Along the lines of Christopher D. Coccio's comment, this quote is just ridiculous:

"they can learn from the Republicans during the Clinton era. The public can get fed up with investigations rather than legislation."

When people were "fed up" with the Republican Congress at that time, it was not because they were "investigating," but rather because their investigations were so obviously frivolous, mean-spirited, and punitive that people defended the President even as they disapproved of his actions!

My initial reaction is, "What planet are these people on?" but of course the answer to that is that these TV pundit boobs are on the same planet they were on circa 1998 when they were happily riding along with the Republican Congress's bandwagon. Salon was on the right side of that issue then, just as they are on the right side of this and other issues today.

Dan Read

Atlanta, GA

I could come to support Senator Clinton as a candidate for President, but my biggest concern centers on the kind of people with which the Senator has chosen to surround herself in her campaign; her staff seems to be heavily populated the same old class of corporate-oriented political consultants that have served Democrats (and the country) so poorly in the past couple decades. How does she defend that? What gives her confidence in these people? I wish Mr. Shapiro had asked the Senator about that. Otherwise, this was a good (if too short) interview.

I'm still holding out hope that General Wesley Clark will enter the race, but I am close to giving up on that hope.

Thanks for the tip.

I would happily pay Radiohead four pounds to download their new album, but the site at the moment kind of sucks. Once I got past putting money in (be sure to type in the zeros) I found that I can't pay unless I fill in my name, address, etc. Why do they need all that information? Why do I need to register for a membership? I just want to pay and download my music. I'll try again in a few weeks and see if they get it working better.

Cheers

I am a supporter of Obama for President, but I fear that your piece gives the campaign too much credit. I seem to recall reading a wire story just a day or two ago which stated that the Obama campaign didn't even know about the singer's anti-gay hangup. Keeping him on the bill is a tactical calculation to keep as much of a lid on the mess as possible. This from the campaign that only recently realized that they need someone to be in charge of rapid response. Luckily we're still early enough--maybe, hopefully--that these kind of gaffes might not hurt too badly. If it's still happening in December, Obama may be in real trouble. Early primary voters are going to be very focussed on electability, and hapless management of routine campaign events and PR does not bode well.

Glenn, I have to wonder what connections could be drawn between the politicization of the military and the evangelicalization of the military (to coin a term)--two phenomena that have developed more or less in parallel, if I'm not mistaken. Coincidence? At the very least, if thousands of officers subscribe to apocalyptic, Rapture-oriented, and even dominionist theology, might that make them much easier tools for politicization during a set of conflicts that are, from their point of view, potentially key events in achieving Christ's return? Apocalyptic mindsets in large numbers of military officers is scary enough, but it's especially scary when you mix in the dominionist strain, since it serves to justify the very politicization you decry.

FWIW, a blogger named "Troutfishing," in connection with his work for something called the Military Religious Freedom Foundation, has written extensively on Daily Kos on the topic of campaigns by the religious right to dominate the military (especially the officer ranks). Search past Daily Kos diaries for "christianity military" and you'll find a bunch of his posts. This one, in particular, is scary:

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2007/10/6/8543/96468

Cheers

With all due respect to Michael Scherer, who is a good writer and I'm sure a nice guy, I won't miss his campaign coverage here at Salon, which I've always found tepid and surface-level. I never could get through any of his debate round-ups this primary season, and I always finished his candidate interviews wishing he'd asked more probing questions. Time is a good place for Michael. Salon needs something more.

In defense of Glenn Greenwald: we need his indignation in these insane times. What seems like long-windedness is necessary to avoid the appearance of a rant, a la the Daily Howler, and to provide more than just poke or a sneer. I suspect Greenwald's scathing criticisms break through to their intended targets, or at least their surrogates, in a way that more pithy bloggers do not. He serves an important role in his own way just like Atrios and Kos and Josh Marshall and Jane Hamsher and Bob Somerby do in their own respective ways. Salon should hold onto Glenn as long as they can.

I fear that in my comment of a moment ago that I leveled my criticism about less than probing interviews at Mr. Scherer when I was actually thinking of Walter Shapiro's campaign interviews this season. My apologies to Michael Scherer. I still don't like those debate round-ups, but I just looked back found many articles of Michael's that I've enjoyed this season. :-)

...and hated when they canceled it. Too bad HBO didn't produce it instead. It might have gotten more traction, or at least been given more of a chance to succeed.