But the last thing on my list right now would be the ballot box.

Listen up fellas: you better read Krugman's latest and cut the nonsense 'cause you better believe we Americans are getting really pissed off. You intervene anywhere in the world you want to and prop up whoever you want to.

Who's gonna prop you up when the guillotines start dropping?

This reply is so late in the thread, I doubt it will find you, but just in case it does....

I remember 1968; I also see the split in the party over goals and strategies as much more serious than you do, partly because I'm involved directly in it. Despite efforts on both sides to minimize the danger, I think it's real. Howard Dean and the Clintons, Howard Dean and Rahm Emmanuel co-exist uneasily at the moment. If you know what's afoot with the DNC's 50-state strategy, I can't see how you can miss the nature, or the seriousness of the struggle going on.

If I'm overreacting, no one will be happier about it than I am.

If you know what's afoot with the DNC's 50-state strategy, I can't see how you can miss the nature, or the seriousness of the struggle going on.

Well, I must not know what's afoot then. The last I knew, James Carville was complaining that Dean's strategy wasn't winning enough, that's about it. Carville is no hack and deserves to have his viewed considered, and for all I know he's right, Dean could have done better. But really... what's the issue? Is anyone in the Democratic Party going to complain if they actually take the White House? Or win a majority in the Senate? Or solidify their lead in the House?

These aren't partisan schoolchildren. They have their disagreements but by and large the party aparatchiks seem to be on board the success wagon. Am I wrong?