As a Southerner, I'm trained to look for subtle nuances in social protocol. While it's certainly true that the South's emphasis on etiquette and manners evolved as a way to reinforce the existing order, it's also true that Southerners of all classes, races and backgrounds rely on the observation of manners as a way to sum up people quickly.

In other words, to any Southerner -- rich or poor, black or white -- your use or neglect of basic manners and proper respect indicates how seriously we should take you. It's a quick and almost infallible indicator of your relative heft, gravitas, and trustworthiness as a person -- not in a socio-economic sense, but in the big picture overall.

I noticed something last night that I found very interesting: At one point Barack Obama held the chair out for Hillary Clinton.

This is going to be something of a short driveby because I'm in a hurry and I'm also pretty pissed off with a lot of the dialogue here lately and am having a hard time controlling my temper.

It seems to be accepted in many quarters on dKos that Latinos support Hillary because of "latent racism" against African Americans, to quote but one comment of many, many similar comments I have read here today.

(No, I'm not going to link to every comment in every diary, and you'll just have to get over it.)

Many of you know me as one of the more assertive/obnoxious Hillary Clinton supporters on dKos. In mixing it up with a lot of you over the past couple of months -- nevadadem, TomP, Bob Johnson, icebergslim, et al -- I've had a lot of confrontational things said to me, and I've said a lot of confrontational things myself. Most of what I've said I still stand by, and some of it I frankly regret.

But watching the Democratic debate in Nevada last night in a relaxed frame of mind, something struck me: All three of these candidates -- Barack, John, and Hillary -- are flat-out fucking fantastic candidates.

Our party is very lucky indeed to have any of them, much less all three, running this year.

Congratulations to the Obama camp on a great win. As a Hillary supporter, I was convinced Obama would flame out the way Dean did in '04. I fully expected Edwards to walk away with this thing, with Clinton in a strong second and Obama in a weak third.

I was 100 percent wrong, and I'm here to admit it and own up to just how wrong I was.

The DMR poll was basically correct, the turnout was gi-normous, the youth vote did show up, and HRC -- though still with major structural advantages moving forward -- cannot realistically be considered the frontrunner anymore. I fully expect her national lead to begin dwindling, much as the big Iowa and N.H. leads did.

Again, congrats to the Obama camp on a great night.

Earlier today I decided I'd had enough of the amnesia in the MSM about Republican filibusters.

I was prompted to action by today's WaPo story on the energy bill, featuring the now-routine line in the lede graf, "Senate Democrats failed to muster enough votes this morning to close debate on the energy bill," etc.

In other words, what used to be known as a filibuster -- that is, when Republicans were in control and valiantly fighting those darned obstructionist Democrats. Nowadays, not so much.

So this is what I e-mailed WaPo writer Jonathan Weisman:

I kid you not. Georgia Gov. Sonny Perdue, a Republican re-elected with 60 percent of the vote, has made praying for rain part of his official policy to deal with the ongoing draught and water shortage in north Georgia.

atlliberal diaried on this yesterday here: http://www.dailykos.com/...

But we now have official confirmation of the rain dance. Here's the full release, which just came to my inbox:

As many of you know, John Barrow of Georgia's 12th District is considered one of the most vulnerable Dem members of Congress. While I personally loathe his tendency to vote with Republicans on almost all foreign policy and surveillance issues, obviously I prefer to be represented by a Dem rather than one of our particularly insipid and out-of-touch Republicans we have down here.

Much talk in the Savannah area has centered on a current Republican state representative, Buddy Carter, challenging Barrow for the seat in '08 (yes, we have a lot of guys named Buddy down here, just deal with it).

Carter would indeed have been a formidable challenger -- a strong campaigner who avoids most overtly partisan posturing. But it's not to be. More on the jump.

According to the twin internet pillars of the neocon propaganda establishment, Drudge and Politico, the MoveOn.org ad is not worthy of the controversy it inspired in some of the media.

How do I know? Because they told me...

Let's face it: Whenever a sitting president mentions your website by name from his official podium, you've made it. Doesn't matter whether it was in a negative context or not.

No one can afford to buy that kind of publicity. There's not enough money in the world.

Especially when said sitting president is an unpopular douchebag and his attack will do nothing but make you look good.

So needless to say, MoveOn will get (is getting) a huge bump in membership and donations.

Here's why that's important:

OK, WaPo resident neocon shill Shailagh Murray just got done with her "chat," wherein she not only called out Kos by name, negatively, but basically repeated the same prefabricated talking point over and over: Next week will be a disaster for "anti-war people," as she calls them/us, and she strongly suspects there will be "a whole new set of calculations" on the table.

Here she is in all her Satanic majesty here:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/...

This chat, perhaps even more than the canned propaganda from the various neocon "institutes," is proof positive to me that the whole surge/escalation kabuki dance was carefully scripted from the beginning. If you read the she-devil's responses closely, you see she has already written the narrative she intends to use in covering The Petraeus Show next week, i.e., "a whole new set of calculations" for the "antiwar people."

The only thing that disgusts me more than this is the fact that the Dems obviously have a copy of the same prewritten script.

I went to Google News to check the latest on the case of the Marines accused of murdering two dozen Iraqi civilians in Haditha. Today in court one of the Marines admitted to urinating on a dead civilian after the massacre.

Going down Google's list of search results, I noticed that only foreign news outlets -- which of course do not rely on the Associated Press -- mentioned the urination incident in the headline.

My curiosity piqued as to why only international outlets mentioned the urination while no American ones did, I soon found out why: The Associated Press account -- the report of record for the vast majority of American news outlets -- doesn't mention the urination incident at all, which was admitted to by USMC Sgt. Sanick Dela Cruz in his sworn testimony.

More on the jump:

Just checking in with the latest and last update in the saga of John Barrow of GA-12, one of the two Georgia Democrats that almost didn't survive their election-day battles to join the new majority.

But it's finally over: Max Burns, the challenger and former holder of the same seat, has said he will not ask for the recount he is entitled to under state law. Link here: http://savannahnow.com/...

This means that the Democratic Party took both houses of Congress without losing a single seat in the process. More on flip:

In the midst of all this South-bashing going on around here, I wanted to pass on the breaking but not unexpected news that John Barrow of GA-12 was officially certified the winner today over Max Burns by 864 votes.

As I write this the Burns campaign has not decided whether to call for a recount, which is their right since the margin is less than one percent of the vote total.

Why does this matter? More below...

Samuel Best has written an otherwise great article at cbsnews.com called "GOP Myths Fall Short of Reality."

Find it at http://www.cbsnews.com/...

However, I need you all to check in with Mr. Best and reeducate him on something...

I really don't have time to write this diary -- seeing as I am in the middle of my fulltime job as one of the Evil Editors on "The Death Star," as Cenk Uygur, hyperbolically puts it at this Recommended Diary: http://www.dailykos.com/...

But I felt I needed to respond to this typical blame-the-messenger red herring that is so much fun to indulge ourselves in but is, in the end, so counterproductive to progressive efforts.

See, I know what I'm talking about on this one. Read on....

You can feel it building in the back of your mind, in that gray and desolate place where your darkest thoughts go before they metastize into grim reality: The worst-case, end-of-the-Republic, nascent civil war scenario that polls show is more and more possible -- though thank goodness certainly not probable -- after the November election.

It goes like this: Dems net 15-17 seats in the House to narrowly win the chamber. Teams of Republican lawyers fan out across the country, challenging all close elections and filing for recounts everywhere. Meanwhile, Rove & Co. work behind the scenes, making proverbial offers-that-can't-be-refused to Blue Dog Democrats to switch parties -- while they still can.

In the Senate, we win 51 seats to control the chamber. However, an Independent senator, one Joseph Lieberman of Connecticut, decides to switch caucuses and throws in with the Republicans. As intended, with Cheney's vote that effectively hands control back to the GOP despite the wishes of the voters.

What comes next? More below...

I'm not a betting man, and if I were I certainly wouldn't be damn fool enough to bet on something as volatile and out of my control as politics.

However, I am fascinated by the predictive markets and their occasionally dead-on abilities to predict election results, in some cases much more accurately than any polling except exit polling.

This link -- http://www.mydd.com/... -- at MyDD contains an intriguing (and contentious) dialogue on the predictive markets, their pros as well as their cons.

More below.

I fully understand the realpolitik behind the collective Kossack desire to see Laffey win last night.

Comparatively unknown far-right conservative on the outs with the RNC = easy Senate pickup in November for Dems in a solid blue state. Got it. No problem.

But here's why I think last night's result was a good thing for our side, the above equation notwithstanding: