Perhaps he was hoping for a demonstration of the lack of support-- among Dems-- for Hillary in 2008?

I must admit, there is a real paradox for Hillary: many readers consider HRC too abrasive, cold, unlikeable. Yet, others have expressed a real desire for a candidate willing to fight dirty. My recollection from the last two campaigns was that W's crew did the dirty work for him, allowing him to take the so-called high road, at least rhetorically. If you can call it that.

So, how does HRC manage, simultaneously, to be more likeable and still reassure those in the Democratic base that she's a real fighter, too? Beats me. Perhaps Carville knows.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

As for me, I (like the reality-based reader of Salon) do want a candidate who will fight back... at that most important time... right after the polls close, when the GOP-machine starts doing its real dirty work. Our real problem hasn't been either our candidates or our issues. In fact, we keep winning elections... but losing the count.

My sense is that Feingold would fight back. And I would love to see a ticket with Feingold/Conyers. After all, Conyers has been doing in the House the same kind of lonely work that Feingold has in the Senate. See the recent issue of Harper's where Lapham makes a case for impeachment, and the interesting quotes from Conyers.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

For what it's worth, I also think that Gore would fight back more vigrously, if he were to find himself once again in the same situation as in 2000. A mighty big "if," but worth contemplating. The real lack of imagination back then-- both Gore's and ours-- was not about the possibility of 9/11-- which was both predicted and imagined-- but the unimaginable degree to which W could drag all of us-- both here and in the rest of the world-- through the mud of war, torture, spying, debt, class warfare and the shredding of the social contract, evironmental crimes, the undoing of science and its replacement with his faith, just to list a few items off the top of my head. Who among us could have imagined then the sheer, terminal embarrassement? Even after reading Molly Ivins's book "Shrub," before the 2000 selection, I did not imagine how bad it would become.

...to find out what SD residents actually think, rather than have them be branded, unnecessarily, by Napoli's crazed statement of an allowable exception.

And perhaps it would not be such a bad thing to have that happen in some other battleground states, as well, before bringing it before the Supremes again. One of the persistent criticisms of Roe is that it bypassed the legislative process, and did not really set the stage, or make the case for reproductive rights, before asking a bunch of mostly white men to rule on it. Collecting signatures and putting this measure up to a vote will at least allow more input from ordinary women (as opposed to activists), input that has been mostly lacking in this debate.

Of course, one hopes that the religious far-right's obvious sway with the SD legislature does not necessarily extend to the voters. And, one really hopes that everyone will vote. Better to know what we're up against than not.

My own intuition is that even if SD residents are more conservative than not, they still won't be willing to let the law stand as-is. The same NewsHour program that featured Napoli, also quoted a number of Republicans who thought the law too restrictive and harsh. In fact, one even went so far as to mention the "fetus viability" issue, which most commentators have not even picked up on. What possible benefit can the anti-choice lobby find in forcing a woman to deliver a terminally defective baby? Yet, that exclusion is also denied by the far right.

...rape is sport?!

However, if someone wanted to form a "pool" of people, in order to maximize donations, I would pledge $20 toward the cause. If enough people pledged $10 or $20 or whatever... that could be a really big donation. [The power of netroots...]

And, if a group won, perhaps it might be a good thing to donate the cartoon itself to one of the clinics involved in this story, or, for something really outrageous, maybe even present it to Napoli himself? Nah, he wouldn't really appreciate it.

but I couldn't find another post appropriate for this comment...

So what's with the right wing suddenly making a big deal of Stockholm Syndrome: http://corner.nationalreview.com/06_03_26_corner-archive.asp#093780 (via Daou Report) They're practically accusing Jill Carroll of being incompetent.

from: http://www.yahoodi.com/peace/stockholm.html

"The victims' (sic) need to survive is stronger than his impulse to hate the person who has created his dilemma." (Strentz, 1980) The victim comes to see the captor as a 'good guy', even a savior. This condition...occurs in response to the four specific conditions listed below:

o A person threatens to kill another and is perceived as having the capability to do so.

o The other cannot escape, so her or his life depends on the threatening person.

o The threatened person is isolated from outsiders so that the only other perspective available to her or him is that of the threatening person.

o The threatening person is perceived as showing some degree of kindness to the one being threatened. [emphasis mine]

I would not begin to guess that this is the case with Jill Carroll, who was already trying to present the Iraqi's story.

However, perhaps, the folks at NRO, etc. should be talking instead to the folks at the Pentagon and the CIA, etc, and suggesting that they consider taking advantage of the Stockholm Syndrome themselves, since apparently it yields better PR than actual torture. [sarcasm mine]