Jo, a good start

Moon of Alabama

Fire Bob shrum and make certain that he is never allowed anywhwere near a Democratic campaign ever again. I'm recommending exile to St. Helena.

I have been involved in politics at the local level for over a local. If we are to take back the Congress and the Presidency we need to start to take back our own local goverments. Grassroots is just that grassroots. School Boards, Municipal Councils, County goverments, building workable local organizations that have a stake in who wins up the line is important. One other point losing is part of it, it how you learn, and how you become hungry. It is not easy and it is not as glamorous a Presidential campaign but it is the necessary groundwork that must be done if we are to take back Congress and the Presidency.

Paul,
Excellent point. Local. That's how they started. What kinds of local issues are attractive? Paul? Anyone? What kind of election cycles are talking about? Tell me more.

Howard Dean, the fellow who showed Weasel was vulnerable, said months ago things need to be started at a local level. He also said we need the folks who are being hurt the most by Repug/ McKinley era economic practices back in the Democratic fold. (The guy driving the pick up with the Confedrate battle flag in the window).

Organize an economic boycott of red state resort/ vacation areas. Skiing in CO, Outer Banks of NC, SC, spring break in FL as a beginning. Coors Beer. Stop trading with the local repug merchants, insurance agents, etc. in your neighborhood or town. Perhaps the civil service or the teachers' unions could compile the hit lists. Or, perhaps the UAW and the CWA and steelworkers. All of this as you start getting ready for the 06 Congressional elections.

I've been talking to my sister since last night and we've come up with four ideas:

1) Impeachment. So many lies, it will be difficult to pick just one. We're thinking Kucinich, Wrangle or Conyers to sponsor.

2) Fillibuster and fillibuster some more. Every single piece of legislation. This is not a time to roll over and wring our hands. This is a time to get to work.

3) Create a 527 and just hammer at them like they did to Clinton.

4) Take back the party at every level. Local stuff is a great idea, but I don't think people make enough of an issue of WHY things suck locally (no federal money, so budgets are slashed), and that really needs to change.

Good for you, Jo. I'm glad you are thinking positively. I lived through 12 years of Reagan/Bush, we can do this. I haven't checked the news today, because I'm still so sad and disillusioned, and it took me hours and hours to even go online. But my sadness is becoming more manageable and I hope we can do this.

Lt. you want an old blackshoe Chief along for the ride as long as I am here in this country I used to call home, I guess that I should gear up and fight an honest effin war, not like the one that Kerry and the rest of us fought in... I for one, am in correspondence with family and friends on my home island and we're going to ratfuck americans... Sorry, your country has fucked up the world and you ALL gonna pay... Since I am now French and the average murican don't like us too much either.. Thought that I would make em dislike us even more...

Nicholas D. Kristof wrote about what Democrats need to do in a column in the NY
Times 11/3/04 titled "Living Poor, Voting Rich"in which he explains how the repubs emphasize "culturally powerful but content-free issues" while Dems want to talk about issues that really SHOULD matter the most to most of the people. "They've created those social issues to get the public to stop looking at what's happening to them economically". So what to do? It's not that Dems have any lower values on the whole than Repubs, so we need to learn how to let people know that "the Dem's Party efforts to improve the lives of working-class Americans in the long run will be blocked by the very people the Dem's aim to please". We need to project our values and show a little more respect for theirs, no matter the gag reflex.

PS ...and to not be so arogant.

The article:

http://www.nytimes.com/2004/11/03/opinion/03kris.html

Leave it to a naval aviator to stay so cool and collected in the face of imminent disaster. (HMFIC--gawd, I haven't heard that expression in a bazillion years!)

A distinct absence of whining, excuse-making, victimhood, wild conspiracy theories here--just what I'd expect of a guy who's made night traps.

Fire Terry McAulliffe, not Bob Shrum. McAulliffe has supervised three consecutive ramp strikes for Dems now; when are y'all going to wake up! Three steps, blindfold, cigar, and over the side he goes! (Better yet, toss him off the tail and let the MarDet get a bit of machine-gun practice in.)

Kristof is somewhat on target, but he's mostly wrong in that he holds a Marxian (not Marxist!) view that people are primarily economic beings. They're not; they're relational beings, and they care about their families and the society they see around them all going to hell. The "values" issues are not a gimic or a deliberate "wedge" issue. It's what Joe and Jane America care about.

Just posted this at Ruminate This! Hope it helps (1st US, 7th Cav, 3rd Air Armored Assault, 1972-74)

I want to thank Lisa (hoping she has time to see this) for putting this site up, and for allowing you to moderate through her times of trial (I hope things are improving - update please).

And I want to share a couple of things.

I think sleeping with a loaded .223 under the mattress, and a loaded .45 under the pillow... is NUTS! But I know a dozen guys just like me 'round here that weren't doing that two years ago. What happened to the lessons we learned thirty years ago?

I came home from The War thirty years ago, helled 'round a bit (you know... Harleys... sex, drugs and Rock&Roll!) and settled down to a life in the woods (Helicopters! - sex, drugs and Rock&Roll!). Fifteen years ago or so the woods fell apart and, raising four children alone, I went to college. Seven years ago I became a denizen of The Net. Through all that time I, like so many before me, held forth that "Fuck IT, my vote was in '72".

Yesterday, I was as responsible for the mess we are in as any who voted for the guy who was AWOL when I did my Tour of Duty, a deserter in the time of war, in '00.

Today I'm an activist. I registered this year, as is our ability here, as "No Party Affilaition". Non-Partisian. Specifically to speak out against - to shout down - this nations' spiral into Fascism.

Voted a mixed ticket.

We didn't lose. We started something that will take some time to "win". And there are a lot of guys out there that think that sleeping with a .223 under the mattress, a .45 under the pillow, is just NUTS!

At one point in life we jokingly proposed the Party for a Liberal Democracy (PLD - Peace, Love and Dope). Today I propose... the Pissed Off Pistol Packing Progressives.

I agree. I see what's happening. An age-old darkness has descended on America in an attempt to destroy the light of our democracy.

I know one weakness of the Repubs...the truth. One truth especially riles them...that conservatives crucified Jesus Christ. How do I know this? I've read the Four Gospels. Whoever killed Jesus, or had him killed, practiced the "death penalty," right? They also accused Jesus of "doing the work of the devil," and of being a "blasphemer and heretic." So, who do you know who believes in the "death penalty" and often uses these words, or variations, just before the censorship or killing begins? CONSERVATIVES!!!!!! I rest my case.

Of course, if you risk bringing this up in conversation with a conservative, then you also risk being crucified like Jesus was. Nothing has changed in thousands of years. Check out history. Look for those words. What resulted each time they were uttered? Jesus being crucified again by a bunch of conservatives. Yesterday's election is just another sad example of the same sorry conservative attitude reappearing to haunt the world.

(Oh, I sent my observation to Ann Coulter's website and got placed on their spam hit list. Figures.)

(Re-read the Four Gospels. Jesus was a Liberal. His killers were conservative. This is why no conservative Christian is really a Christian. They all share the same killing mind-set as the killers of Jesus. They may use syrupy words, but their actions often belie their words. Take Bush, for example...please. He's the War president. Jesus was the Prince of Peace. Bush is not a Christian, nor are any of his followers.)

If you're willing to have a bitter 14-year active duty crypto along for the ride, I'm up for anything. I've been in South Knox Bubba's Rocky Top Brigade for a while, although floating around in the Pacific, as I have been for the past few months, tends to cut in on my availability.

I'd also reccommend Rob Schumaker, another bad-attitude squid with brains. Smart, well-spoken and liberal as much as the day is long.

Once again-up for anything.

Let me throw out a heretical idea here, after first establishing the base of the narrative. Bush won. 3.5 million votes will not be erased by any after-effects of Ohio provisional ballots or Florida abstentees, we are not going to win on technicalities. That's a Republican trick.

My heresy? Just step back a moment and let it happen. We were faced with a two and a half month period with the BushWhacker still in charge even if we had won. Give him that much rope and then begin to organize. Because those of us residing in the reality-based continuum were not, and are not, wrong on the cluster-fuck that is Iraq. The news there today is not good, the news over the next couple of weeks will be worse, and in the final analysis none of this is our fault.

Maybe we did not make enough noise. But collectively we knocked 40 approval points off of a "popular war-time President" and have him stuck below the 50 percentage point line. We did good. And in the final analysis having to clean up after Iraq was not going to be a winner. Someone is going to have to cut and run or further break the Army, which is already teetering on the edge of disaster. And it is not going to be us.

Iraq and its aftermath will forever be known as "Bush's War". And in the short run we need to do little more than hold up the headlines.

People throughout Blogtopia (thanks skip) are despairing or promoting revolution. I would counsel both sides to buck up and simmer down. Four out of every ten Americans has already jumped off of the 'good' ship BushCo since 9/11 took him to 91%. The Chimperor truly has no clothes on. And the next few weeks is going to expose that fact. Unclench the gut (I know it is hard) and let the truth as we know it pervade the land. Because we have left the country of ABB, where people had a choice, and entered the new/old territory of AAB (All About Bush), where people are going to have to confront that choice face-on. And absent election flip-flopping hoo-haw there is no evidence that they are going to like it.

It took two years to take Nixon from electoral blowout to a last trip in Marine One. Given congressional realities it won't play out that way this time, but by Spring Bush will be playing desperate defense over Iraq. Because in the final analysis we were not, and are not wrong on this one.

Bush lied, GI's died. And nothing that happened Tuesday is going to change that.

Well, if you're willing to have a bitter 14-year active duty crypto on your side, I'm up for aything. I've been a member of South Knox Bubba's Rocky Top Brigade for a while now, and a contributor to (the admittedly somewhat slanted, although I'm trying) ETalkingHead.com.

I'd also like to reccommend Rob Schumacher-another bad-attitude squid who's not afraid to be LOAD (Liberal On Active Duty). He's smart and well-written.

Once again, up for anything.

Sorry about the duplicate post, the SHF on this floating death trap is unreliable. Same ole thing, different day...HAGO

"Bush lied, GI's died. And nothing that happened Tuesday is going to change that."

Yes. But what got him elected was the religious bigots who want to run this country. I am working to push these people who voted for him to take responsibility for their vote. Join the military. All the chest thumping and comparisons with WWII, then why isn't anyone joining?

Push them in, it's their religious war. Let them feel the pain.

GM all.
I only recently started reading and ocassionally posting to Democratic Veteran.
I think its the funniest and one of the most intelligent blogs out here.Thanks Jo, and everyone else. I was on of the early members of Dean For America and I've put "my money where my mouth is" to get Bush out of Washington scince then.Jo your post this morning moved me. I just needed to respond to it. Your right on the money
(as usual).I don't want to insinuate myself into blog rivalries (assuming there can be anymore now) but there are others working out there for the same goal.

Hoping I'll always be welcome here,

Marc

I already have you linked. And yours is the first voice that made me lift my head a little. I've been checking real estate prices in Canada for a day and a half, since Kerry quit on us and conceded like a little whimp, after all the big "warrior" talk, instead of making them prove they didn't cheat in Florida.

And I want that too. I want the impeachment proceedings, and damned if I won't be thinking about the school board elections next year, since I think I can maybe get my ward and neighborhood on my side locally. But I want the Florida scandal. Kerry should have demanded that Florida prove there was no cheating and taken it to court and used his ten thousand lawyers and FOUGHT for the votes of the disenfranchised instead of quitting like a punk.

Okay, you're linked on my site and I am linked to yours, and my email address is included on this cmment as it is on all my comments all the time. So whaddaya wanna do?

Thanks a lot for saying this. As I walked in to work today I found myself in an easily justifiable depression. My stomach's killing me, let me tell you. Fucking GERD! Anyway, I began to think about what to do, and, as I said to a friend yesterday, as we discussed living conditions in New Zealand and Canada, "Fuck 'em. It's my fucking country too."

So, anyway, my area's public education policy. We need to think very, very hard about "the hand that rocks the cradle" now. Anybody who wants to join me can find my blog Education Nation. It's small, primative, and infrequently posted, but I promise to do better. I look forward to hearing from anyone who has anything to contribute.

Edgar "Doc" Johnson

P.S. Daytime, weekday email is ejohns22@aug.edu

The hand that rocks the cradle -- DAMN RIGHT!

As the son of 2 educators, I'm with you, Doc. We are a better nation than this, or will be, one day -- but between now and that day, surrender is not an option.

(But I still want to visit New Zealand, one day...)

Jo,

Here's where to start:

Do you have children? What is thier history or science books saying? When they bring home thier text books check them out! Is creationism being taught as science? Is the civil rights movement being covered? What is your childs curriculum? What are they being taught in school? Is the school teaching the kind of progressive values you and I beleive in!?

Attend zoning and planning board meetings are thier plans for an unwanted developement in your community? Are boards taking adquate care to ensure that the environment is being protected? Familarize yourself with with your local zoning ordinance. Does it cover issues such as landscaping, handicap parking, traffic safety?

Attend your council meetings, ask about your local budget, is your community adquately funding programs for the elderly, recreation, and public saftey, is your local health department funded to fullfill it's obligations to protect the communities health? What companies is your community doing business with? Are they paying a living wage? Are they hiring minorities? Do they take measures protect the environment? Learn about the people making decisions for your community!!!

How and where do you get your water? Are the proper safeguards being used to protect your water supply?

What kinds of industries are in community?

Does your community have a recycling program? Why not? Is it being enforced? If not why?

Find out who the chairperson is of your local Democratic party is? Ask if they meet? If not why? Offer to help organize a meeting (nothing attracts people like a couple of pitchers of beer, I've done it and seen it!)!!!

Read your local paper!!! Take all your progressive ideal and apply them to your community.

But 1964 was a good year to be a Democrat. (The last good one before it all started slowly going wrong, actually).

"Fucking GERD"

Hey, Doc. Prevacid! Works wonders!

guess John Kerry went into the primary without a plan to win the election. The Democrats threw everything they had at this election. They ran a phony Vietnam War hero and a phony Southerner. They had middle-aged women executives at MTV hawking "Rock the Vote" to entice the most uninformed young people to vote for Kerry. They had Bruce Springsteen, Dave Matthews and New York Times darling Eminem. They had documentaries, books, the universities, Hollywood (and the French!) on their side.

They had liberal thugs ransacking Bush-Cheney headquarters, stealing Bush-Cheney signs and slashing the tires of Bush-Cheney get-out-the-vote vans on Election Day. In Colorado, they traded voter registrations for crack cocaine. In Ohio, they registered Mary Poppins and Dick Tracy. In South Carolina, Emily's List called Republican households and gave them incorrect information about the location of polling places.

The media campaigned heavily for Kerry with endless Abu Ghraib coverage, phony National Guard documents and, days before the election, false news reports that hundreds of tons of munitions had been looted in Iraq.

The Democrats' cheating never stopped. The big story of this election is the fraudulent exit polling on Election Day. Strange as it seems to me, it is well acknowledged that people are more likely to come out and vote for a winner. Early exit polls showing Kerry the clear winner could be expected to depress the vote for Bush.

Stunningly inaccurate exit polls released around noon on Election Day convinced news anchors, talking heads and even the campaigns that Kerry would win walking away. But at 9 p.m., when the first actual results began to come in, the election flipped to Bush . It was the first Kerry flip-flop that actually served the national interest.

The exit polls were absurd: They showed Kerry winning Pennsylvania by 20 points and Bush tied with Kerry in Mississippi. Only monkey business can explain the wildly pro-Kerry exit polls--admittedly hard to believe with a party that has behaved so honorably throughout this campaign. Michael Barone speculates that the sites of exit polling were leaked to the Democrats, and Democrats sent large numbers of voters to those polls to take exit polls and throw the results.

But for all their chicanery, vote-stealing, Hollywood starlets, fake polls and faux patriotism, the Democrats were wiped out on Election Day.

Bush won the largest popular vote in history with a 3.5 million margin. Indeed, simply by getting a majority of the country to vote for him--the left's most hated politician since Richard Nixon--Bush did something "rock star" Bill Clinton never did. Bush maintained or increased his vote in every state but Vermont. Republicans picked up seats in the House and Senate, and continue to dominate state governorships. Also making history of a sort, Senate Minority Leader Tom Daschle lost his election, marking the first time in half a century a Senate leader has been defeated.

To Michael Moore, George Soros, Terry McAuliffe, Dan Rather, Al Franken and the whole gang at Air America Radio--you were great, guys! Thanks for the help! We couldn't have done it without you!

Of course, we could have done it a lot earlier on election night but for "Boy Genius" Karl Rove. It's absurd that the election was as close as it was. The nation is at war, Bush is a magnificent wartime leader, and the night before the election we didn't know if a liberal tax-and-spend, Vietnam War-protesting senator from Massachusetts would beat him. If Rove is "the architect"--as Bush called him in his acceptance speech--then he is the architect of high TV ratings, not a Republican victory. By keeping the race so tight, Rove ensured that a race that should have been a runaway Bush victory would not be over until the wee hours of the morning.

As we now know, the most important issue to voters was not terrorism, but moral values. Marriage amendments won by lopsided majorities in all 11 states where they were on the ballot. Even in Oregon, the state targeted by gay marriage advocates as their best shot of defeating a marriage amendment, the amendment passed with 57%--a figure noticeable for being larger than the percentage of votes cast for Bush in Oregon. In the great state of Mississippi, the marriage amendment passed with 86% of the vote.

Seventy to 80% of Americans oppose gay marriage and partial-birth abortion. Far from appealing exclusively to a narrow Republican base, opposition to gay marriage is strongest among the Democratic base: blacks, Hispanics, blue-collar workers and the elderly. There were marriage amendments on the ballot in Michigan and Ohio. Bush won Ohio narrowly and lost Michigan by only 2 points. How different might that have been if Bush hadn't run from the issue.

But Rove concluded Bush should stay mum on gay marriage and partial-birth abortion--contravening the politicians' rule of thumb: Talk about your positions that are wildly popular with voters. "Boy Genius" Rove decided Bush shouldn't even run radio ads on gay marriage, and, at the last minute, Bush started claiming he was in favor of civil unions, just like John Kerry.

Amazingly, it was the Democrats--the ones who support gay marriage--who used the gay issue for political advantage, most famously when Kerry gay-baited Mary Cheney during the third debate.

The one toss-up Senate seat lost by the Republicans was Pete Coors in Colorado, where the Democrats did not hesitate to run commercials of a bacchanalian gay festival in Canada sponsored by Coors Brewing Co. The most narrow Republican win in a toss-up Senate race was in Alaska, where the Republican candidate was another "progressive" on the social issues.

When contemplating a former New York mayor as their next presidential candidate, Republicans should remember: This election should have been over sometime in August, not 1 a.m. election night.

I gave you a link and I wanted to thank you for starting this discussion.

This will be a rather long post because I plan to posit an analysis of our problem, offer a few observations and throw out a suggestion or two. Please bear with me. It won’t hurt too much.

Jo is absolutely correct that the Republicans have successfully defined us as something we’re not. Worse, they’ve applied definitions that provoke intensely negative reactions at an emotional and moral level. They accomplished this by devising code words and phrases that easily fit into a TV sound-bite and cause in immediate gut-level negative reaction. “Liberal” is one code word, “pro-abortion” is another, “gun control,” “weak on defense” are others. This is why we always lose the “values” debate.

In addition, every Republican campaign relies on s systematic repetition of lies, distortions and smears. This is the GOP art of “staying on-message.”

I don’t buy the assumption that Kerry and the Democrats didn’t have a clear message. We did. Our message was valid, supported by the facts, addressed defined issues and was clearly articulated by the candidates. Voters didn’t hear the message.

None of this could happen without the active connivance of the mainstream media. We no longer have a free press functioning as a Fourth Estate, meaning a press that applies objective scrutiny to public policy and politicians. It’s worse than the “he said, she said” style of TV stenography disguised as journalism, which is bad enough in itself since it gives a mathematical truth and an absurdity equal stature.

We have a corporate media that deliberately manipulates news reporting in support of two profitable objectives: connecting viewers with advertisers and influencing opinion in support of corporate interests. News stories are marketed just like sitcoms. Based on market analysis, the story most likely to attract viewers gets reported, which is why a juicy sex story receives attention disproportionate to its public value. We, as voters in a democracy, don’t hear what we need to know; we get what market researchers think we want to hear.

The media also uses its megaphone to advance its corporate legislative and policy interests. When the media owners wanted more media consolidation, they suppressed the story and thus pre-empted public awareness. Media owners had both personal and corporate interests in the Bush’s election success. Maybe I’m just a suspicious bastard but I see a connection between those interests and the lengthy and biased coverage of the Swift Boats pack of lies and the relatively cursory coverage of Abu Ghraib’s links to Donald Rumsfeld, the fiasco at Al QaQaa, and the suppression of the full text of Osama’s latest communiqué in the American media until after the election.

Still, we’ve got some superb advantages. First, our vision for America is better. We know the media is our enemy, we know how they operate, we know they’re full of shit and we know we can kick them in the nuts.

Second, the media has no memory. They operate in a 24-hour news cycle without the capability or profit incentive to analyze patterns, apply a critical thinking process, or call bullshit on an outrageous lie outside the 24-hour cycle.

I started my blogging career as a joke, writing a parody blog of a witless True Believer Conservative known as Snotglass Speaks as an amusement for my friends. (I even fooled a certain naval aviator once.) I now operate a different blog and I’m convinced of the potential of bloggers to circumvent the mainstream media. Eschaton and TPM, for example, attract 100,000 visitors every day. If those smug media mavens were paying attention, they’d be shitting green nickels. But we’ve got to improve those numbers if we want to exploit the internet.

Bloggers have tremendous potential as a political combat multiplier. Look at how well bloggers functioned as communicators, fundraisers and organizers. We need to sustain and improve those functions.

We’re independent. We operate outside the 24-hour news cycle. The things we do well are precisely the things the media cannot, and we provide entertaining snark as well.

We can influence corporate behavior. Look at what happened to Sinclair Broadcasting Group when we got organized. I'm not sure how to exploit this tool, but it's there and it's ours. For openers, I strongly suggest pissing in their advertising soup at every opportunity to exploit this vulnerability.

We can’t change the GOP’s established code words. “Liberal” will be a dirty word in the popular culture for a long time to come. But we can and should start demonizing Republicans as relentlessly as they have demonized us.

The media hates and fears the internet; I loved the sneering tone Leslie Stahl used when she said, "some blogger" in a CNN interview the other day. She knows her days as a media maven are numbered because bloggers are holding her and her butt-buddies accountable when they fail to function as a Fourth Estate.

We need to keep up the pressure. Fuck reconciliation and all that Kumbayah bullshit we're hearing from Shrubby, because we heard it all before and saw what he actually did. We have another four years of fighting ahead of us. We’ve got to out-shout, discredit, and disgrace the media, both personally and collectively if we’re going to preserve our country and our American values.

It's going to hurt, and it'll be painful, but the GOP has already set themselves up for complete failure. Maybe Nader was right in that things must get much worse before they gets better. The economy still sucks, unemployment is going to get worse, we're going to get hit with another terrorist attack probably worse than 911, and there is NO solution to the debacle in Iraq.

In summary, I won’t give up and I won‘t run away. I love my country and the ideals of secular liberal democracy. I wore an Army uniform for 27 years as a private soldier, NCO and officer and during that time I ate many buckets of shit. I still believe in the oath I took to our Constitution and I’m willing to consume many more buckets.

Bring ‘em on.

Yankeedoodle, CW4, USA (Ret.)

fletchman:

I read your post. Twice.

When you're finished sucking Karl Rove's dick, wipe your chin. Then march your Republican ass down to the Army recruiter and enlist in the combat arms. I suggest fuel handler as an enlistment option. You get to drive a nice big truck with a full bladder of JP4 strapped to the trailer bed. Much more excitement than spewing shit from a keyboard.

Support your president, dingleberry.

To hell with the apparatchiks in the existing Democratic Party - they lost twice to Bush and lost us the House and Senate. They don't know what we need to do. We must clean house. Here's what I wrote George Soros this morning:

“After the 2004 Debacle” - a letter to George Soros sent 11/04/2004

Dear Mr. Soros,

I appreciate your efforts to promote democratic ideas, including in the US. You'll have to decide for yourself how involved you wish to be in future, but I encourage you to continue to support clean, clear principles and ideals. My ideas are these:

1. Strip away the encrusted layers of elitist and seniority-driven leadership of the Democratic Party.

2. Identify and train a new generation of Democratic candidates for Congress and the Presidency. Don't you believe even the stiff Mr. Kerry would have benefited by a basic training program in how to speak and how to campaign?

3. Pick candidates who have fire in their belly, and who can make a speech that raises crowds to their feet! We need many candidates like this, many all across the country.

4. Identify the long clear lines of thinking that makes democracy a good form of government, then mold and model the party message around these ideals and goals. No more short-term micro messages, no more clutter of promises that are not tied to a more just society. Any democratic leader should be able to explain how their actions will tie into the longer vision of democratic principles. People don't want cheaper pills, they want reasons to be hopeful and reasons to support ideals.

5. About a year from today I'll be able to retire and work at whatever I like. There are many people like me, who believe in the history and the future of this country. We will need some way to express that belief in a rational way. If the Democratic Party shows itself incapable of radical reform, there must be true alternatives.

In the next four years the crows will come home to feast on Republican livers, since they are blind to what they are doing. Who will be there to replace them? That's really the question for this country, and for you. Thank you again for promoting democracy here and everywhere!!

Don Trader
Columbia, Tennessee

Jo,
I gave support to my brothers-in-arms under a "Broken Arrow" in 1972, and I'm still here.

I find it difficult to think that our American war hero, JFK, admitted defeat without some form of insidious coercion on the part of the Repugnant Nazi Coalition and their right-wing fascist constituency. Hell, this soldier forged his way up the Mekong Delta in the face of deadly enemy fire and then sat defenseless in the hot seat before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. A short court battle, along with the unyielding support of nearly 55,000,000 Americans and a "trial lawyer", wouldn't have frightened the likes of John Kerry. Something much more insidious is at work here. But I digress...

These are sad days for true American Patriots… but not the “end of days”.

Let’s talk about 1963 and the era when U.S. Democracy faced insurmountable odds. Our last true “War Hero”, John F. Kennedy, was shot down in his prime; assassinated by the same cabal of fascists that threaten our present day freedoms. Shortly after, more brave soldiers for our cause, Martin Luther King, Jr. and Robert Kennedy were also eliminated before their time. It might as well have been Armageddon for truth and justice. Still, we survived to fight another day. Then “lo and behold” Tricky Dick was on his way to impeachment and the troops were coming home.

The fundamentalist religious clergy may have succeeded in forcing their "born again" ideologies into “our” United States government (for now). Today, this country can’t be considered "of the people, by the people or for the people". Instead, it has become a pulpit for, of and by the neo-con fascists and Falwell followers; all others “be damned” (by the way, that includes you Wolfowitz).

Sadly for them, there are those Conservative Repugnants and Nuevo-Riche that don’t buy into their bizzare ideological philosophies. Instead of casting “their” 1% of the vote, they drove home to their cushy mansions in their Hummers and Beemers rather than wait in the long lines at the polls; all the while thinking that the RNC would keep the green-backs rolling in. It won’t take long for these millionaires and billionaires to realize that their life raft is going to be cast aside for “the faithful” when the Rapture Ship "Dubya" arrives. No CEO junkets or perks will save them from the vengeful hand of Lord George and his GOD on judgment day.

Still, one wonders what the "flock" will do when their precious sons and daughters start coming back from the Middle East in coffins by the tens of thousands instead of hundreds. Since they will not learn from the mistakes made by their hawkish leaders in the Vietnam Conflict, they are destined to relive the horrors of our past. Unfortunately, the rest of the world is now being pushed into their path as they continue to proselytize for the Crusade.

At the very least Democrats should feel vindicated in the fact that New Jersey, New York and the rest of the Tri-State area voted for John Kerry. After all, we were the ones who suffered the most from the attacks on America. We know, all too well, that Dubya and his cronies didn’t do squat to prevent the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks and they are helpless against future terrorist actions. I don't wonder that the “New Confederacy” (Mid-West and Southern Evangelicals) didn't follow our lead. The only wrongful deaths that concern them are unborn fetuses, not teenage soldiers or innocent civilians.

Keep the faith:
"...Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed. That whenever any form of government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the people to alter or abolish it, and to institute new Government..."

I agree with you man. Here's my link.

Get Over It...

I've been linked to you for some time now although I don't say much. My views are a bit left of the average Dem's but I'm just as sickened by this election as the other 49% of my fellow free thinking adults.

let's be frank. george bush won the election because of stupid people. who are stupid people? well, they are predominantly southern, white, christian and uneducated. unless or until these people can be reached with reason and education, this country will continue to slip under the waves.

Is this a private fight, or can I soldier on with ya?

Jo and others,
I do have an idea; it won't change the world mind you, but it should keep the most dangerous politicians and agendas from having a terrible effect on our lives and further corroding our democracy.

Well, the way I see it, Bush has proven is that America's representative government is more vulnerable to greed and ambition through voter disenfranchisement, minority voter suppression and mass media propaganda that we dared to imagine.

We have a duty to this country to prove what election misconduct we can, to challenge the "proprietary" code operating our electronic voting machines, to increase the criminal and civil penalties for voter disenfranchisement and vote suppression in every state of the union, and to combat the mass media's complicity in our failing democratic strength.

We need to get cracking on a local level. If your local government cannot be used as a bulwark to protect you from an errant federal government, work to fix that. Bill Clinton once said, “All politics is national.” He was right, but he shouldn’t be. Empower your principles at the county and state level. Empower fighters at the local level and push the effective horse-traders up into your federal offices. Neuter the federal government’s reach into our lives that way.

Start sharing information about the worst opposition stooges and loons that have been tampering with your local government with friends, relatives and acquaintances across the country. Preempt their arrival on a national stage with an indelible image problem that will require millions and millions of dollars to neutralize if they mean to seek higher office.

I’ll give you an example. Bill Owens – Governor of Colorado – the Republican Party will probably be positioning him for national office in 2008, as a reward for using Colorado as a lab for undemocratic Republican agendas. Here’s what you need to know and tell everyone you know about him: Bill Owens is an unethical Rove stooge. Bill Owens is an adulterer masquerading as a good Christian man. Bill Owens is a slave to personal ambition, at least the ambition that Rove will let him dream about. And Bill Owens has created a financial crisis in Colorado, while making this state more dependent on the federal government.

Last but not least, we need to find or create alternatives to entrusting our mass media to produce the official narrative for our ideology our representatives and us.

First, I'm really glad to meet you folks. I rarely get to meet really sharp people.

Ever since the DNC/DLC saw fit to remove Wesley Clark (& Howard Dean) from the primaries last February, I've been thinking about exactly what Jo proposes.

Along with some really good suggestions, which needs compiling and posting on its own page, the big problem someone pointed out is the way the Dems have been painted into a corner. http://www.rockridgeinstitute.com/ is an excellent place to start getting the lay of that land and learn how to turn the tables on the slimey bastards.

In response to their Strategic Initiatives article, I have one that may be a good place to start. I call it the School Preamble Initiative.

The purpose is to get kids in the schools to start reciting the Preamble to the Constitution instead of or in addition to the Pledge of Allegiance. Might as well know what they are pledging allegiance to eh?

Since the Constitution has been raised so often in the political and public debate, perhaps it is worth considering that our school kids should recite its Preamble. It is the Preamble of the Constitution which forms the actual contract the people have with each other to govern the country and its affairs. Maybe its time we teach it to our kids and learn it ourselves and begin discussing how the duties of the Preamble should be fulfilled.

This initiative lends itself to small scale (local) and big scale (national) levels of involvement. Resistance would be futile because who could possibly be against our kids reciting the opening passage of the Constitution of United States of America, the thing that makes this a nation and is what we are allegedly trying to export to everyone else around the world.

Yankeedoodle, you are a hoot, and damn sharp to boot. Good to know someone else can cuss like me--learned it from my dad who was US Army, retired 1966, Ft. Lewis.

Anyway, I gotta go through the comments again and compile the salient points.

One last thing. Anyone here a Harry Potter fan? I mean the books, especially The Order of the Phoenix book? Makes for good code in case anyone is watching the Floo Network.

BTW, I'm a her, in a Xena kind of way, in case anyone is wondering which pronoun to use.

I'm still too fucking pissed off - knowing that these rotted bastards stole another election out from under our noses. My wife got a call from our friend in Florida (used to work with him) - all the roads are being repaired from hurricane damage.
Apparently, they told 'everyone' their address were invalid due to changes in 'address', and they had to vote 'provisional' ballots. In case you haven't seen the FL data yet - here it is
http://ustogether.org/Florida_Election.htm -

Takes alot to make sense of it I know. I sent Jo the picture from Ohio of the truck loaded with ballots with the B/C sticker on it yesterday. Apparently, thats being investigated.

I'll come to my senses eventually, but for the time being...

I'm one pissed off Marine. May God have mercy on their souls.

Barndog, YankeeDoodle, Jo, et. al.:
It's important that we don't lose the fire in our guts. This latest election theft was no less than another terrorist attack on our democracy. Lest we forget about our brothers-in-arms, here is a disturbing piece of news from the Center for Individual Freedom.

http://www.cfif.org/htdocs/freedomline/current/in_our_opinion/military_absentee_ballots.htm

Hey Cambodian Border. I'll have you know that I promised New Jersey for Kerry and I delivered. And I am pissed. When he won, I was going to put in for the ambassadorship to Tahiti. Now what do I do with all these new speedos I bought?

Frog,
Those speedos will come in handy when we're "stripped" of our human rights. No, really, I was the one who promised NJ for the Vietnam Vet. In fact, I proudly displayed my VFW plates and the VOTE-Kerry/Edwards sticker along with my personally designed promotion...
"Bush Lied; Soldiers Died!"
"Who do you support, Our Troops or Bush?"

I'm sure that did it. Most drivers would simply slow down to see the combination of paraphernalia, then sadly move on. Only once did an RNC prick in a Mercedes SUV give me the digit.

I suggest that all these chicken-shat Repugnants enlist into the military today. Hell, they sure seem to think that we're doing GOD's work, so why not?

Since you know a little about the situation in our “garden state” here is a piece of news that should shake up you and the rest of this BLOG.

http://www.app.com/app/story/0%2C21625%2C1002402%2C00.html

This story is just one of many that outlines the Repugnant Nazi Collective’s wholesale give-away of our National Parks. The jerk-off real estate usurper, James Wassel, who is being handed an open-end, 60-year lease by the DOI to privately develop portions of the park is associated with none other than THE CARLYLE GROUP .
How’s that for cronyism?

I’ll bet there aren’t too many Americans who know that this is just the beginning.
Next stop, Yosemite, Mt. Mitchell, Grand Canyon, etc. etc. Say bye-bye to your favorite vacation spots; King Dubya is going to “balance” the budget by selling off the last remnants of OUR property.

Actually I think you lost because of comments like "Bush is a liar", and other hate filled speeches. Personally I got so sick of it I voted for Bush.

America is cleaning up its act folks. Join the team!
We no longer need Pot to alter our minds
Some believe 13 years of UN threats needed to be enforced.
We are re-thinking the child has a right to live
Democrats have become condescending
We are learning the Democratic Party was the party who fought to keep the black man in slavery, yet pretend to be his friend today.

Its unbelievable how you cant see that
drugs are bad for you
prostitutes are aborting babies as a business expense
God is part of our government (no matter what name you give)
What the hippies did to the Vietnam vets was wrong. (and Kerry led the way)

Until the DNC cleans up the scum that runs it, it will never recover, no matter how you cut it. Get the clues and join the majority!

Thats America folks.

I got a $20 that says you didn't serve jack shit but your own self.

Fact or bullshit?

drugs are bad for you

They sure are. Alcohol and tobacco are costing millions of lives and families and billions of dollars every year.

prostitutes are aborting babies as a business expense

Which you are writing off cuz they're your babies.

God is part of our government (no matter what name you give)

Yep, the name is used all the time and then put in the pocket as greenbacks. The mercy of God however, is nowhere to be found.

What the hippies did to the Vietnam vets was wrong. (and Kerry led the way)

Blaming the soldiers was indeed wrong. But so was our reason for being there.

First speck of hope I've seen since the election is in here. Thanks.
I'm a former ER tech. My goal has been for years to help people get health care. In this I find absolutely zero care and compassion on the part of Republicans. I don't have a blog, but I can be active in my community as Paul suggests in his comment.

Half of me wants to walk away. The majority of my countrymen are NOT the people I thought they were; this country is NOT the place I grew up loving, and I am unlikely to live long enough to see that change. The other half of me is screaming "FUCK THEM!!" at the top its lungs and plots assassinations as I fall asleep.
I need to calm down and get some perspective.
I am not comforted by the fact that we lost, because a significant plurality, if not a majority, of our people are stupid and not evil. I am not concerned that the fundamentalist conservative social agenda will be implemented, because it won't be. Republicans need these wedge issues to remain intact so they can continue to be elected. They can only solve one issue if they've found another to replace it. I AM concerned that we have complete incompetants at ALL of the levers of power in the most powerful nation in the world, and I don't think it will remain the most powerful nation in the world with them at the helm.

Read General Glut, Jo. Instead of the culture war, he says we better be ready for the class war.

I think he's right. So.... what do you have in mind?

Court Martial the Son of a bitch

I believe that because the congress and the press have not praticed the oversight required of them, this President has been allowed to engage in actions which if committed by an offier in the armed forces would result in a General Court Martial. Since this man has defined him self as a "War President" and is the Commander in Chief, he should be held to the same standards as those who serve under him. I have setup a website Called Court Martial GW Bush

Call me Don Quixote but I am so pissed off at this bastard for what he has done to the men and women serving that he must be held accountable. I belong to Veterans for Peace and the members of my chapter are going through hell as this war escalates and their memories resurface. PTSD is not a pretty sight. I have to be strong and help them as we suffer this S.O.B and all that he has done.

If the Swift Boat Liars can savage a good, brave and honest man, there is no reason that we can not savage an evil, incompetent and reckless one. Only we will use the truth.

Call it a show trial or a peoples court but I want this monster exposed. I have only put up the beginning of a draft on the site, so please visit and send any thoughts you have.

BOHICA, check out http://www.democrats.com/ Last February they were calling to impeach the creep. They have since updated their website, but if you contact them I'm sure they'd be happy to share.

RUSH LIMBAUGH HAS POISONED THE MINDS OF MANY AMERICANS – WITH A US VERSUS THEM ATTITUDE

I listened infrequently during the afternoon to Rush Limbaugh. His Show is so anti-American and anti-goodness of what makes the American Dream. He seems angry with everyone and is taking out his “drug problem” on the American people.

Limbaugh’s Opinions are so-slanted and non-factual, but is presented like FACT!

I listened as he allowed Conservatives to air their opinions at length. A few Liberals came on the air and the “host” interrupted the callers repeatedly.
Many of the Liberal people were just cut off the radio or were only allowed to talk for thirty seconds or so. I timed Conservatives that were on the show for 3 to 7 minutes.

It’s a shame that the “New Conservative” Radio Broadcasting for years has resorted to unfair and belligerent hosts who inflame public opinion with one-sided opinion and one-sided callers.

I’m appalled by the blistering contempt, hatred and invective that Limbaugh and other callers have for Liberals and Democrats--WHICH IS NOT TRUE, UNETHICAL AND IMMORAL!

Surely there has to be a more fairer Talk-show Host that gives people equal time?

“Hatred” of the Limbaugh-kind should be outlawed and condemned by all sides and NOT tolerated!

These Media networks should be disbanded and FINED for Hatred and being Anti-American!

Can the Democrats begin laws to outlaw these groups?

RUSH LIMBAUGH HAS POISONED THE MINDS OF MANY AMERICANS – WITH A US VERSUS THEM ATTITUDE

I listened infrequently during the afternoon to Rush Limbaugh. His Show is so anti-American and anti-goodness of what makes the American Dream. He seems angry with everyone and is taking out his “drug problem” on the American people.

Limbaugh’s Opinions are so-slanted and non-factual, but is presented like FACT!

I listened as he allowed Conservatives to air their opinions at length. A few Liberals came on the air and the “host” interrupted the callers repeatedly.
Many of the Liberal people were just cut off the radio or were only allowed to talk for thirty seconds or so. I timed Conservatives that were on the show for 3 to 7 minutes.

It’s a shame that the “New Conservative” Radio Broadcasting for years has resorted to unfair and belligerent hosts who inflame public opinion with one-sided opinion and one-sided callers.

I’m appalled by the blistering contempt, hatred and invective that Limbaugh and other callers have for Liberals and Democrats--WHICH IS NOT TRUE, UNETHICAL AND IMMORAL!

Surely there has to be a more fairer Talk-show Host that gives people equal time?

“Hatred” of the Limbaugh-kind should be outlawed and condemned by all sides and NOT tolerated!

These Media networks should be disbanded and FINED for Hatred and being Anti-American!

Can the Democrats begin laws to outlaw these groups?

1. Timely
   
2. Strategery
   
3. Webb wins
   
4. Huh?
   
5. Bunnypants in Bagdad
   
6. Outage
   
7. Filthy Lucre Watch
   
8. Playing the numbers
   
9. My letter to Countdown
   
10. Jefferson's Nigerian Scams