It really wasn't Bill that made Hillary unelectable, as one reader here has claimed - it was actually Hillary that made Hillary unelectable! (True enough, Bill did manage to contribute quite 'strongly').

Hillary probably would have won the nomination had she right at the start of her race accepted her gross error of judgment in voting for GW Bush's phony war in Iraq.

What prevented her from saying something like the following:

"I was mistaken. I was lied to by GW Bush and Gang, just as all US citizens were. And just like most US citizens (and most members of Congress), I too fell for the lies. (That should be translated into proper 'American', of course).

I would guess Hillary's underlying problem would have to be the difficulty we all face in making such admissions about errors of judgment, at all the forking points we come across in our journey through life.

True enough, that strategy of accepting her Iraq error in the face of GW Bush's lies would have provided a strategic starting advantage to Obama in that he had not allowed GW Bush and Gang to pull the wool over his eyes. But it seems clear (to me, at least) that such a starting advantage would have been strongly countered by Hillary's actual strengths versus Obama. In the event, what happened was that Hillary was always playing to her major weakness - that idiot vote permitting the Iraq war - and not to any of her real strengths which were pretty sizable vis-a-vis Obama's inexperience.

But all said and done, it is probably the best thing that could have happened for the US and for the world that Obama has won the Democratic nomination. Now the Obama campaign has to ensure that he now wins over McCain in November, for sure, whatever Rovian tricks the Republicans may come up with (and they're already coming up with plenty!) Best not to be too complacent: In 2004, Democrat voters (if not the whole Kerry-Edward campaign itself) lost the election in good measure on account of complacency: I think they believed it was impossible that a proven liar like GW Bush could win. But it turned out he could and he did - was it Josef Goebbels that said something to about the willingness of people at large to accept 'the big lie'?

-- GSC

The Republican attacks on Obama are due to get very nasty indeed. The Democrats should be prepared.

Some of the important issues that Obama should emphasize:

1. GW Bush is a War Criminal!!;

2. GW Bush (and his War Criminal Gang) lied to US citizens (to get their approval for his phony wars; lied to Congress (to get the funding for his phony wars); has spent over $ 5 billion is his phony wars - these wars will in due course cost US citizens well over $ 3 trillion(!); has enabled Halliburton and others to loot the US treasury; has brought the US to its nadir in the world, economically and in the opinion of the world; has utterly shamed the US in the eyes of the world; has made us a war criminal nation... (etc, etc, etc - there are plenty more charges that should be laid against GW Bush - he should, in fact, be impeached if that is possible at all);

3. GW Bush, War Criminal, supports John McCain; is this the kind of President the US needs?

4. John McCain has sought and received the support of GW Bush, War Criminal.

Of course, I am an outsider, not eligible to vote in the US and obviously I would not have the grip on the details that US citizens would have. But this distance from the heartland also probably enables me to see some things more clearly than those who are in the thick of things there can.

--GSC

Where do ideas come from?

Ideas come from the interaction of minds (yours and others') with the realities confronted. Existing ideas in those realities interact, swirl together, cluster, coagulate, splinter and integrate to form other ideas, some of which are new, others of which are new formulations of existing ideas.

In the conventional 'prose' mode of thought and debate being used here, it is difficult to be more clear about things as complex and slippery as "ideas". However, in what I call 'prose + structural graphics' (p+sg) it is not difficult to render much more clear and readily understandable those thoughts above about the interaction, swirling together, clustering, coagulation, splintering and integration of ideas and how all of this helps form new ideas. P+sg constitutes a minir extension to the 'prose' that you've spent years in learning, which, unfortunately, is not an adequate tool to enable people to understand and effectively use ideas.

The 'structural graphics' enable us to visually display the interactions and inter-relationships we perceive between ideas, and they clearly show how those interactions go to form new ideas - those inter-relationships between ideas are left largely ambiguous in conventional prose.

You need more ideas?

Learn to recognize a few simple realities of the world around you, and you will find you will always have access to all the ideas you will ever need!

Learn to use 'p+sg' effectively and you will find how very simple it is to get more ideas (or to recognise the huge numbers of ideas that are in fact always swirling around in our minds and in the world around us all the time!

In other postings, I've discussed how more information (along with some useful software to help handle thesre 'interactions of ideas') can be made freely available about how to learn about and use 'p+sg'.

-- GSC