I can't speak for Adnoto, but I don't know where you got the idea that I want to destroy the police, democracy, or otherwise smash the state.

I just pointed out all the great social advances of the 20th century happened because people did more than vote and make donations.

Oh yeah, and I made fun of you for posting page upon page of copy-and-paste articles here in UT comments. It's not like it isn't true. Don't be so thin-skinned.

Obama is killing me today. There's this thing, and the related and worse reality that he is going to facilitate this 'compromise', which as Glenn points out is no compromise at all. It sets a horrendous precedent without anyone anywhere clarifying why that is necessary. Seriously, if we absolutely have to have it, where are the people laying out that argument in the light of day? This is so blatantly the case of corporate influence, it's appalling (and word that Chris Dodd has been caught up in a scandal... hmmm...). I mean, why should anyone have opposed it in the first place?

This is in addition to the reneging on the public financing pledge via unabashedly spinning announcement, and comes on top of his walk-back of his anti-NAFTA rhetoric and walk back of declaring the Iranian Revolutionary Guard a terrorist organization. I can in some sense see the last. Obama has by nature of being mistrusted by those who vote Israel/Middle East issues, little to no latitude to defy them without major political ramifications. This also accounts for the irritating now constant recurrence of the flag pin. But why on God's green earth was the NAFTA flip-flop necessary? He never said trade was a no go, just that it hadn't gone for American workers. That, by the way, is a perfectly politically tenable position that also has the benefit of being correct. Here's why:

http://blogs.cfr.org/setser/2008/06/12/can-the-debate-over-trade-%e2%80%93-or-globalization-%e2%80%93-be-separated-from-the-debate-over-exchange-rates/

This is what gets me about all this. I never thought of Obama as somehow different and transformative- I always thought such talk was naive and overlooking of the candidate's core strengths. His pragmatism, sensibility and core decency. But I did think of him as being sensible and as believing that his core positions didn't jeopardize his electability. But he hasn't shown any conviction of that, which is a very bad trait to be showing. The political handlers that are starting to call the shots here are ruining this candidate. I mean, he may still be better than McCain or Bush, but what in the hell kind of standard is that? If he wins by this type of vacillation, his mandate will be anything but change. What good is the Presidency if you can't do anything worth doing with it?????

On a not so separate but equal point, I've just donated to this FISA bill fight fund. Not because I think it will do any good- sounds to me like the fix is in- but because down the road when the ramifications of these types of dreadful decisions become apparent, when Ben Franklin's foreboding, 'a republic, if you can keep it', becomes tragically prophetic, I won't have to ask myself what it was about a small donation I found to be too costly.

Having been a Clinton supporter during the primary contest, and now through default, a lukewarm Obama supporter, I don't mind gently noting that I am not surprised. What was it that Solomon said? Oh yes, "There is nothing new under the sun."

For those who are young, one gets to chalk it up to inexperience and naivete. For those who are longer in the tooth, there really is no excuse. This doesn't change my opinion of Obama. I'm just tired of campaigns built around talk of change. If only I had a nickel for everytime I've heard a politician talk about change....well, you get the point...I'd have a lot of change.

Obama is playing the game according to the rules. It's sad in a way, but I suppose he fears or has been told he should fear a potential backlash if he appears too soft in his support of the War on Terror. When you see Democrats lining up with Republicans on these kinds of issues, it's a sure sign that conventional wisdom will soon be proclaiming "discretion is the greater part of valour," as a brave soldier once opined.

So I'm not surprised. The change mantle is a very well worn mantle. Indeed, it's looked positively threadbare for decades. I understand that to win this election Obama will almost certainly have to do additional things that many of us will not admire. In terms of national security, Obama faces hurdles that are considerably higher than those that would have faced Clinton. His primary strategy was to tack leftward on these issues. So we'll almost certainly see him tacking (at least rhetorically) rightward during the general election.

Politics is not for the naive.

Voting and hoping is not a plan for change. It is an act of prostrating oneself before the feet of the establishment.

-- adnoto

I think I've just figured out the real source of your anger.

You voted for Bush in 2000.

DjMagoo,

I've asked you once to please stop throwing up on the comment threads. Post something someone else has to say. It may be worth reading.

I've been going to Georgia frequently recently, and folks, except for Black people, Latinos and some 'foreigners' and some 'hippies,' that state is still living in the past.

In Athens, a supposedly intellectual and 'liberal' town, home to the University of Georgia, I found very little politics. There are barely any unions - the black folks work menial jobs at UGA or in the local economy. The white workers are mostly broke too, but some have skilled labor jobs. The 'alternative' paper, the Flagpole, is mildly liberal, but very defensive and weak. And Athens is home to REM and a 'liberal hotbed.' Right. Mostly all they do is drink and eat and listen to music, and as long as they can do that, they are satisfied.

Savannah, again, is a more urban and liberal town, but the same situation, I think, applies. There has been no massive movement to change the South since the civil rights movement in the 60s-70s. That is nearly 35 years ago. The unions tried to organize the south and failed in the 30s-40s. The Republicans have made it the second confederacy (a confederacy of dunces?) in the last 30 years.

Only a new appeal populist to working class interests there, like John Edwards tried, will upset the rule of the neo-planter aristocracy and their corporate cousins in Atlanta. Populism has always played well in the south and left-wing populism is what they need.