This is about a more general topic than this posting.

Rocky Anderson, former mayor of Salt Lake City is head of the High Road for Human Rights. In a posting today he includes a cover letter and then a shorter letter sent to Obama and members of congress. The material is about the return of the rule of law to the USA.

The diary did not make the recommended list on dailykos.com so it might just pass off the list. This needs more visibility.

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2009/2/19/12452/3424/375/699323

The attack on Gaza showed their true colors for many people in the world. The tide has indeed turned. Now the question is how long the rhetorical attacks against opposition will continue.

The Republican NO strategy, or strategy of NO should see a tide turn very quickly.

Even when they collapse, I am amazed by how long positions endure and how they can come up again. I never thought I would hear that Roosevelt did not turn the tide on the depression, nor that Clinton caused the current economic down turn.

The collapse of an empire is never pretty.

Subtitle is "the final phase of empire" by Morris Berman, Copyright 2006.

He laid it all out. Most was probably written in 2005.

Lots on finance, culture, etc. Here is a small piece from the book.

When he first heard the phrase Freedom Fries used to put down France's lack of support to send troops to Iraq, he thought it was a high school prank. When he heard that it was a Republican Representative, his immediate thought was that this was the end of the Republic.

When a society is falling apart, politics becomes theater. (From Chris Hedges' post on truthdig.com)

It is discouraging to see Obama continue Bush policies.

But what if the Republicans had won? There would be less transparency.

as Glenn noted, there is too much back and forth crap.

i worry that some people are trying to kill the blog by putting excess crap out, and others who respond to them

a couple of suggestions

One - follow Glen's advice and not respond

Maybe Glen or some other person could publish a list of who to ignore

two - ban those who seek to overthrow the comments as trolls

It is a shame to waste Glenn's time on this. And he will not get here since he stops reading at 50 comments

three - glen initiate an email to his trusted commenter's when there is a new blog so there will be intelligent dialog up front. Maybe that is already being done.

Read some excellent comments trying to get people to desist

Maybe someone could write a column on blog management of threats from trolls

*********

now that I write this, there is probably nothing worth writing, but I will increase the comment count by one

maybe this could get to 1,000 comments

If someone is teaching a journalism class, this article and the comments would be an excellent example, a teaching moment.

It is interesting to see what happens with intelligent comments and the lack of trolls trying to take the discussion off track.

Thanks Joan for including the article, which is then contrasted with the comments. As someone said, the comments are far more intelligent than the article.

I read the article fast and didn't get the subtle points noted in the comments.

Hi,

I would like to know the date of the article. I need that for reference.

Thanks

Just the two interviews with Bill Moyers and on C-span linked to at the bottom of the previous blog - these are enough to support Glen.

One can see his growth. He tackles new areas and then links other topics which he has already dealt with. His reasoning ability is off the chart, and he backs up his reasoning with data.

One could see his mind work during the interviews. His intellectual products are here for all to read and participate with.

I tell everyone I can that Glenn has the most insights of anyone I read on the web.

I recently made a mistake and double paid for my Salon Premium dues ($45 per year) but then I thought, why not just buy it for 2 years to show support.

He saw the end of our democracy in the constitutional attacks from the Bush administration along with earlier transgressions.

I thought he was just being a too negative when he said a couple of years ago that we may never get the rule of law back in this country.

Well, it looks like he was right. Cheney is embedded into our system. Looks like a hardened site. That is what my friend was saying about how hard it would be to reverse these changes.

Cannot be reversed without prosecution.

I was taken for a ride by Obama.

The good and bad right next to each other. A historic trip to restore our position in the world, coupled with the cover up of crimes against the constitution.

The Main Stream Media sure spends a lot of time on trivial crimes, but it doesn't seem to cover crimes against our laws. This lack of coverage in the press is another crime because the role of the press is to inform the citizens. We have become shoppers as described in James K. Galbraith's book "The Predator State." It is about economics and politics and lays out the failed economic theories that reinforce the oligarchy who is running things and is so powerful that they can keep doing what they want. Galbraith is interviewed on Cenk Uygur program recently. Another area of Obama's cover up is finance.

Here is the link

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YLn2ghl92Gk&feature=channel_page