Obama's defenders base all arguments on the notion that the restoration of the Constitution is just another issue on the table next to health care, the mortgage crisis, and so forth. If one disagrees that the Fourth Amendment is simply a political bargaining chip, then the media dismisses you as an uncompromising Leftist.

But it is the Constitution that it is uncompromising:

...no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.

Many Obama apologists argue that the problem is Bush, not the imperial Presidency itself. Obama makes that argument by promising that, in his administration, spy powers will not be abused. Because he's a good guy.

Well, we know what Obama's promises are worth now. He lies about the big stuff. And few cynics, even on the Left, predicted the success of the current administrations efforts to supplant the rule of law with a corporate-executive alliance. Who knows what Obama is capable of?

I think we who still believe in democracy and limited powers of government need to recognize that we have yet another potentially treacherous candidate in the Bush-Clinton tradition.

I think it's time to organize in swing states to ensure Obama's defeat.

The evil of a McCain administration is less than the evil of losing an opposition party at this point.

The hubris of the Obama campaign is set to take a big fall, and the polls tell us little about McCain's chances in November.

Despite the media censorship of the FISA story, the same human networks that arose with the Obama campaign have proven an excellent conduit for spreading the news of his lies about FISA and campaign financing. These are the same volunteers that Obama assumes will continue to knock doors and ring telephones with enthusiasm through the fall.

For those activists, Obama's willingness to sell off parts of the Constitution to generate big money donations is the issue. But for the broader public in the Midwestern swing states, it's Obama's lying itself that may prove most damaging this fall.

If Pennsylvania proved anything, it's that a massive air war of ads inevitably bursting with image but short on substance doesn't work. The Obama campaign has learned nothing from Pennsylvania except to buy even more ads.

Unity with the Clintons is far more negative than positive for the Democrats. As the Obama campaign absorbs the Clinton fundraisers and backers, it has also adopted its mean-spirited tone, a willingness to cow-tow to the wealthy, and, most of all, the willingness to triangulate on the big issues of the day.

"Moving to the center" Clinton-style has only ever worked for Bill. It didn't work for Hillary, Kerry or Gore. It produces small points of difference, and marginal vote leads, with the opposition that can be flipped even at the last moment. This should be a an out of the park home run election, but Obama is turning himself into a sacrifice bunt. John McCain is not Bob Dole.

Despite the glossy images from Unity, it's been a sad rotten week for Obama's chances.

I supported Obama through the primaries (see my postings). I've never voted or supported a Republican. I (at least) am hardly a Republican troll. Your attitude of dismissal, though, is a dominant one at the moment with high level Democrats. It's an alienating approach at odds mending the real breach in the Democratic party, which not the supposed split between Obama and Clinton supporters. Those of us on the Obama mailing lists have gotten any number of insulting diktat to get in line.

The idea of 527's "running wild" is a bit beside the point. 527's are meant to run wild. If McCain controlled the 527's, as you say Obama wanted, McCain would be breaking the law. This argument is absurd. And Obama supporters should just get their own damn 527's rather than whining uselessly about Swift Boats. Welcome to democracy, folks.

Obama has announced his opposition to the Fourth Amendment, but I wasn't aware that he had also declared opposition to the First. The idea that the major political parties should control all political speech in an election year is anti-American, and I doubt that was Obama's real intent. I think he just wanted to cash in as many chips as possible. He (meaning his strategists) think they can win this thing with a lopsided advantage in targeted advertising. I think they are miscalculating.

I note that you can't deny Obama has changed his stance on FISA.

I agree with you on McCain's dodgy bookkeeping. It should be an issue. But, who can make it an issue now? Not Obama--he's rejected public financing entirely.

Hillary becomes a born-again progressive. Kind of like Gore, or even Kerry, seeing the light after losing (or losing and winning a la Gore) by going "centrist."

For Hillary, that would mean, at a minimum:

1. Apologizes for her Iraq vote, and shuts the hell up about Iran until she can say something rational.

2. Filibusters the FISA bill that Obama is too scared to opposed. Renounces her vote the Patriot Act.

3. Renounces (and repudiates!) her racist statements and those of her supporters. Non-white Americans are hard workers too.

4. Give the hundred million dollars that she and Bill received as payoffs from foreign nationals to a REAL charity. Not their foundation.

5. Promises to renegotiate trade agreements with labor and environmentalists prominently at the table.

6. Divorces Bill and gets a no-contact order on him.

There! Bingo-presto she becomes the new candidate of the Democratic party.