I try to be realistic, but I was fooled too by the polls (I probably should have looked more specifically at them, but even if I did, I'm not sure I would have understood the significance of a substantial number of undecideds), and yes, maybe fooled by some of the media hype.

I'm glad for the wake-up call. Unfortunately, I doubt the media will learn anything from this at all. They've shown themselves impervious to outside influence. I wonder who will come up with the new meme the entire MSM can use to excuse themselves for this massive blunder of prognostication?

As a voter in California, I was expecting my vote not to count. Well, maybe now it will. That will nearly mean I live in a democracy, won't it?

--Ron Robertson

But I'm not there. I'm closer after this report from Joan, since it seems to be a soft way of saying there'll be consequences for the republicans, and that he's talking about republicans away from washington (that's both a good idea and good point).

But, there's still that nagging voice telling me he'll be another Lieberman. I'd vote for Ron Paul before I'd vote for another Lieberman. But, Obama hasn't gone that far into bipartisanship (the DC word for doing everything the republicans want) yet, and I hope he doesn't, because it looks like he'll be our nominee. But, he needs to do more serious action, join with Dodd about the telecom immunity, and show some seriousness about constitutional issues that I'm not hearing from any of the leading candidates. Show some plausible seriousness there, any of you top democratic candidates, and my vote is yours.

--Ron Robertson

I admit, I'm very nervous about Obama winning the nomination because of the things you point out, Joe. It was Hillary's to lose, really, and she lost it by being too much the conventional wisdom candidate, and the hiring of Shrum-like consultants. What's ironic to me is that I suspect Obama will be a massive dissapointment as a president when he starts playing the bipartisan game (which in our country means doing everything the republicans want). This is basically what Hillary is accused of being. I wish I could be so enthusiastic about Obama, but so far I'm not. His use of Republican talking points, bringing in a raging homophobe, to name a couple things I find especially uncomfortable about him. As I've mentioned before, I will vote for him if he gets the nomination, but i hope I'm wrong that he's going to end up being another Lieberman rather than all the hopes I see being projected upon him based only on his rhetoric.

--Ron Robertson

"Our most basic civil liberty is the right to be kept alive..."

-- Mitt Romney

So, does that mean he supports socialized medicine after all? (Just kidding, but that's what it would actually mean!)

--Ron

From taking the press position that Hillary was cold, despite her bringing in bagels, offering sympathy that they were away from their families during the holidays so they could cover her (I couldn't believe it, one person here even completely fell for the rude press line), to all this projection of nasty stuff about her, to whatever other crap you can come up with, you can't even stand for someone else to say something nice about her! How pathetic is that?

No, I'm not planning to vote for Hillary in the primaries either, but she may be the nominee, and I will support her if she is, I'm certainly not going to act like a lot of you here and just trash her over and over about trite junk. Yes, she's made some bad decisions and votes, but if she's president, she'll be a hell-of-a-lot better than what we've gone through for nearly 8 years. Vent your rage and venom on the people who deserve it, the friggin' republicans, or at least the asshole MSM who hate all the democrats (Maureen Dowd anyone?).

Grow up, focus, get your heads in order, or is it going to be if you can't have your way 100% you're going to take your toys and go home? Just pathetic, pathetic, pathetic. With people like I'm seeing here, supposed democrats participating in a circular firing squad and doing the RNC's work for them, I wonder if it's going to be another election close enough for the republicans to steal. Yes, I understand being passionate for whoever your preferred candidate is, so show that passion in a way that makes sense, talk up your candidate, don't participate in the firing squad to the other candidates. Fair criticism of policy, sure, trashing based on MSM projections of coldness or likability, or other crap is just agreeing with and supporting the premises that got us the Jackass-in-Chief for 8 years.

--Ron