Some of you may recall my weekend diary slamming the 'announced' 2008 Dem candidates; others of you may dislike me from the title. Fair enough. Feeling emboldened by the presence of Sen Durbin and the nascent Era of Good Feelings invoked by the Bumbler in Chimp earlier this evening, this is the second installment of what I call "None of these 2008 assholes thrill me (yet)"
I am a liberal. I support descalation. I support universal health care. I support the Democratic Congress, which I both stumped for and voted for. I support the Dem 2008 nominee. But I don't like who I'm seeing, yet.
Let this diary be a lightning rod for the anti-Hillary forces. Let this diary be a lightning rod for the anti-Obama forces. Let this diary be yet again a lightning rod for the anti-Edwards/Clark forces. Gore is okay, but he's not running. The other pretenders: the less said the better.
This diary is for Mike Gravel. For Brian Schweitzer. For Kathleen Sebellius (I hope I spelled at least one of her names right this time). For Dave Freudenthal. Hell, it's even for my own Senator, 'Born Fighting' Jim Webb.
I am writing this because I have amends to make. I supported Howard Dean, or more importantly, what he stood for in 2004. But like many of us, I was scared. Scared of lots of things that I won't go into now. I'm no longer scared. No longer scared of demerits, flames, or whatever they call them these days. Not scared of Republicans, not scared of the groupthink coffeehouse crowd. I'm scared of what 2010 will look like.
Global warming is real. Blackwater owning 767s is real. Habeus Corpus is unfortunately not real anymore.
This diary is my feeble attempt at attracting and creating dialogue about a POTUS candidate (D) in 2008 who actually harbors Democratic positions. Health care. Energy independence. Diplomacy. Remembering New Orleans and preventing another sorry episode. Feeding the poor. Schooling the willing. You know; dirty hippy shit.
To paraphrase Webb's response: if Hillary or Obama are willing to co-opt this message, we're behind them 100%. If not, they can step aside while we lead the way.