I was bemoaning Obama's upholding of the "state secrets privileges", etc. and how Obama wasn't much different from Bush/Cheney and Co. and he said basically that Obama could do the same things as them but he trusted Obama so it was going to be okay.

Yes. As Glenn and others have pointed out, this is the single biggest danger that Obama represents. This gutting of the majority of the opposition that was manifest during the Bush years makes it just that much more difficult for those of us who are, and have been, pressing for real change in our government institutions to make any headway.

We would of been better off with Palin - at least her values ARE transparent.

Just what we need, more of the wrong kind of transparency when dealing with complex worldwide problems and world leaders like Putin, Ahmadinejad, etc.

Without a doubt, it's a lesson in degree of difficulty, but I'll pick the person with brains, male or female, over the transparent brain pan of a fundamentalist secessionist any day.

Our leeway for ignorant leaders ran out even before Bush took office. Obama is wrong on many levels, as anyone reading here is aware. But Palin would have tried to elevate our current Crusade to world-destroying levels in record time. That's just one reason why she's Kristol's Golden Grrrrrl.

I know that when I am depressed it is because people either don't see or willfully ignore reality.:)

I recently went through a period like this after my brother (the one in my family who most consistently benefitted from my father's active - such as it was - parenting) said to me "Republicans are for the Constitution and Democrats are not!". This, from someone who is well-aware of all of my activities and opinions, and equally aware of his own lassitude, just caught me like a sucker punch to the solar plexus.

I truly understand and share, to some extent, your disillusionment. Where we differ is on the possible solutions.

Obama is proof positive that children, especially boys, need a male figure in their lives. Maybe if his dad had been around when he grew up, he'd actually now how to be a man. Instead of constantly seeking validation from others as Obama does. He'd be able to make a decision, without worrying what his critics might say about it.

So, if you're raised without a father, you're automatically deficient? Mothers have no ability to impart assertiveness, responsibility and leadership qualities?

Sorry Conservativeslayer, but decisiveness and surety in decisionmaking are not exclusively male attributes. And there are people who seek input, for decisionmaking reasons, that aren't also simultaneously seeking "validation".

I'm not saying that's what Obama is necessarily doing, just that your analysis laying it at the feet of his absent father or, even more inapropriately, in the lap of the mother who stepped up and carried the load, may be incomplete or biased.

Imagine if Papon had been tried, and then found guilty, and sentenced to prison for the rest of his life. Imagine the damage to French society of all that partisanship. Their country would be in ruins by now.

And we wouldn't have that wonderful Grey Papon mustard either.

Wieners just wouldn't taste the same.

The camp for the infotainment whores will use older music by Teh Village People.

But I really wonder what the hell the secret program is. My imagination is running rampant. Out of control!

I'm thinking that this, like the photos, will slowly seep out in dribs and drabs. While I'm laying awake wondering, I plan on offering up prayers to the deities that this will be the information that leads to the neutering of the Corporation for Insidious Actions.

Okay, the image of Michael Jackson leading the Taliban in a Youtube remake of the "Beat It" video has me awed beyond the capacity for rational expression.

It would look something like the link at sig.

But with beards and black turbans.