to be continued......

I like it....

Why am I suddenly reminded of a time when Joe Klein included a really rude comment about liberals rooting for defeat in Iraq and then removed it from the main post, even though it was already alluded to several times in comments?

PS: I thight the update was particularly good. I look forward to the full post.

Austin is probably a great place for it to be and I think they've learned from last year's mistakes, so it ought to be better. Anyone interesting in going would probably enjoy it and it would be great to meet people and have some sort of get-together for anyone who wanted to go.

In the olden days of Compuserve I was part of a gardening forum there. We had several get-togethers, including what became a yearly jaunt to NOLA for their spring garden show, that were just wonderful. Our love of gardening brought us together, and our delight in meeting and getting to know each other was just icing on the cake.

When I met B earlier in the year in DC I mentioned that I thought this would be a great thing to do with this group - so many fascinating people to get to know!

Unfortunately, the lingering legal effects of a family tragedy will most likely make it impossible for me to have enough available time to squeeze this in or I would have signed up when the discount was still in effect. I am just pounding my head against a wall mourning the (probably) lost opportunity.

I really can't second Glenn's (and RMP orgininally, I think) suggestion enough. I think everyone would find it an exciting and very rewarding experience.

Sorry about your family tragedy and that you won't be able to make it. Maybe Bop can go and he could fill us in on you and your husband, as if he hasn't already. Thanks for the endorsement.

I just came on.

Now I'm wondering what's going on? I 'hit' the last post on the last page as usual, as a habit, and work backward.

I'm 'timid' to read the back-letters...First, as I planned, this *quote* ...then off to another social event...

* Hold every moment sacred. Give each clarity and meaning, each the weight if thine awareness, each its true and due fulfillment. Thomas Mann.

It's quite likely, imho, that Bloomberg is positioning himself for 2012 ... which is when Democrats are likely to be vulnerable ...

and a third party could do very well ....

Bloomberg has no political base. I'm just curious what you think is going to happen between now and then. Ron Paul isn't getting any younger and the ALP and RLC are definitely getting smaller.

Well, the more I think about it the more I hate to rule it out altogether.....have to admit I just spent some time looking at Austin B&B's. I guess it would just depend on some fortuitous things happening. Who knows, eh? ;->

To B (before he goes social on us) and all, a Happy and safe New Year's celebration. I'm very much looking forward to next year here, with newfound friends.

Over the past eight years he has assiduously worked at demolishing institutions, subverting the constitution, dismantling the judiciary and gagging the media.

There is widespread disillusionment....people have asked a simple question: Criminals are punished for breaking laws, so why should those who subvert the constitution not be punished?

We fought each other through elections. We won some. We lost some. That is what democracy is all about. Whoever has the majority rules....

We realized that we were fighting for the same thing: democracy....believed in the rule of law and rule of the people.

Political parties form part of the basis on which the entire edifice of democracy rests. If our country is to move forward, we need an independent judiciary,...and strong political parties that are accountable to the people.

If this sounds familiar, some of it should. However, this is Nawas Sharif, speaking about the current state, and the future, of Pakistan in WaPo today. The reason the crisis in Pakistan is important to people in this country is that it is a microcosm with everything intensified and thrown into stark relief, with blood being spilt instead of complacent drift, of a country in a constitutional crisis, due to a power grab, due to clandestine and imperialist covert military policies, due to corruption, due to cynically employing fundamentalism, due to the suspension of its institutions and its laws.

If it seems like it couldn't happen here, some of it couldn't. But the underlying mechanisms, in some cases, are the same. A government that pursued policies that were not in the best interest of the nation, while subverting the rule of law, and a propaganda machine that fanned the fears of its people to maintain the government's mandate. And it hasn't been so very long since we had candidates of our own gunned down on the campaign trail.

Mr. Sharif finishes with the following. Again, ironically much of it could be said here:

The world must realize that Musharraf's policies have neither limited nor curbed terrorism. In fact, terrorism is stronger than ever, with far more sinister aspects, and as long as Musharraf remains, there remains the threat of more terror. The people of Pakistan should not be antagonized any further for the sake of one man. It is time for the international community to join hands in support of democracy and the rule of law in Pakistan. The answer to my country's problems is a democratic process that promotes justice, peace, harmony and tolerance and hence can play an effective role in promoting moderation. With dictatorship, there is no future.

Well, the short answer to the question about Hagel and acting is: he shouldn't quit his day job.

Let's all remember that the last "heavyweight" professional American actor caught "playing" the role of president of the US of A was, of course, Ronald Wilson Reagan. He was the apogee of the presidency as performance art.

But Reagan - paraphrasing Lloyd Bentsen's famous rebuke to Dan Quayle as Quayle invoked John Kennedy's name in debate - was "no Laurence Olivier."

By the standards of the New York stage, to say nothing of London's West End, Reagan was, even with his Tinseltown credits, merely an "enactor."

~ ~ ~

HAMLET. My lord, you played once i' th' university, you say?

POLONIUS. That I did, my lord, and was accounted a good actor.

HAMLET. What did you enact?

POLONIUS. I did enact Julius Caesar. I was killed i' th' Capitol. Brutus killed me.

HAMLET. It was a brute part of him to kill so capital a calf there.

---HAMLET/III,II/Shakespeare

At court in Elsinore, Polonius is regarded as a flatterer and a blowhard. Hamlet kills him by mistake later in the play.

~~~

Ronnie of course was from Illinois, and he really was elected twice. I don't know how many great actors hail from there.

Hagel is from Nebraska. Two good comedians were born in Nebraska: Johnny Carson and Dick Cavett! And then there's old mumbles himself, Marlon Brando of Omaha.

Reagan was more salesman/corporate pitchman than actor, like ... umm, like .. uhhm ... - LIKE WILLARD!

I'll tell you, 'cause I'm familiar with the emotional terrain, Hagel could not have "acted out" his indignation about Iraq.

What he may do now, it seems to me, is worth paying attention to for the simple reason that, as a Vietnam veteran, Hagel is deeply pained about Iraq. That to me is palpable.

The way for an actor, a good actor, to show true emotion in a scene is to be real, to be as real a person in a scene as out of a scene, using emotional memory as a guide.

Chuck Hagel is not a trained actor, but he is a public man. I read the emotions he's expressed on Iraq, emotions which led him to quit the U.S. Senate, as as very real.