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A lot more important than Lieberman OR Net Neutrality

Brief diary, but please recommend and get the word out:  this is a big honkin' freaking deal, people. Here's the scoop:   The Republican Party, apparently sensing that they may not be  in control of...

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David Sirota is just plain wrong

I made a brief comment with this analysis yesterday, but when I read David Sirota's frankly delusional description of how the various possible outcomes of the Connecticut Democratic Senatorial Primary...

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GCI, Canvassing, and Political Reality

This is a complicated diary to write, but I think it bears saying.  I may have to meander a bit, so please bear with me. If you haven't already already read littlebrudders diary on this topic, please...

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The Intelligence Community's October Surprise

It seems pretty odd to me that with all the divining of entrails and reading of tea leaves around the NIE and its bowdlerized public release, SOMEBODY would have noticed the political subtext. Anybody...

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Kos, this is what I was talking about. Please listen now.

Once upon a time, I wrote a diary you can find here.  It was in response to Kos' ill-considered characterization of anti-war "hippies". In it, I pointed out that by dint of his position as operator of...

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Obama is the new Chauncey Gardner

C'mon, folks--just how gullible are you? Suddenly, the MSM has seized on a mediagenic face and is trying like mad to convince anyone who will listen that he is a viable candidate for President in 2008....

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On Pragmatism and Revolution

Today, Occam's Hatchet posted a diary, "On Gettysburg, Impeachment, and the Left Flank", which begins as follows: Once upon a time, a group of people on the Far Left side of a great battle took a...

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A Reality Pill for Lieberman

Over at Salon, there is a great article about the current political climate in Israel and the perception of the state's security in the wake of its generally recognized defeat in last summer's war with...

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BREAKING: Lantos retiring

Tom Lantos is retiring due to esophageal cancer, leaving the field open for Jackie Speier to take his Congressional seat.  I wish him the best with his health, but I'm glad he's leaving the House....

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Remembering 40 years ago tonight

This has been an emotional year for me.  As of this year, I've been an ardently political person for 40 years.   I remember 1968:  I was 6.  I remember the Tet offensive, the body counts delivered by...

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Setting the Record Straight

I was wrong, and it's overdue that I say so. This has been bugging me for awhile--me, and, I'm sure, no one else.  But on Dec. 2, 2006, I posted a diary entitled "Obama is the New Chauncey Gardner"....

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McCain's Last Gambit

This is a what-Obama-must-do diary.  I know what opinions are like--and that everybody's got one--but I've been in politics for a long time, have run a bunch of campaigns, and I've got a pretty good...

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A Personal Reflection on the Election of Barack Obama

It's been three days now since the election of 2008.   Since that night, I've struggled with a foggy exhaustion, a feeling almost like the disconnected underwater dream of hypothermia, as the hangover...

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The Meta Impact of HCR's Passage

Okay.  We've been over every tiny detail of the policy and politics of HCR getting passed.  We know what it isn't, we know what it is, and we know what it says about President Obama--and, to be fair,...

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The HCR Package: overview and analysis

This started out as a note on Facebook to my friends, which I compiled at the request of my wife, many of whose friends were venting various accusations about the historic reform just passed.  I pulled...

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Not new conduct standards: new technology

Okay, we've been through another round of discussion about how to try to bring the level of civility back up here. I'm of two minds about this.  On the one hand, I like that we duke it out around here...

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CA-6: Jared Huffman is the best choice

With Lynn Woolsey retiring at the end of this term, voters in one of the most progressive districts in the nation now must choose who will represent them after 2012. Woolsey has been a reliable...

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“This may bring my Presidency down”

A reflection, in light of these words, on those who have characterized Barack Obama as "weak" or a "sell-out": Ahem. Wake the hell up, you craven, tactically clueless fools. This man has principles,...

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In Which Defenders of the President are Vindicated.

And there you have it. No grand deal, because Barack Obama did not cave. QED. Look, I understand that the greatest fear is the fear of the unknown. People have been frightening themselves with what...

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The Better Angels of Our Natures

We must all hang together, or we shall surely all hang separately.                                                             --Benjamin Franklin I'm going to do a bunch of things in this diary that...

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Back Slowly Away from the Gun

This is not a GBCW diary. For one thing, I don't like them. Most of them are I-get-the-last-word-after-all-ha-ha kinds of things by people going away mad. The rest read more like suicide notes. I...

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Mitt Romney is the GOP's Michael Dukakis

In 1988, Democrats nominated the former Governor of Massachusetts, Michael Dukakis, as their candidate for President of the United States. Dukakis is considered by many--including me--the most hapless...

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On Respect, "Mental Illness" and Religiosity

The science/religion/respect/disrespect topic has reared its head again here, with some ugly characterizations. This is a big topic but I'll try to be brief. To start with: I don't think there is a...

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The Cowardice of Mitt Romney

Well, it’s apparently been decided. AP is reporting that Mitt Romney has selected Paul Ryan as his Vice Presidential running mate. Now attention will turn to gaming out what this means and how it...

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Running Against Paul Ryan is Exactly What Team Obama Wanted (Updated)

Paul Ryan as VP! Oh, noes! Please, please don't throw me into that briar patch! Anybody remember that Paul Ryan was actually created as a national figure by Barack Obama...so he could use Ryan's...

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WikiLeaks, Security, and the Strange Case of Julian Assange

A lot has been made of the uncharacteristic actions of the Swedish, British and US governments in relation to WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange. Right now, UK military and police are laying siege to...

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Is Mitt Romney Cursed?

You kind of have to wonder. Mitt Romney certain brings a lot of his own disadvantages to the party. He's unlikeable, demonstrably avaricious, dishonest, and a political "Etch-a-Sketch", and his track...

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The Clown Car of Darkness (UPDATED)

There was a time when American politics didn’t involve one party that was stark raving mad. We are about to watch a week of lunacy unfold in Tampa. Not harmless lunacy like Moon-landing-denial—RIP,...

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Eight Strategies for Kicking GOP Butt in 2012

So...since the recent flurry of attention over my lament at the completely unfunny Republican Clown Car of Darkness, celebration of Team Obama's aikido mastery, identification of the Romney campaign's...

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Your One-Stop Resource on Republican Economic Policy Failure

Now and then, a friend asks me where s/he can find a one-stop source of solid, irrefutable data documenting the failures of Republican economic policies. Usually, it's because the friend is in a...

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Fighting the Last War (UPDATED)

One of the recurring warnings/lessons/pitfalls in military history and strategic training is the propensity for armies to prepare and plan for the last war they fought, rather than the next. This is...

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The Words At Long Last: A Personal Perspective on the 2012 DNC

Okay, here's the thing about this Democratic National Convention, in my view. Rallies can be great, but there's a body-level thing that happens in humans when involved with a mob swept with...

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Mitt Romney: The Opposite of Entitlement

Watching Mitt Romney's truly appalling attempt to twist the murder of four members of the American diplomatic corps into an indictment of the Obama administration, what strikes me more than anything...

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How Obama Should Debate Romney

Earlier, this diary asked how the President should address Gov. Romney during the debates. I don't find that question all that interesting, but the larger question of tactical approaches to the...

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Sudden Synchronicity of Fear Inducement

Short diary, but hey: anybody see what could be a pattern here? Just blue-skying: We've got supposedly Al Queda bomb threats on university campuses (yeah, right--because they're so great about warning...

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Sorry, Erick: Mitt Romney Is The *PERFECT* Conservative

One of the many strikes against Mitt Romney's candidacy has been a regular drumbeat of complaint by movement conservatives like Redstate's Erick Erickson that Romney isn't sufficiently ideologically...

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Occupy Retrospection: What Occupy Apparently HASN'T Learned

There is a diary on the Community Spotlight list right now which purports to analyze what we have learned from the Occupy movement. Unfortunately, though well-written and researched, it does nothing...

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Traditional & Social Media Collide Over Obama/Romney Debate

This'll be brief, but it's interesting to me, and...well, this is where I write about stuff that's interesting to me. Today, in the digesting of the first Presidential debate, we are confronted with...

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What Do You Say to Friends Who Won't Vote, or Vote Third Party?

One result of the widespread cynicism about public institutions that grew out of the Sixties era—combined with the thirty-year Republican war on government's capacity to do its job—is a large number...

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Romney's Instincts Betrayed Him

This'll be brief, but I thought it was interesting enough to share. As I reflect on Romney's attempt at a gotcha moment on the Benghazi attack, it strikes me that this is his entire career in a...

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Three Code Words Used by Conservatives to Describe Obama, and What They Mean

People have been talking for a long time about the obsession with the supposed "otherness" of Barack Obama on the right. Talking with a friend yesterday, it occurred to me that the three main epithet...

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A Brief Rant on Voting Machine and "the Candidates Are All the Same"...

(rant on)* Here’s what I know about the conspiracy theories that “both candidates are controlled by the same Powers”, or that the elections will be stolen through mysterious machine tampering: to the...

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Winning the Invisible Vote

As always happens at the end of a high-profile election cycle, the world is a-Twitter (heh) with polls these days. Those of us who concern ourselves with such things breathlessly watch for each new...

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Predictably, the GOP is learning the wrong lessons

"We need Latinos".That's the only consensus conclusion being drawn by Republican talking heads after watching their candidates walloped on Tuesday. Seeing the Latino vote climbing steadily, GOPers...

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The Republican Civil War is On

Months ago, when I first launched Green Dragon, I wrote a post about the implications for the future of the Republican Party of the effectiveness of the Obama campaign's critiques of Bain Capital and...

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No, Dan Senor, it's not a "crisis in polling". It's you.

Remember when Karl Rove had "the real numbers"?Well, that was a long time ago. How about this?And honestly, who could forget this? That one was so delicious I had to watch it several times, until my...

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EVOLVE OR DIE: Environmentalism in the 21st Century

The environmental movement of the latter half of the 20th century is dying. And as a product and member of that movement, I say, not a minute too soon.Don't get me wrong. We have a lot for which to...

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Obama Errs

So, those of you who have accused me of being nothing but a cheerleader for the President, hear this:I hate the proposed shift to chained CPI for federal inflation calculation. It's probably more...

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"Progressive"? Really?

Recently, what with all the Snowden/NSA mishegas, some of my friends have run with their prejudices to climb on the ZOMG! Spooks! Everywhere! bandwagon, and have accordingly become furious with me for...

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Bob Casale of DEVO has died [CORRECTED]

I am sorry to report--having heard it through the press--that DEVO co-founder Bob Casale died suddenly yesterday.RIP, Bob. In answer to your Q, yes: you were a man.MTV online article

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