As you all know Bush thought he could drive this truck straight at the Democratic Party:

"Some seem to believe that we should negotiate with the terrorists and radicals, as if some ingenious argument will persuade them they have been wrong all along.

"We have an obligation to call this what it is: the false comfort of appeasement, which has been repeatedly discredited by history."

In the typical game of chicken with Dems, they flinch first.

But there is a new driver behind the wheel...

This will be a short diary mainly for some cathartic fun.

After the race comments and this long primary war maybe it is better to think ahead to a cathartic moment of joy and celebration rather than just getting madder.

Yesterday I was spitting mad. Today is Friday.

Obama seems to be getting the idea with his walk yesterday and the big smiles.

I hope we can keep this to celebrating or mourning and away from accusing and attacking.

So the question is:

My Mom has been a diehard HRC supporter from the start.

She has a Hillary sign on her bedroom mirror. She has steadfastly resisted the rest of the family's onslaught in favor of Obama. And we have really worked hard.

My Mom grew up white and poor in Detroit. And scared of black people.

She also worked and volunteered for years helping poor often black people in her new town.

My adopted daughter is from Liberia. I also have kids from El Salvador and Ecuador. My wife from Argentina.

'Race' is ever present in our lives

My Mom, the white grandmother of my black daughter, watched the speech.

And she cried.

She sat quietly for a few minutes without saying a single word...

Apparently she is sort of apologizing.

Her biggest apology came in response to a question about comments by her husband, Bill Clinton, after the South Carolina primary, which Obama won handily. Bill Clinton said Jesse Jackson also won South Carolina when he ran for president in 1984 and 1988, a comment many viewed as belittling Obama's success.

I want to put that in context. You know I am sorry if anyone was offended. It was certainly not meant in any way to be offensive," Hillary Clinton said. "We can be proud of both Jesse Jackson and Senator Obama."

I am still a little wary she still seems to be nursing this thing along a sort of offensive line.

Am I being paranoid or does it seem like she wants some of us to be offended still and keep complaining and then get sorta racists whites to feel offended?

Oh wait, sorry wrong royal family.

Make that Harry, Prince Harry.

The Guardian

Our leaders have other priorities.

Iseman goes down to Florida that is.

And McCain sets the cruise industry free from regulations

Follow for the salacious details coming out all over the place.

The main problem being it is all coming out too quickly and, dare I say, prematurely.

It's like the press swallowed all McCain's Viagra and all at once have the courage to stand up against the Maverick.

Let's hope they work this hard all the way to November.

... well actually the Congressional Districts will be holding their delegate selection process conventions on that date.

But these conventions will pick the Hillary and Uncommitted delegations!

That could result in a second campaign for the Uncommitted delegation with Hillary winning yet more delegates!

Personally I think the whole delegation should NOT be seated but the fact of the matter is this at least needs considering. And as a Michigander I feel I can say that.

But the conventions present some controversial choices for the campaigns...

History says, Don't hope
on this side of the grave.
But then, once in a lifetime...

I'm 42.

As a teenager I suffered as Reagan and the contras bled the hope out of Nicaragua.

I ended up in Liberia. The night I became a father, my neighbor was assassinated and the country began a long descent into terror.
The US was too busy in the first Gulf war to help.

In El Salvador later I buried the recovered bones of the children killed (by US trained troops) at El Mozote.

Washington nearly boiled the hope out of me...

It is too early yet, much too early.

Donate and Phonebank

But the candidate of many of us here,

has asked us to build with him a movement

that will heal and overcome the divisions that have wracked this country.

And I would add this site.

To pull ourselves together, broaden our imagination of what is possible.

To hope hard and work hard for progressive gains.

If Barack wins three big tomorrow...

William Kristol call it for Obama citing our very own Poblano

Can we count on his analysis?

He predicts the fall of the house of Clinton

Has anyone done the math?

I did a really quick version and it doesn't seem impossible to me that McCain could fail to reach the magic number.

I am not saying Huckabee will reach it, just that McCain might struggle to reach if forced to run all the way...

A state by state after the fold

Sorry for the Leadership-speak but here is my case for Obama

Our country faces  difficult challenges in the years ahead.

If those challenges have relatively know and understood solutions then we need someone who has the type of leadership Hillary claims to have: the ability to get the job done. To apply knowledge and expertise to solve variants of our same  old problems.

But if we are facing new situations where the principal need is to adapt in new and unknown ways: adaptive change, then we need a different kind of leader. The kind that will help us make that adaptation.

Today, I believe that leader is Obama.

I think it's safe to say George Bush is not the Devil -even if half the world may think he is. But if the President wants to play Moses to the Muslims he can't have them thinking he is the Pharaoh either.

The progressive anti-war Democratic Party needs to be trusted on National Security.

The Lamont victory needs to be coded as something more than anti-war. In the post 9/11-GWOT-Occupied-Iraq-world National Security is everything, or at least a major trump card in electoral politics. Even with surging anti-war sentiment in the country being trusted on national security is key to victory.

There is a need for a new frame around the issue of National Security. Let's frame National Secruity as defending the NATION.

The public, with considerable help their friends in the right-wing media, have come to the TRUE and PROPER conclusion that Democrats can not be trusted with National Security, that is of course WHEN National Security is equated with Imperial Security.