1. Everyone seems to be calling for the method that they think will help their preferred candidate. The problem is that we are all just guessing about that too.

~won'tgetfooledagain

I like the second line of that in particular. I mean, even if we tried, it would be hard to figure out the scenario to get "our" guy or gal into office. Welcome to the nightmare of their real campaign managers!

2. I also like those who said we need to rotate initial primaries. My understanding all along is that the parties liked having IA and NH for economic reasons. Their political infrastructure is permanent, which keeps the expenses down rather than having to rebuild it in a different place every four years. But that is not a good reason!

3. OhioPlayer makes good sense. Superdelegates shouldn't be tied to their district's popular vote. They should hang out and look at the electoral map when all is said and done. Electability should be operative in their decisions.

4. plagiarism v "real issues" @ Socsandtwigs: To be fair, I don't think there are many real issues she can pick on him for. They agree on a lot, and where they disagree or have differed, he's right imo. Where else is she to go? I think he can safely not pick on her b/c that is his message: I'm not politics as usual. But she is behind in delegates and momentum, so she has to attack somewhere. But this one hurts in a way that bothers me and makes me think she shouldn't have gone there.

5. What bothers me enormously is that the procedural problems in this nominating process, which have now reached everybody's radar and to some degree have caused agreement even among competing camps as to their idiocy (and I speak of the "Who's First" primary games, the withdrawal of delegates, the superdelegates) WILL PROBABLY NOT GET FIXED if this is anything like the past. Remember how so many of us hadn't really realized the flaws in our system until 2000 when they were counting chads and looking at butterfly ballots and realizing popular vote didn't match electoral vote--and everybody said, "Let's just get through this one because we are in the middle of the game, but this is good because it will force us to examine and change an antiquated system. We will nationalize our system, we will jettison the elitist electoral college, we will add voting places for the poor so they aren't disenfranchised, we will update our ballots..."

Remember that? Did anybody else notice that none of that happened?

6. This one is too good for the end of a list. This is a red-star item, so I will post it separately.

Think about it. How many of us have truly been recognizing the conundrum nature of this year's election problem and going round and round and round about what the party is possibly going to do to get out of this mess.

Sound familiar?

How many posters have wailed that we are going to lose it again, even though we have a sure-fire candidate (or two), because it is a no-win situation: Violate the rules and seat FL delegates or disenfranchise millions? Watch in helpless desperation as one state after another seesaws between Obama and Clinton (Watch the seesawing in your own head if you're like so many public figures who just can't decide), knowing that the indecision, the equalness, is going to be a problem in the end.

The "no way out" quality of this mess reminds me so much of Iraq, and I end up with, after a long, convoluted, good faith attempt at figuring out if we should bring our troops home asap, add more, or whatever--"I wish those incompetent boobs hadn't gotten into this #$%# mess in the first place!"

Sound familiar?

WHICHEVER CANDIDATE CAN GET US OUT OF THIS MESS WITH SOME MEASURE OF GRACE IS A SURE BET ON HANDLING IRAQ. We could probably even run on this platform. I hope both candidates are looking for a brilliant, unifying, unexpected solution. I will back whomever does.

If Obama is such a lightweight and Hillary such a realpolitik heavyweight, how come she isn't kicking his ass back and forth across the Country?

It's sort of hard to argue with, no, HRC supporters?