The Justice Department could as well still be headed by Alberto Gonzales as far as I can tell.
Were talking post acquittal detention powers here.
The healthcare bill could be an improvement or making things worse.
Iran is still regularly threatened with annihilation.
The war in Iraq is still ongoing.

But apparently you haven't been paying attention.

So. Here and here are some homework for you on the topic of English jurisprudence, habeus corpus, and the "bail" canard.


Diversity is the key to economic and political evolution.

There are few progressives in Congress, but they have more clout if there are more pseudo-progressives and fewer "moderates" and fewer Blue Dogs, so the first priority is identifying any progressive or pseudo-progressive challengers to a "moderate" or Blue Dog incumbent, and work for them. Early Money Is Like Yeast, but so is early volunteer effort.

If there is an incumbent Republican, it's the same as if there is an incumbent "moderate" or Blue Dog: try to get a progressive or, failing that, a pseudo-progressive nominated in the Democratic primary.

When there is a "moderate" available at best in the primary or general election, vote for them but don't waste any resources supporting them. When there is a Blue Dog running against a Republican, its hard to see what difference the vote makes, so picking whichever third party is likely to get the largest vote and voting for them would be a defensible strategy.

In grown up politics, forcing the incumbent to work for re-election is a penalty, whether they win or lose. For one thing, money they spend running for re-election is not money they can hand out to increase their clout inside the beltway. Enough 1 in 100 odds challengers being pushed to 1 in 20 odds challengers is electoral success in some few districts and more caution on the threat on the left flank in the rest.

If there best there is available is a phony progressive who seems likely to turn but is willing to tick all the progressive boxes during the race, they are still more vulnerable to field operations during legislative season than "moderates" and Blue Dogs, so its not a waste of resources to support them beyond voting for them, bearing in mind it is fairly inefficient, as they will require constant babysitting.

If there isn't anyone, and there is a neighboring district close enough where there is, work there.

If there isn't anyone close by, pick a progressive or pseudo-progressive under threat somewhere else in the country and back them.

That's one reason the "Movement Conservatives" punch above their weight: once pulled into the movement, they always find a horse somewhere to back, which means there is no "off" button for the market research professionals to find, which means nobody bothers with trying to turn them off. Self-described progressives, on the other hand, quite often have multiple "off" buttons available to push, with competent full time corporate persuaders with massive incentive to find out how to push as many of those "off" buttons on as many unorganized clusters of progressives as possible.


I've been accused of being a Marxist, yet while Harpo's my favourite, it's Groucho I'm always quoting. Odd, that.

What could he have done?

He could have filled his cabinet with real progressives, not people like Rahm and Geithner.

He could have knocked DINO heads together to make it clear that he's the boss man and if DINOs don't support him, he won't support them come re-election time.

He could have maintained contact with the base, rather than alienating real progressives almost immediately.

He could have pressed for progressive judges throughout the judicial system, and progressive appointess throughout the US equivalent of the civil service.

He has always had plenty of options. But he hasn't done these things, because he's not interested in being a real progressive - he's interested in being everything to everyone to the extent that it furthers his career.

He could have taken a stand on torture, instead of confusing justice with PR.

How long a game do you think he's playing? Will you still be saying the same things in 2012 when nothing much has improved, and his prospects of a second term look slim to non-existent?

Here in the UK we've seen all of this before with the NuLab - which was based on throwing some pennies to the peasants, while keeping the bankers happy and fat, and larding it all with spin, lies and persuasive rhetoric to make it look far more populist than it really was.

its axioms are based on mind reading that I don't agree with

I will be only too glad to be proven wrong, but by now it is up to Obama and his administration to demonstrate that they understand the seriousness of the problems facing us and are serious about addressing them regardless of the consequences to their own careers or re-election prospects. Continuing to wait for him to take actions that we would like to think he supports absent any evidence that he will do so seems to me to be the way religious believers behave. In Shia Islam, The Twelvers believe that Ali, the Twelveth Imam, didn't really die but is just hiding, waiting for the right time to return---for twelve hundred years! The "Obama wants to do the right thing" crowd is not YET quite that bad.  But for myself, I will await deeds, not wondrous rhetoric.

"It is not necessary to have hope in order to persevere."

ormondotvos:

What's a better system of governance?

Donate to Wikipedia!

All power to the wikicracy!

Sweden's finest (and perhaps only) collaborative, leftist e-newspaper Synapze.se

So no - we don't have democracy, and have never had democracy.

With economic and media democracy, rather than pantomime vote-for-nothing-much democracy, more enlighhtened management might become more likely.

Or not. But it would be an interesting experiment. And if the population were educated in social responsibility and participation from birth, who knows how it might work out?