Yes, it's a lame joke. Gallows' humor and all that. My apologies, Senator Edwards...but it's time to face the truth. You will not win this nomination.

I really hoped it wouldn't come to this. I've been an ardent supporter of yours for months, and believe that you have the best platform of the major candidates. Watching the media ignore you has been infuriating, and the enmity you've earned from the megacorps has only increased my respect for your devotion to the needy and your willingness to fight for them, and us all. I have the greatest sympathy for the situation you're in with your wife and her cancer, and have found others' willingness to see it as a mark against you either unfortunate, sad or obscene, depending on their reasons.

Yet it has clearly come to this: you came in third in your home state in the Democratic primary. You would almost certainly win it in the general, were you our candidate, but you will not be our candidate. It is simply reality, barring an unprecedented miracle or an all-too familiar tragedy, that your nomination will not happen.

(Note: Cross-posted on my wife's account at Calitics)

I'm sure that around here, Jerry Lewis of CA-41 fame needs no introduction. Well, a few Democrats have entered the race.

Tonight (writing this as of January 9th), I just met one of them, and Dr. Rita Ramirez-Dean strikes me very much as the real deal. Passionate, outspoken, dedicated and strong-willed, with a life story that has "true Democrat" stamped on it, Dr. Ramirez-Dean could very well help us replace a, well, Jerry Lewis with a real progressive. Crooks and Liars has a great if brief post about her.

Mrs. Roland X here, using my hunny's login until mine finishes going "live" :-).

I'm sharing the job posting I saw on a writerr's list, since maybe someone here might be interested. I have no other connection with the organization than having seen and decided to forward this.

Details below the fold:

That's how many votes we need in the Senate to convict.

It one of two fundamental realities that the impeachment argument continues to ignore. When I first diaried about this last night, I was more annoyed that Scooter effin' Libby was the final straw -- these guys are up to their necks in blood, and a f*cking commutation of sentence is the bridge too far? Now, though, I see that the whole thing has come down to a supposed argument about passion vs. clarity. Those who think this isn't going to work -- especially over Scooter effin' Libby -- are being reduced, whether gently or viciously, to Vichy Dems. They (or we, depending on the time of day for me) don't have the guts to fight back, to defend the Constitution, to 'go nuclear,' to bring it on.

Tell that to Digby. Among the consequences of not convicting are, most perilously, giving all of Bush's monstrous betrayals the patina of legality.

Okay, so Scooter Skates. It's unquestionably a travesty of justice, a particularly toxic icing on a radioactive (yellow) cake. Bush and Cheney are displaying what, in another era, would be a shocking disdain for the justice system.

Honestly, though, after the so-called election in 2000, the USA PATRIOT Act, after making a mockery of the counterattack in Afghanistan, after Iraq, after the actual outing of Valerie Plame, after the so-called election in 2004, after Guantanamo and Abu Ghraib, after 'extraordinary rendition,' after illegal wiretapping, after Katrina and Rita, after Walter Reed, after the war on science, reason and facts, after the firing of the US Attorneys, after their butchery of Habeas Corpus -- the fundamental bedrock of the Western concept of liberty -- after all that and a thousand other ways, great and small, in which this vile, inhuman lot have wiped their collective asses with the Constitution and 225 years of struggle for a better nation and world...this is the straw? Seriously?

Now that 2006 is behind us (yeah team!), it's time to look ahead to '08. Since we don't always realize who's in our own back yard, I'm wondering how many other Kosaks, Kosites, and other Kos-folk there are in California's 43rd.

Of course, we can help out in the 26th and 41st (and visa-versa), so folks from there are welcome to speak up, too :-).

Morgan  /|\
(Mrs. Roland)

Found this news story today, and it doesn't look like anyone else has diaried this angle (if I missed anyone, my apologies.

Pasco nudists recall 'hypocritical' campaign

TALLAHASSEE - Three years ago, U.S. Rep. Mark Foley demanded that the state investigate a summer nudist camp for kids in Pasco County, warning it could expose innocent children to pedophiles.

More below the fold...

Anbar belongs to al-Qaeda. That is the sobering assessment of the Marines' chief of intelligence:

Devlin reports that there are no functioning Iraqi government institutions in Anbar, leaving a vacuum that has been filled by the insurgent group Al Qaeda in Iraq, which has become the province's most significant political force, said the Army officer, who has read the report. Another person familiar with the report said it describes Anbar as beyond repair; a third said it concludes that the United States has lost in Anbar.

Emphasis mine.

And now, as we know, Senate Intelligence Committee has confirmed what we already knew -- that Iraq and al-Qaeda not only weren't friendly, but despised each other.

So why aren't these two dots being connected by every Democrat in the country?

More over the flip.

I went to look at Allen's site, and found this little bit of irony:

This little photo-op of his is pretty much the epitome of  "Empty content."

Update: Edited to fix the typo in the title.

Morgan  /|\
(Mrs. Roland)
"Political tags - such as royalist, communist, democrat, populist, fascist, liberal, conservative, and so forth - are never basic criteria. The human race divides politically into those who want people to be controlled and those who have no such desire." --Robert Heinlein

I am not an alarmist by nature...or perhaps, I didn't used to be. Six years of Bush madness may have made me sensitive to the insanity of our times. Even so, by any standard, the latest Israeli/Palestinian idiocy is mind-boggling, and threatens to explode across the Middle East.

Yes, I know, the Israelis are quite expert in smacking down any attempted invasions by their neighbors. I truly believe, however, that the current situation threatens to become very different. A toxic mix of religious extremism in several of the countries involved, a connected sense of self-righteousness in all concerned, and increasing desperation have left a very short fuse on a very large powder keg.

More on the flip side.

I'm amazed this hasn't been diaried:

A CIA official who had a top role during the run-up to the Iraqi war charges the White House with ignoring intelligence that said there were no weapons of mass destruction or an active nuclear program in Iraq.

...

"[The source] told us that there were no active weapons of mass destruction programs," says Drumheller. "The [White House] group that was dealing with preparation for the Iraq war came back and said they were no longer interested. And we said 'Well, what about the intel?' And they said 'Well, this isn't about intel anymore. This is about regime change.'"

Wow. Just...wow.

Props to HuffPo, where this is the top story (as of this writing).
--
(/) Roland X
Fleeing the Chenon tyranny, the last Battleblog, Galactikos, leads a rag-tag fugitive web, on a lonely quest; a shining concept, known as Truth.

This is Morgan, borrowing Roland's login. After reading a few "nuts and bolts" diaries, I think this subject needs to be addressed.

Most of the advice in articles like that one is directed at the "extrovert majority." There are a lot of "people" people in politics -- those who enjoy the networking and similar stuff. Then there are those of us who aren't people-people, but who still want to do something to help take back our party and our country.

What I'd like to see is some tips for the introverts among us.

Wrong.

A Homeland Security Department spokesman was held Wednesday on felony charges of sexually preying on a detective posing as a 14-year-old girl through explicit online conversations. He was quickly suspended without pay from one of the nation's top crime-fighting agencies.

The arrest of Brian J. Doyle, 55, raised doubts about the ability of an agency responsible for safeguarding the country to ensure the security credentials of its own people.

Gee, ya think?

Of course, it can't get much worse than this, right?

Every so often, I feel compelled to return to this issue, the heart of what shows that Bush is evil -- not just his administration, nor Bush himself merely incompetent -- but the man himself, the puppet sitting in the Oval Office. He bears responsibility, no matter how he might try to avoid it.

Below the fold, I am going to ask you to come back with me, back to That Day, back to when the millennium truly turned and America changed forever -- just not the way we thought or hoped. Just a heads-up.

My wife "wrote" this for Street Prophets, so I'm "stealing" it for Dkos as well (she doesn't have an account here). As she mentions there, two things differentiate us and BTB: one, we're stating outright that most of this comes from another source, and two, we actually changed a few words. :-)

This is total hearsay, but here's what I've heard on CA-44: Louis Vandenberg, on trying to take out (not file) papers, was asked to pay the $1600 fee. He's asked the state party to help on this, because he's not going through another race without their support. They're supposed to get back to him in the next couple of days.

There's a feeling by some (many? dunno the relative numbers) that putting money into the 44th is a waste because the district is so heavily Republican. Vandenberg is a good candidate, but I can't say as I blame him for not wanting to run again without party backing.

Anyway, as I said, this is all hearsay, as in I heard it from someone who heard it from someone, and I can't guarantee I've gotten the details 100% right. Also FTR, I don't live in the 44th, but I noticed it's come up here and wanted to report.

Morgan  /|\
(borrowing Roland's logon)

Yeah, yeah, I'm shameless. What's your point? ;-)

Actually, this concept sprung from a parody .sig I created for Street Prophets (you can find it at the end of this diary, if you care), but more and more, its implications weigh on me: are we really it? Is there no one else left who's really standing up and fighting with genuine heart except a bunch of liberals, progressives, and infuriated moderates all suffering from outrage overload? Maybe -- on good days -- a handful of Democratic leaders who kind of almost get it?

I'm an introvert. I'd vastly prefer to donate once in a while, write when it's helpful, and otherwise let the fighters do the fighting and the leaders do, you know, the leading. More and more, though, it seems like there aren't any real leaders on our side any more. Well, except Howard Dean, but as DNC chairman, he's kind of in a wonkish position, structurally and strategically -- not exactly a high profile position to launch rhetorical Vipers from.

Well, they're called diaries, right? So here's some diarizing: what the hell is wrong with this country?

Not Kossacks and the larger Blue movement, mind you. Aside from a few morons (I am increasingly annoyed by Feinstein desperately trying to become the new Lieberman -- what, is she planning to embarrass herself in the '08 Presidential primaries or something?), most of us Get It. The Bushistas are, day by day, making their hostility toward governing, liberty, justice, or any remotely Constitutional American ethic crystal clear. We see it.

Why can't anyone else?