What are you doing sending all those perfectly good CDs and things to the landfill? Somewhere out there is someone who can use them and would love to have them. Post them to your local FreeCycle list instead, or take them to your local thrift store. Just because anything and everything is available dirt cheap (fresh off the boat from China) is no reason to convert perfectly serviceable products into more environmental headaches.

The other question will be, how many independents accidentally invalidated their vote by forgetting to mark the "Democratic" bubble on their non-partisan ballot?

No matter who wins the Democratic nomination, we can expect strong turnout from the Democrats (who after 8 years of W would happily vote for a ham sandwich over any Republican).

With BHO as the Dem candidate, the Republican turnout will be muted at best (since for any Republican nominee you care to name, a third of the Republican party hates him).

With HRC as the Dem candidate, you can expect most Republicans to show up to vote for the Republican candidate simply to try to keep HRC out of office. Fairly or not, Hillary has been demonized so much for so long that most Republican voters will be motivated to vote against her even if they don't particularly like their own candidate.

So from a strategic standpoint, I think Barack will fare much better in November than Hillary would. The depressed Republican turnout will help other Democratic candidates on the ballot as well.

Why not just take the Post at its word here? It's not as if "anything but Hillary" is an unheard-of position in the right wing of our country.

Hey Mike,

Glad to have you in the comments thread. Regarding the surge working: I see it working at the tactical level, in that violence has decreased since the surge began. What I don't see happening are the political changes necessary for the nation of Iraq to become stable in the absence of a large US military presence. Given that "surge" levels of US troops can't last forever (even the US military indicates that we will need to reduce troop levels soon, we simply don't have enough personnel to sustain them at this level), what do you foresee happening when the surge ends? Do you think that Iraqi government will have its house in order before then, or do you think that the surge will have to be extended in order to keep Iraq stable? And if it's the latter, do you think the US has the logistical and political stamina to "surge" for the 8-12 years the Iraqi government thinks would be required?

-Jeremy

BabyGrumpus: What you're missing is that 2009 won't be like 2001-2008. In 2009, Democrats will have a majority in both houses and the Presidency. Therefore there won't be any need to "suck Republican cock", as you so colorfully put it. Obama and the Democrats will have the political power and popular mandate to set the agenda themselves. If Obama can do that in such a way that moderate Republicans are happy to go along with it, so much the better for all of us.

It's not a question of whether right-wingers will vote for the Democratic nominee over McCain. It's a question of whether they'll go to the polls in the first place. If they dislike their nominee, and don't hate the Democratic nominee, many of them will just stay home in disgust. My worry is that their dislike for McCain will be outweighed by their dislike for Clinton, and they'll vote for him in an attempt to keep her out of office. With Obama I suspect that they wouldn't bother.

Cythera45, your idea of politics is *exactly* what we are trying to get away from. That's why people support Obama; because he isn't doing the Karl Rove anything's-fair-in-politics gutter campaign. Call that naive if you like, but some of us think we can do better than that.

FWIW, Kori made the call "on his lunch break", not at 4AM. Perhaps calling someone's home phone number is inappropriate, but I don't see how it justifies the nasty voicemail he received in return. There's no excuse for being un-civil.

I think it would be nice if some enterprising soul were to edit all the Republican campaign videos together into a single reel; it would probably make a pretty good action movie.

Forward, backward, inward, outward

Come and join the chase

Nothing could be drier

Than a jolly caucus race

Backward, forward, outward, inward

Bottom to the top

Never a beginning,

There can never be a stop

To skipping, hopping, tripping fancy free and gay

Started it tomorrow

But will finish yesterday

'Round and 'round and 'round we go

Until forevermore

For once we were behind

But now we find we are be-

Foreward, backward, inward, outward

Come and joing hte chase

Nothing could be drier

Than a jolly caucus race!

-- from Alice in Wonderland, of course... sorry folks, I just couldn't resist!

It really is classic Bush, isn't it? "It turns out I was entirely wrong but that isn't going to change my mind one bit".

I can't wait to get someone from the reality-based community back in power.

Nobody will even raise an eyebrow at this. The Bush Administration deliberately lying to the public? People would be much more surprised to find out they had been told the truth. Unfortunately, expectations have been beaten down so far that everybody will just roll over and take it, as usual, and hope for something better in 2009.

Doesn't the Republican's anti-abortion, anti-contraceptive, anti-sex-ed policies make them the party of single motherhood?

Or perhaps we should be more nuanced: the Republican party makes sure there are plenty of single mothers, and then when the Democratic Party tries to help same (WWJD?), uses them as political ammunition against the Dems.

-Jeremy