...the insistence by many gay activists on "full marriage equality now," which was primarily the agenda of blue-state activists, has largely resulted in red-state gays (who still lack basic protections against employment discrimination and hate crimes) being set back decades in their own struggle for equality. Now they have anti-marriage-equality amendments in their state constitutions that will take decades to repeal, and my partner and I worry every time we drive through Virginia to visit my parents that if something happened to one of us, the other wouldn't even have hospital visitation rights.

I have in the past been accused of being incredibly cynical, and no doubt will be again. That said, here goes: I have some lingering suspicions that the couple in MA who began the whole seeking-legitimation-of-marriage process some years back may have been put up to it in order to provoke reactionary Republican backlash.

I also watch and listen to the "all or nothing" purists, and see many people who, taking the stand they do, end up far more often with nothing, excepting possibly the dubious salve for their feelings that they "lost pure" and thus fought the good fight.

They are wrong.

In the political arena, where compromise is the name by which we know the idea of accomplishment, it's always best to take half a loaf. Why? (This part is for the "innocent"...) Every step forward from that point goes on from the incremental gains being consolidated.

The Republicans did not accomplish their dismantling of the Constitutional mechanisms of government overnight. No one, not even Bush, walked into Washington and threw the "Republican" switch, changing everything at a stroke. This happened over decades, by the work of dedicated minions, who spend their long days and nights looking for ways to turn the institutional protections back on themselves and exploit the resulting cracks. Neither will it be changed overnight.

...I suppose there's "something" to be said for the NOW/purist approach, but it ain't pragmatism. It's the anthem of people who feel it's more important to stick to their principles than to actually get anything done.

Rarely if ever more clearly expressed. Make it better than it was yesterday. Come back tomorrow and do it again. Thus is a future transformed.

At bottom, NOW is getting down there in the mud with the Clinton campaign. America, all of America, deserves better.

This non-conservative, non-Republican wants to know Sen. McCain's conception of the nature of those excesses. And the American voters might benefit from that information as well.

Not that I think he's well suited for the Presidency anyway - I don't, and he isn't. We just deserve to know where he stands, rather than hearing some allusion to "excesses" delivered offhandedly in an attempt to reinforce his false depiction of himself as an independent.

...maybe early Wednesday, if California comes in as slowly as it's been rumored.

We'll know then, and let's all realize that nobody's going to close it out tomorrow, not even by running the table, which in any case is not going to happen.

And remember that political campaigns, like battle plans, tend not to survive first contact unscathed.

All that said, Clinton emerging less than 100 delegates ahead once tomorrow's returns are in definitely favors Obama over the run of the rest of the primary campaign.

You, like numerous other MoveOn defenders, have missed the point. By some significant distance, in fact.

What they did with their foolish headline-grab was to move the discussion in the public sphere away from the content of Petraeus' comments and toward their "ridicule" of him. No one talked about the lies he was sent there to tell, or who sent him, everyone just talked about MoveOn's too-clever-by-half pun.

That ad is now seen in the dictionary, illustrating the term "bad idea".

I guess, like everyone else, they have the right to be as idiotic in public as they choose. And I, and many others, are yearning for the days of the occasional unexpressed thought.

After their truly idiotic "General Betray Us" ad fiasco, a MoveOn endorsement is unquestionably a liability.

Just what we'd need - for any Dem to have that bunch give the Republicans a club to use to beat on them.

And for those of you who still think "General Betray Us" was a good idea, ask yourselves this: How long did the discussion stay about what Petraeus was there to sell, and how quickly did it become (and how long did it stay) about the terminology in the ad headline?

Such stupidity we don't need.

MoveOn, stay the hell out of this.

He's the one I worry about. Willard Romney, who might well have outspent his rivals to the nomination, would have been easy to beat. Gomer the Huckabeast likewise. Ron Paul is simply a racist, paranoid right-wing looney-tune and might well have become the Dukakis or McGovern of the Republicans. (Can they have one right about now, please?)

McCain's phony "hero" shtick plays all too well in Middle America to suit me. Never mind that, as others have said, he made his "hero" rep by dropping bombs until he was shot down. He cuts off Hillary's "tough-girl" act at the pass. He'll draw the independents and undecideds out of the middle, even though he's just about certifiable, because she's so damn dislikeable.

If it's McCain vs. Clinton, Clinton most likely loses, and America loses either way.

Likely got more gray hair than you do, Sparky.

Go crawl back under your bridge, troll.