and also a bit sad.

Americans are generally more resilient than we like to pretend, and this article is a good example of that.

But I can't help but think that the positive tone of the author is not something that is shared by the majority of working people in this country. Botox parties have never been a part of my life, nor the lives of anyone I know, regardless of the economy. Most people are actually very frustrated because they've been given a bill of goods by their society that is now impossible to attain- the American Dream. The idea of stability and comfort- not lavishness, but comfort. The idea that if you work hard you can raise a family, buy a home and be fed.

People are discovering more and more by the day how the American Dream is slipping away. People are upset, bitter and frustrated- and rightly so!

The author says: "Personally, I'm happier when my options are limited. I like knowing that I can't afford to move and I can't afford to quit my job."

So are your employers. That makes you a wage slave. Which means, that they can jerk you around however they'd like because they think that they own you. Having no options isn't a quaint situation-it sucks. Try giving that platitude to someone who has worked the same job for thirty years and is staring down the possibility of a pink slip.

But there is a more important point that always goes unmentioned. The American people are constantly forced to tighten their belts in an economic downturn. We're asked to shave away costs until there's nothing left to shave. But the most blatantly wasteful part of our economy - the Federal Government- continues to waste and hemorrhage money without a care in the world, and no desire to stop it.

What an interesting website, looking at the maps- which match Obama against McBush and Clinton against McBush-it's obvious who we would want to nominate.

On the Obama/McBush map a lot more states come into play here - Colorado, Nevada, New Mexico and the upper Midwest states- than do in the Clinton/McBush map. The Clinton/McBush map looks like a re-tread of 2004.

Regardless- don't we want a candidate who will make McBush have to work like hell during the campaign? I sure do. If we run Clinton, all McBush will have to do is point out that he's running against a Clinton, and the Repug base will turn out in droves.

Also, on a side note, excellent post by BryanS.

isn't as offensive as it could have been. It acknowledges Osama, instead of simply trading on 9-11, which is what every single Republican politician in America has been doing since it happened.

Who knows? Maybe the next President can actually catch that son of a bitch.

Are they really resonating that much? Did the Ohio/Texas primaries hinge on those comments? Is Pennsylvania gong to hinge on them?

Politics is a fast moving game. Unless you make statements to clarify remarks immediately it's too late to back up.

3 people are killed in gangland violence in Chicago.

1 Million Iraqi civilians are killed in Shrub's War of Choice.

4000+ American soldiers are also killed.

If this is the best they can do, John W. McBush doesn't stand a chance.

From CNN:

"Hillary Clinton said Tuesday that her comments that the United States could “totally obliterate” Iran if it made a nuclear attack on Israel had been an attempt to return the United States to Cold War style deterrence."

Anyone want to talk about this? Mr. Benen? Ms. Walsh? Anyone?

The Pennsylvania primary was hardly a blowout-roughly ten percentage points separated the two candidates. Even still- the overall count is still close in regard to a political race. Pennsylvania gave Clinton a slight edge, but still managed to keep both candidates strongly in play. It wasn't a blowout, as Mr. Shapiro's article would have us believe.

"But watching Obama stumble across the finish line as the presumptive nominee..." At this point either of them would be "stumbling over the finish line". And in reality, Obama STILL has a delegate lead over Clinton. The Clinton nomination is not a certainty at this point.

I watched both speeches last night and my initial impression still holds. Clinton gave a good speech, a solid speech, with occasional inspirational statements. However, it came off as a Patented Political Speech- the same tired, boring-but-wishing-to-be-rallying speech we've been listening to from candidates for at least twenty years.

Obama's speech blew me away. He is passionate and genuinely uplifting and inspiring. Obama really cares about the working Americans in this country, and the vanishing middle class. He gets it. Maybe that has something to do with the fact that he doesn't have $109 million dollars kicking around in the bank. He also took the fight where it needed to go- to John McCain. He hammered on McCain in his speech last night, and showed to me, how weak McCain is as a candidate once you highlight his positions.

People against Obama constantly harp on his optimism and motivation as if it were a negative. It is not. Besides, what has snarkiness, triangulation, cronyism and swift-boat strategies by insider politicians ever gotten us? It leaves our perennial problems unsolved and in the case of the past eight years- a nightmare we'll hopefully be waking up from in January.

Obama '08!

"it's best to give the nomination to Hillary this year, so that she can run, and lose, and the Clinton's quarter-century reign over the Democratic Party can end now, and the Clintons can get the f*** out of our faces forever."

Except if she runs and loses we get John W. McBush in the White House. No thanks.