On the subject of upward mobility, we can find numerous examples of other racial and ethnic groups that moved into the middle class within one generation following coming to this country. For example, Asian immigrants that arrived in this country following the Vietnam war are seeing their children graduating today from major universities in droves. What did they do right that causes such extraordinary achievement? For one: Asian culture is based on educational achievement almost to a fault. Remember, these are folks who came to this county as refugees who did not speak a lick of English. There are other examples but none come to mind as strongly as the Asian experience in this country since 1980.

Nice try...conflating some idiot in NH making headlines with a long history of mental illnesses and the ongoing catholic church scandals. You guys never miss an opportunity to stiff the RCC whether the claims have merit or not. This guy decided to blame the RCC for the fact that he was in prison by blaming his parish priest of sexual misconduct at the age of 21 nonetheless. And you guys printed it and gave it major prominence. It seems you were more intersted in trashing the RCC rather than reporting the events in NH.

Let's be clear on this point: the Surge was not intended to save Iraq, only buy time for the US to get the hell out "with some honor". Reminds me of Nixon in the early 70's with Vietnam where he invaded Cambodia in 1970 and bombed the hell out of North Vietnam during 1972 until they begged us to stop, which then brought us peace talks and an exit strategy. It also caused McGovern to lose 49 states in 1972, which today is causing the Dems to recently break a sweat in 2008. As we enter the election year and troops start heading home, will Juan Cole still be bashing the Surge and the pending collapse of Iraq? No. He will realize that he has been out-flanked by the Bushies leaving him with no good options, just where McGovern found himself in 1972.

I remember Jimmy Carter going on and on about his religious beliefs and nobody called him on his use of religion as a wedge to get elected. And he did very very well among religious conservatives and Catholics, the very people that Salon readers routinely scorn.

Juan Cole concludes that the presence of US troops in Iraq hypes the chances of a terrorist attack in this country, but there hasn't been one in 6 years, even while the US has been making a mess of things in Iraq. I don't know where he is going with this line of reasoning. And neither do most Americans. It simply does not compute.

Furthermore, the bushies are feeling poorly that Iran has abandoned its nuclear weapons program? I don't think so. It clearly was the anti-appeasement policies of the US that caused Iran to double-think where they were going with this thing, or other countries (i.e. suppliers) did the thinking for them.

What Juan Cole needs to worry about is another mega-attack followed by 25 years of republican rule. The Dems will not hold a majority if there is another attack on the scale of 9/11. Reasonable people will not accept a policy of appeasement following such an attack regardless of what the left wants. Salon writers can imagine otherwise but this is the political reality.

The reason why Juan Cole and Gary Kamiya are lame on this issue is that it is Iran, not the US, that has the most to lose from this revelation. In theory, at least, the US and Israel can breathe a little easier that it is now unlikely that WW III will not start in 2008 over Iran, after all. Iran has been undressed publicly as another two-bit player in the Middle East and is probably being ridiculed in private as having tried to bluff everybody and lost. Saddam freely admitted that he tried to bluff everybody around him on nuclear weapons and it costed him his life and country. Consequently, Iran will likely have no impact on the 2008 election with the exception that the repugs can claim that it was their tough-ass policy that undressed Iran and North Korea in rapid succession.

I am surprised that both Cole and Kamiya are this far off-base on Iran.

I am enjoying the Dems' hand-wringing that has emerged over how many times has Obama been to Europe during his tenure on the subcommittee. This public service provided by Conason has been duly noted by the vast right-wing conspiracy for further use "downstream". The "lightweight" label is now going to stick without even having to make something up.

Also, reminds me of the way Al Gore got gored by his own as "too superficial", "too wooden" and "too snooty" to be president. The repugs don't do this to their own because they realize that this kind of stuff jacks up one's negative ratings. Just ask Hillary.

Once again, the Dems are showing their propensity for tearing down one of their own not unlike the Stalinist purges or Mao's cultural revolution. The ideological left values idealogical purity above all else, even at the risk of never getting elected. The result is the left becomes marginalized, often viewed with suspicion and accused of having sinister motives against "reactionary and imperialistic" forces. This is the world inhabited by the Salonista writers.