"You know what, I am not the enemy," Vilsack said, after inviting the Democratic bloggers to hold their next convention in Des Moines. "I am a pretty decent guy."

An illustrative quote. I'm sure most of the guys (and gals) running could convince me of each being a "pretty decent guy." What a non sequitor.

Oddly enough, the Democrats seem to be well-practiced at old-fashioned gladhanding, but how about old-fashioned political campaigning--the nasty, no-holds-barred type that the Republicans have been using to make themselves the primary agents of change in America since 1994.

I'd like to see a little fighting prowess mixed in with the also good old-fashioned politics of conviction.

It's funny how the "netroots" of the left blogosphere continues to trash Democratic politicians for fun and profit, yet they want to work in the same party structure that they hate and suck up to party leaders.

I've have gotten to the point where I have less and less use for the "left" blogosphere because I know as an activist that the party is a big tent, and these bloggers want to kick people out who don't fit their litmus tests and thus threaten to marginalize the party further.

These people are nothing but Green Party clones, using Green Party lies about how there is no difference between the two parties and trashing the DLC (which these fools don't even know what it is), and thus they are doing NOTHING to help the party at all.

With "friends" like these, Republicans don't have to rig elections.

I remember lefty blogger after lefty blogger, from those who were invited to "blog the convention" in Boston in the summer of 2004, going on and on about how "brilliant" Kerry's speech was when he accepted the democratic nomination, how tough and determined he sounded, saluting the crowd, etc. etc.

It was a doomed exercise. None of them said a word about how cowardly he must have seemed to the general public in July of 2004, perhaps because they couldn't see it for themselves. Earlier that summer the swift boat guys viciously and scurrilously attacked Kerry, and he said and did nothing, even actively discouraging his first wife from speaking on his behalf.

He couldn't be bothered to defend himself-- too unseemly perhaps, for a patrician, but none of the bloggers who attended could see this, dazzled by the convention lights and sundry goodies. He bravely saluted them -- a nice, safe audience.

But defend himself in the outside, rough-and-tumble world of cable-TV news soundbites? Couldn't be bothered. All he could do was go on tv and ask George Jr to denounce them, a little like asking your Yale brother to tell the bullies to stop picking on him. Think of all the voters in Cleveland, who stood for hours waiting to vote for this sorry excuse for a democrat, even as he decided to fold up right away the next day, even with over 40 million bucks left in the campaign kitty. After all, if he fought like Gore, what would his friends think of him?

In all likelihood the democrats are going to get screwed by electronic devices, again. And if Hillary(or whoever)waits till after she gets shafted to complain about the jimmied, broken voting sytem, she'll just look like a whiner, and the very notion that perhaps the paperless, auditless voting machines are an antidemocratic abomination will likewise be regarded as an argument borne of sour grapes.

In the meantime, bloggers owe it to themselves to not allow themselves to be dazzled by these go-along-to-get-along losers, er, democratic big shots.

I've been posting at dKos for a couple years now and watched the creation of this convention at the site. It was done with true community spirit with everyone pitching in where they could. Many decisions (like location) were made through polling. That it should have turned out so successfully credits its group of organizers and the dKos community.

Jonathon, from what I saw, Kerry was screwed by his own advisors into not answering the swift boat lies. It was beltway mentality. I admit I was impressed by his convention speech; I finally felt like I could support him. He hadn't been my first choice. But it was a roller coaster ride from there. I think he would have made a decent president--hell, anyone compared with Dubya would have made a decent president. And that was what it came down to for a lot of people. Maybe we weren't dazzled, just desperate. Kerry wasn't the first pick of the lefty blogosphere, after all. Again, he was thrust on us by the beltway boys, the conventional Democratic wisdom.

Speaking of conventional wisdom, I do know who the DLC is, Susan. They're the go-along-to-get-along guys. They think people will like us if we could only be more like the Republicans. They're the ones who, as far as I can see, have betrayed traditional Democratic values, like being for the working people of this country. I have no use for them. And it isn't the lefty blogosphere, or at least not dKos, that is saying there's no difference between Dems and Repubs. In fact, we've been working to define those differences. And I do mean working. I and many others I know have been out working for the party since 2003, knocking on doors, planning fundraisers, etc. This is what the netroots is doing and we don't deserve your disdain. I've lived in my neighborhood 14 years and I have never had a Dem precinct person knock on my door. Is that how you all win elections? At least we're doing something about it.

If nothing else, Yearly Kos should show people that it can be fun to be a Democrat again. Wish I could have been there.

and frankly, I didn't see a single sale.

Every YearlyKos attendee I talked to was happy to have the elected officials named in the story attend. We think it's good for them to hear something besides the inane chatter and praise they hear at regular fundraisers and campaign events.

To put it in the terms that Markos and Warner used (terms that will probably be misconstrued) it was more like "a first date". There's some measure of interest, we're listening, we're open to possiblities. It's a developing relationship, not a sale.

If more elected officials approached public service like that, we'd all be a hell of a lot better off.