of issues that are tough to tease apart and deal with separately.

We hope that Obama and friends will make progress reversing 1.) torture (and related obscenities) and Iraq, 2.)the unitary executive, and 3.)the corruption of the voting process (AG scandal, courts intervening to declare victory, etc.).

Then there are the related, but much broader, issues of 1.)American exceptionalism in the foreign policy establishment, 2) the increasing irrelevance and impotence of the "other two" branches of government, and 3.) the corruption of the entire election and governance process and institutions by money and power.

I guess health care reform, credit reform and EFCA fall under the broader trend of the rape of the middle class by the Masters of the Universe. Or maybe I should say distribution issues.

From where I sit (in a small, private social service agency) on an everyday basis it comes down to a single mom with a couple of kids who loses her job or has an (uncovered) medical emergency. When she asks for help she finds the food banks are running bare and she and her kids can sleep on mats in a church basement. And the rightwing moralists are still worried about "creating dependency."

At the same time a ghoul like Hank Paulson can go to Congress and get $700B for his buddies from guys like Dodd and, yes, Obama. No accountability, no disclosure, no plan. No effort to even pretend to eliminate the venal, greedy scum that created the mess to their own huge profit. Just "give me the money or the sky will fall."

All this is enabled by the failure of the MSM to inform the public in a balanced and fact-based manner, as Glenn tirelessly points out. But the MSM problem is also part of a broader theme that has to do with insiders vs. outsiders, the village vs. the outland, the Very Serious People vs. the Dirty Fucking Hippies. As Glenn and others also point out, Villagers of all stripes are turning up the heat on the Dems and the Obama Administration to be "bi-partisan and centrist" (tm).

The big winners in the bi-partisanship and moderation derby are people like Lieberman, his protege, Salazar, and Feinstein. They may be sleazy, but they're not stupid. They are trying to keep enough local support at election time and to be winners in the KEWL KIDS poll in the Village. The values, traditions, and, indeed the platform of the Democratic party are just mind farts to them.

It's going to take more than audacity to change this dynamic. It's going to take incredible strength, courage, intelligence and arrogance to stand up to a whole interconnected and incredibly powerful and insular class of people who regard themselves as the annointed. It's going to take facing down one's "betters."

Even if it happens, it's going to take time. A lot of time.

Early decisions do not determine the direction of an entire administration. Carter announced early that human rights would be core to U S foreign policy. Train wreck. Clinton took on health care and gay rights right out of the gate. Train wreck.

Obama and his allies are our best hope on torture and other issues. He needs and deserves our help, support and forbearance. The Obamas are new in town. Most of us can't even imagine the pressures they will encounter. The village vipers aren't giving them a break. We should.

Feinstein and Wyden, on the other hand, are on familiar ground and are enacting the agenda of those who continue to proclaim the supremacy of the center-right. It is they and their ilk who are the real enemy now, not the minority. Let's get 'em.

And you thought Frost won the "interview."

Ha ha.

The ghost of Nixon says, "He who laffs last...."

Power corrupts. Absolute power can't be prosecuted no matter how corrupt.

Like GWB, these people are not stupid. They have just stopped thinking. It's inconvenient, and really, dear, just so graceless and uncivil. Moderation and bipartisanship, nay, postpartisanship. That's the ticket, old man.

Ironic how the ruling class justifies the projection American democracy with American exceptionalism based on the sanctity of the voting process and the rule of law. While pissing it away at every opportunity.

The Constitution is just a piece of paper. If the king says it, it must be true.

Never give up.

Please have Dawn Johnsen contact your blog and its readers any time her supply of outrage runs low. We can help.

Rachel, Amy, Naomi and now Dawn. Women who know their place.

Maybe Dawn can help PE Obama rethink his FISA vote?

Nice rant Glenn.

I love it when Cohen agonizes over the great moral dilemmas of our time.

Too bad he always takes the easy way out.

He's on my list of people I only read when they're quoted by you or Digby or some one else who can put their putrid tripe into a reality and justice -based context. It's a long list.

Not the sharpest tool in the village toolshed, is he?

MichaelRWall: Can you spell credulous? Extra credit: When might this quality be inappropriate, damaging or stupid?

Titowan: Your comments are great fun to read. You get my nomination for "Junkyard Dog of the Week". That's a good thing. But, surely, Jebbie's comment was sarcastic?

...is underrated. Feeling cynical, I sometimes say it is most easily found between shit and syphilis in the dictionary.

My brother went down on one knee in right field one warm summer evening, keeled over, and never got up. Fifty-one years old. For three months I survived by remembering how to act like myself.

Times like these show cynicism for what it is: shallow and angry.

Deepest sympathies for your terrible loss and the pain that renders you helpless. A replacement may help, but it will never fill the cavern in your heart.

Time heals, scars remain. So it goes. Peace.