I read DEFuning's diary saying that Obama & the media had wronged Dr. Perez by accusing her of encouraging misdiagnosis of soldiers returning with PTSD.  While I found the diary offensive, I'm no expert on the topic so I turned the information over to my husband who is board certified in both child & adult psychiatrist with over 25 years of experience.  He read the memo and DEFuning's diary.  The following is his response to DEFuning's diary:

I know there have been a couple of other diaries complaining about Mayhill Fowler on Huffington Post and her "citizen-journalism" coverage of the Obama campaign.  She claims to have given more money to Obama than Hillary (and also contributed to Fred Thompson just to support her home state!), and claims to be somewhat of an Obama supporter, but what she writes are without a doubt hit pieces on Obama and she's even fabricates stories to make him look bad.  If that's citizen journalism, it's no better (and maybe even worse) than the MSM.
Today when I logged onto the Huff Post site, Fowler's newest headline jumped out at me, and I decided I couldn't take it any more.  So I wrote emails to the addresses I could find for Huffington Post.  Here's what I wrote:

I heard the end of a report on network TV -- the report was on the results of a test on "character" among school children in Fairfax County, Virginia.  The controversy that made the story news was that the results were reported by race.  Black and Hispanic children (and special ed children) scored lower than did White and Asian children.
As a researcher I was curious about what questions were asked of the kids, how "character" was measured, was the test anonymous so that children would tell the truth, was this done on a sample of students or the whole population; the sorts of questions researchers think about when assessing the validity of a study.  
What I found was disturbing beyond belief -- not about the children but about the school system that produced this report.

Bill could have written Patraeus's testimony for him.  In today's Cheers and Jeers he predicted what Patraeus would say in his testimony.  Yes it was snark (Bill's prediction, unfortunately not Patraeus), and yes our beloved Bill entertains us by taking things to the absurd.  But when you're talking about the Bush administration and the Iraq war, the absurd is the reality.
So here's Bill's statement from this morning's Cheers & Jeers:

We'll be told that things are going well enough in Iraq that we can talk about drawing down forces, but not so well that we can actually draw down forces.

And here's Petraeus's statement:
(via TPM  http://tpmmuckraker.talkingpointsmem...)

I wonder if they'll ever get it.  This political analysis by Michael Cooper and Larry Rohter in tomorrow's NY Times is about the effect of the increasing violence in Iraq on the presidential campaign.  http://www.nytimes.com/...

While I might not agree with their political analysis, it's their basic assumptions about the Iraq war that almost sent part of me (the part containing intelligence) exploding through the roof of our house. Here's the sentence that blew the top of my head off:

The reporters said that the heavy fighting in Basra (they seem to conveniently forget the stuff going on in Baghdad and elsewhere) has

raised anew a host of politically charged questions about whether the current strategy is succeeding, how capable the Iraqis are of defending themselves and what the potential impact would be of any American troop withdrawals.

still something we Obama supporters should think about.  I'm referring, of course, to Alegre's diary about her decision to stop reading and posting to Daily Kos.
While this is not a strike in the real meaning of the word, I think people on this site need to take a step back and look at the behavior that prompted Alegre's decision.

There was a diary earlier on this, but I wanted to present my views as an Obama supporter, as a "white" American, and as a woman.  
First, for those who don't know about this or haven't seen the video of Rev. Wright's sermon, here's a link (embedded in Ben Smith's blog on Politico):
Video of Rev Wright Sermon on Politico
Watch it and see what you think.

Last week in comments on a diary unrelated to this topic, DKos sherlyle wrote that her daughter in Illinois had been told by her insurer that immunizations for her children were considered "elective" and therefore the insurance company would no longer pay for them.  It cited waivers in the Illinois state laws that allow parents to opt out of immunizations usually required for school entrance and attendance. http://www.dailykos.com/...

My daughter's insurance company no longer pays for regular child immunizations - says they're "elective", not required by schools anymore, since you can sign a waiver.  Is that true for where you are, too?  Sounds to me like a medical disaster waiting to happen.  (this is in IL)

About an hour ago I went to the website of Alcalde & Fay, McCain's probable paramour's lobbying firm.  I clicked on "Meet the Firm" and perused the alphabetical listing of names of the staff.  Since I'm pretty familiar with the alphabet, I knew Iseman should appear between Charlotte Hrncir (I kid you not) and Maurice J. Kurland.  But wait, there was no name between those two.  Maybe Iseman doesn't work there any more or maybe she's such a minor player that they don't list her?
Nope -- she was there earlier in the day.  TPM has a link to her page on the firm's website.  
http://web.archive.org/...

Last night we celebrated the Chinese New Year by having dinner with two of the families who traveled with us in China in 2001 when we all adopted our daughters.  We decorated our house with banners and lanterns.  We had a whole chicken, a whole fish and a platter of dumplings (and lots of other food).  The girls were dressed in fancy Chinese dresses or jackets and played non-stop (and without a single argument).  And the adults talked for hours about family and friends and life.  Out of the blue, one of the other mothers said "I've decided I'm supporting Obama."  And this was a major surprise since both of these families are Republican.

I only made my decision to support Obama a few weeks ago.  And I was thinking today about why I made that decision.  
It's not about Hillary-hatred.  I like Hillary Clinton a great deal and think she has an excellent history of supporting the causes I believe in (so Obama supporters looking forward to some Hillary-trashing, don't bother to read further).  If she wins the nomination, I will not only be out there working for her, I'll be enthusiastic about it.
My gripe with Hillary over the Iraq vote, the more recent Iran vote and the bankruptcy vote is in the context of years of making the right choices and standing up for children and families.  So Obama is not the "not-Hillary" for me, although his voting record is slightly better (but shorter) than hers.

During the Iowa caucuses, I finally realized that I had already made up my mind about the Democratic nomination.  I cheered the numbers for Obama showing up on the screen and cried (and felt like an idiot doing it) during his victory speech.  My husband put an Obama sticker on our good car (the Prius, not on the gas guzzling minivan) and we wake each other up in the morning, interrupt each other's quiet reading time, call each other during the day with good news about the Obama campaign (new support from the Hispanic community; his terrific response to Bill Clinton's Jesse Jackson remarks).  So how come I end up spending so much of my commenting time on Dkos defending Hillary Clinton?

Day after MLK day, and I'm on my way to work, half asleep and thinking grumpily about what I have to accomplish today.  But loud voices and crowds at the Metro (subway) station wake me up.  Milling groups of young teens with their school names on jackets, hats or backpacks.  Oh no! I forgot that this is the week we're inundated with parochial school children dragged to Washington D.C. by their priests, pastors, teachers or administrators to protest a woman's right to choose.  
Most of these kids haven't the slightest interest in the subject of their trip to Washington.  Listen in on their conversations and you hear the standard fare of 11-16 year olds.  Who likes who.  What Jenny bought at the mall.  Will they be able to go to the Air and Space Museum?  When they going to get their driver's license.  What Ryan said to Courtney.  Not a word about the "unborn" or dead babies.  They're not here because of what they believe or care about.  They're here because their school instructs them what to believe and obliges them to parade those beliefs.

I'm an Obama supporter, but I like & respect Hillary and John Edwards and would be happy with any of the 3 as President.  However, I think Obama is the most inspiring of the candidates, could bring the most excitement to the campaign and would bring in both young voters and independents to make the Democrats a much stronger majority.  Since on policy issues the 3 front-runners are very close, I can afford to choose on the basis of emotion.  So I admit that a great part of my support for Obama is because he can bring me to tears when he speaks.  But that's practical also -- that skill will be tremendously helpful when running against the Repubs.
But the ongoing skirmishes between the Obama Campaign and the Clinton Campaign, the trading of accusations of sexism and racism, is exaggerated and overplayed.  Much of this mess is caused by our lovely media's desire for a story.  Can't find a real story, well just go out and make one up!

Yesterday nyceve wrote an impassioned diary about the villainy of the health insurance companies. http://www.dailykos.com/...
My son's tragic life is yet another example of how truly despicable these companies are.  He had a major stroke on Thanksgiving of 1986 when he was 3, and died about 1 month short of his seventh birthday.  For the 4 years he survived after his stroke, he was in similar medical shape to David Denney (described in nyceve's diary) -- couldn't walk or control his body, couldn't talk, smile, swallow; had to be fed with a feeding tube; needed respiratory therapy every morning (which was mainly done by my husband because the insurance company would only pay for it twice/week).  

Last year I wrote a diary on my oldest daughter's birthday about giving her a better world for her birthday.  On this birthday I have some different thoughts.  
She would have been 27 today.  A few days after she turned six, on Thanksgiving day, her little brother had a massive stroke and became severely disabled.
She did not have a normal childhood after that.  She went from a tremendously social child to a child who shut herself in her room much of the time.  But this is not the story of a child doomed to bitterness and misery.  She shut herself in her room to write.  She became an amazing writer -- using words in ways I've never seen elsewhere.  She turned our family disaster into a new and creative way to deal with the world.

We don't have BIG cable (meaning all the stations).  No  MTV, no Nickelodeon, no SciFi (sigh), no CNN.  So at 8 pm on Thursday, I tuned into CNN online to watch the Dems.  At about 8:30 pm, my 7-year-old daughter walked in with her Harry Potter in hand (2nd book, yep, she's smart), ready for bed, and was immediately caught up by the debate.  She sat in my lap and watched for over an hour.

I'm really really trying to narrow down my choices.  But every time I think I've settled on someone, they do something I don't like, and the others look better.  It's a bit like ground and background!  I realize my expectations were probably too high.  Remember that when Gore ran, many of us (including me) got very annoyed at him.  Now he's a hero to the very people who were pretty underwhelmed during the 2004 election.
So I thought I'd go through pluses and minuses and invite other fence sitters to join in.  I'm starting with the three front runners because I know them the most, but I would welcome similar information on the rest of the Democratic field.