If the telecoms aren't criminally charged before George Bush blessedly leaves office, can the president actually pre-pardon crimes not yet levied?

Not that it seems to matter in our current political culture, but even for the filth that makes up this administration that seems like quite the legal mind-bender.

Is that possible?

Thanks, whoever advised Obama to change his mind on FISA.

McCain is already pushing the idea, my title is from a quote of his. McCain is not talking about this issue, but he's trying to show a trend and Obama is falling right into this trap.

http://blogs.abcnews.com/politicalradar/2008/06/mccain-on-some.html

Obama "moving" towards the center will be used against more successfully than any strong positions he takes.

p.s. I agree that sometimes it's unfair and not exactly accurate, but that doesn't always matter, does it? Gore or Kerry weren't wimps. Neither was Bush's Dad. Somehow they all managed to be portrayed that way.

Technically I guess you are correct about Obama not changing his position on immunity, but what has changed of course is that it appears he will be breaking his promise to filibuster any bill that includes immunity.

To be accurate, Obama said he would support a fillibuster of any bill which included immunity. He has not yet broken that promise.

You miss the forest for the trees, Glenn. A lot of Democrats are in trouble. I write my (one) Democratic Senator, Boxer, and she is desperately raising money to fight off the Right Wing challenge. Why is that? The Republicans have Feinstein in their pocket, divide and conquer.

The Right defines the center, and until the Democrats define the center, they will be the understudy.

The first thing Obama needs to do is give back the campaign contributions he has taken from Wall Street. The market is tanking and THEY are already blaming him. Let the dogs loose, Wall Street and Main Street are on very different realities. (Bob Novak said once, that George Bush should run the economy for the benefit of American Business, and not a bunch of Liberal stockpickers.) Novak is now the media outlet for the Federal Reserve, as they leak news about interest rates directly to him.

Second thing, put Bernanke on notice.

Third, use the bully pulpit to rail against Congressional acquiescence on the Iran spending bills. Stand up to the Democratic Congress, and Pelosi.

Fourth, negotiate directly with Iran. NOW. THe rumor mill has it that Bush plans to bomb Iran after the elections. Let Bush complain, he has less than a 1/4 of the American people behind him, and none of his Congressional Republicans.

Fifth, make appeareances with Democratic voices against Bush, like Kuchinich, and promise him a cabinet post.

So far there is no real change in Obamas rhetoric. and the move to the center is probably already underway, after that lovefeast with Clinton, its a done deal.

Just watched ABC Sunday: Arianna Huffington is upset with Obama's shilly shallying and Katrina van den Heuvel is holding her nose. Let us see how this os going to play out in H Post and The Nation. Sen Obama: these are two very disillusioned supporters.

So, perhaps those superdelegates aren't such a bad idea after all....

Thanks for reminding me about the Superdelegates. I somehow forgot their role in this mess. While there may be some glimmer of hope that the Superdels could pressure Obama, I am just not convinced that any of them have the backbone to stand up to him or that he wouldn't continue his move to the center after the convention. To oppose him/his policy shift means that they risk going against the "unity" theme, they risk future repercussions, and they risk being labeled that "thing" that people who oppose Obama get labeled. I have this feeling that the Superdels are way too risk averse for that.

can the president actually pre-pardon crimes not yet levied?

Yes. See: Nixon, Richard M, pardoned by Gerald Ford.

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I (and others) answered your flood plain question in yesterday's thread.

US "centrism" is considered Right Wing anywhere else in the world. for the same price, people will always choose an original brand name and not a generic replacement. If the Democrats want to run as GOP Lite, the voters will pick the original. What so many Democrats don't understand is that running as a more subdued version of their opponents indicates to voters that they don't have any core convictions. The mantra I keep hearing from conservatives is:what do the Democrats actually stand for? It seems like the more unpopular and despised the GOP becomes, the more scared, timid and accommodating Democrats become, which is really a battered wife syndrome.

By Glenn's logic, McCain's recent reversals represent the same mistake: moving away from one's established positions in an effort to appeal to more voters (or at least a specific group of voters), only to end up looking like somebody who will say anything and do anything to get elected. Yet McCain is getting a free pass from everybody - including the Obama camp, who could be hammering away a lot more at this. I would tend to think the false perception among the mainstream media that McCain is a "maverick" is responsible for this - what does everyone think? And why isn't the Obama camp pushing this characterization of McCain more?

Obama is listening to someone who shares Schrum's acute ability to develop losing campaign strategies. Am I dreaming?

If Obama loses in November the FISA debacle will have been the turning point. To think that all Democrats had to do to safeguard the only and also most significant victory they had achieved so far is...nothing! They really really had to go out of the way to lose here.

I am so angry at the vile, unprincipled approach the Democrats are taking, exemplified by this sorry FISA capitulation, that I am very seriously questioning whether it makes any sense to vote for Obama (I'm not voting for McSame!), since at this point I believe the Democrats to be worse than useless. Since Bush came to office they have:

• Voted for the Patriot Act (while in control of Senate)
• Voted for the Authorization of force in Iraq (ditto)
• Voted for Patriot Act II
• Helped enact the Military Commissions Act
• Did nothing meaningful to oppose the confirmation of Alito and Roberts
• Took impeachment "off the table"
• Have failed in their oversight duties, and have failed to issue and/or enforce subpoenas (When asked about this, a Rockefeller aide told a group of us visiting his office that the Senator wished to keep relations with the Republicans "collegial")
• Are now about to expand the President's surveillance powers and retroactively immunize lawbreaking telecoms, according to the desires of this industry's lobbyists.

All this with the guy from the other party in the Oval office! What will they do when that guy is one of their own?

Given this sad record, if the Democrats really wished to "Move to the Center" then they should immediately start moving Left. There's still time before November...