is seeking that sort of Grand Bargain is delusional. Maybe Obama ought to take warning from his base that there is a limit to how far he can go to destroy the rest of the New Deal.”

But no, you’ve just doubled down with your hippie punching–and revealing how much you suffer from battered wife syndrome when it comes to the Obama administration.

And you lemming commenters, with your phony monikers and your childish cursing, have at me. But the truth hurts. You may blame the Stein supporters if they contribute to Obama’s loss (which they won’t; they or we just don’t count). But you folks and again TBogg must take some responsibility when Obama undermines the entitlements and continues to support the banksters against the declining middle class.

And maybe all of you guys can stop typing long enough to run for office too….

It’s difficult to be serious on a snarky site, so I know I’m asking for it.

But are “vegan juice” and “Sparkle Rainbow Unicorn” expressions used to ridicule those that are outraged at the warrantless killing of American citizens by a President that was a former Harvard Professor of Constitutional Law?

I’m outraged. And I’m stunned that people regard my outrage as “sanctimonious douchebaggery” as one commenter put it.

I know there is nothing I can do about it—at least not this election. The alternatives to Obama are worse. But to scorn and ridicule people that are determined not to sit by and excuse this…I don’t know what to say. A White House kill list? An administration that actually makes the case that there is a separate “due process” and “judicial process” provided in the Constitution that makes this OK?

So there’s my bait. Snark away, people.

I agree that we need to start at the bottom and get the right people elected.

But what is it that makes you think Mittens won’t do as much and more than what you attribute to Obama? Oh I know , never mind. Gotta first blow the whole fuckimg thing to bits so you will have a clean slate to start all over again. Love that strategy, especially the images it gives me.

have at me

Why?

Aren’t you the mitchell freedman that got filleted here a couple months backs?

I’m gonna stay with what you said. The alternatives to Obama are worse. Really don’t need a name calling contest on a nice Saturday afternoon.

Only 16 comments ’til the first site scold showed up. Bravo, Mr. freedman, bravo, I say!

More phrases to add to the list: “the truth hurts,” “banksters”

Mostly anecdotal, although this Gallup poll from a month ago would tend to corroborate my assertion. It seems to me to be a fairly simple statistical assumption that more registered Democratic voters will defect to the Republicans, as has happened in the past, than will jump to the Jill Stein Juggernaut.

Yes, many Florida Democrats voted for Bush in 2000. They’re conservative, Southern Democrats, mostly in N. Florida and the Panhandle. Oh, and a few thousand perhaps voted for Buchanan by mistake. Remember the butterfly ballot, and the elderly Jewish woman who exclaimed, “Oy, i think I just voted for Hitler!”?

Uh-huh, and that was all Nader’s fault how? Look, I’m not pretending that his role was insignificant in the outcome, I’m saying that there were many factors in that outcome, most of them having a greater effect, and all of them were studiously ignored in the aftermath. And that’s the real problem, the inability to learn what should have been a fairly simple lesson.

Thank you for your comment. Yes—My particular outrage is with the rape of Constitutional due process. But the rape of the social promise of the New Deal is yet another manifestation of the same malady.

Will those that laugh now have the integrity to admit that they were wrong when it happens? Probably not, since so many of those same people were the ones applauding Sen. Obama’s claim of opposition to the FISA bill. We saw Obama’s betrayal firsthand on that, yet they are still applauding.

gunsbeforebutter at 19,

I was not filleted a few months back. I was saying that Obama was for the Grand Bargain. And I proved it then with articles from Time Magazine, the Washington Post and other sourcing. And now, with the new book on the budget negotiations, and the latest speeches from Clinton, Biden and Obama, it looks like that point was correct.

I guess you thought the DFH’s were filleted when they said don’t go into Iraq, and that Saddam did not have nukes….Yeah, that Jeneane Garafalo. That Hollywood broad sure got filleted by the Very Serious People, didn’t she?

I figured I’d show up just to see if anyone on this thread or even TBogg would admit that Obama’s pursuit of the Grand Bargain is as strong as ever. Guess not. Oh, and for those, including TBogg, who make light of Obama’s anti-civil liberties positions and actions, such humor makes this place more fit for Dana Loesch than anything we’d want to call liberal.

Jill Stein is a really nice lady and very progressive also, too. And and …… That’s about it.

The internet’s nerd boyfriend Nate Silver sees corrupt war criminal

Well, firing missiles at a funeral in hopes of killing a terrorist or two is, most likely, a war crime.

Try not to take it too personally, josephp. To some extent, virtually all politics indulges to some degree in sanctimonious douchebaggery. That’s life. But the Obama deeds you decry here and in earlier threads would be perpetuated tenfold by a Rmoney/Ryan regime. So by your own metrics, a third-party vote would tend to be impractical.

If you’re in a safe state, then rock on. If you’re in a swing state, you may want to reconsider the pragmatism of your decision. Whichever way you go, vaya con dios, Chief.

Look, assuming you’re a working-class dog like most of us, your choice is ugly — one guy probably won’t do much to improve your lot in life, the other one definitely won’t. There’s no shame in playing the dismal odds in front of you.

You’re going to have do actual work, people.

You mean shrugging, sighing, and pulling the lever for the guy whose slightly better than the other guy and doing no more is “actual work”?

And HeywoodJ, at 27: That’s all I’m saying too. We can vote for Obama in Ohio and Florida, for example, and have a chance to say no to the Property Party in Oklahoma and California.

But, really, it’s time for TBogg and some of these commenters to stop punching hippies. It’s unbecoming. Hippies are already heavily punched throughout the national discourse.

It’s been a hundred years, and here we are, still basically trying to figure out whether it’s permissible to support M. Millerand’s appointment to the Waldeck-Rousseau cabinet without selling out the Revolution…

Yeah, them and the low efficacy ’08 voters who aren’t as enthusiastic this time around. Those groups combined are a way bigger number of voters than disgruntled DFHs and 99.9% of them have no earthly idea who Jane Hamsher is.

the Obama deeds you decry here and in earlier threads would be perpetuated tenfold by a Rmoney/Ryan regime

That’s an absurd statement. Even if I believed in crystal balls, how do I know you can operate one?

Under Obama, income inequality grown worse than under George W., Obama has committed 5 times as many drone strikes as W, has deported more undocumented immigrants than W, and prosecuted more whistleblowers and fewer bankers.

W talked about cutting Social Security and people revolted; Obama talks about it and people shrug. Which is worse?

I was not filleted a few months back

Archive says “Really?”….

Yowza! Thanks for the history lesson. (Drove me to Teh Great Gazoogle, you did…)

Dems continue to hippie punch because it worked a time or two back in the 90s. These days it doesn’t impress moderates at all. I’m just shocked it’s still going on with such vigor this close to the election. If you’ve worked on a campaign you know that you win by getting your supporters out and persuading as many fence-sitters as you can. You don’t waste a moment of time with voters who absolutely won’t vote for your candidate under any circumstances, regardless of which side they’re coming from.

Chicago rather than Harvard professor.

Fair enough. Reread my post #11, I am not engaging in DFH-punching. I would say, though, that a swing-state vote for a third-party candidate would be pretty foolish, but you acknowledged that.

It’s an ugly situation we’re all caught in, whether we identify as “progressive” or merely “librul” — forced to perpetuate a vicious system that marginalizes even mild dissent, to support an ever-changing array of Lucy-with-the-football candidates, each promising a bigger and better pony, whilst trading favors with the banksters who continue to merrily gut and clean out the working class.

Still and all….Rmoney and Ryan just flat fucking suck. No way around it, and I cannot for the life of me understand an ’08 Obama voter willing to jump ship for those humps. Chickens voting for Colonel Sanders, indeed.

There you go again. Here I thought we were talking about Obama and Romney and you bring up Bush. I thought you guys wanted to make him off limits? Ain’t he the guy who lied to get us in Iraq? No matter.

Lets see I heard some right wing wingnutty say he wants to make wages competitive so we should do away with the minimum wage and then there’s this guy wants to take the 716 billion and use it for more tax breaks for the upper classes.

So you really think those kind of people are gonna let you live in peace with your unemployment insurance, SS, medicare and medicaid? And I’m pretty sure they will appoint a progressive to the supreme court next time around. right?

Do you really need a crystal ball to understand that Rmoney/Ryan would be substantially worse than Obama/Biden? I agree with everything you pointed out — and yet the choice is still clear.

Chickens voting for Colonel Sanders, indeed

Wish I’d said that.

Actually, for me the ironic part is not that swing states might be thrown by DFH’s voting for Sparkle Pony, but by bigoted black churches willing to sell out their own (and everyone else’s) futures because Teh Ghey makes the Baby Jebus cry.

Wish I’d coined it. It seems an apt re-appropriation of this. I honestly didn’t realize so many teabaggers were using it for their anti-Obama rants. I was just thinking about how former (black) Oklahoma Republican Representative J.C. Watts’ father has admonished him.

Nice point. Actually — and this really continues to puzzle me — the biggest demographic waiting to be poached is non-voters. Are they lazy? Apathetic? Or have they just given up? Is it more in the interest of the “donors” who bankroll both “parties” that such folk stay home, rather than get motivated? Obama did a decent job in motivating some of those folks in ’08; he’ll need some of them this time around, even if every single DFH comes back to the rez. Too many morans falling for Paul Ryan’s dreamy blue eyes and unctuous lies.

I will agree that the grand bargain and the four trillion dollar cut in the deficit are two of the more disappointing things I have heard from Obama in the past four years. It started with the catfood commission and continues to this day. And he keeps pushing it in the face of severe unemployment. I think if he dropped that and said he wanted a major infrastruture program to help the unemployment situation, it would go a long way to winning this thing. But then I am not a politician.

Now if he gets the four trillion out of taxing the elites ok.

The Census actually asks non-voters why they didn’t vote. “Did not like candidates or campaign issues” isn’t one of the top four or five reasons given…and hasn’t been for decades. (Link is to Excel spreadsheet. CSV version of data also available)

The respondents could all be lying because the Census is just The Man, with a clipboard, of course… and waiting, just waiting.

Oh please, how could they be worse. George the Lesser dropped millions of pounds of ordinance on two countries killing tens of thousands of innocent civilians and sent thousands of young Americans to their deaths, but according to TK421, he was five times more frugal with the drones so it is clear that Obama is a much much bigger monster.

And it’s ridiculous to imagine that two honest, upstanding family men like Romney/Ryan would ever feel they need to bolster their towering manliness by padding their resumes or unilaterally attacking another country like, say, Iran.

And how many of us died there to boot?

No, I believe them, I don’t think they’re lying, and I don’t the majority of them are lazy or apathetic. I think they’ve given up. And I think to a great extent, that suits the moneyed interests who invest heavily in the political system as is just fine.
As the IT folks say, it’s not a bug, it’s a feature.

Yes, exactly. I can see either one of them (Mittford or Paulsy) picking a fight with the mullahs just to impress Bibi.

I have huge respect for Digby under both my anonymous and real-name monikers, and I’m not going to attempt to refute what I’m not willing to take the time to read. But, the evidence is clear, to me at least, that NEITHER the Obama administration — which basically disowned the commission once it was done producing its right-leaning twaddle — NOR the radical burn-it-all-down Republican Party are going to seriously endorse or enact anything in Simpson-Bowles. The GOP crapped all over it, and their every invocation of it now is pure political hypocrisy: they killed it in the first place. Any fondness for Simpson-Bowles from the Democratic campaign is in response to the Republicans’ bullshit. They have made it clear what they want, a voucher system that kills Medicare conceptually, and forever, and slash Medicaid. Obama wants to kill Medicare advantage and bolster Medicaid.
There’s talk now of a new-look Erskine-Bowles with some sort of Grand Bargain that looks ominous for Social Security, but the atmosphere suggests that the Blue Dogs and the GOP earth scorchers are never going to come up with a compromise acceptable to the radical right wing controlling the GOP. I just think it’s a non-starter and a really poor excuse for pissing away a vote and letting Romney win — so we can get, for sure, a far worse version of Simpson-Bowles shoved down our throats.

I like to think that I punch the far left as much as I punch the far right because they both deserve it. Quite frankly, when I read posts and comments like I did yesterday where so-called progressives were complaining that the DNC convention was reveling too much in the (choose one) “murder”/assassination” of Osama bin Laden, I pretty much lost all hope that liberals have any real desire to govern for any extended period of time.

The progressive wing of the party is nothing less than the Black Bloc members of Occupy except that they spend more time setting their own houses on fire than the other guys.

Obama drone-killed Alawaki? Good. I’m glad the fucker is a smear in the desert. I don’t know why they killed his son, but I don’t think they wasted a Hellfire on him because they wanted to see if they could hit a smaller target. But, as I have said before, I’d prefer death from above to the invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan. If you want another terrorist attack on the US, this time under Obama’s watch (and believe me, he won’t get the same pass Bush did) despite the fact we could have nipped it in the bud, well then explain to me how you would deal with al Quaeda cells in the hinterlands of Pakistan and the terrorist petri dish that is Yemen..

I read Digby’s post which stated about the same thing that David did here on FDL. I just don’t have the same over-the-top reaction that they do, to say nothing of the fact that they failed to address the alternative. Ryan budget anyone? You have an idea for a better outcome for Nov 6? Then spit it out.

And quit complaining that I have not considered the serious implications of voting for Obama over Romney/Ryan, okay? Because you obviously have no fucking idea what you’re talking about.

‘Not interested’ and ‘Too busy’ lead the list, along with ‘other’, ‘out of town’ or ‘sick’

You could I suppose argue that these are just proxies for ‘no sufficiently revolutionary candidates presented themselves’….

Declined to give a reason is only 3%.

FWIW, the Vanishing Voter Project (Kennedy School of Government/Annenberg) did a big study on this topic a decade ago, and discovered that the ideological profile of non-voters was mildly, but only mildly, less conservative than that of the electorate that shows up.

Tumbrels and pitchforks don’t seem to fall into the ambit of ‘if you build them, they will come’.

Now, THAT is a fascinating spreadsheet. On an admittedly too quick glance “too busy/conflicting schedule” appears to be the main reason almost across the board. But, as you said, it’s very easy to lie on a census form. But maybe expanded voting hours (rigorously opposed by Republicans) might help.

Yeah, but it’s a spreadsheet, and that’s the problem. I’m more comfortable with data-free, off-the-cuff snark, attacks on people’s personalities, and my own cherished nostrums.

Vote-by-mail.

In Oregon we get our ballots about 2 weeks in advance of voting deadline which allows plenty of time to read the pros/cons for measures/candidates.

But as you say above, rigorously opposed by Republicans…

Know what REALLY, REALLY, REALLY should be done? Get rid of Diebold touch-screen, impossible-to-verify machines. For about 2 years down here we had “fill in the bubble and scan it” ballots, which still aren’t perfect, but at least can be verified. Then, presto-changeo, we had touch screen machines. I’ve been moderately insane about this issue for a while now…

But your silly data doesn’t produce convenient scapegoats to blame election losses on.

Which is just as well. In the same way that the demand for LL Bean windbreakers has caused the anorak to be hunted to the brink of extinction, the population of scapegoats, this being an election year, is also under tremendous pressure, thanks to the internet.

I’m thinking of beginning a captive-breeding program.

This feels like an unhealthy hobby, man.

Must….resist….political….rant….no…..one…..wants…..

Ah, fuck it.

Believe it or not, Obama is a centrist, a corporatist. He is, as a truly dear, now gone friend put it to me first, a Republican.
Not the modern, rabidly hating, science denying, dog whistling, randian assholes that are the current state of the Republican Party, but an old school, party of business but not pure insanity Republican.

Now is this an improvement over the rabidly hating, science denying, dog whistling, randian assholes that are the current state of the Republican Party? I believe so. It may not be much, but there is a difference.

Look, if you want to talk about how to move the so-called Overton Window to the left, please, let’s hear you suggestions (here is mine: help the Democrats hold the Senate this year and take your best shot with the 2016 primary).
But this is what we have right now.

And please, feel free. Continue to remind our President, and anyone who’ll listen that, just like all his predecessors for the last fifty years, he does have people killed. He does make decisions based on what is best for business and not necessarily what is best for people. He does compromise, not fulfill promises and expectations, and in some cases sell out his core supporters.

So be it. This is American politics. There is much I am not very happy with. But there are positive things too. At least the Democrats have the let’s-get-corporate-money-out-of-politics amendment plank in their platform (not that I’ll live to see it). Obama will almost certainly do better with Supreme Court nominees than Romney. Again, it may be marginal, but I’ll take what I can get.

And finally (thank you), I live in a state with a Senate seat up for grabs, and may actually get a true progressive as a Congressperson. I am going to work for them and if we win it improves things, if only by a little. And next time we’ll try again, and with more.
Politics is a long game. The Cock Brothers and the rabid right have plans over many election cycles. So should the progressives.

The progressive wing of the party is nothing less than the Black Bloc members of Occupy except that they spend more time setting their own houses on fire than the other guys.

as Joe From Lowell once said:

“The most important thing to Protest People is their self-image as Protest People. If they’re the first to denounce something, that gets them mega-points on the Protest People scale.”

the self-appointed liberal base are Protest People: people who act as if they want nothing more than for everyone to know how pure their ideology is. and they do this by finding (or inventing) things to complain about. as long as other people know how pure they are, it’s all good.

Believe it or not, Obama is a centrist, a corporatist. He is, as a truly dear, now gone friend put it to me first, a Republican.
Not the modern, rabidly hating, science denying, dog whistling, randian assholes that are the current state of the Republican Party, but an old school, party of business but not pure insanity Republican.

what makes this notion ring false is: there is no time in history when Obama could have ever been a Republican. even if he was white. there is no time when a pro-gay-marriage, pro-choice, pro-women, non-Commie-seeking, non-Bible-beating, non-culture-warring community organizer could have been a Republican nominee. never. the GOP has never been that socially liberal.

you have to ignore every bit of his record and his personality except his passivity towards big business to say he’s a Republican.

as if he was the first Democrat to ever play nice with big business….

….you have to ignore every bit of his record and his personality except his passivity towards big business to say he’s a Republican.

And so one ignores it. One does what one must do, to make the point one wants to make. Few of us are innocent of the same crime.

The internet’s nerd boyfriend

you’re incorrigible TBogg

What TBogg said. ;-)

I want to have the system hobble on for awhile (as it will under the Dems) rather than blow apart (as it will under the Reps) for these simple reasons:

1) What happens to the experiments with economic democracy (aka employee-owned/run businesses) such as the Mondragon Corporation and the similar venture being set up by the United Steelworkers if the system collapses before a new and better one is ready to take its place?

2) When things fall apart, people get frightened, especially if they have no clue why things are falling apart. When they get frightened, their normal reaction is not to become more open and friendly and liberal, but to look for the nearest authoritarian Daddy Figure to lead the way to stability. (See also: 1930s Germany, 1980s America, 2000s America.)

Expand on this and post it over at MyFDL! (Or I will. But I’ll be sure to credit you.)

I notice that “Too Busy/Conflicting Schedule” is the #1 reason; around 26% of respondents listed that; assuming the respondents weren’t lying because they didn’t want to sound unpatriotic, the way to fix this is to push for mail-in voting and/or extended voting hours/days. A distant second, clocking in around 17%, is “Not Interested”.

Shine on, you crazy diamond.

By the way, the comments over at Todd Gitlin’s book salon are well worth reading and you should not miss the couple of times when Gitlin rolls up his book and smacks some snouts with it.

Hilarity ensued…

Better yet, put election day on Saturday and make it mandatory to vote, as in Australia. Couldn’t hurt.

He’s not much different from Ronny, and he’s more conservative than Tricky Dicky was. So yes, he’s an old-style Republican.

I think you’re looking at the loud left-wing minority and mistaking them for the base.

It can be really difficult when you have a long commute, and the polls close too soon after you get home (at best) or before you get home (at worst).

real funny Tbogg, now take the quiz and tell me who shares your values…
http://www.isidewith.com/presidential-election-quiz?fbp=i8&from=98390611

I live in the deepest red of states, there is exactly 0% chance Obama will carry Mississippi, so I have the luxury of voting my conscience…and if the Greens get automatic ballot access in 2 years as a result, I may even run on their ticket for the House. So there! NYAAA NYAAAA!

I do wish people would stop confusing two very different questions:
(1) How do I vote in the November Presidential election?
(2) How do I best help to create a better society?
Capiche?

guns, thanks for the Archive link … I remember that one well, as evidently mf hopes we don’t.

Please keep us updated on your progress.

Now now, let’s be nice.
If I was going to compare Obama to a Republican I would pick Nelson Rockefeller (and yes, I remember Attica).

MF? He gone!

Obama is nicer than Ronny – he doesn’t seem to hate women, minorities, and students. I wish he’d stop believing whatever he’s told by older white men, though, and trying to get the GOP to compromise on any of their dearly-held policies. And these days Rockefeller would be a Democrat, too.

I think you’re looking at the loud left-wing minority and mistaking them for the base.

oh no. not at all.

the only people who mistake them for the base are the loud minority themselves: idiotically, constantly.

that’s why wrote “self-appointed”.

In Ohio, they send you applications for absentee voting–you don’t have to have a reason–and I take mine in person to the Board of Elections. Thrice-burned, forever careful.
When I talked to people in my town about registering to vote, I found quite a few were under the impression that they could never vote again because they had been in jail. And the Board of Elections even got it wrong and told people they couldn’t vote…Blackwell was the Sec of State then, so it may not have been an ‘error,’ as it was described in the news.
It was very hard to persuade people. One woman said she was afraid she’d go back to jail and lose her children if she tried to vote. She confided in her child’s school counselor, who got on the phone and talked to someone in Columbus until the woman really believed her and registered. This was a huge victory. It took 4 years but it was sweet.

Save the Naugas.

For the fucking win.

The progressive wing of the party is nothing less than the Black Bloc members of Occupy except that they spend more time setting their own houses on fire than the other guys.

T’s little rant above apparently includes a lot of people like me, broadly caricaturing progressives. I voted devotedly, never made a “protest vote” and have been further left than anyone I put into office, even locally. I am voting for Obama for the greater good of the country, he has not done me a lick of good personally. No matter. I dislike some of Obama’s policies, but he is considerably better in some areas where I thought he wouldn’t be and there really is no choice.

Mr. Bogg, you’re an ass at times, this is another. I remember when you posted a reply to me years ago about how well you did under Reagan. You may have done great under Reagan, but I never understood why you needed to brag about it.

Ohmygawd. That is pitiful. In the true sense of the word, not the snarky one. How terrible that we have filled people with so much fear that they think they could lose their kids if they tried to vote.

I blame the whole atmosphere of “voter fraud! voter fraud!” hysteria in part for such fears. So sad.

Ah, Mr. Bogg, I just noticed the new tag:

just fucking with you guys now

I appreciate quality readership trolling myself, but as I’m sure you know, it’s a competitive field. Here’s a recent example, authored by a known Troll Master.

I’m glad to see our third rate humorist has come out of his closet on the morality of Drone Murder of Amerikan citizens he disagrees with. Not only does he mock those with a conscience but he mocks the document our country is based on.

I’m very glad that he has shown his true nature which he shares with our President and apparently with many other Liberals and Conservatives.

It may be time for MR Bogg to run for office so he can join the ranks of other Leaders with these enlightened views.

But, the evidence is clear, to me at least, that NEITHER the Obama administration — which basically disowned the commission once it was done producing its right-leaning twaddle — NOR the radical burn-it-all-down Republican Party are going to seriously endorse or enact anything in Simpson-Bowles

Whatever you’re on, I want some. Because you might have a heck of a surprise in a few months, but you’re gonna enjoy the intervening space.

The only thing that might save us from a Grand Bargain is the childish racist hate of the KKKTeabaggers.

It’s too late for the nauga… all that can be found are a few mounted specimens in thrift stores.

Sniff….

Be my guest. The data’s freely available and I’ve been banging on about it biennially for a decade with no detectable impact.

There’s an immutable belief in vast numbers of non-voters, all, or mostly all, to the left of the folks who presently turn out, who are just waiting for the call to expropriate the expropriators from an appropriately radical figure — and it turns out to be mostly logistics keeping folks from the polls.

I’ve been a DSA/USA member since DSOC days. I’d like to believe it’s so, too, but there’s no evidence to support it, but it goes soldiering on.

Better trolls for these Hot Troll-on-Troll Troll Porn posts, please. Or has a logical purity limit for FDL been achieved?

I knew one of the big foundations was rolling the non-voter stone, but it’s Pew, not Annenberg.

They’ve got a lot of stuff on 2010…

I don’t know why they killed his son, but I don’t think they wasted a Hellfire on him because they wanted to see if they could hit a smaller target. But, as I have said before, I’d prefer death from above to the invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan.

Wow. Are those the only choices?

As a former member of the “death from above” gang (AH-1G Cobra), I can say with some authority that “hitting a smaller target” is exactly the game we played. It was still murder.

Maybe because I have “seen the elephant”, my reaction is more visceral than the average person.

War is the enemy.

BOHICA
RA18960500
Repentant ex member of Murder Inc.
Southeast Asia Division

But, as I have said before, I’d prefer death from above to the invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan.

Here is an honest endorsement of the virtues of “the lesser of two evils,” or as advocates like to say, “the perfect is the enemy of the good.”

Let’s face it, in order to efficiently feed the masses, you must accept a few rat hairs in your Snickers. Campaigning for better FDA oversight will only result in the bankruptcy of big ag and the death of millions, so back off you idealistic watchdogs of the commons.

MLK was shrill and, as Trent Lott pointed out, if Strom had won in ’48, “we wouldn’t have had all these problems.”

So courageous, so practical.

It’s not Nader’s fault that those conservative Democrats voted for Bush, but was it Gore’s fault? What should he have done differently? He wasn’t conservative enough? Nader supporters complain that national Democratic candidates are way too conservative. The vote in Florida was so close that any one factor could be seen as making the difference, including Nader’s presence on the ballot.

Thanks!

One of the things that’s so insidious about the ALEC vote suppression bills is that they depend on white voters’ understanding that the intent is to keep nonwhites from voting. Which is why opponents focusing on that angle may be actually helping rather than hurting these bills. Sadly, it’s probably better to focus on the cost argument — namely, the fact that these bills will cost state and especially local (and really especially rural local) governments tons of money (Minnesota’s Kittson County is looking at a staggering bill of $160 per person — not per voter, per person — if Minnesotans approve the ALEC voter suppression amendment) at a time when GOP state legislatures have already slashed local monies.

I think it’s safe to say that all of the people who regularly comment here are to the left of every candidate they’ve ever voted for.

I think it’s also safe to say that all of them have, every time they’ve cast a vote, voted for someone who didn’t agree with them on every single issue.

What’s tiresome is the continued bleating that somehow it makes one more liberal, lofty, whatever for doggedly pointing out that the people we ALL vote for are less than perfect. As adults, we already know this.

Does this mean you are wrong if you point out that you have moral problems with the use of drone strikes? No. But it also doesn’t make you in any way better than someone else who points out that you have two choices, one of which will continue to use drone strikes, and the other of which will mount full-scale invasions. Essentially, it just makes you someone who likes to point out the obvious – that there are moral issues involved in drone strikes. Doesn’t mean everyone else who doesn’t endlessly point out those moral issues can’t see them as well. Just means that they aren’t looking at that one thing alone as the one and only issue determining how they’ll vote.

Like it or not, the way this bitch is set up, your next president is going to be one of two people. In other words, you’re ALWAYS going to be choosing from the lesser of two evils, because as previously noted, you aren’t ever going to be presented with a candidate who you agree with on everything 100%. If that is your expectation, you need to run for office, because you’re the only person who can meet that criteria. In the meantime, it’s a bit juvenile to sit around puling about how everyone who recognizes the reality of the system is less pure than thou. Suppose we are? We’re still going to have one of two people as the next president. That would continue to be the reality even if we amped up our purity level to 11. So essentially it’s a pointless exercise in terms of having any actual impact, though I understand that it may make some people feel better about themselves to constantly point out to the rest of us how much purer and more moral they are. And FWIW, I’ve been involved in at least one epic flamewar here – regarding how our president was a hopeless sell-out for not announcing his support of gay marriage on the timeline that certain people wanted to see – and so I am well acquainted with being at the bottom of the pile-on. But the difference is, I was right in my contention that actions were more important than words, and that ill-timed words could set the issue back rather than moving it forward, and the president did finally say about a year later what folks on the other side of that argument were insisting had to be said immediately or else. He simply chose his own time to do it, and as I had noted, it really didn’t change anything WRT actual law when he did, so the fact that it came a year later than some wanted didn’t have any concrete real-world impact – as I had noted in that epic flamewar a year previously.

Which is to say, we all find ourselves out of step with majority opinion – in any given setting – from time to time. But to constantly re-hash the same thing over and over and over again doesn’t change anything in the same way as it doesn’t prove that anyone is better or purer. It’s just masturbation – it may serve the purpose of self-pleasure, but it doesn’t accomplish anything else.

There might still be time to save the Spanda Ranchers though. Your donation of only $19.95 per day will help provide badly needed fencing. And as an added bonus we promise not to publish pictures of Sarah Palin in running shorts.

33-yard pass from Sanchez for a 14-0 lead. There should be no need for Tebow posts for some time.

…you’re ALWAYS going to be choosing from the lesser of two evils, because as previously noted, you aren’t ever going to be presented with a candidate who you agree with on everything 100%… it’s a bit juvenile to sit around puling about how everyone who recognizes the reality of the system is less pure than thou…We’re still going to have one of two people as the next president. That would continue to be the reality even if we amped up our purity level to 11. So essentially it’s a pointless exercise in terms of having any actual impact, though I understand that it may make some people feel better about themselves to constantly point out to the rest of us how much purer and more moral they are.

Decrepatory strawman construct aside, I really don’t disagree with anything you say. I’d just like to remind you just who is tossing the bombs here.

I realize that this is primarily a humor site, so I take much of it with a huge grain of salt (and that is why you won’t find me here “puling” very often.) But the cover of humor only goes so far, and even the best of them occasionally step in it (ask self-professed “clown” Rush Limbaugh, or ref. Michael Richards’ unfortunate meltdown). Frankly, very often the snark delivered here at a well-deserving right at times exceeds my comfort zone, but I am not of the righteous, and have no trouble keeping my own counsel.

However, there is a certain hypocritical lack of self-awareness on this issue. In his clearly defensible efforts to take the air out of lofty lefties, TBogg has demonstrated his own tendencies towards purity policing to the point of air-punching his own imaginary opposition. I’m a practical person, and I can appreciate realpolitik as well as the next non-hysteric, but these “Mumia t-shirt” rants go beyond merely puncturing the pontifications of the minority of “masturbating” liberal self-promoters (they are real, but they are a minority, and to aver otherwise is to hand the right the bouquet of snickering that they so delight in.)

They go beyond the taunting of this minority, into the deprecation of ideals and idealism that motivate progressivism itself. Mock it if you must, but holding these truths close is what keeps one’s “eyes on the prize” even as we are forced to navigate the muddier canals of political reality. I deeply resent this being characterized as “masturbation.”

If I believe that better behavior from my representatives is a possibility, that does not necessarily mean that I endeavor to subvert the sad practicality of the “lesser evil,” or that I shall stumble upon that path inadvertently in my righteous ignorance. But I find it very difficult to extend grace to someone who can nakedly state that they’d “prefer death from above” and then hide behind the lofty superiority of some brand of Machiavellian humor.

Some things just ain’t funny, and I would be more assured in enjoying the sharp wit on display here (and I have linked to stellar examples TBogg’s sharp observations, and surely will again) if he might dial back some of this repetitive “puling” over his DFH strawman, embarrassingly amplified and echoed by some of his more reactionary commenters who do not well-acquit his point.

Well said, and very polite. There is an additional irritation, which I haven’t seen anyone mention today: the theme that Obama will never be forced to the left unless we take every opportunity to tie weights on his legs and set up hoops he has to crawl through to beat his massively funded return-to-the-dark-ages opposition. The thing that pisses most of us off is that we all may have to pay very dearly, probably for the rest of our lives and maybe those of our descendants, because of the tunnel vision and ideological analism of others.

Hating to explain humor, I’m just giving the same over the top treatment to the far left that I usually give to the far right. I think the response to it is more of a whose ox is being gored response. What is good for the bull goose loonies is good for the purity navel ganderers.

Fair enough, and I appreciate the gracious response, TBogg.

What should [Gore] have done differently?

Hell, I dunno, maybe won his home state. That would have taken Florida off the table altogether. Jesus H. Tapdancing Christ, even McGovern and Mondale won their home states. But I’m sure that’s Nader’s fault as well. As is a bunch of apparently blind people voting for Pat Buchanan.

Consider also the major factor that, while Bill Clinton is being fast-tracked for sainthood nowadays, at the time he had basically fucked off his final two years in office, did nothing noteworthy besides signing the repealment of Glass-Steagall, effectively Rubinizing the economy and making open season for the banksters. He and Gore didn’t get along by then, so he didn’t campaign for Gore. So many different factors in play there, yet people just return to one, preferring to ignore all the others.

Again, I am not saying that Nader’s presence on the Florida ballot was a non-factor. But the numbers don’t lie — twelve times as many Florida Democrats defected for Bush than did for Nader. Do we have twelve times the whinging over their rank apostasy, their feckless, traitorous conduct? Hell no, there’s never been one one-hundredth of the garment-rending.

And again, it’s not the picking on Big Bad Ralph that annoys me, so much as the fact that the incessant scapegoating of him allowed the Democrats to avoiding the other very real factors of why they lost in 2000, and not doing anything about those factors. It was all Ralph’s fault, so they were absolved of everything else, whatever and ever, amen.

Actually McGovern did NOT win South Dakota. He won Massachusetts and DeeCee

OK, thanks for the correction. My bad on McGovern. But Gore still should have won his home state (yes, I know, a very tough sell as the southern states have decided to swim in the kool-aid), and his failure to do so is no one else’s fault.

Great post TBogg!

I don’t actually see it as that big of a mark against Gore that he lost his home state, given that by that time he hadn’t represented them in 8 years, hadn’t lived there in many more, and the entire region was growing ever more reactionary during that time.

What I DO fault him for was not at least sending Clinton out to campaign in HIS home state of Arkansas for a couple of weeks prior to the election. Bush didn’t win Arkansas by all that much and Clinton could not have hurt Gore here; a win in Arkansas would have also meant that Florida didn’t matter. To this day it remains inexplicable to me why he didn’t even send Clinton out for him on Clinton’s own home turf; he gave away his biggest advantage in the campaign by not using Clinton as a surrogate…especially where it had no chance of hurting him.

But the numbers don’t lie — twelve times as many Florida Democrats defected for Bush than did for Nader. Do we have twelve times the whinging over their rank apostasy, their feckless, traitorous conduct? Hell no, there’s never been one one-hundredth of the garment-rending.

Because they did it quietly, rather than flooding forums with obnoxious screeching about their clean conscience and calls for everyone to stay home rather than sully themselves by making a difficult, realistic choice.

So here it is, the nub of the argument now: Jack Kirby’s The New Puritans feel picked on. “Billy does worse stuff but Momma doesn’t yell at him. I’m gonna lay down in the street and cry and cry and cry and then you’ll all be sorry!”

*lays down on lawn just off sidewalk instead*

“I’m a martyr!!”

all we have to do is hang on until december 21.

then mayageddon will take us all.

Yes, he ran a dismal campaign. To be fair to Gore, he was simultaneously trying to run on the successes of the Clinton administration and get out from under the media-created shadow of “Clinton fatigue”. But still a poorly-run and strategized campaign.

I would stipulate that the conscience of a Democrat who voted for Ralph Nader is substantially cleaner than that of a Democrat who voted for C-Plus Augustus.

Or, for that matter, a Democrat who plans to vote for Buzz Killington and his little Randroid hetero life-mate. My question continues to be, is there a more constructive way to keep those folks from defecting, the Democrats who might vote for Rmoney?

FWIW, I do think the Dems acquitted themselves fairly well, aside from their continued inability to tell the jebus freaks in the peanut gallery to go fuck themselves with their ankle-biting, But strategically, it was probably a good move to god up the platform, keep it from being another bullshit distraction.

And Obama and Clinton had very nice speeches. Hell, with Clinton you could close your eyes and pretend for a moment that you weren’t listening to the man who helped Phil Gramm turn the economy into a giant pyramid scheme.

You…really don’t understand that there’s more at stake that your pure, clean conscience, do you? You really don’t.

Do you want to know why we rant about pseudoprogressive Naderheads? Because you’re so damned predictable. Every election, like clockwork, you scuttle out from under your rocks and start it up: WE HAVE BEEN BETRAYED BY OUR CHAMPION! DON’T VOTE! LET THE GOP WIN THIS ONE…AGAIN! BUT KEEP YOURSELVES PURE! PURE, LIKE ME! MEEE!

I still have on my hard drive a LTTE from a San Francisco resident who swore that if Hillary Clinton “stole” the 2008 nomination from Obama, he would vote Republican.

He would’ve voted McCain/Palin because of his hurt butt.

And I’m sure he’s sitting somewhere right now screaming about his pure, clean conscience, mad at the very man he thought shared his purity and cleanliness. Because a self-proclaimed genius never, ever learns.

Gore let both Lieberman and Tipper sway him as they both were still mad at Clinton for being a horndog. Gore soon learned not to trust Short Ride Joe on anything, and he’s no longer married to Tipper.

Are you having flashbacks to 1980, too? When Teddy Kennedy deliberately inflamed his purity-obsessed followers against Carter so much in his ultimately futile and destructive primary challenge that they stayed home that year and let Reagan squeak out a win?

If Teddy had stood down back in March of 1980 and shook hands with Jimmy, the intra-party wounds would have healed long before November and the Democrats would have beat Old Senile handily. Which means we’d still have a marginal tax rate of 71% (which means we’d have no debt), we’d still have a middle class, and we’d have had three decades of serious commitment to solar and wind power, which also means that we’d have already begun to do serious reductions in our collective carbon footprint and be a lot further along in ditching fossil fuels. Hell, we might have already gone totally off of them by now.

Sigh.

Better news today. Nate has Bamz at 318 and romney at 219, giving Bamz an 80% chance of winning.

Saw romney speaking with David Gregory over the weekend. romney sez he wants to, of all things, close tax loopholes for the wealthiest Americans. WTF?!?

While he simultaneously advocates for trillions in tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans on the ideological grounds that the rich are the job creators?

Hold on here. Following romneys ideology, since he believes that jobs are created by putting more money in the hands of the wealthy, he now says we should take away money (tax loopholes) from the wealthy? By his own pronouncements, that would cost jobs?

Im dizzy from romenys continuous spin.

I think this

He does make decisions based on what is best for business and not necessarily what is best for people.

is the one bone I have to pick with your statement. Unlike the Keenyan Uslurper, I’m an actual socialist. But if I had been faced with Obama’s bag of maggoty seconds he got handed, I don’t know if I would have done anything differently… if I were also a blah. Being white, however, I might could have gone more populist than Obama (being a Scary Near-Man) felt was within his abilities to push in this here Corprocracy.

You see, I have no illusions about what is possible in American politics. Hell, after Bush II: Electric Cattle Prod Board-a-Roo, I’m amazed we haven’t all been stacked as batteries for dinnertime lightshows for the .01%. The fact that we got a decently progressive (closer to German-style) healthcare arrangement agreed to is remarkable, as are the advances in gay rights. But I think Obama is thinking pragmatically, not venally, when his agenda is not as hard on business fuckheadedness as it should be. I think he knows who the press works for, and every morning he is reminded of the 238 years of history pressing down on him and squeezing his options when he looks in the mirror and sees his beautiful brown skin. I think he has done what he could, and Americans, the voting-averse, history denying cuties that we are, barely deserve even that.

Call me naive, but just don’t call me Shirley.

mitchell writes: But you folks and again TBogg must take some responsibility when Obama undermines the entitlements and continues to support the banksters against the declining middle class.

Which is of course why he bargained for an extension of unemployment benefits, and gave up something in return, yeah, hates the middle class, dummy.

joseph writes: But are “vegan juice” and “Sparkle Rainbow Unicorn” expressions used to ridicule those that are outraged at the warrantless killing of American citizens by a President that was a former Harvard Professor of Constitutional Law?

[sigh] There it is again, the “my God but he’s an American citizen” complaint.

First go read your contract, Sonny. The constitution guarantees rights to “the people”, in other words, whoever happens to be on US soil. Your bigotry is noted, in which you feel that an American has better status than those brown skinned foreigners.

Second, the constitution does not, should not, and did not protect John Dillinger from being shot down as he emerged from the Biograph Theater in Chicago. As you may recall he was top of the pops on the FBI’s “Most Wanted” list and he was not afforded a trial before being shot down like a mad dog. Yes, there was due process, but as is repeatedly explained, not judicial process, get it, mug? See, mug? Mug mug mug?

Third, the same applies to terrorists on the “kill list” you describe. It is actually more of a “kill if they cannot be taken into custody” list by the way, and has existed as long as there has been a United States of America. The difference is that for the first time, an American President has said I want to have the final word and personally sign off on whoever it is instead of relegating it off to the CIA or military, ducking the responsibility.

That’s why you know about this, honey, because he’s not pretending to not know about it. That’s an act of courage, by the way.

TK421 writes: Obama has committed 5 times as many drone strikes as W, has deported more undocumented immigrants than W, and prosecuted more whistleblowers and fewer bankers.

In so noting, you’d have to concede that Obama has carpet bombed far fewer residential neihgborhoods, senselessly invaded far fewer countries, murdered far fewer hundreds of thousands of non-combatants, destroyed far fewer public infrastructures unrelated to war, and committed far less genocide.

Don’t you think?

Thw whole point of the drone strikes is to avoid the kind of widespread collateral damage that you and Dubya couldn’t have a harder dick about.

Asshole.

You know what’s like hippie punching? Actually punching hippies.

A mitchell freedman who had any integrity would have said: “Despite 3+ years of doom and gloom predictions by the real Progressives of the blogosphere, the laws that have passed under Obama have not cut Social Security, Medicare, or, especially, Medicaid benefits. In fact, Obamacare actually increased benefits offered under Medicare, and greatly increased funding for Medicaid. It seems all of our scaremongering has been wrong.”

Don’t be so frikkin calm and rational. It makes shouted hyperbole look like hyperbole, only shouted.

Test

Hey. Asshole. I’m voting for Obama. Never said I wasn’t.

But it’s precisely the insufferable, arrogant bullshit such as yours that accounts for why I won’t indulge in DFH-punching, not as long as there’s people who actually jump party just to be dickheads. Misplaced idealism, I understand, even when I disagree with it. But there’s no excuse for voting out of pure spite. Those are the assholes who grind my gears. I cannot get worked up over a couple hundred Portlandians and upstate New Yorkers.

Anyhoo, get off your cross already, the rest of us could use the wood. Very few people are going to go the DFH route and vote for Stein. You should be more worried about black churches in southern swing states staying home because of Teh Ghey. Or butthurt Floridians either going Rmoney or Buchanan, depending on ballot design.

This is a really good point. There’s no mistaking that droning a wedding party and taking out a few dozen civilians along with the two or three actual bad guys sucks balls.

And then you think about what we did (for just one egregious example) to Fallujah, where after one failed siege in the spring of an election year, we went all out for the fall version, saturating it in white phosphorus, killing anything that moved, blasting holes in every building, and cordoning off the entire city with biometric scans at all points of entry. That’s so much worse, it scarcely bears mentioning.

Drone warfare can and will be subject to a lot of questionable behavior in the years to come, especially since the tech for it is conceivably within reach of non-military actors (i.e., terrorists). But for the time being, it allows us to avoid the extensive collateral damage we inflicted over the last decade in Afghanistan.

As for al-Awlaki. I’m with the “fuck that guy” crowd. I don’t like that it was done extrajudicially, but I can live with preventing him from inciting future Fort Hood massacres.

My integrity is intact. Obama made the deal with the Republican leadership to cut Social Security and Medicare, and they like the nutcases they are, rejected it. He just said to CBS News tonight he’d do it again.

As for TBogg, I had initially decided not to reply to his abusive vitriol, but since some commenters think I just slinked away, I guess I should respond this evening: Yes, TBogg, the Romney/Ryan plans are worse than Obama’s. No doubt about it. But let’s recall in 2005, when the Republicans controlled everything, and Bush II wanted to start undermining Social Security, the Democrats in Congress showed their backbone and were united against him. That’s what would likely happen again if President Romney tried to undermine Social Security and Medicare. Obama, on the other hand, once he goes for the Grand Bargain again, will give cover to enough Democrats to get the deal passed. Just like Clinton did with the NAFTA and the WTO, and again with “welfare reform” and the repeal of Glass-Stegall. It’s Nixon goes to China in reverse…

The problem I see at this website is that most of the vitriolic folks, including TBogg, don’t really give a damn about the decline of the middle class, and the causes of that, which are the loss of our manufacturing base, the loss of private sector unions and the codification of the international economic trends through the institutions created through the NAFTA and WTO. These folks see that decline of the middle class as inevitable and irreversible, so they are focused far more on the cultural issues. Those of us who support labor union reform (the ECA), tariffs to restore the manufacturing base and massive infrastructure redevelopment are seen as focused on something narrow, when folks like me see this as fundamental and affecting every working class and poor man, woman and child in this nation. Obama, like Clinton before him, would rather listen to people like Rubin, Geithner and the like who side with the financiers and corporate leaders. That’s his record. That’s his view, even in his book the Audacity of Hope, where he just sees no room for protectionist policies. That’s his view when he infamously said there were no shovel ready projects (his stimulus was nearly 70% tax cuts and maintenance (food stamps and extended unemployment), and less than 15% was infrastructure driven, and most of that money never even was spent when he had the power to do it.).

The thing that really struck me about TBogg’s rant (at #53) was his hatred for Glenn Greenwald, which TBogg lacked the guts to identify by name, and his FoxNews sort of view that drone attacks are really saving us. There is plenty of evidence that the drone attacks are leading to more terrorist recruits, especially when weddings are bombed. Since the terrorists know our airports are now fairly well hardened, and since we’re bogged down in Afghanistan, they simply strike us there. And let’s recall that 9/11 happened not because we did not bomb enough people, but because we failed to harden our airport security like European governments did in the spring and summer of 2001. It was criminal negligence on the part of the Bush-Cheney regime (I am not a conspiracy theorist on 9/11, I should make clear).

I have said my peace. I am likely voting for Jill Stein here in CA. I’d vote for her in a New York minute in Oklahoma. I would vote for Obama in Florida or Ohio because Obama is better than Romney on the issues of the Supreme Court nominations and women’s issues, and then I’d pray that we can get enough Democrats to stand up to Obama to stop the Grand Bargain that undermines the rest of the New Deal. Let’s just hope they don’t cut the deal in a lame duck Congress if Obama is re-elected….

Wordy moron writes: My integrity is intact. Obama made the deal with the Republican leadership to cut Social Security and Medicare, and they like the nutcases they are, rejected it. He just said to CBS News tonight he’d do it again

Okay, fair enough, show your work and we’ll talk about it.

Wordy moron continues: I have said my peace.

Okay I think we’re done here.

Obama made the deal with the Republican leadership to cut Social Security and Medicare, and they like the nutcases they are, rejected it.

Funny how that worked out, no? The repubs very publicly stated they would not accept any compromise with even one dollar of new taxes, and the President offered a deal that had a trillion dollars of new taxes. It’s almost like it was not a serious offer at all!

There is plenty of evidence that the drone attacks are leading to more terrorist recruits

This is a platitude often repeated on fdl without a shred of supporting evidence. This notion that “terrorists” are created by a personal need for revenge is vapid. It ignores the long-term social and political factors that actually motivate said “terrorists”, and turns them into emo assholes.