Slackie Onassis is right. And unless we want to face the son of the son of Iran-Contra in 20 years, there must be impeachments, indictments, convictions and hard time served.

>>Never leave here. Most of the time no one understands what I am saying, and most all of the other times, I can't, for the deer life of me, understand what some people are saying, ...<<

Is the GG Salon forum a vortex into which one descends and is never released until, one day, blinking in the daylight, we emerge to find our toenails overgrown and the grandchildren circling the moon and the tree frogs replaced by a Best Buy in the swamp out back?

Children are beautiful, grandchildren are better, and a truck isn't a truck if it doesn't smell. The wine has corkscrews, and hubby is a dab hand with computers although forgets about changing light bulbs.

Sproglet's only toy until yesterday was a soft huggable Earth, to which the grandparents have added a proportionally-sized huggable moon and a world wildlife puzzle atlas. A good start.

Be always kind to stray kitties, and especially goats, or goat people, and I will try to think generous thoughts about ATV-riding neighbors.

Farmer John. Be careful. I just came here to read you what you said that introverted Slacki was right. I just said that too at a old Salon post this morning at Andrews article about Language School. It's getting all Arabic to me.

This Place makes farmers doze bozo's. Isuzu best try to wean off the computer too. It's getting a bad as a broken rototiller. It's too polite fir me lately and me way way girting' into too fairs much troubles furs a lifetime, in mho.

Glenn's got a new rabble riser crowd at the new post. No way, Hosea, am I gonna letter write out loud, fir crayons melting in the sun, I'm getting out loud of here till tonight, and that's only maybe.

Damn rototiller, kittens, peeps, Rottweiler's, goats, stinky Toyoda's politico's drive 'round the block in...and damn computers too.

I too like the idea of a movement in the political will toward a politics of responsiblity. To that end I think Americans need to wake up to the fact of income disparity. Recently, ABC evening news reported on one hedge-fund manager who made $1.7 billion last year. I ask you: is this not a travesty of our democratic principles?

It is not so only if that money is taxed in such a way that most of it is returned to the public coffers. Yes, we should applaud this enterprising individual. We might even give him a medal or erect a statue to him. But what we can no longer afford to do is to see the fruits of his success as his property alone. I know there must be a way to couch this argument so that voters across a wide spectrum realize that hiking taxes for the rich, for the corporations and for the stock-option billionaires, is a civic-minded call, and not a pandering to socialism or a resentment to success or a collapse into envy. We need to work at every level possible in order to determine who in this country will lead a long-awaited social revolution that redistributes the wealth of our republic. Will it be John Edwards? Or Hillary Clinton? Or Barack Obama? Or, is there a dark horse out there who will plug into the disaffection so many have felt over the past decade?

From 1900 to approximately 1920 the Progressive Era challenged, and then built upon, the great accumulation of wealth under the robber barons of the late nineteenth century. Perhaps America today, riding on a commercial and economic high from the growth of wealth in the 1990s, is ready for a progressive kind of correction to that growth--a correcting that will enhance those material gains by sharing them across the nation. Perhaps then we can return to a less anxiety-ridden public life and find justice, and our own pleasure, in a sense of moderation.

I have read Glenn’s “Sunday” post, and all 47 pages of comments. I must thank Glenn for such a thought-provoking post in the first place to have spent an hour reading the posts.

First, while I agree with DCLaw1 that a “sea change” is coming, The MSM, especially network TV, is still beholden to the right-wing noise machine (RWNM) , and its not-so-subtle pull. For example, yesterday’s ABC “This Week,” where the talking heads agreed that the Democrats risk “splitting the party” over Bush’s expected veto of the war spending bill. They spewed the far-right view that the “new Democrats” are “more conservative” than the “old Democrats” and will not want to be seen as “de-funding” the troops. This has been the MSM view since the election, that the so-called “sea change” of the election was the election of “more conservative” Democrats.

The 2006 elections, showed a resurgence of economic populism, such as Jim Webb in Virginia and Jon Tester in Montana, not a “more conservative” trend. Webb and Tester know that the economy is not running as it did in the 50s, 60s and early 70s, and that corporations have run wild with the “globalization” of the world’s economy. As a result, the middle class has “shrunk,” both in terms of the numbers of people and the dollars earned. There are now more people who are literally living on the edge of the next economic downturn, who struggle just to pay their monthly bills, and who cannot save anything for the future. It’s no accident that in 2005, the U.S. had its first “negative savings rate” since the Great Depression. These are the real “left behind” folks, the Wal-Mart shoppers, who don’t understand why their world isn’t what their parents’ world was, economically.

The question is, can the “sea change” occur while the RWNM still controls what MSM spews? Frankly, I believe that if the MSM continues its current path, it will become irrelevant to the political process. I no longer rely at all on the MSM, both print and TV, for my news, preferring the vastly superior Internet for news, information, and political dialogue. Unfortunately, this leaves out a vast number of Americans, who are too poor or who have too little time to get their news and information on the Internet. The MSM also has its economic interests at stake, and will desperately try and retain “control” over the political process, despite the Internet. One of Timberman’s comments gave me great concern over the issue of “Net Neutrality,” that the Democratic Party Caucus in California this last week tabled a statement of support for Net Neutrality, based on the apparent effort by the TelComm industry to get its unions to oppose Net Neutrality. We must have Net Neutrality, or the Internet, the last great uncontrolled source for news and information, will go the way of the MSM. So, “sea change” will depend, in part, on preservation of Net Neutrality.

Second, “sea change” will depend on the current Democratic party finally accepting the true meaning of the 2006 elections, the resurgence of economic populism, and NOT the so-called “more conservative” Democrat trend that the MSM spouts as the election’s meaning. There’s hope in that regard, given Howard Dean’s continued subtle influence as the DLC Chair. After all, the Democrats chose Jim Webb as the “Democratic Response” the the President’s State of the Union Address, which was a fantastic choice. It’s the people that have been hurt by economic globalization that have dumped the Republican party and have rejoined the Democrats. Those people are now beginning to know the truth about the run-up to the Iraq War, and all of the falsehoods that were spewed, especially by Dick Cheney.

Third, it is essential that the Democratic Party reverse it’s “not on the table” approach to Impeachment, and endorse Kucinich’s introduction of Articles of Impeachment of Dick Cheney. Cheney has not just committed impeachable acts, he is a war criminal, having directly participated in the Administration’s fraudulent build-up to the War, including, quite possibly, the Niger forgery scheme. (forged documents that formed basis of the claim that Saddam Hussein “sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa”) It is despicable to me that even John Edwards, who I would otherwise support as a Democratic Presidential candidate, would not endorse Kucinich’s position the other night at the first Democratic Candidate Debate. (That’s why I’m still supporting an Al Gore candidacy)

Fourth the Democrats need to stand firm with Bush on the Iraq funding issue, and either re-submit the same bill to him, or, at minimum, only agree to a two-months “no-strings-attached” funding bill, similar to what Congressman Murtha has proposed.

Lastly, it’s absolutely vital that the election system be fixed before the next election. Rush Holt’s bill is a start, although even it, in its current form, would not ban DRE election equipment entirely. I note 2-cent’s comments that Bush “won” the 2004 election despite his poor performance in the debates. Note to 2-cent: Bush DIDN’T win the 2004 election!!! Look at Fitrakis and Rosenfeld’s books and articles on this. They now have direct evidence, that was spawned by the outrage over the missing e-mails generated by Karl Rove’s and others’s use of RNC e-mail accounts for official government business, that the election count in Ohio, the critical state for Kerry in 2004, was controlled by Rove and the RNC after 12 a.m. the morning after the 2004 Election Day. This isn’t just “conspiracy theories,” folks. There are many rural Ohio county precincts where the Bush “vote” FAR EXCEEDED the actual number of registered voters that voted that day. Who knows what other shenanigans may be uncovered by a full investigation? The 2006 election was much closer than it might have been without the unknown effect of DREs.

In sum, yes, there’s a sea change, but only if we continue to make waves!